Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

His Life and Attempts to Write about It
On His Published Prose Writings

Bases of Yoga [1]

I have been reading your Bases of Yoga — a most staggering book: the Himalayan conditions for success you impose — well, shall the likes of us ever fulfil a hundredth part of such countless conditions?

Conditions for success? But these are not conditions for doing the sadhana, but the basic conditions for the integral siddhi — they are, as it might be said, basic siddhis, realised foundations on which the total and permanent siddhi can be created — or one may say they are the constituents of the Yogic as opposed to the ordinary consciousness. When one has arrived fully at this Yogic consciousness, one can be called a Yogi, till then one is a sadhak. So much as all that is not demanded immediately from a sadhak. From the sadhak all that is asked is “a sincerity in the aspiration and a patient will to arrive... in spite of all obstacles, then the opening in one form or another is sure to {{0}}come.”[[Sri Aurobindo, Bases of Yoga (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1981), p. 24.]] “All sincere aspiration has its effect; if you are sincere you will grow into the divine life” [p. 26]. Again “One cannot become altogether this at once, but if one aspires at all times and calls in the aid of the Divine Shakti with a true heart and a straightforward will, one grows more and more into the true consciousness” [cf. p. 27]. It is of course said that the success will come sooner or later,— it is for that reason that patience is indispensable. But these are not Himalayan conditions — it is not putting an impossible price on what is asked for. As for the difficulty, as it has also been said in the book, when one once enters into the true (Yogic) consciousness, “then you see that everything can be done, even if at present only a slight beginning has been made; but a beginning is enough, once the Force, the Power are there” [pp. 33 – 34]. It is not really on the capacity of the outer nature that success depends, (for the outer nature all self-exceeding seems impossibly difficult), but on the inner being and to the inner being all is possible. One has only to get into contact with the inner being and change the outer view and consciousness from the inner — that is the work of the sadhana and it is sure to come with sincerity, aspiration, and patience. All that is not excessively stern or exacting.

As a description of the constituents of the Yogic consciousness, the bases of realisation, I don’t think the book can be called staggering or its suggestions Himalayan — for in fact they have already been stated by the Gita and other books on Yoga and, after all, thousands of people have realised them in part at least or in the inner being — though not so well in the outer. But to realise the inner being is quite enough for a foundation — for many it is quite enough even as a last state, for those who do not seek the transformation of the outer nature. Here too, even if one puts the whole ideal, it is not alleged that it must be all done at once or as a first condition for the greater endeavour.

26 June 1936