{"id":2220,"date":"2013-07-13T01:40:12","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2220"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:40:12","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:40:12","slug":"78-chapter-xxiv-the-supramental-sense-vol-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga\/78-chapter-xxiv-the-supramental-sense-vol-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","title":{"rendered":"-78_Chapter XXIV The Supramental Sense.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n\n\n
\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tChapter XXIV <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe Supramental Sense
\n<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA<\/font>LL THE<\/b> instruments, all the activities of the mind have
\ntheir corresponding powers in the action of the supramental energy and are there exalted and transfigured, but
\nhave there a reverse order of priority and necessary importance. As there is a supramental thought and essential consciousness,
\nso too there is a supramental sense. Sense is fundamentally not the action of certain physical organs, but the contact of  consciousness with its objects, samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhen the consciousness of the being is withdrawn wholly into itself, it is aware only of itself, of its own being, its own
\nconsciousness, its own delight of existence, its own concentrated force of being, and of these things not in their forms but in their
\nessence. When it comes out of this self-immersion, it becomes aware of or it releases or develops out of its self-immersion its
\nactivities and forms of being, of consciousness, of delight and force. Then too, on the supramental plane, its primary awareness
\nstill remains of a kind native to and entirely characteristic of the self-awareness of the spirit, the self-knowledge of the one and
\ninfinite; it is a knowledge that knows all its objects, forms and activities comprehensively by being aware of them in its own
\ninfinite self, intimately by being aware in them as their self, absolutely by being aware of them as one in self with its own
\nbeing. All its other ways of knowledge are projected from this knowledge by identity, are parts or movements of it, or at the
\nlowest depend on it for their truth and light, are touched and supported by it even in their own separate way of action and
\nrefer back to it overtly or implicitly as their authority and origin. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe activity which is nearest to this essential knowledge by
\nidentity is the large embracing consciousness, especially characteristic of the supramental energy, which takes into itself all truth
\nand idea and object of knowledge and sees them at once in their   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>862<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tessence, totality and parts or aspects, \u2014 vijnā<\/font>na<\/i>. Its movement is a total seeing and seizing; it is a comprehension and possession in
\nthe self of knowledge; and it holds the object of consciousness as a part of the self or one with it, the unity being spontaneously
\n\t\t\tand directly realised in the act of knowledge. Another supramental
\n\t\t\tactivity puts the knowledge by identity more into the background and
\n\t\t\tstresses more the objectivity of the thing known. Its characteristic
\n\t\t\tmovement, descending into the mind, becomes the source of the
\n\t\t\tpeculiar nature of our mental knowledge, intelligence, prajnā<\/font>na<\/i>. In the mind the action of intelligence involves, at the outset, separation and otherness between the
\nknower, knowledge and the known; but in the supermind its movement still takes place in the infinite identity or at least in
\nthe cosmic oneness. Only, the self of knowledge indulges the delight of putting the object of consciousness away from the
\nmore immediate nearness of the original and eternal unity, but always in itself, and of knowing it again in another way so as
\nto establish with it a variety of relations of interaction which are so many minor chords in the harmony of the play of the
\nconsciousness. The movement of this supramental intelligence, 
\nprajnā<\/font>na<\/i>, becomes a subordinate, a tertiary action of the supramental for the fullness of which thought and word are needed.
\nThe primary action, because it is of the nature of knowledge by identity or of a comprehensive seizing in the consciousness, is
\ncomplete in itself and has no need of these means of formulation. The supramental intelligence is of the nature of a truth seeing,
\ntruth hearing and truth remembering and, though capable of being sufficient to itself in a certain way, still feels itself more
\nrichly fulfilled by the thought and word that give it a body of expression. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFinally, a fourth action of the supramental consciousness completes the various possibilities of the supramental knowledge. This still farther accentuates the objectivity of the thing known, puts it away from the station of experiencing consciousness and again brings it to nearness by a uniting contact effected either in a direct nearness, touch, union or less closely across
\nthe bridge or through the connecting stream of consciousness  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>863<\/font> <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tof which there has already been mention. It is a contacting
\nof existence, presences, things, forms, forces, activities, but a contacting of them in the stuff of the supramental being and
\nenergy, not in the divisions of matter and through the physical
\ninstruments, that creates the supramental sense, samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt is a little difficult to make the nature of the supramental sense understood to a mentality not yet familiar with it by enlarged experience, because our idea of sense action is
\ngoverned by the limiting experience of the physical mind and we suppose that the fundamental thing in it is the impression
\nmade by an external object on the physical organ of sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, and that the business of the mind, the
\npresent central organ of our consciousness, is only to receive the physical impression and its nervous translation and so become
\nintelligently conscious of the object. In order to understand the supramental change we have to realise first that the mind is the
\nonly real sense even in the physical process: its dependence on the physical impressions is the result of the conditions of the material
\nevolution, but not a thing fundamental and indispensable. Mind is capable of a sight that is independent of the physical eye, a
\nhearing that is independent of the physical ear, and so with the action of all the other senses. It is capable too of an awareness,
\noperating by what appears to us as mental impressions, of things not conveyed or even suggested by the agency of the physical
\norgans, \u2014 an opening to relations, happenings, forms even and the action of forces to which the physical organs could not have
\nborne evidence. Then, becoming aware of these rarer powers, we speak of the mind as a sixth sense; but in fact it is the only
