Sri Aurobindo on the risks of the Intermediate Zone

[Guest guest]

This is how he discussed some important pitfalls on the seeker's path:

 

" All these experiences are of the same nature and what applies to one

applies to another. Apart from some experiences of a personal

character, the rest are either idea-truths, such as pour down into the

consciousness from above when one gets into touch with certain planes

of being, or strong formations from the larger mental and vital worlds

which, when one is directly open to these worlds, rush in and want to

use the sadhak (yoga practitioner) for their fulfilment.

 

These things, when they pour down or come in, present themselves with

a great force, a vivid sense of inspiration or illumination, much

sensation of light and joy, an impression of widening and power. The

sadhak feels himself freed from the normal limits, projected into a

wonderful new world of experience, filled and enlarged and

exalted;what comes associates itself, besides, with his aspirations,

ambitions, notions of spiritual fulfilment and yogic siddhi

(supernatural powers); it is represented even as itself that

realisation and fulfilment. Very easily he is carried away by the

splendour and the rush, and thinks that he has realised more than he

has truly done, something final or at least something sovereignly

true. At this stage the necessary knowledge and experience are usually

lacking which would tell him that this is only a very uncertain and

mixed beginning; he may not realise at once that he is still in the

cosmic Ignorance, not in the cosmic Truth, much less in the

Transcendental Truth, and that whatever formative or dynamic

idea-truths may have come down into him are partial only and yet

further diminished by their presentation to him by a still mixed

consciousness. He may fail to realise also that if he rushes to apply

what he is realising or receiving as if it were something definitive,

he may either fall into confusion and error or else get shut up in

some partial formation in which there may be an element of spiritual

Truth but it is likely to be outweighted by more dubious mental and

vital accretions that deform it altogether.

 

It is only when he is able to draw back (whether at once or after a

time) from his experiences, stand above them with the dispassionate

witness consciousness, observe their real nature, limitations,

composition, mixture that he can proceed on his way towards a real

freedom and a higher, larger and truer siddhi. At each step this has

to be done. For whatever comes in this way to the sadhak of this yoga,

whether it be from overmind or Intuition or Illumined Mind or some

exalted Life Plane or from all these together, it is not definitive

and final; it is not the supreme Truth in which he can rest, but only

a stage. And yet these stages have to be passed through, for the

supramental or the Supreme Truth cannot be reached in one bound or

even in many bounds; one has to pursue a calm patient steady progress

through many intervening stages without getting bound or attached to

their lesser Truth or Light or Power or Ananda.

 

This is in fact an intermediary state, a zone of transition between

the ordinary consciousness in mind and the true yoga knowledge. One

may cross without hurt through it, perceiving at once or at an early

stage its real nature and refusing to be detained by its half-lights

and tempting but imperfect and often mixed and misleading experiences;

one may go astray in it, follow false voices and mendacious guidance,

and that ends in a spiritual disaster; or one may take up one's abode

in this intermediate zone, care to go no farther and build there some

half-truth which one takes for the whole truth or become the

instrument of the powers of these transitional planes, - that is what

happens to many sadhaks and yogis.

 

Overwhelmed by the first rush and sense of power of a supernormal

condition, they get dazzled with a little light which seems to them a

tremendous illumination or a touch of force which they mistake for the

full Divine Force or at least a very great yoga Shakti; or they accept

some intermediate Power (not always a Power of the Divine) as the

Supreme and an intermediate consciousness as the supreme realisation.

Very readily they come to think that they are in the full cosmic

consciousness when it is only some front or small part of it or some

larger Mind, Life-Power or subtle physical ranges with which they have

entered into dynamic connection. Or they feel themselves to be in an

entirely illumined consciousness, while in reality they are receiving

imperfectly things from above through a partial illumination of some

mental or vital plane; for what comes is diminished and often deformed

in the course of transmission through these planes; the receiving mind

and vital of the sadhak also often understands or transcribes ill what

has been received or throws up to mix with it its own ideas, feelings,

desires, which it yet takes to be not its own but part of the Truth it

is receiving because they are mixed with it, imitate its form, are lit

up by its illumination and get from this association and borrowed

light an exaggerated value.

