Where Do We Stand Now?

Time has come for us for a sincere soul-searching and an honest appraisal to see how far we in the Ashram have advanced towards the realisation of the double goal of

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establishing spiritual consciousness in the constituent individuals and building up a collective spiritual life. Where does our Ashram stand in its present form and disposition with respect to that dual achievement?

Surely, as it is, the Sri Aurobindo Ashram cannot be considered to conform to what Sri Aurobindo and the Mother wanted it to grow into. Sri Aurobindo himself said a long time ago: "The Ashram as it is now is not that ideal." (The Mother, p. 229)

But why not? Where is the lacuna? Sri Aurobindo answers: "For that all its members have to live in a spiritual consciousness and not [as it is now] in the ordinary egoistic mind and mainly rajasic vital nature." (Ibid., p. 229) In one of his important letters Sri Aurobindo made the position clear:

"What is being done here [in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram] is a preparation for a work - a work which will be founded on yogic consciousness and Yoga-Shakti, and can have no other foundation." (Letters on Yoga, p. 847, italics ours)

In another letter dated 25-2-45, just five years before his passing, Sri Aurobindo wrote "The Ashram is a first form which our effort has taken, a field in which the preparatory work has to be done." (The Mother, p. 229, italics ours)

Now the crucial question is: What do these expressions "preparation", "first form" and "preparatory work" signify? Have Mother and Sri Aurobindo an occult plan to build the "ideal group-life" of their dream elsewhere than at Pondicherry and at some other time than at present? Has our Ashram to remain content with its arrested flowering and the not too glorious a role of being a mere pilot project? Can it not hope and aspire to embody in time the Mother's and Sri Aurobindo's goal of spiritually perfect individuals dwelling in a spiritually consummate community?

It is no use denying the fact that garbled and exaggerated

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reports of some isolated unpleasant happenings in our Ashram have started reaching people outside, confusing in the process the Mother's and Sri Aurobindo's devotees residing elsewhere. Hostile elements outside, elements not well-disposed towards our Ashram or for that matter to the teaching of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, are eagerly lapping up this 'news', spreading calumny against the Ashram and gleefully prophesying the impending decay and downfall of the creation of the Master and the Mother.

But we, the inmates of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, need not feel unduly perturbed by the uncharitable reactions of others. For, as Sri Aurobindo has affirmed:

"What X or others think or say does not matter very much after all as we do not depend on them for our work but on the Divine Will only. So many (people outside) have said and thought all sorts of things about and against us, that has never affected either us or our work in the least; it is of a very minor importance." (Letters on Yoga, p. 856)

So, leaving the prophets of doom to their biased and inimical assessment of our work, let us, the Ashramites -one and all - turn our gaze within and see for ourselves how far we have been faithful to the ideal of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo in our own individual life and practice. And if on soul-searching it is found that lapses and failings have appeared at some point, let us take remedial measures to arrest in time any possible erosion of spiritual values here.