\ntrue sense organ and the rest are no more than its outer conveniences and secondary instruments, although by its dependence
\non them they have become its limitations and its too imperative and exclusive conveyors. Again we have to realise
\n\u2014 and this is
\nmore difficult to admit for our normal ideas in the matter \u2014 that the mind itself is only the characteristic instrument of sense, but
\n˙ <\/i> the thing itself, sense in its purity, samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>, exists behind and
\nbeyond the mind it uses and is a movement of the self, a direct and original activity of the infinite power of its consciousness.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>864<\/font>  <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tThe pure action of sense is a spiritual action and pure sense is
\nitself a power of the spirit. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe spiritual sense is capable of knowing in its own characteristic way, which is other than that of supramental thought
\nor of the intelligence or spiritual comprehension, vijnā<\/font>na<\/i>, or knowledge by identity, all things whatsoever, things material and
\nwhat is to us immaterial, all forms and that which is formless. For all is spiritual substance of being, substance of consciousness and force, substance of delight; and the spiritual sense, pure
\n\t\t\tsamjnā<\/font>na<\/i>, is the conscious being’s contactual, substantial awareness of its own extended substance of self and in it of all that is of
\nthe infinite or universal substance. It is possible for us not only to know by conscious identity, by a spiritual comprehension
\nof self, of principles and aspects, force, play and action, by a direct spiritual, supramental and intuitive thought knowledge,
\nby the heart’s spiritually and supramentally illumined feeling, love, delight, but also to have in a very literal significance the
\nsense \u2014 sense-knowledge or sensation \u2014 of the spirit, the self, the Divine, the Infinite. The state described by the Upanishad
\nin which one sees, hears, feels, touches, senses in every way the Brahman and the Brahman only, for all things have become
\nto the consciousness only that and have no other, separate or independent existence, is not a mere figure of speech, but the
\nexact description of the fundamental action of the pure sense, 
\nthe spiritual object of the pure samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. And in this original action,
\n\u2014 to our experience a transfigured, glorified, infinitely
\nblissful action of the sense, a direct feeling out inward, around, everywhere of the self to embrace and touch and be sensible of
\nall that is in its universal being, \u2014 we can become aware in a most moving and delightful way of the Infinite and of all that is
\nin it, cognizant, by intimate contact of our being with all being, of whatever is in the universe. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe action of the supramental sense is founded on this true truth of sense; it is an organisation of this pure, spiritual, infinite,
\n\t\t\tabsolute samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. The supermind acting through sense feels
\n\t\t\tall as God and in God, all as the manifest touch, sight, hearing,
\n\t\t\ttaste, perfume, all as the felt, seen, directly experienced
\n\t\t\tsubstance <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>865<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tand power and energy and movement, play, penetration, vibration, form, nearness, pressure, substantial interchange of the Infinite. Nothing exists independently to its sense, but all is felt
\nas one being and movement and each thing as indivisible from the rest and as having in it all the Infinite, all the Divine. This
\nsupramental sense has the direct feeling and experience, not only of forms, but of forces and of the energy and the quality in things
\nand of a divine substance and presence which is within them and round them and into which they open and expand themselves
\nin their secret subtle self and elements, extending themselves in oneness into the illimitable. Nothing to the supramental sense is
\nreally finite: it is founded on a feeling of all in each and of each in all: its sense definition, although more precise and complete
\nthan the mental, creates no walls of limitation; it is an oceanic and ethereal sense in which all particular sense knowledge and
\nsensation is a wave or movement or spray or drop that is yet a concentration of the whole ocean and inseparable from the
\nocean. Its action is a result of the extension and vibration of being and consciousness in a supra-ethereal ether of light, ether
\nof power, ether of bliss, the Ananda Akasha of the Upanishads, which is the
\n\t\t\tmatrix and continent of the universal expression of the Self, \u2014 here
\n\t\t\tin body and mind experienced only in limited extensions and
\n\t\t\tvibrations, \u2014 and the medium of its true experience. This sense even
\n\t\t\tat its lowest power is luminous with a revealing light that carries
\n\t\t\tin it the secret of the thing it experiences and can therefore be a
\n\t\t\tstarting-point and basis of all the rest of the supramental
\n\t\t\tknowledge, \u2014 the supramental thought, spiritual intelligence and
\n\t\t\tcomprehension, conscious identity, \u2014 and on its highest plane or at
\n\t\t\tits fullest intensity of action it opens into or contains and at
\n\t\t\tonce liberates these things. It is strong with a luminous power that
\n\t\t\tcarries in it the force of self-realisation and an intense or
\n\t\t\tinfinite effectiveness, and this sense-experience can therefore be
\n\t\t\tthe starting-point of impulsion for a creative or fulfilling action
\n\t\t\tof the spiritual and supramental will and knowledge. It is rapturous
\n\t\t\twith a powerful and luminous delight that makes of it, makes of all
\n\t\t\tsense and sensation a key to or a vessel of the divine and infinite
\n\t\t\tAnanda.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>866<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t   The supramental sense can act in its own power and is independent of the body and the physical life and outer mind and it is above too the inner mind and its experiences. It can be aware
\nof all things in whatever world, on whatever plane, in whatever formation of universal consciousness. It can be aware of the
\nthings of the material universe even in the trance of samadhi, aware of them as they are or appear to the physical sense, even
\nas it is of other states of experience, of the pure vital, the mental, the psychical, the supramental presentation of things. It can in
\nthe waking state of the physical consciousness present to us the things concealed from the limited receptivity or beyond the range
\nof the physical organs, distant forms, scenes and happenings, things that have passed out of physical existence or that are not
\nyet in physical existence, scenes, forms, happenings, symbols of the vital, psychical, mental, supramental, spiritual worlds and all
\nthese in their real or significant truth as well as their appearance. It can use all the other states of sense consciousness and their
\nappropriate senses and organs adding to them what they have not, setting right their errors and supplying their deficiencies: for