 

There are worse dangers in this intermediate zone of experience. For

the planes to which the sadhak has now opened his consciousness, - not

as before getting glimpses of them and some influences, but directly,

receiving their full impact, - send a host of ideas, impulses,

suggestions, formations of all kinds, often the most opposite to each

other, inconsistent or incompatible, but presented in such a way as to

slur over their insufficiencies and differences, with great force,

plausibility and wealth of argument or a convincing sense of

certitude. Overpowered by this sense of certitude, vividness,

appearance of profusion and richness, the mind of the sadhak enters

into a great confusion which it takes for some larger organisation and

order; or else it whirls about in incessant shiftings and changes

which it takes for a rapid progress but which lead nowhere. Or there

is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some

apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these intermediate

planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings who

want to create, to materialise something or to enforce a mental and

vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or influence or

even possess the thought and will of the sadhak and make him their

instrument for the purpose. This is quite apart from the well-known

danger of actually hostile beings whose sole purpose is to create

confusion, falsehood, corruption of the sadhana and disastrous

unspiritual error. Anyone allowing himself to be taken hold of by one

of these beings, who often take a divine Name, will lose his way in

the yoga. On the other hand, it is quite possible that the sadhak may

be met at his entrance into this zone by a Power of the Divine which

helps and leads him till he is ready for greater things; but still

that itself is no surety against the errors and stumblings of this

zone; for nothing is easier than for the powers of these zones or

hostile powers to imitate the guiding Voice or Image and deceive and

mislead the sadhak or for himself to attribute the creations and

formations of his own mind, vital or ego to the Divine.

 

For this intermediate zone is a region of half-truths - and that by

itself would not matter, for there is no complete truth below the

supermind; but the half-truth here is often so partial or else

ambiguous in its application that it leaves a wide field for

confusion, delusion and error. The sadhak thinks that he is no longer

in the old small consciousness at all, because he feels in contact

with something larger or more powerful, and yet the old consciousness

is still there, not really abolished. He feels the control or

influence of some Power, Being or Force greater than himself, aspires

to be its instrument and thinks he has got rid of ego; but this

delusion of egolessness often covers an exaggerated ego. Ideas seize

upon him and drive his mind which are only partially true and by

over-confident misapplication are turned into falsehoods; this

vitiates the movements of the consciousness and opens the door to

delusion. Suggestions are made, sometimes of a romantic character,

which flatter the importance of the sadhak or are agreeable to his

wishes and he accepts them without examination or discriminating

control. Even what is true, is so exalted or extended beyond its true

pitch and limit and measure that it becomes the parent of error. This

is a zone which many sadhaks have to cross, in which many wander for a

long time and out of which a great many never emerge.

 

Especially if their sadhana is mainly in the mental and vital, they

have to meet here many difficulties and much danger; only those who

follow scrupulously a strict guidance or have the psychic being

prominent in their nature pass easily as if on a sure and clearly

marked road across this intermediate region. A central sincerity, a

fundamental humility also save from much danger and trouble. One can

then pass quickly beyond into a clearer Light where if there is still

much mixture, incertitude and struggle, yet the orientation is towards

the cosmic Truth and not to a half-illumined prolongation of Maya and

ignorance.

 

I have described in general terms with its main features and

possibilities this state of consciousness just across the border of

the normal consciousness, because it is here that these experiences

seem to move. But different sadhaks comport themselves differently in

it and respond sometimes to one class of possibilities, sometimes to

another. In this case it seems to have been entered through an attempt

to call down or force a way into the cosmic consciousness - it does

not matter which way it is put or whether one is quite aware of what

one is doing or aware of it in these terms, it comes to that in

substance. It is not the overmind which was entered, for to go

straight into the overmind is impossible. The overmind is indeed above

and behind the whole action of the cosmic consciousness, but one can

at first have only an indirect connection with it; things come down

from it through intermediate ranges into a larger mind-plane,

life-plane, subtle physical plane and come very much changed and

diminished in the transmission, without anything like the full power

and truth they have in the overmind itself on its native levels. Most

of the movements come not from the overmind, but down from higher mind

ranges. The ideas with which these experiences are penetrated and on

which they seem to rest their claim to truth are not of the overmind,

but of the higher Mind or sometimes of the illumined Mind; but they

are mixed with suggestions from the lower mind and vital regions and

badly diminished in their application or misapplied in many places.

