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The Cycles and Causes of Recurring Difficulties in Relation to Spiritual Development and Progress · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  It is a limitation of our normal mental mode of understanding
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  that we do not tend to take into account the impact of time and
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  the cyclical nature of development.
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  We expect things to move in a straight line.
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  We expect progress to be continuous and in a single
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  direction. When we overcome a particular
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  issue or obstacle, we believe it is in our past, over and done
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  with. When it recurs at a later stage
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  of the spiritual journey, we become concerned or confused
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  about whether we have made any progress at all, since we are
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  apparently confronted with the very same issue we already dealt
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  with and put behind us. There are several intertwined
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  issues involved in the recurrence of difficulties
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  already faced and overcome. First, there's the law of the
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  minimum. The human being is a complex
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  amalgam of a number of different parts and powers of being which
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  have been brought together and found a rough balance for
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  working to create an individual lifetime and life experience.
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  Change does not happen in all parts of the being at once.
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  Rather, a modest change in one part allows the progress to open
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  up in other parts of the being. To some degree.
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  What was locked in to a way of doing things now has the
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  opportunity to make further adjustments.
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  Thus, a change at the mental level can lead to progress on
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  the vital or physical levels. Facing and overcoming a specific
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  difficulty thus is not necessarily addressing it either
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  for all parts of the being or for all time, as in some cases
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  an absolute minimum of progress needed to be made in one part so
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  others could begin to adjust. One then returns to the original
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  issue with a new foundation and basis that has developed as a
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  result of the consequential development brought about by the
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  1st minimum change. The second issue follows from
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  the first. We may eliminate a particular
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  issue from one part of the being, but not from the others.
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  Thus the difficulties maintain a foothold somewhere in the being.
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  If removed from any mental sanction, they can still provide
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  a vital impulse or a physical craving, or fall even deeper
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  into the subconscious realms, there to remain encapsulated
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  until some circumstance triggers their reappearance.
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  This brings us to 1/3 issue, which is the cycles of
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  development. We do not grow and progress in a
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  straight line. We make some progress, we face a
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  set back or get redirected to some degree.
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  We open up to new forces and energies, and then we thereby
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  gain new insight and new powers of action to address the
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  recurrent difficulty from a new place higher in the cycle of our
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  evolutionary development, but with the new abilities provided
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  by the new insights and powers of action we have gained in the
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  interim. We come then to the larger
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  question of the unity of all existence of all humanity, such
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  that as long as a particular force or activity remains alive
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  and active anywhere, it has the potential to invade and impact
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  any individual. Particularly if that individual
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  is not expecting it, is off his guard, or is in a state of
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  relative non observance, such as during a sleep state.
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  We have documented circumstances of individuals who are deeply
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  committed to a humanist agenda who happened to pass by a Nazi
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  rally in 1930s Germany. The individual thought he could
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  simply observe what was happening, but found that he
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  too, despite his abhorrence at the Nazi agenda, found himself
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  shouting and participating in the hate filled environment.
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  Which of us is truly so free of any human responsiveness that we
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  can withstand powerful vital forces working and others around
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  us and impacting our vital envelope or aura As a result,
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  progress is necessarily something that occurs in stages
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  and cycles, and we need to overcome the mental limitation
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  that fails to recognize that there is no final resolution
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  until the force itself has been either eliminated or transformed
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  in its entirety from all of nature through evolutionary
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  development and the influx of a new power of consciousness that
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  can harmonize and overcome the limits of the former
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  evolutionary stages. Trior Bindo notes quote, It is
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  quite normal for difficulties to come back and it is not a proof
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  that no progress has been made. The recurrence after one has
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  thought one has conquered is not unaccountable.
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  I have explained in my writings what happens when a habitual
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  movement long embedded in the nature is cast out.
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  It takes refuge in some less enlightened part of the nature,
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  and when cast out of the rest of the nature, it takes refuge in
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  the subconscious, and from there surges up when you least expect
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  it, or comes up in dreams or sudden inconscient movements.
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  Or it goes out and remains in wait in the environmental being
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  through which the universal nature works, and attacks from
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  there as a force from outside, trying to recover its Kingdom by
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  a suggestion or repetition of old movements.
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  One has to stand fast till the power of return fades away.
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  These returns or attacks must be regarded not as parts of
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  oneself, but as invasions and rejected without allowing any
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  depression or discouragement. If the mind does not sanction
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  them, if the vital refuses to welcome them, if the physical
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  remains steady and refuses to obey the physical urge, then the
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  recurrence of the thought, the vital impulse, the physical
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  feeling will begin to lose its last holds.
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  And finally, they will be too feeble to cause any trouble.
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  End Quote. Reference.
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  Shrioro, Bindu and the Mother Looking from Within, Chapter 5.
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  Attitudes on the Path, pages 156 to 157.