\nit is the source of the others and they are only inferior derivations 
\nfrom this higher sense, this true and illimitable samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe lifting of the level of consciousness from the mind to the
\nsupermind and the consequent transformation of the being from the state of the mental to that of the supramental Purusha must
\nbring with it to be complete a transformation of all the parts of the nature and all its activities. The whole mind is not merely
\nmade into a passive channel of the supramental activities, a channel of their down-flow into the life and body and of their
\noutflow or communication with the outward world, the material existence, \u2014 that is only the first stage of the process,
\n\u2014 but is
\nitself supramentalised along with all its instruments. There is accordingly a change, a profound transformation in the physical
\nsense, a supramentalising of the physical sight, hearing, touch, etc., that
\n\t\t\tcreates or reveals to us a quite different view, not merely   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>867<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tof life and its meaning, but even of the material world and all
\nits forms and aspects. The supermind uses the physical organs and confirms their way of action, but it develops behind them
\nthe inner and deeper senses which see what are hidden from the physical organs and farther transforms the new sight, hearing,
\netc. thus created by casting it into its own mould and way of sensing. The change is one that takes nothing from the physical
\ntruth of the object, but adds to it its supraphysical truth and takes away by the removal of the physical limitation the element of
\nfalsehood in the material way of experience. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe supramentalising of the physical sense brings with it
\na result similar in this field to that which we experience in the transmutation of the thought and consciousness. As soon as the
\nsight, for example, becomes altered under the influence of the supramental seeing, the eye gets a new and transfigured vision
\nof things and of the world around us. Its sight acquires an extraordinary totality and an immediate and embracing precision
\nin which the whole and every detail stand out at once in the complete harmony and vividness of the significance meant by
\nNature in the object and its realisation of the idea in form, executed in a triumph of substantial being. It is as if the eye of
\nthe poet and artist had replaced the vague or trivial unseeing normal vision, but singularly spiritualised and glorified,
\n\u2014 as if
\nindeed it were the sight of the supreme divine Poet and Artist in which we were participating and there were given to us the
\nfull seeing of his truth and intention in his design of the universe and of each thing in the universe. There is an unlimited intensity
\nwhich makes all that is seen a revelation of the glory of quality and idea and form and colour. The physical eye seems then to
\ncarry in itself a spirit and a consciousness which sees not only the physical aspect of the object but the soul of quality in it, the
\nvibration of energy, the light and force and spiritual substance of which it is made. Thus there comes through the physical sense
\nto the total sense consciousness within and behind the vision a revelation of the soul of the thing seen and of the universal
\nspirit that is expressing itself in this objective form of its own conscious being. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>868<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t  There is at the same time a subtle change which makes the
\nsight see in a sort of fourth dimension, the character of which is a certain internality, the seeing not only of the superficies and the
\noutward form but of that which informs it and subtly extends around it. The material object becomes to this sight something
\ndifferent from what we now see, not a separate object on the background or in the environment of the rest of Nature, but
\nan indivisible part and even in a subtle way an expression of the unity of all that we see. And this unity that we see becomes
\nnot only to the subtler consciousness but to the mere sense, to the illumined physical sight itself, that of the identity of the
\nEternal, the unity of the Brahman. For to the supramentalised seeing the material world and space and material objects cease
\nto be material in the sense in which we now on the strength of the sole evidence of our limited physical organs and of the
\nphysical consciousness that looks through them receive as our gross perception and understand as our conception of matter. It
\nand they appear and are seen as spirit itself in a form of itself and a conscious extension. The whole is a unity
\n\u2014 the oneness
\nunaffected by any multitudinousness of objects and details \u2014 held in and by the consciousness in a spiritual space and all substance there is conscious substance. This change and this totality of the way of seeing comes from the exceeding of the limitations
\nof our present physical sense, because the power of the subtle or psychical eye has been infused into the physical and there has
\nagain been infused into this psycho-physical power of vision the ˙ <\/i> spiritual sight, the pure sense, the supramental samjnā<\/font>na<\/i>. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll the other senses undergo a similar transformation. All
\nthat the ear listens to, reveals the totality of its sound body and sound significance and all the tones of its vibration and
\nreveals also to the single and complete hearing the quality, the rhythmic energy, the soul of the sound and its expression of the
\none universal spirit. There is the same internality, the going of the sense into the depths of the sound and the finding there of
\nthat which informs it and extends it into unity with the harmony of all sound and no less with the harmony of all silence, so that
\nthe ear is always listening to the infinite in its heard expression  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>869<\/font>
\n  <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tand the voice of its silence. All sounds become to the supramentalised ear the voice of the Divine, himself born into sound, and a rhythm of the concord of the universal symphony. And there
\nis too the same completeness, vividness, intensity, the revelation of the self of the thing heard and the spiritual satisfaction of
\nthe self in hearing. The supramentalised touch also contacts or receives the touch of the Divine in all things and knows all
\nthings as the Divine through the conscious self in the contact: and there is too the same totality, intensity, revelation of all that
\nis in and behind the touch to the experiencing consciousness. There comes a similar transformation of the other senses. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThere is at the same time an opening of new powers in all the senses, an extension of range, a stretching out of the
\nphysical consciousness to an undreamed capacity. The supramental transformation extends too the physical consciousness
\nfar beyond the limits of the body and enables it to receive with a perfect concreteness the physical contact of things at a distance.