All this would not matter; it is usual and normal, and one has to pass

through it and come into a clearer atmosphere where things are better

organised and placed on a surer basis. But the movement was made in a

spirit of excessive hurry and eagerness, of exaggerated self-esteem

and self-confidence, of a premature certitude, relying on no other

guidance than that of one's own mind or of the ``Divine'' as conceived

or experienced in a stage of very limited knowledge. But the sadhak's

conception and experience of the Divine, even if it is fundamentally

genuine, is never in such a stage complete and pure; it is mixed with

all sorts of mental and vital ascriptions and all sorts of things are

associated with this Divine guidance and believed to be part of it

which come from quite other sources. Even supposing there is any

direct guidance, - most often in these conditions the Divine acts

mostly from behind the veil, - it is only occasional and the rest is

done through a play of forces; error and stumbling and mixture of

Ignorance take place freely and these things are allowed because the

sadhak has to be tested by the world-forces, to learn by experience,

to grow through imperfection towards perfection - if he is capable of

it, if he is willing to learn, to open his eyes to his own mistakes

and errors, to learn and profit by them so as to grow towards a purer

Truth, Light and Knowledge.

 

The result of this state of mind is that one begins to affirm

everything that comes in this mixed and dubious region as if it were

all the Truth and the sheer Divine Will; the ideas or the suggestions

that constantly repeat themselves are expressed with a self-assertive

absoluteness as if they were Truth entire and undeniable. There is an

impression that one has become impersonal and free from ego, while the

whole tone of the mind, its utterance and spirit are full of vehement

self-assertiveness justified by the affirmation that one is thinking

and acting as an instrument and under the inspiration of the Divine.

Ideas are put forward very aggressively that can be valid to the mind,

but are not spiritually valid; yet they are stated as if they were

spiritual absolutes. For instance, equality, which in that sense - for

yogic Samata is a quite different thing - is a mere mental principle,

the claim to a sacred independence, the refusal to accept anyone as

Guru or the opposition made between the Divine and the human Divine

etc., etc. All these ideas are positions that can be taken by the mind

and the vital and turned into principles which they try to enforce on

the religious or even the spiritual life, but they are not and cannot

be spiritual in their nature. There also begin to come in suggestions

from the vital planes, a pullulation of imaginations romantic,

fanciful or ingenious, hidden interpretations, pseudo-intuitions,

would-be initiations into things beyond, which excite or bemuse the

mind and are often so turned as to flatter and magnify ego and

self-importance, but are not founded on any well-ascertained spiritual

or occult realities of a true order. This region is full of elements

of this kind and, if allowed, they begin to crowd on the sadhak; but

if he seriously means to reach the Highest, he must simply observe

them and pass on. It is not that there is never any truth in such

things, but for one that is true there are nine imitative falsehoods

presented and only a trained occultist with the infallible tact born

of long experience can guide himself without stumbling or being caught

through the maze. It is possible for the whole attitude and action and

utterance to be so surcharged with the errors of this intermediate

zone that to go farther on this route would be to travel far away from

the Divine and from the yoga.

 

Here the choice is still open whether to follow the very mixed

guidance one gets in the midst of these experiences or to accept the

true guidance. Each man who enters the realms of yogic experience is

free to follow his own way; but this yoga is not a path for anyone to

follow, but only for those who accept to seek the aim, pursue the way

pointed out upon which a sure guidance is indispensable. It is idle

for anyone to expect that he can follow this road far, - much less go

to the end by his own inner strength and knowledge without the true

aid or influence. Even the ordinary long-practised yogas are hard to

follow without the aid of the Guru; in this which as it advances goes

through untrodden countries and unknown entangled regions, it is quite

impossible. As for the work to be done it also is not a work for any

sadhak of any path; it is not, either, the work of the ``Impersonal''

Divine who, for that matter, is not an active Power but supports

impartially all work in the universe. It is a training ground for

those who have to pass through the difficult and complex way of this

yoga and none other. All work here must be done in a spirit of

acceptance, discipline and surrender, not with personal demands and

conditions, but with a vigilant conscious submission to control and

guidance. Work done in any other spirit results in an unspiritual

disorder, confusion and disturbance of the atmosphere. In it too

difficulties, errors, stumblings are frequent, because in this yoga

people have to be led patiently and with some field for their own

effort, by experience, out of the ignorance natural to Mind and Life

to a wider spirit and a luminous knowledge. But the danger of an

unguided wandering in the regions across the border is that the very

basis of the yoga may be contradicted and the conditions under which

alone the work can be done may be lost altogether. The transition

through this intermediate zone - not obligatory, for many pass by a

narrower but surer way - is a crucial passage; what comes out of it is

likely to be a very wide or rich creation; but when one founders

there, recovery is difficult, painful, assured only after a long

struggle and endeavour. "

Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, 3rd ed., pages 1039-1046.

