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Darshan

Self-revelation of the Deity to the devotee. It is an unveiling of his presence temporary or permanent, and may come as a vision or may come as a close feeling of his presence which is more intimate than sight and a frequent or constant communication with him; that happens by the deepening of the being into its inner self and growth of consciousness or by growth of the intensity of bhakti. When the crust of external consciousness is sufficiently broken by the pressure of increasing and engrossing bhakti, the contact comes. [1]

Day and Night

The up and down movement is common to all ways of yoga. It is there in the path of Bhakti, but there are equally alternations of states of light and states of darkness, sometimes sheer and prolonged darkness, when one follows the path of Knowledge. Those who have occult experience come to periods when all experiences cease and even seem finished for ever. These alternations are the result of the nature of human consciousness. One has to be prepared for them and pass through. They are the’ day and night’ of the Vedic mystics. [2]

Death

Death is there because the being in the body is not yet developed enough to go on growing in the same body without the need of change and the body itself is not sufficiently conscious. If the mind and vital and the body itself were more conscious and plastic, death would not be necessary. [3] Death has no separate existence by itself, it is only a result of the principle of decay in the body and that principle is there already- it is part of the physical nature. At the same time it is not inevitable; if one could have the necessary consciousness and force, decay and death is not inevitable. But to bring that consciousness and force into the whole of the material nature is the most difficult thing of all- at any rate, in such a way as to annul the decay principle. [4]

Depression

It comes from some disharmony in the being, from a lack of receptivity to the divine forces. When you cut yourself off from the energy and light that sustain you, then there is this depression, there is created... It is doubt, gloominess, lack of confidence, a selfish turning back upon yourself that cuts you off from the light and divine energy and gives the attack this advantage. [5] The rule in yoga is not to let the depression depress you, to stand back from it, observe its cause and remove the cause; for the cause is always in oneself, perhaps a vital defect somewhere, a wrong movement indulged or a petty desire causing a[p.1347] recoil, sometimes by its satisfaction, sometimes by its disappointment. [6]

Descent

The descent is that of the powers of the higher consciousness which is above the head. It usually descends from centre to centre till it has occupied the whole being... The descent comes in order to transform the consciousness but the transformation takes time. It is not done all in a moment.

The Force descends for two things:

(1) To transform the nature.

(2) To carry on the work through the instrument. [7]

A deep, intense or massive substance of peace and stillness is very commonly the first of its powers that descends and many experience it in that way. At first it comes and stays only during meditation or, without the sense of physical inertness or immobility, a little while longer and afterwards is lost; but as the sadhana follows its normal course, it comes more and more, lasting longer and in the end as an enduring deep peace and inner stillness and release becomes a normal character of the consciousness, the foundation indeed of a new consciousness, calm and liberated. [8]

Desire

Destiny

Determinism and Freewill

In reality, the freedom and the determination are only two sides of the same thing—for the fundamental truth is self-determination, a self-determination of the cosmos and in it a secret self-determination of the individual. The difficulty arises from the fact that we live in the surface mind of ignorance, do not know what is going on behind and see only the phenomenal process of Nature. There the apparent fact is an overwhelming determinism of Nature and as our surface consciousness is part of that process we are unable to see the other term of the biune reality. For practical purposes, on the surface there is an entire determinism in Matter—though this is now disputed by the latest school of Science. As Life emerges a certain plasticity sets in, so that it is difficult to predict anything exactly as one predicts material things that obey a rigid law. The plasticity increases with the growth of Mind so that man can have at least a sense of free will, of a choice of his action, of a self-movement which at least helps to determine circumstances. But this freedom is dubious because it can be declared to be an illusion, a device of Nature, part of its machinery of determination, only a seeming freedom or at most a restricted, relative and subject independence. It is only when one goes behind away from Prakriti to Purusha and upward[p.514] away from Mind to spiritual Self that the side of freedom comes to be first evident and then, by unison with the Will which is above Nature, complete. [9]

Destiny in the rigid sense applies only to the outer being so long as it lives in the Ignorance. What we call destiny is only in fact the result of the present condition of the being and the nature and energies it has accumulated in the past acting on each other and determining the present attempts and their future results. But as soon as one enters the path of spiritual life, this old predetermined destiny begins to recede. There comes in a new factor, the Divine Grace, the help of a higher Divine Force other than the force of karma, which can lift the sadhaka beyond the present possibilities of his nature. One’s spiritual destiny is the divine election which ensures the future. [10]

Devi

Devotion

Dhāranā

Difficulties

Distrust

Disturbances

There are always two things that can rise up and assail the silence - vital suggestions, the physical mind’s mechanical recurrences. Calm rejection for both is the cure. There is a Purusha within who can dictate to the nature what it shall admit or exclude, but its will is a strong, quiet will; if one gels perturbed or agitated over the difficulties, then the will of the Purusha cannot act effectively as it would otherwise. [11]

Divine

The Divine is that from which all comes, in which all lives. In its supreme Truth, the Divine is absolute and infinite peace, consciousness, existence, power and Ananda. [12]

Divine Life

Divine Love

Divine Will

Divine Working

Divinisation

Division

Double Life

Doubt

Dreams

Dry Period

Duality/Dvaita

Durga

Duty

Dynamic Realisation

Dynamism

References