\nAnd the physical organs become capable of serving as channels for the psychic and other senses so that we can see with the
\nphysical waking eye what is ordinarily revealed only in the abnormal states and to the psychical vision, hearing or other sense
\nknowledge. It is the spirit or the inner soul that sees and senses, but the body and its powers are themselves spiritualised and
\nshare directly in the experience. The entire material sensation is supramentalised and it becomes aware, directly and with a
\nphysical participation and, finally, a unity with the subtler instrumentation, of forces and movements and the physical, vital,
\nemotional, mental vibrations of things and beings and feels them all not only spiritually or mentally but physically in the self and
\nas movements of the one self in these many bodies. The wall that the limitations of the body and its senses have built around us is
\nabolished even in the body and the senses and there is in its place the free communication of the eternal oneness. All sense and
\nsensation becomes full of the divine light, the divine power and intensity of experience, a divine joy, the delight of the Brahman.
\nAnd even that which is now to us discordant and jars on the senses takes its place in the universal concord of the universal <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>870<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tmovement, reveals its rasa<\/i>, meaning, design and, by delight in
\nits intention in the divine consciousness and its manifestation of its law and dharma, its harmony with the total self, its place
\nin the manifestation of the divine being, becomes beautiful and happy to the soul experience. All sensation becomes Ananda. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe embodied mind in us is ordinarily aware only through the physical organs and only of their objects and of subjective
\nexperiences which seem to start from the physical experience and to take them alone, however remotely, for their foundation
\nand mould of construction. All the rest, all that is not consistent with or part of or verified by the physical data, seems to it
\nrather imagination than reality and it is only in abnormal states that it opens to other kinds of conscious experience. But in fact
\nthere are immense ranges behind of which we could be aware if we opened the doors of our inner being. These ranges are there
\nalready in action and known to a subliminal self in us, and much even of our surface consciousness is directly projected from them
\nand without our knowing it influences our subjective experience of things. There is a range of independent vital or pranic experiences behind, subliminal to and other than the surface action of the vitalised physical consciousness. And when this opens itself
\nor acts in any way, there are made manifest to the waking mind the phenomena of a vital consciousness, a vital intuition, a vital
\nsense not dependent on the body and its instruments, although it may use them as a secondary medium and a recorder. It is
\npossible to open completely this range and, when we do so, we find that its operation is that of the conscious life force individualised in us contacting the universal life force and its operations in things, happenings and persons. The mind becomes aware of
\nthe life consciousness in all things, responds to it through our life consciousness with an immediate directness not limited by
\nthe ordinary communication through the body and its organs, records its intuitions, becomes capable of experiencing existence
\nas a translation of the universal Life or Prana. The field of which the vital consciousness and the vital sense are primarily aware
\nis not that of forms but, directly, that of forces: its world is a world of the play of energies, and form and event are sensed
\n  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>871<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tonly secondarily as a result and embodiment of the energies. The
\nmind working through the physical senses can only construct a view and knowledge of this nature as an idea in the intelligence,
\nbut it cannot go beyond the physical translation of the energies, and it has therefore no real or direct experience of the true nature
\nof life, no actual realisation of the life force and the life spirit. It is by opening this other level or depth of experience within and
\nby admission to the vital consciousness and vital sense that the mind can get the true and direct experience. Still, even then, so
\nlong as it is on the mental level, the experience is limited by the vital terms and their mental renderings and there is an obscurity
\neven in this greatened sense and knowledge. The supramental transformation supravitalises the vital, reveals it as a dynamics
\nof the spirit, makes a complete opening and a true revelation of all the spiritual reality behind and within the life force and the
\nlife spirit and of all its spiritual as well as its mental and purely vital truth and significance. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe supermind in its descent into the physical being awakens,
\n\t\t\tif not already wakened by previous yogic sadhana, the consciousness
\n\t\t\t\u2014 veiled or obscure in most of us \u2014 which supports and forms there the vital sheath, the prā<\/font>n<\/font>a kos<\/font>a<\/i>. When this .<\/i>
\nis awakened, we no longer live in the physical body alone, but also in a vital body which penetrates and envelops the physical
\nand is sensitive to impacts of another kind, to the play of the vital forces around us and coming in on us from the universe
\nor from particular persons or group lives or from things or else from the vital planes and worlds which are behind the material
\nuniverse. These impacts we feel even now in their result and in certain touches and affectations, but not at all or very little
\nin their source and their coming. An awakened consciousness in the pranic body immediately feels them, is aware of a pervading vital force other than the physical energy, and can draw upon it to increase the vital strength and support the physical
\nenergies, can deal directly with the phenomena and causes of health and disease by means of this vital influx or by directing
\npranic currents, can be aware of the vital and the vital-emotional atmosphere of others and deal with its interchanges, along with
\n  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>872<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\ta host of other phenomena which are unfelt by or obscure to our
\noutward consciousness but here become conscient and sensible. It is acutely aware of the life soul and life body in ourself and
