{"id":70,"date":"2013-07-13T01:25:40","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=70"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:25:40","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:40","slug":"51-yoga-and-hypnotism-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03\/51-yoga-and-hypnotism-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","title":{"rendered":"-51_Yoga and Hypnotism.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\n
\nYoga and Hypnotism<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nW<\/font>HEN <\/font>
\n<\/b>the mind is entirely passive, then
\nthe force of Nature which works in the whole of animate and
\ninanimate creation, has free play; for it is in reality this force
\nwhich works in man as well as in the sun and star. There is no
\ndoubt of this truth whether in Hinduism or in Science. This is the
\nthing called Nature, the sum of cosmic force and energy, which
\nalone Science recognises as the source of all work and activity.
\nThis also is the Prakriti of the Hindus to which under different
\nnames Sankhya and Vedanta agree in assigning a similar position
\nand function in the Universe. But the immediate question is
\nwhether this force can act in man independently of man’s individual will and initiative. Must it always act through his volition
\nor has it a power of independent operation ? The first real proof
\nwhich Science has had of the power of action independent of volition is the
\nphenomena of hypnotism. Unfortunately, the nature of hypnotism has not been properly understood. It is supposed that by putting the subject to sleep the hypnotist is able
\nin some mysterious and unexplained way to substitute his will for
\nthe subject’s. In a certain sense all the subject’s activities in the
\nhypnotic state are the results of his own volition, but that volition is not
\nspontaneous, it is used as a slave by the operator working through the medium of suggestion. Whatever the hypnotist
\nsuggests that the subject shall think, act or feel, he thinks, acts
\nor feels, and whatever the hypnotist suggests that the subject
\nshall become, he becomes. What is it that gives the operator this
\nstupendous power ? Why should the mere fact of a man passing
\ninto this sleep-condition suspend the ordinary reactions of mind
\nand body and substitute others at the mere word of the man who
\nhas said to him "sleep" ? It is sometimes supposed that it is the
\nsuperior will of the hypnotist which overcomes the will of the
\nother and makes it a slave. There are two strong objections to
\nthis view. It does not appear to be true that it is the weak and
\ndistracted will that is most easily hypnotised; on the contrary,<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\nthe strong concentrated mind forms a good subject. Secondly, if
\nit were the operator’s will using the will of the subject, then the
\nresults produced must be such as the latter could himself bring
\nabout, since the capacities of the instrument cannot be exceeded
\nby the power working through the instrument. Even if we suppose that the invading will brings with it its own force still the
\nresults produced must not exceed the sum of its capacity plus the
\ncapacity of the instrument. If they commonly do so, we must
\nsuppose that it is neither the will of the operator nor the will of
\nthe subject nor the sum of these two wills that is active, but some
\nother and more potent force. This is precisely what we see in
\nhypnotic performance.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nWhat is this force that enables or compels a weak man to
\nbecome so rigid that strong arms cannot bend him; that reverses
\nthe operations of the senses and abrogates pain ? That changes
\nthe fixed character of a man in the shortest of periods ? That is
\nable to develop power where there was no power, moral strength
\nwhere there was weakness, health where there was disease?
\nThat in its higher manifestations can exceed the barriers of space
\nand time and produce that far-sight, far-hearing and far-thinking
\nwhich shows mind to be an untrammelled agent or medium pervading the world and not limited to the body which it informs or
\nseems to inform. The European scientist experimenting with
\nhypnotism is handling forces which he cannot understand, stumbling on truths of which he cannot give a true account. His feet
\nare faltering on the threshold of Yoga. It is held by some thinkers, and not unreasonably if we consider these phenomena, that
\nmind is all and contains all. It is not the body which determines
\nthe laws of the body. It is the ordinary law of the body that if it
\nis struck, pierced or roughly pressed, it feels pain. This law is
\ncreated by the mind which associates pain with these contacts,
\nand if the mind changes its Dharma and is able to associate with
\nthose contacts not pain but insensibility or pleasure, then they
\nwill bring about those results of insensibility or pleasure and no
\nother. The pain and pleasure are not the result of the contact,
\nneither is their seat in the body; they are the result of association
\nand their seat is in the mind. Vinegar is sour, sugar sweet, but to
\nthe hypnotised mind vinegar can be sweet, sugar sour. The sour-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\nness or sweetness is not in the vinegar or sugar, but in the mind.
\nThe heart also is the subject of the mind. My emotions are like
\nmy physical feelings, the result of association, and my character
\nis the result of accumulated past experiences with their resultant
\nassociations and reactions crystallising into habits of mind and
\nheart summed up in the word, character. These things like all
\nthe rest that are made of the stuff of associations are not permanent or binding but fluid and mutable,
\nanityāh sarve samskārāh<\/i>.
\n<\/i>If my friend blames me, I am grieved; that is an association and
\nnot binding. The grief is not the result of the blame but of an
\nassociation in the mind. I can change the association so far that
\nblame will cause me no grief, praise no elation. I can entirely stop
\nthe reactions of joy and grief by the same force that created them.
