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The Attitude of the Psychic Being Helps Overcome Obstructions and DIfficulties in the Sadhana · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  The more we focus on difficulties, the more they seem
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  to accumulate. It is one thing to be able to
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  quietly observe issues as they arise.
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  It is quite another to fixate on them and expend energy trying to
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  push through them using the normal powers of body, life and
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  mind. The spiritual force, once it
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  begins to work in the being, continues relentlessly.
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  Sometimes as it pushes into a new area of the consciousness,
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  it can provoke the awakening of old samskaras, memories, habits,
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  instincts, trained responses, which may seem to the seeker to
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  be a backwards or retrogressive step in the sadhna with the
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  right attitude. These things are seen as part of
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  the process, not permanent issues, and thus they can be
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  overcome if one remains in the right psychological space.
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  This psychological space is the one that the psychic being
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  naturally adopts, one of quiet observation, aspiration,
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  confidence, patience, perseverance, faith, and
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  reliance on the spiritual force and its action.
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  At some point practitioner begins to appreciate that it is
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  not through his own human power of action that true
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  transformation of human nature can occur, but through the
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  action of the divine force, which is the actual doer of the
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  sadhana. What we do not ordinarily grasp
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  is that the change to the outer nature and its reactions may be
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  the result of a much more hidden internal process of change.
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  The mother advises not to condone, support or fixate on
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  the outer movements that are the result of past actions, rather
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  to focus on the objective, the goal, the spiritual realization
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  as the reality one must cling to, Fioro Bindu observes.
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  Quote A difficulty comes, or an arrest in some movement which
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  you have begun or have been carrying on for some time.
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  How is it to be dealt with? For such arrests are inevitably
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  frequent enough, not only for you, but for everyone who is a
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  seeker. One might almost say that every
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  step forward is followed by an arrest.
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  At least that is a very common, if not a universal experience.
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  It is to be dealt with by becoming always more quiet, more
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  firm in the will to go through, by opening oneself more and more
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  so that any obstructing non receptivity in the nature may
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  diminish or disappear. By an affirmation of faith even
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  in the midst of the obscurity. Faith in the presence of a power
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  that is working behind the cloud and the veil in the guidance of
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  the Guru. By an observation of oneself to
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  find any cause of the arrest, not in a spirit of depression or
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  discouragement, but with the will to find out and remove it.
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  This is the only right attitude, and if one is persistent in
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  taking it, the periods of arrest are not abolished, for that
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  cannot be at this stage, but greatly shortened and lightened
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  in their incidents. Sometimes these arrests are
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  periods, long or short, of assimilation or unseen
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  preparation. Their appearance of sterile
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  immobility is deceptive. In that case, with the right
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  attitude, one can, after a time, by opening, by observation, by
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  accumulated experience, begin to feel, to get some inkling of
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  what is being prepared or done. Sometimes it is a period of true
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  obstruction, in which the power at work has to deal with the
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  obstacles in the way, obstacles in oneself, obstacles of the
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  opposing cosmic forces, or any other, or of altogether.
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  And this kind of arrest may be long or short according to the
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  magnitude or obstinacy or complexity of the impediments
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  that are met. But here, too, the right
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  attitude can alleviate or shorten, and, if persistently
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  taken, help to a more radical removal of the difficulties, and
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  greatly diminish the necessity of complete arrests hereafter.
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  On the contrary, an attitude of depression or unfaith in the
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  help or the guidance, or in the certitude of the victory of the
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  Guiding Power, a shutting up of yourself in the sense of the
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  difficulties, impedes the recovery, prolongs the
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  difficulties, helps the obstructions to recur with force
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  instead of progressively diminishing in their incidents.
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  It is an attitude whose persistence or recurrence you
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  must resolutely throw aside if you want to get over the
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  obstruction which you feel so much, which the depressed
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  attitude only makes, while it lasts, more acute.
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  End Quote. Reference.
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  Shrioro Vindo and the Mother Looking from Within, Chapter 4,
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  Ordeals and Difficulties, pages 104 to 106.