[Guest guest]

Wow! Quite the post Selena. Good stuff. - thanks - chrism

[Guest guest]

> Wow! Quite the post Selena. Good stuff. - thanks - chrism

agreed.

 

I used to write at length about every dinky little occurrence, vivid

dream or insight I'd experience; I found that the more I wrote about

it, the less I was writing about it and the more I was writing about the

words I wrote about it.

 

if our desire to have a map is sufficiently strong we can make a lot

of things seem to fit that map; in doing so we validate our desire not

the map.

 

cheers,

-brian

[Guest guest]

Thats an absolutely fantastic post thank you Sel,

Some of it sounds familiar...!

It reminds me of, lets see, maybe Swami Satyananda, who said that as

one progresses, don't hold onto conceptions that appear, for they

are like half truths, philosophical ideas that are still crude and

come and go.

Love and Blessing

 

, " selena230 "

<selena230 wrote:

>

> This is how he discussed some important pitfalls on the seeker's

path:

>

> " All these experiences are of the same nature and what applies to

one

> applies to another. Apart from some experiences of a personal

> character, the rest are either idea-truths, such as pour down into

the

> consciousness from above when one gets into touch with certain

planes

> of being, or strong formations from the larger mental and vital

worlds

> which, when one is directly open to these worlds, rush in and want

to

> use the sadhak (yoga practitioner) for their fulfilment.

>

> These things, when they pour down or come in, present themselves

with

> a great force, a vivid sense of inspiration or illumination, much

> sensation of light and joy, an impression of widening and power.

The

> sadhak feels himself freed from the normal limits, projected into a

> wonderful new world of experience, filled and enlarged and

> exalted;what comes associates itself, besides, with his

aspirations,

> ambitions, notions of spiritual fulfilment and yogic siddhi

> (supernatural powers); it is represented even as itself that

> realisation and fulfilment. Very easily he is carried away by the

> splendour and the rush, and thinks that he has realised more than

he

> has truly done, something final or at least something sovereignly

> true. At this stage the necessary knowledge and experience are

usually

> lacking which would tell him that this is only a very uncertain and

> mixed beginning; he may not realise at once that he is still in the

> cosmic Ignorance, not in the cosmic Truth, much less in the

> Transcendental Truth, and that whatever formative or dynamic

> idea-truths may have come down into him are partial only and yet

> further diminished by their presentation to him by a still mixed

> consciousness. He may fail to realise also that if he rushes to

apply

> what he is realising or receiving as if it were something

definitive,

> he may either fall into confusion and error or else get shut up in

> some partial formation in which there may be an element of

spiritual

> Truth but it is likely to be outweighted by more dubious mental and

> vital accretions that deform it altogether.

>

> It is only when he is able to draw back (whether at once or after a

> time) from his experiences, stand above them with the dispassionate

> witness consciousness, observe their real nature, limitations,

> composition, mixture that he can proceed on his way towards a real

> freedom and a higher, larger and truer siddhi. At each step this

has

> to be done. For whatever comes in this way to the sadhak of this

yoga,

> whether it be from overmind or Intuition or Illumined Mind or some

> exalted Life Plane or from all these together, it is not definitive

> and final; it is not the supreme Truth in which he can rest, but

only

> a stage. And yet these stages have to be passed through, for the

> supramental or the Supreme Truth cannot be reached in one bound or

> even in many bounds; one has to pursue a calm patient steady

progress

> through many intervening stages without getting bound or attached

to

> their lesser Truth or Light or Power or Ananda.

