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Illness and Health
You ask me whether your illness comes from yoga. By no means − far from damaging health, yoga helps to build up a health that is robust and unfailing. 29 June 1942 Do not forget that to succeed in our yoga one must have a strong and healthy body. For this, the body must do exercise, have an active and regular life, work physically, eat well, and sleep well. It is in good health that the way towards transformation is found. 18 April 1971 It is good to do exercises and to lead a simple and hygienic life, but for the body to be truly perfect, it must open to the divine forces, it must be subject only to the divine influence, it must aspire constantly to realise the Divine.
Good health is the exterior expression of an inner harmony. We must be proud if we are in good health and not despise it.
As yet happiness and good health are not normal conditions in this world. We must protect them carefully against the intrusion of their opposites. Page - 147
I have been having various kinds of small accidents and hurts, and I feel troubled because all my efforts to avoid them seem to go in vain. What should I do?
You need not torture yourself about these small things − they have no importance in themselves and their utility is to show us where inconscience is still to be found in our nature so that we may put light there. 13 July 1937 You must take this illness as a sign that in spite of all your convictions, perhaps even resolutions, you have to do sadhana and to add to your outer consecration in work the inner consecration of deep understanding and psychological transformation and make use of your seclusion for that purpose. My love and help are with you. 6 April 1952 Physical ailments are always the sign of a resistance in the physical being; but with surrender to the Divine’s Will and a complete trust in the working of the Grace, they are bound to disappear soon. 22 May 1957 Sri Aurobindo says, “Disease is needlessly prolonged and ends in death oftener than is inevitable, because the mind of the patient supports and dwells upon the disease of the body”,¹ and I add,
¹ Thoughts and Aphorisms, Cent. Vol. 17, p. 126. 149 Page - 148 “An illness of the body is always the outer expression and translation of a disorder, a disharmony in the inner being; unless this inner disorder is healed, the outer cure cannot be total and permanent.” 1 October 1959 Physical troubles always come as lessons to teach equality and to reveal what in us is pure and luminous enough to remain unaffected. It is in equality that one finds the remedy. An important point: equality does not mean indifference. 11 December 1965 The illness has come like a test and gone like a purification carrying away all that was standing in the way of the joy of an integral consecration. 2 February 1967 This illness has been put upon you by the hostile forces as a strong test. You have not met it with the proper attitude. That is why it lingers. Your going back to Madras does not ameliorate the attitude − on the contrary. You yield to a movement of fear and distrust in the Divine. I cannot see that it will lead to anything good for you.
Your illness was not a mere accident. You did not give sufficient attention to the inner change, a psychological change with a broadening of your consciousness. You were satisfied with Page - 149 yourself. You were shut up in your small shell and did not try to make any progress. You said sadhana did not interest you and you thought that the little work that you were doing was quite sufficient for you and nothing more was needed. It was this attitude that took you out of my protection. I gave you a warning, but you challenged Nature by saying that nothing could touch you. All these things combined and brought your mental difficulties, weakness and illness. You must change. You must try to fulfil the conditions of Mahasaraswati, make your work more and more perfect, make progress and try for a psychological transformation. Less than this will not help you. This is the minimum and if you try sincerely, my help will always be there. These days my work is going on at such a speed that unless you make a serious effort, you will be left far behind and not be able to remain with me. But if you do as I say, everything will be all right.
Your illness gave you an opportunity to open your eyes towards the need for an inner change. You must take advantage of this and progress.
Things that do not want to change in your nature join together and come out in the form of illness. The only thing to be done is to have a strong aspiration and a total change. Then everything will be all right. Page - 150
Be on your guard. There was on X a formation of fear − fear of cold, fear of bad health, etc. − take care that this formation does not jump upon you; you must reject it resolutely. 1937 You must not fear. Most of your troubles come from fear. In fact, ninety per cent of illnesses are the result of the subconscient fear of the body. In the ordinary consciousness of the body there is a more or less hidden anxiety about the consequences of the slightest physical disturbance. It can be translated by these words of doubt about the future: “And what will happen?” It is this anxiety that must be checked. Indeed this anxiety is a lack of confidence in the Divine’s Grace, the unmistakable sign that the consecration is not complete and perfect. As a practical means of overcoming this subconscient fear each time that something of it comes to the surface, the more enlightened part of the being must impress on the body the necessity of an entire trust in the Divine’s Grace, the certitude that this Grace is always working for the best in our self as well as in all, and the determination to submit entirely and unreservedly to the Divine’s Will. The body must know and be convinced that its essence is divine and that if no obstacle is put in the way of the Divine’s working, nothing can harm us. This process must be steadily repeated until all recurrence of fear is stopped. And then even if the illness succeeds in making its appearance, its strength and duration will be considerably diminished until it is definitively conquered. 14 October 1945 Page - 151 When physical disorder comes, one must not be afraid; one must not run away from it, must face it with courage, calmness, confidence, with the certitude that illness is a falsehood and that if one turns entirely, in full confidence, with a complete quietude to the divine grace, it will settle in these cells as it establishes itself in the depths of the being, and the cells themselves will share in the eternal Truth and Delight.
For some time I have been really worried about the skin-trouble on my legs. Please, Mother, throw this disease out of my body and the fear out of my mind.
The real disease is fear. Throw the fear away and the disease will go. My help is with you. Blessings. 1965 As for cancer, the first thing is that you should drive off all fear.
If you want to get cured there are two conditions. First you must be without fear, absolutely fearless, you understand, and secondly you must have a complete faith in the Divine protection. These two things are essential. Page - 152 |