Changes

= What Is Imagination ? =

<div style="color:#000000;">… what is called imagination is a capacity to project oneself outside realised things and towards things realisable, and then to draw them by the projection. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/6-july-1955#p40</u></ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">Our surface imagination is a selection from a vaster more creative and effective subliminal image-building power of consciousness. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/memory-ego-and-self-experience#p15</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">Imagination itself The imagination is in its nature a substitute for a truer consciousness faculty really the power of intuition mental formation. When this power is put at the service of possibilitythe Divine, it is not only formative but also creative. There is, however, no such thing as an unreal formation, because every image is a reality on the mental plane. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2103/thepower-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-andof-hallucinationimagination#p25</u>p1</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">The imagination is really the power of mental formation. When this power is put at the service of the Divine, it is not only formative but also creative. There is, however, no such thing as an unreal formation, because every image is a reality on the mental plane. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/power-of-imagination#p1</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">When you imagine something, it means that you make a mental formation which may be close to the truth or far from the truth—it also depends upon the quality of your formation. You make a mental formation and there are people who have such a power of formation that they succeed in making what they imagine real. There are not many of these but there are some. They imagine something and their formation is so well made and so powerful that it succeeds in being realised. These are creators; there are not many of them but there are some. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/6-july-1955#p25</u></ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">Imaginations that persist in the human mind, like the idea of travel in the air, end often by self-fulfilment; individual thought-formations can actualise themselves if there is sufficient strength in the formation or in the mind that forms it. Imaginations can create their own potentiality, especially if they are supported in the collective mind, and may in the long run draw on themselves the sanction of the cosmic Will. In fact all imaginations represent possibilities: some are able one day to actualise in some form, perhaps a very different form of actuality; more are condemned to sterility because they do not enter into the figure or scheme of the present creation, do not come within the permitted potentiality of the individual or do not accord with the collective or the generic principle or are alien to the nature or destiny of the containing world-existence. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p24</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">Our mind is an observer and user of actualities, a diviner or recipient of truths not yet known or actualised, a dealer in possibilities that mediate between the truth and actuality. But it has not the omniscience of an infinite Consciousness; it Imagination itself is limited in knowledge and has to supplement its restricted knowledge by imagination and discovery. It does not, like the infinite Consciousness, manifest the known, it has to discover the unknown; it seizes the possibilities of the Infinite, not as results or variations of forms of nature a substitute for a latent Truth, but as constructions or creations, figments truer consciousness faculty of its own boundless imagination. It has not the omnipotence intuition of an infinite conscious Energy; it can only realise or actualise what the cosmic Energy will accept from it or what it has the strength to impose or introduce into the sum of things because the secret Divinity, superconscient or subliminal, which uses it intends that that should be expressed in Naturepossibility. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p22</u>p25</ref></div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">… </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">our mind has the faculty of imagination; it can create and take as true and real its own mental structures: here, it might be thought, is something analogous to the action of Maya. Our mental surface imagination is an instrument of Ignorance; it is the resort or device or refuge of a limited capacity of knowledge, a limited capacity of effective action. Mind supplements these deficiencies by its power of imagination: it uses it to extract selection from things obvious and visible the things that are not obvious and visible; it undertakes to create its own figures of the possible and the impossible; it erects illusory actuals or draws figures of a conjectured or constructed truth of things that are not true to outer experience. That is at least the appearance of its operation; but, in reality, it is the mind's way or one of its ways of summoning out of Being its infinite possibilities, even of discovering or capturing the unknown possibilities of the Infinite. But, because it cannot do this with knowledge, it makes experimental constructions of truth and possibility and a yet unrealised actuality: as its power of receiving inspirations of Truth is limited, it imagines, hypothetises, questions whether this or that may not be truths; as its force to summon real potentials is narrow vaster more creative and restricted, it erects possibilities which it hopes to actualise or wishes it could actualise; as its effective subliminal image-building power to actualise is cramped and confined by the material world's oppositions, it figures subjective actualisations to satisfy its will of creation and delight of self-presentation. But it is to be noted that through the imagination it does receive a figure of truth, does summon possibilities which are afterwards realised, does often by its imagination exercise an effective pressure on the world's actualitiesconsciousness. