The Physical Consciousness: Abandon or Transform?

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Through long habit, spiritual
seekers tend to look at the

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question of how to attain
spiritual liberation involving

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abandonment of the external life
in the world.

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Not only spiritual seekers raise
this question in some form or

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another, anyone involved in
aesthetic, mental, artistic or

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emotional or vital pursuits.
Eventually tries to find ways to

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overcome the limits and
restraints of the physical

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material consciousness.
Clearly, there is an element of

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truth in the need to be able to
move beyond these limitations if

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one wants to achieve anything in
the vital mental or spiritual

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aspects of one's life.
Yet it is not a complete truth

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as it condemns the universal
creation to some kind of

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irrelevancy.
Or elusive distraction from

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these higher pursuits.
Sriorobindo reviews this issue

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in depth in The Life Divine.
He comes to a different

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conclusion about the goal of the
spiritual seeking by taking us

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through the human aspiration to
the two basic opposite

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viewpoints, that of the
materialist who fixes himself

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upon success in the external
world.

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And that of the ascetic who
focuses on the spiritual.

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His conclusion is that there's
no necessary separation.

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The universal manifestation is
an omnipresent reality which

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encompasses all aspects of life
as the seeker begins to

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appreciate and understand this
unified view, this continuum

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between matter and spirit.
The question is not so much how

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to abandon the physical
consciousness, but how to

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transform it to reveal the
spiritual reality that permeates

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and creates it.
A disciple inquires how should

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we come out of the physical
consciousness, which keeps us

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preoccupied all the time and
exclusively with physical

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circumstances, The mother
observes quote.

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There is a considerable number
of ways.

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There are intellectual ways,
ways of which may be called

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sentimental, artistic ways and
spiritual ways.

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And generally it is preferable
for each one to take the way

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that is easiest for him.
For if one wants to begin

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straight away with the most
difficult, one comes to nothing

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at all.
And here we always come back to

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the same thing.
To what Triorobindo describes in

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the synthesis of yoga, it is the
way of knowledge, or the way of

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devotion, or the way of works.
But the way of works is

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precisely the one which keeps
you in physical life and makes

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you find your liberation in it.
And perhaps this is the most

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effective way of all, but also
the most difficult for most

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aspirants.
The way of meditation,

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concentration, withdrawal from
physical life, rejection of

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physical activities is certainly
easier than the way of action.

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But they leave the physical
consciousness just as it is

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without ever changing it.
And unless one becomes like a

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sadhu or an ascetic who leaves
behind all active life and

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remains in constant
concentration or meditation.

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One achieves nothing at all.
That is to say, an entire part

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of the being is never
transformed.

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And for them the solution is not
at all to transform it, it is

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simply to reject it, to get out
of their body as quickly as

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possible.
That is how yoga was conceived

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of formerly, for obviously it is
much easier, but this is not

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what we want.
What we want is the

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transformation of the physical
consciousness, not its

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rejection.
And so in this case, what trio

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Bendo has recommended as the
most direct and most total way

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is surrender to the divine, a
surrender made more and more

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integral progressively
comprising the physical

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consciousness and physical
activities.

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And if one succeeds in this then
the physical.

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Instead of being an obstacle
becomes a help.

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End Quote reference Shriorobindo
and the mother, Our Many cells,

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Practical Yogic Psychology,
Chapter 2, Planes and Parts of

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the Being, pages 25 to 26.