Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume I - Part 2

Fragment ID: 10226

In the process of our Yoga the centres have each a fixed psychological use and general function which base all their special powers and functionings. The mūlādhāra governs the physical down to the subconscient; the abdominal centre – svādhiṣṭhāna – governs the lower vital; the navel centre – nābhipadma or maṇipūra – governs the larger vital; the heart centre – hṛtpadma or anāhata – governs the emotional being; the throat centre – viśuddha – governs the expressive and externalising mind; the centre between the eyebrows – ājñācakra – governs the dynamic mind, will, vision, mental formation; the thousand-petalled lotus – sahasradala – above commands the higher thinking mind, houses the still higher illumined mind and at its highest opens to the intuition through which or else by an overflooding directness the overmind can have with the rest communication or an immediate contact¹.

¹ In a draft of this letter Sri Aurobindo wrote in the opening paragraph: “I have often written of the centres – but without using the Sanskrit names which are intelligible only to Hindus. They are the same but our interpretation and application is not quite identical. We relate them to the psychological levels or planes.” – Ed.

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