Page 10 - All India Magazine Nov-2022

difficult opening. When the mind falls quiet and the concentration
becomes strong and the aspiration intense, then there is a begin-
ning of experience. The more the faith, the more rapid the result is
likely to be. For the rest one must not depend on one’s own eff orts
only, but succeed in establishing a contact with the Divine and a
receptivity to the Mother’s Power and Presence.
CWSA 29: 106-07

A Yoga of Divine Life
You have apparently a call and may be fit for Yoga; but there

are different paths and each has a different aim and end before it.

It is common to all the paths to conquer the desires, to put aside
the ordinary relations of life, and to try to pass from uncertainty
to everlasting certitude. One may also try to conquer dream and
sleep, thirst and hunger etc. But it is no part of my Yoga to have
nothing to do with the world or with life or to kill the senses or
entirely inhibit their action. It is the object of this Yoga to trans-
form life by bringing down into it the Light, Power and Bliss of the
divine Truth and its dynamic certitudes. This Yoga is not a Yoga of
world-shunning asceticism, but of divine Life. Your object, on the
other hand, can only be gained by entering into Samadhi and ceas-
ing in it from all connection with world-existence.
CWSA 29: 19 Sri Aurobindo

The two paths of Yoga
There are two paths of Yoga, one of tapasyD (discipline), and
the other of surrender. The path of tapasyD is arduous. Here you

rely solely upon yourself, you proceed by your own strength. You
ascend and achieve according to the measure of your force. There
is always the danger of falling down. And once you fall, you lie
broken in the abyss and there is hardly a remedy. The other path,
the path of surrender, is safe and sure. It is here, however, that the
Western people find their difficulty. They have been taught to fear

and avoid all that threatens their personal independence. They
10 All India Magazine, November 2022