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Ascent and Integration Define Spiritual Progress for the Seeker · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  Transforming human nature does not happen overnight.
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  There are thus periods when the spiritual force is actively
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  experienced and descending into the being, and then there are
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  other periods where it needs to adjust the responses of the
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  mind, the life energy and the physical body to both hold and
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  accommodate the impact of the force and thereby create the
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  needed changes. Fiora Bindo describes this
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  process as one of assent and integration.
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  Both are essential elements in the transformational process,
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  and the seeker soon learns that he can only receive a certain
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  amount of force at a time until the being is widened, the
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  receptivity is enhanced, and the necessary changes are being made
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  to use that force. If the seeker pulls the force,
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  it can be spilled if the being is not prepared to hold it, and
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  this can lead to various forms of imbalance, disruption, or
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  disturbances. Eventually, the seeker also
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  recognizes that the yoga is not fixated on accumulating
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  experiences, but on the actual work of change needed to
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  manifest the next stage of the evolution of consciousness.
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  A work that involves addressing virtually every part of the
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  being, every response, every reaction, every habit, every
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  instinct, every trained action to open the being to a new way
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  of seeing, acting and responding.
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  Thus the need for perspective, receptivity, continual faith and
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  patience with the process. Srioro Bindo writes quote.
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  The length of your period of dullness is also no sufficient
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  reason for losing belief in your capacity or your spiritual
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  destiny. I believe that alternations of
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  bright and dark periods are almost a universal experience of
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  yogis, and the exceptions are very rare.
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  If one inquires into the reason of this phenomenon, very
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  unpleasant to our impatient human nature, it will be found,
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  I think, that they are in the main too.
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  The first is that the human consciousness either cannot bear
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  a constant descent of the light or power or ananda, or cannot at
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  once receive and absorb it. It needs periods of
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  assimilation. But this assimilation goes on
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  behind the veil of the surface consciousness.
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  The experience or the realization that has descended
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  retires behind the veil and leaves this outer or surface
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  consciousness to lie fallow and become ready for a new descent.
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  In the more developed stages of the yoga, these dark or dull
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  periods become shorter, less trying, as well as uplifted by
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  the sense of the greater consciousness, which, though not
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  acting for immediate progress, yet remains and sustains the
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  outer nature. The second cause is some
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  resistance, something in the human nature that is not felt.
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  The former descent is not ready, is perhaps unwilling to change.
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  Often it is some strong habitual formation of the mind or the
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  vital, or some temporary inertia of the physical consciousness,
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  and not exactly a part of the nature.
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  And this, whether showing or concealing itself, thrusts up
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  the obstacle. If one can detect the cause in
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  oneself, acknowledge it, see its workings, and call down the
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  power for its removal, then the period of obscurity can be
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  greatly shortened, and their acuity becomes less.
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  But in any case the divine power is working always behind, and
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  one day, perhaps, when one least expects it, the obstacle breaks,
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  the clouds vanish, and there is again the light and the
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  sunshine. The best thing in these cases
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  is, if one can manage it, not to fret, not to despond, but to
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  insist quietly and keep oneself open, spread to the light, and
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  waiting in faith for it to come. That, I have found, shortens the
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  ordeals. Afterwards, when the obstacle
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  disappears, one finds that a great progress has been made,
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  and that the consciousness is far more capable of receiving
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  and retaining than before. There is a return for all the
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  trials and ordeals of the spiritual life.
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  End Quote. Reference Srioro Bindo, Bases of
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  Yoga, Chapter 3 in difficulty, pages 45 to 47.