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Spiritual Experience Beyond the Mind · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  In his epic poem savitri, a legend and a symbol, Sri
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  aurobindo states quote God shall grow up while the wise men talk
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  and sleep. End Quote.
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  Until an individual has an actual experience of an inward
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  state of consciousness or that of the silent mind, or one in
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  which the experience is that of an uninvolved witness, or one
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  experiences the descent of knowledge or power or ecstatic
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  bliss that goes outside the bounds of the normal human
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  experience, he cannot truly understand what is meant by
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  these descriptive terms. The matter of his spiritual
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  experiences, for those who have not personally experienced them,
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  is one of either belief or disbelief or one of argument in
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  favor of or against. For those who are locked into
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  the logical, rational mental mindset, these experiences are
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  almost impossible to fit into their world view and thus they
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  will declare them as hallucinations, dreams,
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  delusions, or any number of other derogatory terms that more
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  than anything else to find the limits and framework that
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  surrounds the mental consciousness.
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  This same mental consciousness, however, falls silent when it is
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  asked to explain the first cause of existence or any number of
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  other inexplicable things. The mind is so busy analyzing,
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  categorizing, comparing, contrasting, and formulating
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  that it remains locked into its narrow round of conceptions.
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  Only when the mind falls silent and the being takes a receptive
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  standpoint can the individual truly begin to widen the
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  consciousness and experience what lies outside the strictly
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  mental realm. When the seeker begins to have
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  experiences that fall outside the mind's realm, he recognizes
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  the reality of them. Indeed, they are more real, more
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  compelling than all the mental ideas and arguments he engaged
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  in prior. They are generally so powerfully
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  impactful that the individual treats them as highlights and
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  key experiences of his life and will remember them and their
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  powerful impact throughout the rest of his lifetime.
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  Generally Sri Aurobindo notes quote what happened to you shows
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  what are the conditions of that state in which the divine power
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  takes the place of the ego and directs the action, making the
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  mind, life and body an instrument.
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  A receptive silence of the mind, an effacement of the mental ego,
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  and the reduction of the mental being to the position of a
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  witness, a close contact with the Divine power and an openness
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  of the being to that one influence and no other, are the
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  conditions for becoming an instrument of the Divine moved
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  by that and that only. The silence of the mind does not
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  of itself bring in the supermental consciousness.
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  There are many states or planes or levels of consciousness
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  between the human mind and the supermind.
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  The silence opens the mind and the rest of the being to greater
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  things, sometimes to the cosmic consciousness, sometimes to the
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  experience of the silent self, sometimes to the presence or
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  power of the Divine, sometimes to a higher consciousness than
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  that of the human mind. The mind's silence is the most
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  favorable condition, not the only one, for the divine power
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  to descend first upon and then into the individual
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  consciousness and there do its work to transform that
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  consciousness, giving it the necessary experiences, altering
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  all its outlook and movements, leading it from stage to stage
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  till it is ready for the last super mental change.
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  End Quote reference. Shriya Robindo, Bases of Yoga,
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  Chapter 1, Calm, Peace and Equality, pages 16 to 17.