The Vigilance Needed to Ensure That Sattwic Calm, Peaceful Focus Does Not Get Distracted Through the Rise of Rajasic or Tamasic Reactions in the Being

0:00 There's a dynamic that frequently occurs when an individual starts to actively take up the yogic path at a certain stage of development. The need to bring peace into the being and the need for a calm, quiet energy to support the practice of meditation may take center stage. At that point, the seeker may take steps to minimize external contacts, create a quiet space and increase the time spent in meditation and study. The active impulsive participation in external affairs recedes. This tendency, if it is a short term action and particularly if it remains dynamic and focused, can be extremely useful for the seeker. In fact, for many it may be a necessary stage. The danger arises if the individual either becomes so habituated to the attitude of withdrawal from an act of life that he becomes imbalanced and unable to withstand the pressures of life in the world, or else that the Sutwick impulse that led to this focus in the 1st place gets mixed with talus and turns into a form of indolence or somnolence. In such a case, the individual winds up opening himself to all manner of thoughts, impulses, feelings, emotions and desires that enter through the less

1:31 vigilant and less conscious state of the Temasek energy. It is very difficult to maintain dynamic and focused meditation constantly for long periods of time. When the concentration slips, it allows the mind to wander, various impulsions to arise, and creates a form of mental fatigue that becomes a field for these opposing thoughts and tendencies to rise up. Similarly, the vital nature has an inherent bias towards activity and excitement. Thus, it treats periods of calm, quiet reflection as unnatural and works to bring some energy to the being.

2:15 This energy is not always helpful to the sadhna, of course, so it can lead to undesirable consequences, Sriorobindo writes. Quote. It is perhaps that the attitude that you took of going on with the calm within and slowly changing what had to be changed, postponing certain things for the future, though not a wrong attitude in itself, made you somewhat LAX, allowing things to play on the surface, desires, et cetera, which should have been kept in check. This resolution may have opened the way for the old movements to rise through this part, which was not yet ready to change at all, and the hostile forces, finding you off your guard, took the opportunity to push the attack home. They are always vigilant for an opportunity, and there must be a sufficient vigilance on the sodic side to refuse it to them. End Quote Reference Sri Aurobindo and the Mother looking from Within, Chapter 5, Attitudes on the Path, page 147.