>

> This is in fact an intermediary state, a zone of transition between

> the ordinary consciousness in mind and the true yoga knowledge. One

> may cross without hurt through it, perceiving at once or at an

early

> stage its real nature and refusing to be detained by its half-

lights

> and tempting but imperfect and often mixed and misleading

experiences;

> one may go astray in it, follow false voices and mendacious

guidance,

> and that ends in a spiritual disaster; or one may take up one's

abode

> in this intermediate zone, care to go no farther and build there

some

> half-truth which one takes for the whole truth or become the

> instrument of the powers of these transitional planes, - that is

what

> happens to many sadhaks and yogis.

>

> Overwhelmed by the first rush and sense of power of a supernormal

> condition, they get dazzled with a little light which seems to

them a

> tremendous illumination or a touch of force which they mistake for

the

> full Divine Force or at least a very great yoga Shakti; or they

accept

> some intermediate Power (not always a Power of the Divine) as the

> Supreme and an intermediate consciousness as the supreme

realisation.

> Very readily they come to think that they are in the full cosmic

> consciousness when it is only some front or small part of it or

some

> larger Mind, Life-Power or subtle physical ranges with which they

have

> entered into dynamic connection. Or they feel themselves to be in

an

> entirely illumined consciousness, while in reality they are

receiving

> imperfectly things from above through a partial illumination of

some

> mental or vital plane; for what comes is diminished and often

deformed

> in the course of transmission through these planes; the receiving

mind

> and vital of the sadhak also often understands or transcribes ill

what

> has been received or throws up to mix with it its own ideas,

feelings,

> desires, which it yet takes to be not its own but part of the

Truth it

> is receiving because they are mixed with it, imitate its form, are

lit

> up by its illumination and get from this association and borrowed

> light an exaggerated value.

>

> There are worse dangers in this intermediate zone of experience.

For

> the planes to which the sadhak has now opened his consciousness, -

not

> as before getting glimpses of them and some influences, but

directly,

> receiving their full impact, - send a host of ideas, impulses,

> suggestions, formations of all kinds, often the most opposite to

each

> other, inconsistent or incompatible, but presented in such a way

as to

> slur over their insufficiencies and differences, with great force,

> plausibility and wealth of argument or a convincing sense of

> certitude. Overpowered by this sense of certitude, vividness,

> appearance of profusion and richness, the mind of the sadhak enters

> into a great confusion which it takes for some larger organisation

and

> order; or else it whirls about in incessant shiftings and changes

> which it takes for a rapid progress but which lead nowhere. Or

there

> is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some

> apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these intermediate

> planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings

who

> want to create, to materialise something or to enforce a mental and

> vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or

influence or

> even possess the thought and will of the sadhak and make him their

> instrument for the purpose. This is quite apart from the well-known

> danger of actually hostile beings whose sole purpose is to create

> confusion, falsehood, corruption of the sadhana and disastrous

> unspiritual error. Anyone allowing himself to be taken hold of by

one

> of these beings, who often take a divine Name, will lose his way in

> the yoga. On the other hand, it is quite possible that the sadhak

may

> be met at his entrance into this zone by a Power of the Divine

which

> helps and leads him till he is ready for greater things; but still

> that itself is no surety against the errors and stumblings of this

> zone; for nothing is easier than for the powers of these zones or

> hostile powers to imitate the guiding Voice or Image and deceive

and

> mislead the sadhak or for himself to attribute the creations and

> formations of his own mind, vital or ego to the Divine.

>

> For this intermediate zone is a region of half-truths - and that by

> itself would not matter, for there is no complete truth below the

> supermind; but the half-truth here is often so partial or else

> ambiguous in its application that it leaves a wide field for

> confusion, delusion and error. The sadhak thinks that he is no

longer

> in the old small consciousness at all, because he feels in contact

> with something larger or more powerful, and yet the old

consciousness

> is still there, not really abolished. He feels the control or

> influence of some Power, Being or Force greater than himself,

aspires

> to be its instrument and thinks he has got rid of ego; but this

> delusion of egolessness often covers an exaggerated ego. Ideas

seize

> upon him and drive his mind which are only partially true and by

> over-confident misapplication are turned into falsehoods; this

> vitiates the movements of the consciousness and opens the door to

> delusion. Suggestions are made, sometimes of a romantic character,

> which flatter the importance of the sadhak or are agreeable to his

> wishes and he accepts them without examination or discriminating

> control. Even what is true, is so exalted or extended beyond its

true

> pitch and limit and measure that it becomes the parent of error.