\nothers. The supermind takes up this vital consciousness and vital sense, puts it on its right foundation and transforms it
\nby revealing the life-force here as the very power of the spirit dynamised for a near and direct operation on and through subtle
\nand gross matter and for formation and action in the material universe. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe first result is that the limitations of our individual life being break down and we live no longer with a personal life
\nforce, or not with that ordinarily, but in and by the universal life energy. It is all the universal Prana that comes consciently
\nstreaming into and through us, keeps up there a dynamic constant eddy, an unseparated centre of its power, a vibrant station
\nof storage and communication, constantly fills it with its forces and pours them out in activity upon the world around us. This
\nlife energy, again, is felt by us not merely as a vital ocean and its streams, but as the vital way and form and body and outpouring
\nof a conscious universal Shakti, and that conscient Shakti reveals itself as the Chit Shakti of the Divine, the Energy of the transcendent and universal Self and Purusha of which \u2014 or rather of whom \u2014 our universalised individuality becomes an instrument
\nand channel. As a result we feel ourselves one in life with all others and one with the life of all Nature and of all things in
\nthe universe. There is a free and conscious communication of the vital energy working in us with the same energy working
\nin others. We are aware of their life as of our own or, at the least, of the touch and pressure and communicated movements
\nof our life being on them and theirs upon us. The vital sense in us becomes powerful, intense, capable of bearing all the small
\nor large, minute or immense vibrations of this life world on all its planes physical and supraphysical, vital and supravital,
\n\t\t\tthrills with all its movement and Ananda and is aware of and open to
\n\t\t\tall forces. The supermind takes possession of all this great range
\n\t\t\tof experience, and makes it all luminous, harmonious, experienced
\n\t\t\tnot obscurely and fragmentarily and subject to the limitations <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>873<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tand errors of its handling by the mental ignorance, but revealed,
\nit and each movement of it, in its truth and totality of power and delight, and directs the great and now hardly limitable powers
\nand capacities of the life dynamis on all its ranges according to the simple and yet complex, the sheer and spontaneous and yet
\nunfalteringly intricate will of the Divine in our life. It makes the vital sense a perfect means of the knowledge of the life forces
\naround us, as the physical of the forms and sensations of the physical universe, and a perfect channel too of the reactions
\nof the active life force through us working as an instrument of self-manifestation. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe phenomena of this vital consciousness and sense, this direct sensation and perception of and response to the play of subtler
\nforces than the physical, are often included without distinction under the head of psychical phenomena. In a certain sense it is
\nan awakening of the psyche, the inner soul now hidden, clogged wholly or partially covered up by the superficial activity of the
\nphysical mind and senses that brings to the surface the submerged or subliminal inner vital consciousness and also an inner
\nor subliminal mental consciousness and sense capable of perceiving and experiencing directly, not only the life forces and their
\nplay and results and phenomena, but the mental and psychical worlds and all they contain and the mental activities, vibrations,
\nphenomena, forms, images of this world also and of establishing a direct communication between mind and mind without the aid
\nof the physical organs and the limitations they impose on our consciousness. There are however two different kinds of action
\nof these inner ranges of the consciousness. The first is a more outer and confused activity of the awakening subliminal mind
\nand life which is clogged with and subject to the grosser desires and illusions of the mind and vital being and vitiated in spite of
\nits wider range of experience and powers and capacities by an enormous mass of error and deformations of the will and knowledge, full of false suggestions and images, false and distorted <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tintuitions and inspirations and impulses, the latter often even
\ndepraved and perverse, and vitiated too by the interference of the physical mind and its obscurities. This is an inferior activity
\nto which clairvoyants, psychists, spiritists, occultists, seekers of powers and siddhis are very liable and to which all the warnings
\nagainst the dangers and errors of this kind of seeking are more especially applicable. The seeker of spiritual perfection has to
\npass as quickly as possible, if he cannot altogether avoid, this zone of danger, and the safe rule here is to be attached to none
\nof these things, but to make spiritual progress one’s sole real objective and to put no sure confidence in other things until
\nthe mind and life soul are purified and the light of the spirit and supermind or at least of the spiritually illumined mind and
\nsoul are shed on these inner ranges of experience. For when the mind is tranquillised and purified and the pure psyche liberated
\nfrom the insistence of the desire soul, these experiences are free from any serious danger,
\n\u2014 except indeed that of limitation and
\na certain element of error which cannot be entirely eliminated so long as the soul experiences and acts on the mental level. For
\nthere is then a pure action of the true psychical consciousness and its powers, a reception of psychical experience pure in itself
\nof the worse deformations, although subject to the limitations of the representing mind, and capable of a high spiritualisation and
\nlight. The complete power and truth, however, can only come by the opening of the supermind and the supramentalising of
\nthe mental and psychical experience. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe range of the psychic consciousness and its experiences
\nis almost illimitable and the variety and complexity of its phenomena almost infinite. Only some of the broad lines and main
\nfeatures can be noted here. The first and most prominent is the activity of the psychic senses of which the sight is the most
\ndeveloped ordinarily and the first to manifest itself with any largeness when the veil of the absorption in the surface consciousness which prevents the inner vision is broken. But all the physical senses have their corresponding powers in the psychical
