Open main menu
Line 10: Line 10:
 
It is to bring back all the scattered threads of consciousness to a single point, a single idea. <ref>The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).</ref>  
 
It is to bring back all the scattered threads of consciousness to a single point, a single idea. <ref>The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).</ref>  
 
----
 
----
Concentration, for our Yoga, means when the consciousness is fixed in a particular state (e.g. peace) or movement (e.g. aspiration, will, coming into contact with the Mother, taking the Mother’s name); <ref>Sri Aurobindo. (2015). The Synthetic Method of the Integral Yoga. In Letters on yoga II.</ref>
+
Concentration, for our Yoga, means when the consciousness is fixed in a particular state (e.g. peace) or movement (e.g. aspiration, will, coming into contact with the Mother, taking the Mother’s name); <ref>Sri Aurobindo. (2015). The Synthetic Method of the Integral Yoga. In Letters on yoga II.</ref> (See '''[[Yogic Concentration]]''')
 
----
 
----
 
Concentration is a state one must be in continually, whatever the outer activity.<ref>The Mother. (1979). Letters to a Young Sadhak VI (1933-1949). In Collected works of the Mother Volume 16. Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/letters-to-a-young-sadhak-vi</ref>
 
Concentration is a state one must be in continually, whatever the outer activity.<ref>The Mother. (1979). Letters to a Young Sadhak VI (1933-1949). In Collected works of the Mother Volume 16. Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/letters-to-a-young-sadhak-vi</ref>

Revision as of 15:45, 24 May 2018

Related pages: Yogic Concentration | Meditation | Difference between Concentration and Meditation | Knowledge by idenitity

What is concentration?

Concentration means fixing the consciousness in one place or on one object and in a single condition. [1]


In concentration proper there is not a series of thoughts, but the mind is silently fixed on one object, name, idea, place etc. [2]


It is to bring back all the scattered threads of consciousness to a single point, a single idea. [3]


Concentration, for our Yoga, means when the consciousness is fixed in a particular state (e.g. peace) or movement (e.g. aspiration, will, coming into contact with the Mother, taking the Mother’s name); [4] (See Yogic Concentration)


Concentration is a state one must be in continually, whatever the outer activity.[5]


Why should one learn to concentrate?

...whatever you may want to do in life, one thing is absolutely indispensable and at the basis of everything, the capacity of concentrating the attention. If you are able to gather together the rays of attention and consciousness on one point and can maintain this concentration with a persistent will, nothing can resist it —whatever it may be, from the most material physical development to the highest spiritual one.

There is no spiritual obstacle which can resist a penetrating power of concentration. For instance, the discovery of the psychic being, union with the inner Divine, opening to the higher spheres, all can be obtained by an intense and obstinate power of concentration —but one must learn how to do it.

There is nothing in the human or even in the superhuman field, to which the power of concentration is not the key.

You can be the best athlete, you can be the best student, you can be an artistic, literary or scientific genius, you can be the greatest saint with that faculty. And everyone has in himself a tiny little beginning of it —it is given to everybody, but people do not cultivate it. [6]

Those who can attain perfect attention succeed in everything they undertake; they will always make a rapid progress.[7]


It is well known that the value of a man is in proportion to his capacity of concentrated attention; the greater the concentration the more exceptional is the result, to the extent that a perfect and unfailing concentrated attention sets the stamp of genius on what is produced. [8]

Three powers of concentration

Concentration has three powers...

  • By concentration on anything whatsoever we are able to know that thing, to make it deliver up its concealed secrets; we must use this power to know not things, but the one Thing-in-itself.
  • By concentration again the whole will can be gathered up for the acquisition of that which is still ungrasped, still beyond us; this power, if it is sufficiently trained, sufficiently single-minded, sufficiently sincere, sure of itself, faithful to itself alone, absolute in faith, we can use for the acquisition of any object whatsoever; but we ought to use it not for the acquisition of the many objects which the world offers to us, but to grasp spiritually that one object worthy of pursuit which is also the one subject worthy of knowledge.
  • By concentration of our whole being on one status of itself, we can become whatever we choose; we can become, for instance, even if we were before a mass of weaknesses and fear, a mass instead of strength and courage, or we can become all a great purity, holiness and peace or a single universal soul of Love; but we ought, it is said, to use this power to become not even these things, high as they may be in comparison with what we now are, but rather to become that which is above all things and free from all action and attributes, the pure and absolute Being. All else, all other concentration can only be valuable for preparation, for previous steps, for a gradual training of the dissolute and self-dissipating thought, will and being towards their grand and unique object. [9]

How to develop concentration

And this kind of concentration can be developed exactly like the muscles; one may follow different systems, different methods of training. Today we know that the most pitiful weakling, for example, can with discipline become as strong as anyone else. One should not have a will which flickers out like a candle.