This

> is a zone which many sadhaks have to cross, in which many wander

for a

> long time and out of which a great many never emerge.

>

> Especially if their sadhana is mainly in the mental and vital, they

> have to meet here many difficulties and much danger; only those who

> follow scrupulously a strict guidance or have the psychic being

> prominent in their nature pass easily as if on a sure and clearly

> marked road across this intermediate region. A central sincerity, a

> fundamental humility also save from much danger and trouble. One

can

> then pass quickly beyond into a clearer Light where if there is

still

> much mixture, incertitude and struggle, yet the orientation is

towards

> the cosmic Truth and not to a half-illumined prolongation of Maya

and

> ignorance.

>

> I have described in general terms with its main features and

> possibilities this state of consciousness just across the border of

> the normal consciousness, because it is here that these experiences

> seem to move. But different sadhaks comport themselves differently

in

> it and respond sometimes to one class of possibilities, sometimes

to

> another. In this case it seems to have been entered through an

attempt

> to call down or force a way into the cosmic consciousness - it does

> not matter which way it is put or whether one is quite aware of

what

> one is doing or aware of it in these terms, it comes to that in

> substance. It is not the overmind which was entered, for to go

> straight into the overmind is impossible. The overmind is indeed

above

> and behind the whole action of the cosmic consciousness, but one

can

> at first have only an indirect connection with it; things come down

> from it through intermediate ranges into a larger mind-plane,

> life-plane, subtle physical plane and come very much changed and

> diminished in the transmission, without anything like the full

power

> and truth they have in the overmind itself on its native levels.

Most

> of the movements come not from the overmind, but down from higher

mind

> ranges. The ideas with which these experiences are penetrated and

on

> which they seem to rest their claim to truth are not of the

overmind,

> but of the higher Mind or sometimes of the illumined Mind; but they

> are mixed with suggestions from the lower mind and vital regions

and

> badly diminished in their application or misapplied in many places.

> All this would not matter; it is usual and normal, and one has to

pass

> through it and come into a clearer atmosphere where things are

better

> organised and placed on a surer basis. But the movement was made

in a

> spirit of excessive hurry and eagerness, of exaggerated self-esteem

> and self-confidence, of a premature certitude, relying on no other

> guidance than that of one's own mind or of the ``Divine'' as

conceived

> or experienced in a stage of very limited knowledge. But the

sadhak's

> conception and experience of the Divine, even if it is

fundamentally

> genuine, is never in such a stage complete and pure; it is mixed

with

> all sorts of mental and vital ascriptions and all sorts of things

are

> associated with this Divine guidance and believed to be part of it

> which come from quite other sources. Even supposing there is any

> direct guidance, - most often in these conditions the Divine acts

> mostly from behind the veil, - it is only occasional and the rest

is

> done through a play of forces; error and stumbling and mixture of

> Ignorance take place freely and these things are allowed because

the

> sadhak has to be tested by the world-forces, to learn by

experience,

> to grow through imperfection towards perfection - if he is capable

of

> it, if he is willing to learn, to open his eyes to his own mistakes

> and errors, to learn and profit by them so as to grow towards a

purer

> Truth, Light and Knowledge.

>

> The result of this state of mind is that one begins to affirm

> everything that comes in this mixed and dubious region as if it

were

> all the Truth and the sheer Divine Will; the ideas or the

suggestions

> that constantly repeat themselves are expressed with a self-

assertive

> absoluteness as if they were Truth entire and undeniable. There is

an

> impression that one has become impersonal and free from ego, while

the

> whole tone of the mind, its utterance and spirit are full of

vehement

> self-assertiveness justified by the affirmation that one is

thinking

> and acting as an instrument and under the inspiration of the

Divine.