\nbeing, there is a psychical hearing, touch, smell, taste: indeed the physical senses are themselves in reality only a projection of
\n  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tthe inner sense into a limited and externalised operation in and
\nthrough and upon the phenomena of gross matter. The psychical sight receives characteristically the images that are formed in the
\n\t\t\tsubtle matter of the mental or psychical ether, cittākāś<\/font>a<\/i>. These
\nmay be transcriptions there or impresses of physical things, persons, scenes, happenings, whatever is, was or will be or may be in
\nthe physical universe. These images are very variously seen and under all kinds of conditions; in samadhi or in the waking state,
\nand in the latter with the bodily eyes closed or open, projected on or into a physical object or medium or seen as if materialised
\nin the physical atmosphere or only in a psychical ether revealing itself through this grosser physical atmosphere; seen through
\nthe physical eyes themselves as a secondary instrument and as if under the conditions of the physical vision or by the psychical
\nvision alone and independently of the relations of our ordinary sight to space. The real agent is always the psychical sight and the
\npower indicates that the consciousness is more or less awake, intermittently or normally and more or less perfectly, in the
\npsychical body. It is possible to see in this way the transcriptions or impressions of things at any distance beyond the range of the
\nphysical vision or the images of the past or the future. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBesides these transcriptions or impresses the psychical vision
\n\t\t\treceives thought images and other forms created by constant activity
\n\t\t\tof consciousness in ourselves or in other human beings, and these
\n\t\t\tmay be according to the character of the activity images of truth or
\n\t\t\tfalsehood or else mixed things, partly true, partly false, and may
\n\t\t\tbe too either mere shells and representations or images inspired
\n\t\t\twith a temporary life and consciousness and, it may be, carrying in
\n\t\t\tthem in one way or another some kind of beneficent or maleficent
\n\t\t\taction or some willed or unwilled effectiveness on our minds or
\n\t\t\tvital being or through them even on the body. These transcriptions,
\n\t\t\timpresses, thought images, life images, projections of the
\n\t\t\tconsciousness may also be representations or creations not of the
\n\t\t\tphysical world, but of vital, psychic or mental worlds beyond us,
\n\t\t\tseen in our own minds or projected from other than human beings. And
\n\t\t\tas there is this psychical vision of which some of the more external
\n\t\t\tand <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>876<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tordinary manifestations are well enough known by the name of
\nclairvoyance, so there is a psychical hearing and psychical touch, taste, smell
\n\u2014 clairaudience, clairsentience are the more external
\nmanifestations, \u2014 with precisely the same range each in its own kind, the same fields and manner and conditions and varieties
\nof their phenomena. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThese and other phenomena create an indirect, a representative range of psychical experience; but the psychical sense has also the power of putting us in a more direct communication
\nwith earthly or supraterrestrial beings through their psychical selves or their psychical bodies or even with things, for things
\nalso have a psychical reality and souls or presences supporting them which can communicate with our psychical consciousness.
\nThe most notable of these more powerful but rarer phenomena are those which attend the power of exteriorisation of our consciousness for various kinds of action otherwise and elsewhere than in the physical body, communication in the psychical body
\nor some emanation or reproduction of it, oftenest, though by no means necessarily, during sleep or trance and the setting up of
\nrelations or communication by various means with the denizens of another plane of existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor there is a continuous scale of the planes of consciousness, beginning with the psychical and other belts attached to
\nand dependent on the earth plane and proceeding through the true independent vital and psychical worlds to the worlds of the
\ngods and the highest supramental and spiritual planes of existence. And these are in fact always acting upon our subliminal
\nselves unknown to our waking mind and with considerable effect on our life and nature. The physical mind is only a little part of
\nus and there is a much more considerable range of our being in which the presence, influence and powers of the other planes are
\nactive upon us and help to shape our external being and its activities. The awakening of the psychical consciousness enables us to
\nbecome aware of these powers, presences and influences in and around us; and while in the impure or yet ignorant and imperfect
\nmind this unveiled contact has its dangers, it enables us too, if rightly used and directed, to be no longer their subject but their
\n  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tmaster and to come into conscious and self-controlled possession
\nof the inner secrets of our nature. The psychical consciousness reveals this interaction between the inner and the outer planes,
\nthis world and others, partly by an awareness, which may be very constant, vast and vivid, of their impacts, suggestions, communications to our inner thought and conscious being and a capacity of reaction upon them there, partly also through many kinds of
\nsymbolic, transcriptive or representative images presented to the different psychical senses. But also there is the possibility of a
\nmore direct, concretely sensible, almost material, sometimes actively material communication
\n\u2014 a complete though temporary
\nphysical materialisation seems to be possible \u2014 with the powers, forces and beings of other worlds and planes. There may even be
\na complete breaking of the limits of the physical consciousness and the material existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe awakening of the psychical consciousness liberates in us the direct use of the mind as a sixth sense, and this power
\nmay be made constant and normal. The physical consciousness can only communicate with the minds of others or know the
\nhappenings of the world around us through external means and signs and indications, and it has beyond this limited action only a
\nvague and haphazard use of the mind’s more direct capacities, a poor range of occasional presentiments, intuitions and messages.
