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"Are We There Yet?" · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  Just about anyone who has experienced a long trip with
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  young children will relate to the question Are we there yet?
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  10 minutes into the journey and every 5 or 10 minutes
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  thereafter, the children ask if we are at the destination yet.
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  They have no realistic sense of time, distance or process.
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  They become bored and want to move on to whatever is next.
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  In a certain sense, we are all like the children in the journey
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  when we reflect on the process of the manifestation of a next
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  stage of consciousness in evolutionary time.
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  Our short human lifetime simply cannot comprehend or encompass
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  the vast time needed for each stage of consciousness to
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  evolve, integrate itself into the manifestation, and prepare
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  for the next stage that must inevitably follow.
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  After the evolution of the vital nature took billions of years,
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  the evolution of the mental nature took at least hundreds of
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  millions of years to reach the current stage.
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  So when we reflect on the changes needed to bring forth
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  the supermental nature, we need a certain amount of perspective
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  and ability to separate our individual lifetime and ego
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  individuality from that larger process.
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  Rather than an overnight short term transformation, the
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  evolutionary process is more like a very long relay race
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  where the runners are tasked with carrying the baton to the
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  next runner, who then runs and hands off to the subsequent
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  runner until eventually a final runner reaches the finish line.
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  This does not rule out some type of evolutionary saltis, as
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  Srioro Bindo has termed it, the sudden manifestation of
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  something that has been preparing unseen until it is
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  ready to burst forth. Yet this also does not obviate
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  the need for the detailed working out of that force of
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  consciousness through the entirety of the earth nature.
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  Sri Aurobindo and the Mother have pointed out that the
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  conscious participation of spiritual aspirants with a basis
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  of the evolved mentality and a developed psychic being or soul
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  presence should be able to dramatically speed up the
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  process so that it should not take hundreds of millions or
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  even hundreds or 10s of thousands of years.
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  Each phase of the Yoga of Nature occurs dramatically faster than
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  the earlier stages. Each stage needs to both
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  manifest and then integrate itself into the Earth nature.
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  Thus, for the Super mental force to fully evolve, the entire
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  earth consciousness needs to be prepared, textured for an
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  ability to receive, hold and utilize that force effectively
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  within the framework of earthly existence.
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  Until that is done, any individual remains subject to
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  the complex and difficult process along the way.
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  That is why in various places, the mother and trio Robindo have
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  implied a time frame of hundreds of years at a minimum.
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  Putting that into context, those who take up this yoga to day in
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  the early days of the process are likely the early relay
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  runners who have to carry out the work without impatience with
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  perseverance and be satisfied that they are helping the larger
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  process along through their own inner growth and development.
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  In other words, we are not there yet, and to claim otherwise is
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  essentially shutting down the internal process in favor of
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  egoistic self aggrandizement, which is more or less a dead end
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  in this journey. The mother who declared the
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  initial advent of the supermental force into the earth
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  atmosphere spent many years after that working on making the
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  body's cells receptive and preparing them for the
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  supermental force to work at that level.
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  She did not claim the complete transformation of human nature,
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  rather she demonstrated the selfless efforts that aid the
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  process for the long term. She described the type of
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  changes that would be needed in the physical body to carry out
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  the complete transition to a super mental being, a new race
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  with dramatically different bodily functionality.
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  Srioro Bindu observes quote. It is very unwise for anyone to
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  claim prematurely to have possession of the Super mind, or
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  even to have a taste of it. The claim is usually accompanied
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  by an outburst of super egoism, some radical blunder of
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  perception or a gross fall, wrong condition and wrong
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  movement, a certain spiritual humility, a serious unarrogant
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  look at oneself and quiet perception of the imperfections
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  of 1's present nature. And instead of self esteem and
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  self assertion, a sense of the necessity of exceeding one's
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  present self, not from egoistic ambition but from an urge
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  towards the Divine, would be, it seems to me, for this frail
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  terrestrial and human composition, far better
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  conditions for proceeding towards the Super mental change.
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  End Quote Reference. Srioro Bindo.
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  Basis of Yoga chapter 2. Faith, Aspiration Surrender,
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  pages 35 to 36.