Proper Conduct

 

I know that people are fussy and unreasonable. But unless their consciousness changes, what else can we expect from them?

 

People are here to change their consciousness. Unless they become, all of them, true to their aim, nothing true can be done.

 

It is evident that those who want to live here must change not so much their way of living as their way of being.

We are striving towards a consciousness more deep, more total and more true; because our raison d'être is to manifest this consciousness.

 

What is the use of being a sadhak if, as soon as we act, we act like the ignorant ordinary man?

 

We are expected to give to the world an example of better life but surely not of misbehaviour.

 

The moment one enters the life of the Ashram and takes up the yoga, he ceases to belong to any creed or caste or race; he is one of Sri Aurobindo's disciples and nothing else. To cut jokes

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about what he was in the past is altogether incongruous and in bad taste, and only helps to keep up in both him and the speaker an old and wrong mental attitude.

January 1929

  

When X, a dancer, came here to see You, many sadhaks flocked around him. They insisted on his performing some dances. But he said he had come here without any dance dresses. He did not appreciate people's desires for dances. He secretly told me that if he came here again he would take particular care not to bring the dance costumes. For he would come not for showing himself off but for the yoga!

 

He is quite right. Too many people in the Ashram forget that they are here for yoga.

7 January 1938 

The Ashram is meant for Yoga, not for musical entertainment or other social activities.

Those that live in the Ashram are requested to live quietly and noiselessly and if they are not capable themselves of meditation they must, at least, leave the others to meditate.

 

I do not know who is spreading the rumour that I do not like music. That is not true at all I like music very much, but it should be heard in a small circle, that is, played for five or six people at the most. When there is a crowd it becomes a social gathering, more often than not, and the atmosphere that is created is not good.  

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Apart from the fact that the Ashram is not meant for those who seek the satisfaction of their vital or sentimental desires, but for those who aspire to perfect their consecration to the Divine, I have to warn you that here you must do only what can be done publicly because nothing can remain hidden.

25 April 1958

 

In the Ashram one must do only what one may do publicly, for nothing remains hidden. As for my protection it is equally over all and not over some as against others.

 

It is impossible to give a single answer for all cases. With each person and on each occasion, it will differ. But, at any rate, it can be said that whoever lives in a community must follow, as much as possible, the rules of that community. Moreover people have a right to go against collective rules only when all their actions are prompted exclusively by the Divine in them. If all they do, all they say is done and said as they would do and say in the presence of the Divine, then, but then only, they have the right to say, “I follow my own rule and no other.”

28 January 1960 

With “personal feelings” nothing can be done in the Ashram.

Rise above personal feelings and the doors of realisation will open.

3 February 1965 

It is high time that peace and harmony should reign in the Ashram.  

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(About a fight between two Ashramites)

 

All that seems very much like going back to the time of primitive man in the caves.

We do not wish to live the artificial life of civilised society, but it would be better to climb up the ladder towards a greater civilisation rather than to fall backwards to the rule of the blows.

 

I have sent for the “delinquent” to tell him that this kind of activity is out of place in the Ashram, though unfortunately it is only too often practised here; but I am sending you this letter before seeing him so that you may know that he has nothing to do with what I am writing to you.

But the second part of your letter made me see that, without justifying the aggression, for an aggression cannot be justified, at least your state of mind warrants it. I have rarely seen such a display of hatred and envy, bitter criticism and commonplace morality arising from unsatisfied and repressed desires.

All this is not very nice and immediately takes away the sympathy one could have felt because of the blows you received.

 

I thank you for reminding me that my position gives me duties and responsibilities, but it is better to call the Grace rather than justice, for if it were to come into action very few would be those who could stand before it.

 

Sexual relations are forbidden in the Ashram.

So, honesty demands a choice between the Ashram and sexual relations. It is a matter of conscience.

12 June 1971 

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The Ashram is not a place for being in love with anyone. If you want to lapse into such a stupidity, you may do so elsewhere, not here. 

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