\nThey are habits of the mind, nothing more. In the same way
\nthough with more difficulty I can stop the reactions of physical
\npain and pleasure so that nothing will hurt my body. If I am a
\ncoward today, I can be a hero tomorrow. The cowardice was
\nmerely the habit of associating certain things with pain and grief
\nand the shrinking from the pain and grief; this shrinking and
\nthe physical sensations in the vital or nervous man which accompany it are called fear and they can be dismissed by the action of
\nthe mind which created them. All these are propositions which
\nEuropean science is even now unwilling to admit, yet it is being
\nproved more and more by the phenomena of hypnotism that
\nthese effects can be temporarily at least produced by one man
\nupon another; and it has even been proved that disease can be
\npermanently cured or character permanently changed by the
\naction of one mind upon another. The rest will be established in
\ntime by the development of hypnotism.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe difference between Yoga and hypnotism is that what
\nhypnotism does for a man through the agency of another and in
\nthe sleeping state, Yoga does for him by his own agency and in
\nthe waking state. The hypnotic sleep is necessary in order to prevent the activity of the subject’s mind full of old ideas and associations, from interfering with the operator.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nIn the waking state he would naturally refuse to experience
\nsweetness in vinegar or sourness in sugar or to believe that he can
\nchange from disease to health, cowardice to heroism by a mere<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 389<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nact of faith; his established association would rebel violently
\nand successfully against such contradictions of universal experience. The force which transcends matter would be hampered
\nby the obstruction of ignorance and attachment to universal
\nerror. The hypnotic sleep does not make the mind a tabula rasa<\/i>,
\n<\/i>but it renders it passive to everything but the touch of the operator. Yoga similarly teaches passivity of the mind so that the
\nwill may act unhampered by the samskāras<\/i>, or old associations.
\nIt is these samskāras<\/i>, the habits formed by experience in the
\nbody, heart or mind, that form the laws of our psychology. The
\nassociations of the mind are the stuff of which our life is made.
\nThey are more persistent in the body than in the mind and therefore harder to alter. They are more persistent in the race than in
\nthe individual; the conquest of the body and mind by the individual is comparatively easy and can be done in the space of a
\nsingle life, but the same conquest by the race involves the development of ages. It is conceivable, however, that the practice of
\nYoga by a great number of men and persistence might bring
\nabout profound changes in human psychology and, by stamping
\nthese changes into body and brain through heredity, evolve a
\nsuperior race which would endure and by the law of the survival
\nof the fittest eliminate the weaker kinds of humanity. Just as the
\nrudimentary mind of the animal has been evolved into the fine
\ninstrument of the human being so the rudiments of higher force
\nand faculty in the present race might evolve into the perfect
\nbuddhi<\/i> of the Yogin.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nYo yacchraddhah sa eva sah<\/i>. According as is a man’s fixed
\nand complete belief, that he is, not immediately always but sooner or later, by the law that makes the psychical tend inevitably
\nto express itself in the material. The will is the agent by which
\nall these changes are made and old samskāras<\/i> replaced by new,
\nand the will cannot act without faith. The question then arises
\nwhether mind is the ultimate force or there is another which
\ncommunicates with the outside world through the mind. Is the
\nmind the agent or simply the instrument? If the mind be all,
\nthen it is only animals that can have the power to evolve; but
\nthis does not accord with the laws of the world as we know them.
\nThe tree evolves, the clod evolves, everything evolves. Even in<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\nanimals it is evident that mind is not all in the sense of being the
\nultimate force in nature. It seems to be all, only because that
\nwhich is all expresses itself in the mind and passes everything
\nthrough it for the sake of manifestation. That which we call
\nmind is a medium which pervades the world. Otherwise we could
\nnot have the instantaneous and electrical action of mind upon
\nmind of which human experience is full and of which the new
\nphenomena of hypnotism, telepathy, etc., are only fresh proofs.
\nThere must be contact, there must be interpenetration if we are
\nto account for these phenomena on any reasonable theory. Mind
\ntherefore is held by the Hindus to be a species of subtle matter
\nin which ideas are waves or ripples and it is not limited by the
\nphysical body which it uses as an instrument. There is an ulterior
\nforce which works through this subtle medium called mind. An
\nanimal species develops, according to the modern theory, under
\nthe subtle influence of the environment. The environment supplies a need and those who satisfy the need develop a new species
\nwhich survives because it is more fit. This is not the result of any
\nintellectual perception of the need nor of a resolve to develop the
\nnecessary changes, but of a desire, often though not always, a
\nmute, inarticulate and unthought desire. That desire attracts a
\nforce which satisfies it. What is that force ? The tendency of psychical desire to manifest in the material change is one term in the
\nequation; the force which develops the change in response to the
\ndesire is another. We have a will beyond mind which dictates
\nthe change, we have a force beyond mind which affects it. According to Hindu philosophy, the will is the Jiva, the Purusha, the
\nSelf in the ānandakosa<\/i> acting through vij\u00f1āna<\/i>, universal or transcendental mind; this is what we call spirit. The force is Prakriti
\nor Shakti, the female principle in Nature which is at the root of
\nall action. Behind both is the single Self of the universe which
\ncontains both Jiva and Prakriti, spirit and material energy. Yoga
\nputs these ultimate existences within us in touch with each other
\nand by stilling the activity of the samskāras<\/i> or associations in
\nmind and body, enables them to act swiftly, victoriously and as
\nthe world calls it, miraculously. In reality, there is no such thing
\nas a miracle; there are only laws and processes which are not yet
\nunderstood.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 391<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nYoga is therefore no dream, no illusion of mystics. It is
\nknown that we can alter the associations of mind and body temporarily and that the mind can alter the conditions of the body
\npartially. Yoga asserts that these things can be done permanently
\nand completely. For the body, conquest of disease, pain and
\nmaterial obstructions, for the mind, liberation from bondage to
\npast experience and the heavier limitations of space and time,
\nfor the heart victory over sin and grief and fear, for the spirit
\nunclouded bliss, strength and illumination, this is the gospel of
\nYoga, this is the goal to which Hinduism points humanity.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 392<\/font><\/p>\n

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