The will, concentration must be cultivated; it is a question of method, of regular exercise. If you will, you can. [10]

Through regular, persevering, obstinate, unflagging exercise —I mean exercise of concentration and will. [11]

Concentration on idea

If one concentrates on a thought or a word, one has to dwell on the essential idea contained in the word with the aspiration to feel the thing which it expresses.[12]

See also: Thinking with ideas

Concentrated meditation

The first step in concentration must be always to accustom the discursive mind to a settled unwavering pursuit of a single course of connected thought on a single subject and this it must do undistracted by all lures and alien calls on its attention. Such concentration is common enough in our ordinary life, but it becomes more difficult when we have to do it inwardly without any outward object or action on which to keep the mind; yet this inward concentration is what the seeker of knowledge must effect.

Nor must it be merely the consecutive thought of the intellectual thinker, whose only object is to conceive and intellectually link together his conceptions. It is not, except perhaps at first, a process of reasoning that is wanted so much as a dwelling so far as possible on the fruitful essence of the idea which by the insistence of the soul’s will upon it must yield up all the facets of its truth.

Thus if it be the divine Love that is the subject of concentration, it is on the essence of the idea of God as Love that the mind should concentrate in such a way that the various manifestation of the divine Love should arise luminously, not only to the thought, but in the heart and being and vision of the Sadhaka.

The thought may come first and the experience afterwards, but equally the experience may come first and the knowledge arise out of the experience.

Afterwards the thing attained has to be dwelt on and more and more held till it becomes a constant experience and finally the Dharma or law of the being.

This is the process of concentrated meditation; [13]

Practicing meditation or concentration using a sentence

Q: Mother, in the Friday Classes, you often read a sentence to us and ask us to meditate on it. But how should we meditate on a sentence? That is, should we think, meditate on the idea or... what should we do?

The sentence is already a mental formation; the mental formation is made. The sentence is the expression of the mental formation. So when you meditate on a sentence, there are two methods. There is an active, ordinary external method of reflecting and trying to understand what these words mean, understand intellectually what the sentence means exactly —that is active meditation. You concentrate on these few words and take the thought they express and try, through reasoning, deduction, analysis, to understand what it means.

There is another method, more direct and deep; it is to take this mental formation, this combination of words with the thought they represent, and to gather all your energy of attention on it, compelling yourself to concentrate all your strength on that formation. For instance, instead of concentrating all your energies on something you see physically, you take that thought and concentrate all your energies on that thought —in the mind, of course.

And then, if you are able to concentrate the thought sufficiently and stop it from vacillating, you pass quite naturally from the thought expressed by the words to the idea which is behind and which could be expressed in other words, other forms. The characteristic of the idea is the power to clothe itself in many different thoughts. And when you have achieved this, you have already gone much deeper than by merely understanding the words. Naturally, if you continue to concentrate and know how to do it, you can pass from the idea to the luminous force that is behind. Then you enter a much vaster and deeper domain. But that asks for some training. But still, that is the very principle of meditation.

If you are able to go deep enough, you find the Principle and the Force behind the idea, and that gives you the power of realisation. This is how those who take meditation as a means of spiritual development are able to unite with the Principle which is behind things and obtain the power to act on these things from above.

But even without going so far —that implies a rather hard discipline, doesn’t it, a long-standing habit —you can pass quite easily from the thought to the idea, and that gives you a light and an understanding in the mind which enables you, in your turn, to express the idea in any form. An idea can be expressed in many different forms, in many different thoughts, just as when you come down to a more material level, a thought can be expressed through many different words. Going downwards, towards expression, that is, spoken or written expression, there are many different words and different formulas which may serve to express a thought, but this thought is only one of the forms of thought which can express the idea, the idea behind, and this idea itself, if it is followed deeply, has behind it a principle of spiritual knowledge and power which can then spread and act on the manifestation.