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/thememory-cosmicego-illusionand-mindself-dream-and-hallucinationexperience#p24</u>p15</ref></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Imagination itself is And now, to come down to a more ordinary level, everyone has in him, in its nature a substitute for a truer consciousness's faculty of intuition of possibility: as greater or lesser measure, the mind ascends towards the truth-consciousness, power to give form to his mental activity and use this mental power becomes a truth imagination which brings the colour form either in his ordinary activity or to create and light of realise something. We are all the higher truth time, always, creating images, creating forms. We send them into the limited adequacy or inadequacy of the knowledge already achieved atmosphere without even knowing that we are doing so—they go roaming about, pass from one person to another, meet companions, sometimes join together and formulated get on happily, sometimes create conflicts, andthere are battles; for often, finallyvery often, in the transforming light above it gives place wholly these mental imaginations there is a small element of will which tries to higher truth-powers or realise itself turns into intuition , and then everyone tries to send out his formation so that it can act, so that things can happen as he wants and inspiration; , as everyone does this, it creates a general confusion. If our eyes were open to the Mind vision of all these forms in that uplifting ceases to be the atmosphere, we would see very amazing things: battlefields, waves, onsets, retreats of a creator crowd of delusions small mental entities which are constantly thrown out into the air and an architect of erroralways try to realise themselves. Mind then is All these formations have a common tendency to want to materialise and realise themselves physically, and as they are countless—they are far too many for there to be room enough on earth to manifest them—they jostle and elbow one another, they try to push back those which do not a sovereign creator of things non-existent agree with them or erected even form armies marching in good order, always to take up the available room both in time and space—it is only a void: it is an ignorance trying to know; its very illusions start from a basis of some kind and are small space compared with the results countless number of a limited knowledge or a half-ignorancecreations. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2109/the3-cosmicseptember-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination1958#p25</u>p9</ref></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">… people with imagination turn it upward, because up above there is everything, you know, all inspirations of artistic and literary things: this comes from another domain. It comes from a much more subtle domain, much less material. So these turn upward and want to receive the light from above. But it is the same instrument. The others turn it downwards, and it is just a lack of gymnastic skill. It is the same instrument. It is the same power of a luminous ray upon something. But as one has made it a habit of concentrating it in a certain direction, one is no longer supple, one loses the habit of doing things otherwise. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/24-june-1953#p59</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color… our mind has the faculty of imagination; it can create and take as true and real its own mental structures: here, it might be thought, is something analogous to the action of Maya. Our mental imagination is an instrument of Ignorance; it is the resort or device or refuge of a limited capacity of knowledge, a limited capacity of effective action. Mind supplements these deficiencies by its power of imagination:#000000it uses it to extract from things obvious and visible the things that are not obvious and visible; it undertakes to create its own figures of the possible and the impossible;">All human imaginations indeed correspond it erects illusory actuals or draws figures of a conjectured or constructed truth of things that are not true to some outer experience. That is at least the appearance of its operation; but, in reality , it is the mind's way or one of its ways of summoning out of Being its infinite possibilities, even of discovering or real capturing the unknown possibilities of the Infinite. But, because it cannot do this with knowledge, it makes experimental constructions of truth and possibilityand a yet unrealised actuality: as its power of receiving inspirations of Truth is limited, it imagines, hypothetises, though they questions whether this or that may in themselves not be a quite inaccurate representation truths; as its force to summon real potentials is narrow and restricted, it erects possibilities which it hopes to actualise or couched in too physical images wishes it could actualise; as its power to actualise is cramped and therefore inapt confined by the material world's oppositions, it figures subjective actualisations to express satisfy its will of creation and delight of self-presentation. But it is to be noted that through the imagination it does receive a figure of truth of supraphysical realities, does summon possibilities which are afterwards realised, does often by its imagination exercise an effective pressure on the world's actualities. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2321/the-planescosmic-ofillusion-mind-dream-ourand-existencehallucination#p10</u>p24</ref></div>

