Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

Human Relations and the Ashram

Inadvisability of Forming Special Relations [2]

All that you have written in this letter is quite correct. It is useless to go through the old kind of reconciliation with X — it will only bring back the same futile circle — for he will act in the same way always (until he changes spiritually in the vital and that means a turning away from all vital relations) and you would be flung back into the same reactions. To cut away is the only thing — the best for him, the best for you. As for the feelings excited in him — more hurt self-esteem than anything else — they will fade out of themselves. The first necessity of both is to free yourselves from the old relations and that cannot, it is very clear, be done by going back to any remnant of the old interchange.

For the rest keep to your resolution. Do not discuss him with anybody, do not interest yourself in what he does or does not do; let it be his own concern and the Divine’s, not yours. Expect nothing personally from him — you may be sure that your expectations will only be disappointed. His nature is not yours and his mental view of what should or should not be done is quite different — incompatible with yours. By retaining anything of the old feeling you will only invite pain and farther disillusionment — you gain nothing and pay a heavy price for that nothing. It is only by becoming one-minded in the sadhana that you can escape from this painful circle.

I hope that you will recover tomorrow the capacity for food and shake off the remnants of the physical depression which have been left behind by the attack. Let the physical consciousness as well as the rest of the nature turn wholly to the Light and the Divine and seek only the one true source of happiness and Ananda.

31 March 1933