Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

Sadhana in the Ashram

Personal Difficulties and Progress in Yoga [2]

If the difficulties in my nature still persist after so many years of sadhana, how can I be certain of success? How can I think that I am fit for the Yoga?

The vital difficulties persist so long as one indulges in any way the lower nature — even after one has ceased indulging, they persist so long as there is anything in the lower consciousness which desires or regrets them or is still responsive to their touch when they return either as waves from the universal Prakriti or an attack by the hostile forces. If length of time in mastering the vital or transforming it were a proof of unfitness, then nobody in this Asram — or outside it — would be fit for the Yoga.

Until success actually comes, there is always the chance that it will not come at all.

The mind can argue like that about anything not yet actually realised and established beyond dispute and without flaw. But what one has to lean on in Yoga is not the reasonings of the physical mind, but faith in the soul and the secret certitude of the Spirit.

I want to have the Yogic consciousness at all times and never lose it. This constant moving between light and darkness, peace and struggle cannot be a proof of progress. In what way am I incorrect?

Absolutely incorrect. The progress of the sadhana is for most even such an alternation because it is precisely a struggle between the powers of Light and Darkness, those who want the divine transformation and those who want the continuance of the old ignorant Nature. At each step something has to be conquered from the hold of the Ignorance, something brought down from the Light above. When the whole nature is opened and the peace and equality are brought down into the vital and physical and settled there, then there is no inner disturbance, but the struggle continues until there is the beginning of the supramental transformation.

20 July 1933