<span style="backgroundImaginations that persist in the human mind, like the idea of travel in the air, end often by self-color:transparentfulfilment;color:#000000;">The source from which these imaginations come has nothing to do with individual thought-formations can actualise themselves if there is sufficient strength in the formation or in the reason and does not care for any rational objectionsmind that forms it. They come either from Imaginations can create their own potentiality, especially if they are supported in the vital collective mind, and may in the long run draw on themselves the sanction of the same source from which come cosmic Will. In fact all the fine imaginations and long stories which men tell themselves represent possibilities: some are able one day to actualise in which some form, perhaps a very different form of actuality; more are condemned to sterility because they are do not enter into the heroes and do great things figure or they come from little entities attached to scheme of the physical mind which pick up any random suggestion anywhere and present it to creation, do not come within the mind just to see whether it will be accepted. If one watches oneself closely one can find permitted potentiality of the most queer and extraordinary individual or nonsensical things crossing do not accord with the mind collective or peeping in on it in this way. Usually one laughs the generic principle or hardly notices and are alien to the thing falls back to nature or destiny of the containing world of incoherent thought from which it came-existence. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2821/the-vitalcosmic-illusion-mind-beingdream-and-vital-consciousnesshallucination#p20</u>p24</ref></span>

<div style="color''Q:#000000;">By the higher vital parts of the nature I mean the vital mindSweet Mother, can one imagine the emotional nature, the life-force dynamis in the being. The vital mind is that part of the vital being which builds, plans, imagines. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/Divine and have the-vital-being-and-vital-consciousness#p16</u></ref></div>contact?''

<div style="colorA:#000000;">… an unbalanced vital Certainly if you succeed in imagining the Divine you have the contact, and a weak nervous system apt to follow its own imaginations and unruled impulses without you can have the contact with what you imagine, in any true mental will or strong vital will case. In fact it is absolutely impossible to steady or restrain imagine something which doesn't exist somewhere. You cannot imagine anything at all which doesn't exist somewhere. It is possible that itdoesn't exist on the earth, and so at it is possible that it's elsewhere, but it is impossible for you to imagine something which is not already contained in principle in the mercy of the imaginationsuniverse; otherwise it could not occur. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3107/accidents6-possessionjuly-madness1955#p32</u>p42</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">This at once raises the question of the nature of Mind, the parent of these illusions, and its relation to the original Existence. Is mind the child and instrument of an original Illusion, or is it itself a primal miscreating Force or Consciousness? or is the mental ignorance a misprision of the truths of Existence, a deviation from an original Truth-Consciousness which is the real world-builder? Our own mind, at any rate, is not an original and primary creative power of Consciousness; it is, and all mind of the same character must be, derivative, an instrumental demiurge, an intermediary creator. It is likely then that analogies from the errors of mind, which are the outcome of an intermediate Ignorance, may not truly illustrate the nature or action of an original creative Illusion, an all-inventing and all-constructing Maya. Our mind stands between a superconscience and an inconscience and receives from both these opposite powers: it stands between an occult subliminal existence and an outward cosmic phenomenon; it receives inspirations, intuitions, imaginations, impulsions to knowledge and action, figures of subjective realities or possibilities from the unknown inner source; it receives the figures of realised actualities and their suggestions of further possibility from the observed cosmic phenomenon. What it receives are truths essential, possible or actual; it starts from the realised actualities of the physical universe and it brings out from them = Imagination in its subjective action the unrealised possibilities which they contain or suggest or to which it can arrive by proceeding from them as a starting-point: it selects some out of these possibilities for a subjective action and plays with imagined or inwardly constructed forms of them; it chooses others for objectivisation and attempts to realise them. But it receives inspirations also from above and within, from invisible sources and not only from the impacts of the visible cosmic phenomenon; it sees truths other than those suggested by the actual physicality around it, and here too it plays subjectively with transmitted or constructed forms of these truths or it selects for objectivisation, attempts to realise. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p21</u></ref></div>Children ==

