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The Psychic Being: Its Growth and Development Through the Evolutionary Cycle · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  There are certain questions about the meaning and processes
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  of the evolutionary cycle, the existence and growth of the
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  psychic being and its relation to our human external existence
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  that most of us have a difficult time addressing as we have not
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  had the experience or evidence from our own investigations to
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  understand them completely. For most people, this means we
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  rely on a specific religious, philosophical or scientific
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  viewpoint to create an understanding that we accept, if
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  not dogmatically, at least provisionally, until our own
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  experience can validate or modify that understanding.
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  The Mother, relying on her experience, provides her view of
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  these issues and provides us a way to reflect on them based on
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  what we are actually able to see and respond to.
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  We appreciate there are certain qualities that are associated
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  with the soul. Qualities of caring, compassion,
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  spiritual aspiration, a feeling of consecration, of sacredness
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  rising in the depths of the being, a sense of oneness and
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  unity with the rest of the creation.
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  These things develop over time. Some people begin to exhibit
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  these qualities at a very early age, others may undergo various
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  forms of traumatic or life changing experience, while still
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  others may develop these qualities as they mature and
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  reflect on their lives and experience.
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  Rishis and Sages in India developed a way of understanding
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  the divine intervention into the universal creation.
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  They speak of the Jivatman, a spark of the divine that is
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  seated above and acts to individualize the divine
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  elements in beings through creation of a psychic entity
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  which eventually flowers out to become the psychic being as it
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  matures and develops. Every being has the divine
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  spark, but this does not automatically translate into the
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  full possession of an individualized conscious soul or
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  psychic being. This development takes place
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  over lifetimes and through gathered essence of experiences
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  gained during those lifetimes. We can recognize individuals who
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  develop these psychic qualities as well as those who appear to
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  not have any of them at all. Many people have, for instance,
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  asked whether Hitler had a soul. Some people have indicated that
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  whether he was born with a soul or had not developed 1, he was
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  actually possessed by a demonic vital being who had no concern
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  for humanity nor any positive qualities we associate with the
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  soul. He was intoxicated with power
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  and domination and a destructive intent that was so massive that
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  it was impossible for people to believe the extent of the
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  depravity until afterwards when facts came out about the
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  concentration camps, the torture, the mass
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  exterminations, et cetera. He started out his career with
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  the theme of making Germany great again after the loss they
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  suffered in the First World War. He went on to conquer other
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  countries to expand into greater Germany for access to land and
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  resources for his dream of greatness.
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  Once he realized that his dreams for creating Germany first were
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  failing, he turned his wrath on the loser German people and
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  ordered his lieutenants to destroy all civilian
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  infrastructure so the German people themselves would suffer.
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  He occupied a human body, but did he have a soul?
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  On the other hand, researcher Dian Fossey reported on juvenile
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  gorillas who had seen a young gorilla in their band trapped by
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  a poacher's snare. Thereafter, they went out
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  seeking for snares and found ways to consciously disable
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  them, not to respond to an immediate attack, but to protect
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  other gorillas from being trapped by those snares in the
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  future. They showed not only
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  intelligence and insight, but a degree of larger oneness and
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  concern that spoke about some element that went beyond purely
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  animal instinct to something that evidenced qualities we
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  associate with at least the incipient development of a more
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  present and active psychic being, the mother writes.
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  Quote. With regard to the evolution
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  upwards, it is more correct to speak of the psychic presence
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  than the psychic being, for it is the psychic presence which
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  little by little becomes the psychic being.
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  In each evolving form there is this presence, but it is not
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  individualized. It is something which is capable
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  of growth and follows the movement of the evolution.
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  It is not a descent of the involution from above.
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  It is formed progressively round the spark of divine
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  consciousness, which is meant to be the centre of a growing
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  being, which becomes the psychic being when it is at last
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  individualized. It is this spark that is
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  permanent and gathers round itself all sorts of elements for
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  the formation of that individuality.
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  The true psychic being is formed only when the psychic
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  personality is fully grown, fully built up round the eternal
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  divine spark. It attains its culmination, its
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  total fulfillment, If and when it unites with a being or
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  personality from above, below the human level, there is
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  ordinarily hardly an individual formation.
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  There is only this presence, more or less.
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  Of course, 1 cannot say that every man has got a psychic
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  being, just as one cannot refuse to grant it to every animal.
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  Many animals that have lived near man have some beginnings of
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  it, while so often one comes across people who do not seem to
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  be anything else than brutes. But on the whole the psychic in
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  the true sense starts at the human stage.
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  That is also why the Catholic religion declares that only man
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  has a soul. In man alone there is the
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  possibility of the psychic being growing to its full stature,
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  Even so far as to be able in the end to join and unite with a
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  descending being, a godhead from above.
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  End Quote reference Srioro Bindo and the Mother.
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  The psychic being soul, its nature, mission and evolution.
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  Section 3. Growth and Development of the
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  Psychic. Page 78.