4. THE YOGIC ATTITUDE

    If you want to do Yoga, you must take more and more in all matters, small or grea4 the yogic attitude. In our path that attitude. is not one of forceful suppression, but of

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detachment and equality with regard to the objects of desire. Forceful suppression (fasting comes under the head) stands on the same level as free indulgence; in both cases, the desire remains: in the one it is fed by indulgence, in the other it hes latent and exasperated by suppression. It is only when one stands back, separates oneself from the lower vital, refusing to regard its desires and clamours as one's own, and cultivates an entire equality and equanimity in the consciousness with respect to them the lower vital itself becomes gradually purified and itself also calm and equal. Each wave of desire as it comes must be observed, as quietly an d as much unmoved detachment as you would observe something going on outside you and must be glowed to pass rejected from the consciousness steadily put in its place.

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    All the ordinary vital movements are foreign to &e true being and come from outside; they do not belong to the soul nor do they originate in it but are waves from the general Nature, prakrti.

    The desires come from outside, enter the subconscious vital and rise to the surface. It is only when they rise to the surface and the mind becomes aware of them, that we become conscious of the desire. It seems to us to be own because we feel. it thus rising from the vital into the mind and do not know that it came from outside. What Belongs to the vital, to the being, what makes it responsible is not the desire itself, but the habit of responding to the waves or the currents o)f suggestion that come into it from thee utniversal prakrti

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    The rejection of desire is essentially the rejection of the element of craving, putting that out from the consciousness itself as a foreign element not belonging to the true self and the inner nature. But refusal to indulge the suggestions of desire is also a part of the rejection; to abstain from the action suggested, if it is not the right action, must be included in the yogic discipline. It is only when this is done in the wrong way, by a mental ascetic principle or a hard moral rule, that it can be called suppression. The difference between suppression and an inward essential rejection is the difference between mental or moral control and a spiritual purification.

    When one lives in the true consciousness one feels the desires outside oneself, entering from outside, from the universal lower prakrti, into the mind and the vital parts. In the ordinary human condition this is not felt; men become aware of the desire only when it is there, when it has come inside and found a lodging or a habitual harbourage and so they think it is their own and a part of themselves. The first condition for getting rid of desire is, therefore, to become conscious with the true consciousness; for then it becomes much easier to dismiss it than when one has to struggle with it as if it were a constituent part of oneself to be thrown out from the being. It is easier to cast off an accretion than to excise what is felt as a parcel of our substance.

    When the psychic being is in front, then also to get rid of desire becomes easy; for the psychic being has in itself no desires, it has only aspirations and a seeking and love for the Divine and all things that are or tend towards the Divine. The constant prominence of the psychic being tends of itself to bring out the true consciousness and set right almost automatically the movements of the nature.

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