<span style=Children are not as "background-color:transparent;color:#000000;concretised">Thus the mind, materialised in their physical consciousness as older people—as one grows up, it is as though one is coagulated and becomes more and more gross in one's imaginations are consciousness unless through a willed action one develops otherwise. For instance, the majority of children find it very difficult to distinguish their imagination, their dreams, what they see within themselves from outer things. The world is not purely as limited as when one is older and radically illusory: more precise. And they are extremely sensitive within; they are much closer to their psychic being than when they proceed on are grown up, and much more sensitive to the basis forces which, later, will become invisible to them—but at this moment are not. It is not unusual for children to have some sort of its experience fits of actualities fear or at least set out even of joy in their sleep, from that, dreams. Children are variations upon actualityafraid of all sorts of things which for older people don't exist any more. Their vision is not solely material. They have a kind of perception, more or they figure less exact and precise, of the "may-be"s or "might-be"s play of the Infiniteforces behind. So, what could be if other truths had manifested, if existing potentials had been being in that state they are influenced by forces which otherwise arranged or other possibilities than those already admitted became potential. Moreover, through this faculty forms have no hold over people who are shut up in themselves and powers of other domains than that of the physical actuality communicate with our mental beingmore gross. Even when the imaginations are extravagant or take the form And these forces—the forces of hallucinations or illusionsdestruction, for example, they proceed with actuals or possibles for their basis. The mind creates the figure forces of a mermaidcruelty, but the phantasy is composed forces of two actualities put together in a way that is outside the earth's normal potentiality; angelswickedness, griffinsof ill-will—all, chimeras all these things are constructed on in the same principle: some times the imagination atmosphere. When one is a memory of former actualities as in the mythical figure of the dragonmore conscious and well-formed within, sometimes it is a figure or a happening one can see that they are outside oneself and deny them any expression. But when one is real or could be real on other planes or very young and lives in other conditions of existence… &nbsp;Againa half-dream, when we look into the origin of mental error, we find normally that these things can exercise much influence and make children do things which in their normal state they would not do. I believe it is a miscombination, misplacement, misuse, misunderstanding or misapplication of elements of experience and knowledgedue to that above all. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2105/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream30-anddecember-hallucination1953#p2</u>p3</ref></span>

= Different Types of Imaginations Why is Imagination Important? =

=== TruthThe universe is progressive; we said that constantly things manifest, more and more. But for your imagination to be able to go and seek beyond the manifestation something which will be manifested, well, it may happen, in fact it does—I was going to tell you that it is in this way that some beings can cause considerable progress to be made in the world, because they have the capacity of imagining something that's not yet manifested. But there are not many. One must first be capable of going beyond the manifested universe to be able to imagine something which is not there. There are already many things which can be imagined. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/6-imagination ===july-1955#p44</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">There are higher geniuses still. They are people who can open to a higher region, a higher force which, passing through the mental layers, comes and takes a form in a human mind and reveals itself in the world as new truths, new philosophical systems, new spiritual teachings, which are the works and at the same time the actions of the great beings who come to take birth on earth. That is an imagination which can be called "Truth-imagination". These higher forces, when they come down into the earth-atmosphere, take living, active, powerful forms, spread throughout the world and prepare a new age. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/3-september-1958#p7</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

=== Mental Imaginations Arising from … people who can open to a higher region, a higher force which, passing through the mental layers, comes and takes a form in a human mind and reveals itself in the world as new truths, new philosophical systems, new spiritual teachings, which are the works and at the same time the actions of the great beings who come to take birth on earth. That is an Ordinary Level ===imagination which can be called "Truth-imagination". These higher forces, when they come down into the earth-atmosphere, take living, active, powerful forms, spread throughout the world and prepare a new age. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/3-september-1958#p7</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">And now, to come down to a more ordinary level, everyone has in him, in a greater or lesser measure, the power to give form to his mental activity and use this form either in his ordinary activity or to create and realise something. We are all the time, always, creating images, creating forms. We send them into the atmosphere without even knowing that we are doing so—they go roaming about, pass from one person to another, meet companions, sometimes join together and get on happily, sometimes create conflicts, and there are battles; for often, very often, in these mental imaginations there is a small element of will which tries to realise itself, and then everyone tries to send out his formation so that it can act, so that things can happen as he wants and, as everyone does this, it creates a general confusion. If our eyes were open to the vision of all these forms in the atmosphere, we would see very amazing things: battlefields, waves, onsets, retreats of a crowd of small mental entities which are constantly thrown out into the air and always try to realise themselves. All these formations have a common tendency to want to materialise and realise themselves physically, and as they are countless—they are far too many for there to be room enough on earth to manifest them—they jostle and elbow one another, they try to push back those which do not agree with them or even form armies marching in good order, always to take up the available room both in time and space—it is only a very small space compared with the countless number of creations. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/3-september-1958#p9</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