\nOur minds are indeed constantly acting and acted upon by the minds of others through hidden currents of which we are not
\naware, but we have no knowledge or control of these agencies. The psychical consciousness, as it develops, makes us aware of
\nthe great mass of thoughts, feelings, suggestions, will impacts, influences of all kinds that we are receiving from others or sending to others or imbibing from and throwing into the general mind atmosphere around us. As it evolves in power, precision
\nand clearness, we are able to trace these to their source or feel immediately their origin and transit to us and direct consciously
\nand with an intelligent will our own messages. It becomes possible to be aware, more or less accurately and discerningly, of the
\nactivities of minds whether near to us physically or at a distance, to understand, feel or identify ourselves with their temperament, <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>878<\/font> 
\n <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tcharacter, thoughts, feelings, reactions, whether by a psychic
\nsense or a direct mental perception or by a very sensible and often intensely concrete reception of them into our mind or on
\nits recording surface. At the same time we can consciously make at least the inner selves and, if they are sufficiently sensitive,
\nthe surface minds of others aware of our own inner mental or psychic self and plastic to its thoughts, suggestions, influences or
\neven cast it or its active image in influence into their subjective, even into their vital and physical being to work there as a helping
\nor moulding or dominating power and presence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll these powers of the psychic consciousness need have and
\noften have no more than a mental utility and significance, but it can also be used with a spiritual sense and light and intention
\nin it and for a spiritual purpose. This can be done by a spiritual meaning and use in our psychical interchange with others, and
\nit is largely by a psycho-spiritual interchange of this kind that a master in Yoga helps his disciple. The knowledge of our inner subliminal and psychic nature, of the powers and presences and influences there and the capacity of communication with
\nother planes and their powers and beings can also be used for a higher than any mental or mundane object, for the possession
\nand mastering of our whole nature and the overpassing of the intermediate planes
\n\t\t\ton the way to the supreme spiritual heights of being. But the most
\n\t\t\tdirect spiritual use of the psychic consciousness is to make it an
\n\t\t\tinstrument of contact, communication and union with the Divine. A
\n\t\t\tworld of psycho-spiritual symbols is readily opened up, illuminating
\n\t\t\tand potent and living forms and instruments, which can be made a
\n\t\t\trevelation of spiritual significances, a support for our spiritual
\n\t\t\tgrowth and the evolution of spiritual capacity and experience, a
\n\t\t\tmeans towards spiritual power, knowledge or Ananda. The mantra is
\n\t\t\tone of these psycho-spiritual means, at once a symbol, an instrument
\n\t\t\tand a sound body for the divine manifestation, and of the same kind
\n\t\t\tare the images of the Godhead and of its personalities or powers
\n\t\t\tused in meditation or for adoration in Yoga. The great forms or
\n\t\t\tbodies of the Divine are revealed through which he manifests his
\n\t\t\tliving presence to us and we can more easily  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 <\/font>879<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tby their means intimately know, adore and give ourselves to
\nhim and enter into the different lokas, worlds of his habitation and presence, where we can live in the light of his being. His
\nword, command, Adesha, presence, touch, guidance can come to us through our spiritualised psychic consciousness and, as
\na subtly concrete means of transmission from the spirit, it can give us a close communication and nearness to him through all
\nour psychic senses. These and many more are the spiritual uses of the psychic consciousness and sense and, although capable
\nof limitation and deformation, \u2014 for all secondary instruments can be also by our mental capacity of exclusive self-limitation
\nmeans of a partial but at the same time hindrances to a more integral realisation,
\n\u2014 they are of the greatest utility on the road
\nto the spiritual perfection and afterwards, liberated from the limitation of our minds, transformed and supramentalised, an
\nelement of rich detail in the spiritual Ananda. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAs the physical and vital, the psychical consciousness and
\nsense also are capable of a supramental transformation and receive by it their own integral fullness and significance. The
\nsupermind lays hold on the psychical being, descends into it, changes it into the mould of its own nature and uplifts it to be
\na part of the supramental action and state, the supra-psychic being of the Vijnana Purusha. The first result of this change is
\nto base the phenomena of the psychical consciousness on their true foundation by bringing into it the permanent sense, the
\ncomplete realisation, the secure possession of the oneness of our mind and soul with the minds and souls of others and the mind
\nand soul of universal Nature. For always the effect of the supramental growth is to universalise the individual consciousness. As
\nit makes us live, even in our individual vital movement and its relations with all around us, with the universal life, so it makes us
\nthink and feel and sense, although through an individual centre or instrument, with the universal mind and psychical being. This
\nhas two results of great importance. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFirst, the phenomena of the psychical sense and mind lose
\nthe fragmentariness and incoherence or else difficult regulation and often quite artificial order which pursues them even more<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tthan it pursues our more normal mental activities of the surface,
\nand they become the harmonious play of the universal inner mind and soul in us, assume their true law and right forms and
\nrelations and reveal their just significances. Even on the mental plane one can get by the spiritualising of the mind at some
\nrealisation of soul oneness, but it is never really complete, at least in its application, and does not acquire this real and entire
\nlaw, form, relation, complete and unfailing truth and accuracy of its significances. And, secondly, the activity of the psychical
\nconsciousness loses all character of abnormality, of an exceptional, irregular and even a perilously supernormal action, often
\nbringing a loss of hold upon life and a disturbance or an injury to other parts of the being. It not only acquires its own right
\norder within itself but its right relation with the physical life on one side and with the spiritual truth of being on the other and
\nthe whole becomes a harmonious manifestation of the embodied spirit. It is always the originating supermind that contains within
\nitself the true values, significances and relations of the other parts of our being and its unfolding is the condition of the integral
\npossession of our self and nature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe complete transformation comes on us by a certain
\nchange, not merely of the poise or level of our regarding conscious self or even of its law and character, but also of the