> Ideas are put forward very aggressively that can be valid to the

mind,

> but are not spiritually valid; yet they are stated as if they were

> spiritual absolutes. For instance, equality, which in that sense -

for

> yogic Samata is a quite different thing - is a mere mental

principle,

> the claim to a sacred independence, the refusal to accept anyone as

> Guru or the opposition made between the Divine and the human Divine

> etc., etc. All these ideas are positions that can be taken by the

mind

> and the vital and turned into principles which they try to enforce

on

> the religious or even the spiritual life, but they are not and

cannot

> be spiritual in their nature. There also begin to come in

suggestions

> from the vital planes, a pullulation of imaginations romantic,

> fanciful or ingenious, hidden interpretations, pseudo-intuitions,

> would-be initiations into things beyond, which excite or bemuse the

> mind and are often so turned as to flatter and magnify ego and

> self-importance, but are not founded on any well-ascertained

spiritual

> or occult realities of a true order. This region is full of

elements

> of this kind and, if allowed, they begin to crowd on the sadhak;

but

> if he seriously means to reach the Highest, he must simply observe

> them and pass on. It is not that there is never any truth in such

> things, but for one that is true there are nine imitative

falsehoods

> presented and only a trained occultist with the infallible tact

born

> of long experience can guide himself without stumbling or being

caught

> through the maze. It is possible for the whole attitude and action

and

> utterance to be so surcharged with the errors of this intermediate

> zone that to go farther on this route would be to travel far away

from

> the Divine and from the yoga.

>

> Here the choice is still open whether to follow the very mixed

> guidance one gets in the midst of these experiences or to accept

the

> true guidance. Each man who enters the realms of yogic experience

is

> free to follow his own way; but this yoga is not a path for anyone

to

> follow, but only for those who accept to seek the aim, pursue the

way

> pointed out upon which a sure guidance is indispensable. It is idle

> for anyone to expect that he can follow this road far, - much less

go

> to the end by his own inner strength and knowledge without the true

> aid or influence. Even the ordinary long-practised yogas are hard

to

> follow without the aid of the Guru; in this which as it advances

goes

> through untrodden countries and unknown entangled regions, it is

quite

> impossible. As for the work to be done it also is not a work for

any

> sadhak of any path; it is not, either, the work of the

``Impersonal''

> Divine who, for that matter, is not an active Power but supports

> impartially all work in the universe. It is a training ground for

> those who have to pass through the difficult and complex way of

this

> yoga and none other. All work here must be done in a spirit of

> acceptance, discipline and surrender, not with personal demands and

> conditions, but with a vigilant conscious submission to control and

> guidance. Work done in any other spirit results in an unspiritual

> disorder, confusion and disturbance of the atmosphere. In it too

> difficulties, errors, stumblings are frequent, because in this yoga

> people have to be led patiently and with some field for their own

> effort, by experience, out of the ignorance natural to Mind and

Life

> to a wider spirit and a luminous knowledge. But the danger of an

> unguided wandering in the regions across the border is that the

very

> basis of the yoga may be contradicted and the conditions under

which

> alone the work can be done may be lost altogether. The transition

> through this intermediate zone - not obligatory, for many pass by a

> narrower but surer way - is a crucial passage; what comes out of

it is

> likely to be a very wide or rich creation; but when one founders

> there, recovery is difficult, painful, assured only after a long

> struggle and endeavour. "

> Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, 3rd ed., pages 1039-1046.

>

[Guest guest]

Yeah, many enlightened folks have said pretty much the same thing.

Since the temptations of the " intermediate zone " are many, I thought

yet another reminder wouldn't hurt...

 

Cheers,

 

Sel

 

, " James "

<milliondegrees wrote:

>

> Thats an absolutely fantastic post thank you Sel,

> Some of it sounds familiar...!

> It reminds me of, lets see, maybe Swami Satyananda, who said that as

> one progresses, don't hold onto conceptions that appear, for they

> are like half truths, philosophical ideas that are still crude and

> come and go.

> Love and Blessing

[Guest guest]

Hey, 7th son. This is a great Joseph Campbell take on it. Love it!

 

-richard O

 

Kundalini-Awakening-Systems-

1 , " a_seventh_son " <a_seventh_son wrote:

>

> > Wow! Quite the post Selena. Good stuff. - thanks - chrism

> agreed.

>

> I used to write at length about every dinky little occurrence,

vivid

> dream or insight I'd experience; I found that the more I wrote

about

> it, the less I was writing about it and the more I was writing

about the

> words I wrote about it.

>

> if our desire to have a map is sufficiently strong we can make a

lot

> of things seem to fit that map; in doing so we validate our desire

not

> the map.

>

> cheers,

> -brian

>