Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

Help and Guidance

Useful and Useless Letters [5]

I find great difficulty in understanding what is the difference between the inner mind and the vital, physical and outer minds. Also I want to know what is the physical consciousness and what are the different places of these things. If these things have forms but are not material, how am I to get the idea of them?

An answer would mean writing several essays for which I have no time.

You [Sri Aurobindo’s secretary] can tell him that it would be a waste of time to think of these things now — it is only when experience comes that it would be possible to distinguish the different parts.

Quietness and calm cannot come all at once — always at the beginning thoughts come and the mind interferes with its activity. One has to persevere, to detach oneself from the mental activity till one feels oneself as separate from it.

29 July 1936