\nwhole substance of our conscious being. Till that is done, the supramental consciousness manifests above the mental and psychical atmosphere of being \u2014 in which the physical has already become a subordinate and to a large extent a dependent method
\nof our self’s expression, \u2014 and it sends down its power, light, and influence into it to illumine it and transfigure. But only when the
\nsubstance of the lower consciousness has been changed, filled potently, wonderfully transformed, swallowed up as it were
\n\u00af<\/i> into the greater energy and sense of being, mahā<\/font>n<\/i>, br<\/font>hat<\/i>, of
\n.<\/i> which it is a derivation and projection, do we have the perfected,
\nentire and constant supramental consciousness. The substance, the conscious ether of being in which the mental or psychic
\nconsciousness and sense live and see and feel and experience is something subtler, freer, more plastic than that of the physical <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tmind and sense. As long as we are dominated by the latter,
\npsychical phenomena may seem to us less real, hallucinatory even, but the more we acclimatise ourselves to the psychical and
\nto the ether of being which it inhabits, the more we begin to see the greater truth and to sense the more spiritually concrete
\nsubstance of all to which its larger and freer mode of experience bears witness. Even, the physical may come to seem to itself
\nunreal and hallucinatory \u2014 but this is an exaggeration and new misleading exclusiveness due to a shifting of the centre and a
\nchange of action of the mind and sense \u2014 or else may seem at any rate less powerfully real. When, however, the psychical and
\nphysical experiences are well combined in their true balance, we live at once in two complementary worlds of our being each
\nwith its own reality, but the psychical revealing all that is behind the physical, the soul view and experience taking precedence
\nand enlightening and explaining the physical view and experience. The supramental transformation again changes the whole
\nsubstance of our consciousness; it brings in an ether of greater being, consciousness, sense, life, which convicts the psychical
\nalso of insufficiency and makes it appear by itself an incomplete reality and only a partial truth of all that we are and become
\nand witness. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll the experiences of the psychical are accepted and held
\nup indeed in the supramental consciousness and its energy, but they are filled with the light of a greater truth, the substance of
\na greater spirit. The psychical consciousness is first supported and enlightened, then filled and occupied with the supramental
\nlight and power and the revealing intensity of its vibrations. Whatever exaggeration, whatever error born of isolated incidence, insufficiently illumined impression, personal suggestion, misleading influence and intention or other cause of limitation or
\ndeformation interferes in the truth of the mental and psychical experience and knowledge, is revealed and cured or vanishes,
\nfailing to stand in the light of the self-truth \u2014 satyam<\/i>, r<\/font>tam <\/i>\u2014 of
\n.<\/i>
\nthings, persons, happenings, indications, representations proper to this greater largeness. All the psychical communications, transcriptions, impresses, symbols, images receive their true value,  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\ttake their right place, are put into their proper relations. The psychical intelligence and sensation are lit up with the supramental sense and knowledge, their phenomena, intermediate between
\nthe spiritual and material worlds, begin to reveal automatically their own truth and meaning and also the limitations of their
\ntruth and significance. The images presented to the inner sight, hearing, sensation of all kinds are occupied by or held in a larger
\nand more luminous mass of vibrations, a greater substance of light and intensity which brings into them the same change as
\nin the things of the physical sense, a greater totality, precision, revealing force of sense knowledge carried in the image. And
\nfinally all is lifted up and taken into the supermind and made a part of the infinitely luminous consciousness, knowledge and
\nexperience of the supramental being, the Vijnana Purusha. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe state of the being after this supramental transformation
\nwill be in all its parts of consciousness and knowledge that of an infinite and cosmic consciousness acting through the universalised individual Purusha. The fundamental power will be an awareness of identity, a knowledge by identity,
\n\u2014 an identity of
\nbeing, of consciousness, of force of being and consciousness, of delight of being, an identity with the Infinite, the Divine,
\nand with all that is in the Infinite, all that is the expression and manifestation of the Divine. This awareness and knowledge
\nwill use as its means and instruments a spiritual vision of all that the knowledge by identity can found, a supramental real
\nidea and thought of the nature of direct thought vision, thought hearing, thought memory that reveals, interprets or represents
\nto the awareness the truth of all things, and an inner truth speech that expresses it, and finally a supramental sense that provides
\na relation of contact in substance of being with all things and persons and powers and forces in all the planes of existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe supramental will not depend on the instrumentation, for example,
\n\t\t\tof the sense, as the physical mind is dependent on the evidence of
\n\t\t\tour senses, although it will be capable of making them a
\n\t\t\tstarting-point for the higher forms of knowledge, as it will also be
\n\t\t\tcapable of proceeding directly through these higher forms and making
\n\t\t\tthe sense only a means of formation   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>883<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tand objective expression. The supramental being will transform
\nat the same time and take up into itself the present thinking of the mind transfigured into an immensely larger knowledge
\nby identity, knowledge by total comprehension, knowledge by intimate perception of detail and relation, all direct, immediate,
\nspontaneous, all the expression of the self’s already existent eternal knowledge. It will take up, transform, supramentalise
\nthe physical sense, the sixth sense capacities of the mind and the psychic consciousness and senses and use them as the means of
\nan extreme inner objectivisation of experience. Nothing will be really external to it, for it will experience all in the unity of the
\ncosmic consciousness which will be its own, the unity of being of the infinite which will be its own being. It will experience
\nmatter, not only gross matter but the subtle and the most subtle, as substance and form of the spirit, experience life and all kinds
\nof energy as the dynamics of the spirit, supramentalised mind as a means or channel of knowledge of the spirit, supermind as the
\ninfinite self of knowledge and power of knowledge and Ananda of knowledge of the spirit. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>884<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter XXIV   The Supramental Sense   ALL THE instruments, all the activities of the mind have their corresponding powers in the action of the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","wpcat-46-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2220\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}