When you have a thought you look for words, don’t you, and then you try to arrange these words to express your thought; you can use many words to express a thought, you tell yourself, “No, look, if I put this word instead of that, it would express what I am thinking much better.” That is what you learn when you are taught style, how to write.

But when I give you a written sentence which has the power to express a thought and tell you to concentrate on it, then, through this thought-form you can go back to the idea behind, which can be expressed in many different thoughts. It is like a great hierarchy: there is a Principle right at the top, which itself is not the only one, for you can go still higher up; but this Principle can be expressed in ideas, and these ideas can be expressed in a great number of thoughts and this great number of thoughts can make use of many languages and an even greater number of words.

When I give you a thought it is simply to help you to concentrate....

All this is to learn concentration, that’s all.

Sometimes one of these sentences expresses a very deep truth. It is one of those happy sentences which are very expressive. So that helps you to find the truth that is behind. [14]

Practicing concentration using objects

There are schools which put an object in front of you, a flower or a stone, or any object, and then you sit around it and concentrate on it and your eyes go like this (Mother squints) until you become the object. That too is a method of concentration. By gazing steadily like that, without moving, you finally pass into the thing you are gazing at. But you must not begin to gaze at all kinds of things: only gaze steadily at that. That gives you a look... it makes you squint. [15]

Concentration & Physical Education

Bulletin of April 1949 written by The Mother for Sri Aurobindo Ashram Department of Physical Education

In sporting activities those who want to be successful choose a certain line or subject which appeals more to the and suits their nature; they concentrate on their choice and take great care not to disperse their energies in different directions. As in life a man chooses his career and concentrates all his attention upon it, so the sportsman chooses a special activity and concentrates all his efforts to achieve as much perfection as he can in this line. This perfection comes usually by a building up of spontaneous reflex which is the result of constant repetition of the same movements. But this spontaneous reflex can be, with advantage, replaced by the faculty of concentrated attention. This faculty of concentration belongs not only to the intellectual but to all activities and is obtained by the conscious control of the energies. It is well known that the value of a man is in proportion to his capacity of concentrated attention, the greater the concentration the more exceptional is the result, to the extent that a perfect and unfailing concentrated attention sets the stamp of genius on what is produced. There can be genius in sports as in any other human activity.

Shall we then advise a limit to one action in order to achieve perfection in concentration?

The advantages of limitation are well known, but it has also its inconvenience, bringing narrowness and incapacity for any other line than the one chosen. This is contrary to the ideal of a perfectly developed and harmonised human being. How to conciliate these two contrary tendencies?

There seems to be only one solution to the problem. In the same way as an athlete develops methodically his muscles by a scientific and gradual training, the faculty of concentrated attention can be developed scientifically by a methodical training—developed in such a way that concentration is obtained at will and on whatever subject or activity is chosen. Thus the work of preparation instead of being done in the subconscient by a slow and steady repetition of the same movements, is done consciously by a concentration of will and a gathered attention centred on one point or another according to plan and decision. The chief difficulty seems to be to obtain this power of concentration independent from all inner and outer circumstances—difficult perhaps but not impossible for him who is determined and persevering. Moreover, whatever method of development is chosen, determination and perseverance are indispensable to obtain success.

The aim in the training is to develop this power of concentrating the attention at will on whatever subject or activity one chooses from the most spiritual to the most material, without losing anything of the fullness of the power,—for instance, in the physical field, transferring the use of the power from one game to another or one activity to another so as to succeed equally in all.

This extreme attention concentrated on a game or a physical activity like lifting, vaulting, punching, running, etc., focusing all energies on any of these movements which bring about in the body the thrill of an exhilarating joy is the thing which carries with it perfection in execution and success. Generally this happens when the sportsman is especially interested in a game or an activity and its happening escapes all control, decision or will. Yet by a proper training of concentrated attention one can obtain the phenomenon at will, on command, so to say, and the resulting perfection in the execution of any activity follows inevitably.

This is exactly what we want to try in our Department of Physical Education. By this process the result may come more slowly than by the usual method, but the lack of rapidity will surely be compensated by a fullness and richness in the expression. [16]

Straining and Concentration

Straining and concentration are not the same thing. Straining implies an over-eagerness and violence of effort, while concentration is in its nature quiet and steady. If there is restlessness or over-eagerness, then that is not concentration. [17]


Effort means straining endeavour. There can be an action with a will in it in which there is no strain of effort. [18]

Inertia & Tiredness in Concentration

It is not a fact that when there is obscurity or inertia, one cannot concentrate or meditate. If one has in the inner being the steady will to do it, it can be done. [19]


If the mind gets tired, naturally it is difficult to concentrate—unless you have become separated from the mind. [20]


Concentration is very helpful and necessary—the more one concentrates (of course in the limits of the body’s capacity without straining it), the more the force of the Yoga grows. But you must be prepared for the meditation being sometimes not successful and not get upset by it—for that variability of the meditations happens to everybody. There are different causes for it. But it is mostly something physical that interferes, either the need of the body to take time to assimilate what has come or been done or sometimes inertia or dullness due to causes such as those you mention or others. The best thing is to remain quiet and not get nervous or dejected—till the force acts again. [21]

Obstacles to develop concentration

But the thought “What’s the use?” must not come in to weaken the will. The idea that one is born with a certain character and can do nothing about it is a stupidity. [22]

The mind is always in activity, but we do not observe fully what it is doing, but allow ourselves to be carried away in the stream of continual thinking. When we try to concentrate, this stream of self-moved mechanical thinking becomes prominent to our observation. It is the first normal obstacle (the other is sleep during meditation) to the effort towards Yoga. [23]

Purity and concentration

Along with purity and as a help to bring it about, concentration. Purity and concentration are indeed two aspects, feminine and masculine, passive and active, of the same status of being; purity is the condition in which concentration becomes entire, rightly effective, omnipotent; by concentration purity does its works and without it would only lead to a state of peaceful quiescence and eternal repose. Their opposites are also closely connected; for we have seen that impurity is a confusion of Dharmas, a lax, mixed and mutually entangled action of the different parts of the being; and this confusion proceeds from an absence of right concentration of its knowledge on its energies in the embodied Soul. The fault of our nature is first an inert subjection to the impacts of things1 as they come in upon the mind pell-mell without order or control and then a haphazard imperfect concentration managed fitfully, irregularly with a more or less chance emphasis on this or on that object according as they happen to interest, not the higher soul or the judging and discerning intellect, but the restless, leaping, fickle, easily tired, easily distracted lower mind which is the chief enemy of our progress. In such a condition purity, the right working of the functions, the clear, unstained and luminous order of the being is an impossibility; the various workings, given over to the chances of the environment and external influences, must necessarily run into each other and clog, divert, distract, pervert. Equally, without purity the complete, equal, flexible concentration of the being in right thought, right will, right feeling or secure status of spiritual experience is not possible. Therefore the two must proceed together, each helping the victory of the other, until we arrive at that eternal calm from which may proceed some partial image in the human being of the eternal, omnipotent and omniscient activity. [24]

References

  1. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  2. Sri Aurobindo. (2015). The Synthetic Method of the Integral Yoga. In Letters on yoga II. Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  3. The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).
  4. Sri Aurobindo. (2015). The Synthetic Method of the Integral Yoga. In Letters on yoga II.
  5. The Mother. (1979). Letters to a Young Sadhak VI (1933-1949). In Collected works of the Mother Volume 16. Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/letters-to-a-young-sadhak-vi
  6. The Mother. (1998). Questions and Answers 1957-1958, Vol. 9 (pp. 360-361).
  7. The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).
  8. The Mother. (1949). Concentration and Dispersion. In On Education (Collected Works of the Mother Volume 12). Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/concentration-and-dispersion
  9. Sri Aurobindo. sabcl/20/concentration
  10. The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).
  11. The Mother. (1972). On Education. In Collected works of the Mother Volume 12 (p. 398). Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
  12. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  13. Sri Aurobindo. sabcl/20/concentration
  14. The Mother. (1972). Questions and Answers 1957-1958. In Collected works of the Mother(pp. 381-383). Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
  15. The Mother. (1972). Questions and Answers 1957-1958. In Collected works of the Mother(pp. 381-383). Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
  16. The Mother. (1949). Concentration and Dispersion. In On Education (Collected Works of the Mother Volume 12). Retrieved from http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/concentration-and-dispersion
  17. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  18. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  19. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  20. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  21. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  22. The Mother. (1972). Questions and answers, 1950-1951. In Collected Works of the Mother Volume 4 (p. 5).
  23. Sri Aurobindo. cwsa/29/concentration-and-meditation
  24. Sri Aurobindo. sabcl/20/concentration