=== Luminous Formations Men of science must be having imagination! A lot. Otherwise they would never discover anything. In fact, what is called imagination is a capacity to project oneself outside realised things and Dark Formations ===towards things realisable, and then to draw them by the projection. One can obviously have progressive and regressive imaginations. There are people who always imagine all the catastrophes possible, and unfortunately they also have the power of making them come. It's like the antennae going into a world that's not yet realised, catching something there and drawing it here. Then naturally it is an addition to the earth atmosphere and these things tend towards manifestation. It is an instrument which can be disciplined, can be used at will; one can discipline it, direct it, orientate it. It is one of the faculties one can develop in himself and render serviceable, that is, use it for definite purposes. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/6-july-1955#p40</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">I have known people with such opposite sides in their nature, so contradictory, that one day they could make a magnificent, luminous, powerful formation for realisation, and then the next day a defeatist, dark, black formation—a formation of despair—and so both would go out. And I was able to follow in the course of circumstances the beautiful one being realised, and while it was being realised, the dark one demolishing what the first one had done. And that is how it is in the larger lines of life as in its smaller details. And all that because one does not watch oneself thinking, because one believes one is the slave of these contradictory movements, because one says, "Oh! Today I am not feeling well. Oh! Today things seem sad to me", and one says this as if it were an ineluctable fate against which one could do nothing. But if one stands back or ascends a step, one can look at all these things, put them in their place, keep some, destroy or get rid of those one does not want and put all one's imaginative power—what is called imaginative—only in those one wants and which conform with one's highest aspiration. That is what I call controlling one's imagination. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/3-september-1958#p1</u></refcenter>~</divcenter>

= Misuse If you imagined something more beautiful, a more beautiful life, that would be worth the trouble. People who take pleasure in writing ugly things show a great poverty of Imagination =mind—it is always a sign of a poverty of mind. It is infinitely more difficult to tell a story beautiful from beginning to end than to write a story ending with a sensational event or a catastrophe. Many authors, if they had to write a story which ends happily, beautifully, would not be able to do it—they do not have enough imagination for that. Very few stories have an uplifting ending, almost all end in a failure—for a very simple reason, it is much more easy to fall than to rise. It is much more difficult to end one's story on a note of greatness and splendour, to make one's hero a genius seeking to transcend himself, because for that one must be a genius oneself, and this is not given to everybody. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-february-1951#p23</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;margin-left:0cm;margin-right:0cm;">That [repetitive imaginative thinking] ...one must have a lively power of imagination, for―I seem to be telling you stupid things, but it is quite true―there is a world in which you are the ordinary activity supreme maker of forms: that is your own particular vital world. You are the vital mind which is always imagining and thinking and planning what to do about this supreme fashioner and you can make a marvel of your world if you know how to arrange about thatuse it. It has obviously its utility in human nature and human actionIf you have an artistic or poetic consciousness, if you love harmony, but acts in a random and excessive way without disciplinebeauty, economy of its powers or concentration on you will build there something marvellous which will tend to spring up into the things that have really to be donematerial manifestation. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2808/the-vital-being-and18-vitalapril-consciousness1956#p18</u>p55</ref></div>

=== Giving a Form to Your Fears =Importance in Yoga ==

<div style="margin-left:0cm;margin-right:0cm;"><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">...The imagination is like a knife which may be used for good deal of our life embodies the products of our imaginationor evil purposes. Every time If you indulge your imagination always dwell in an unhealthy way, giving a form the idea and feeling that you are going to your fears and anticipating accidents and misfortunesbe transformed, then you are undermining your own futurewill help the process of the Yoga. On the other handIf, on the more optimistic your imaginationcontrary, the greater the chance you give in to dejection and bewail that you are not fit or that you are incapable of realisation, you poison your realising your aimown being.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#d9d9d9;"> </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Monsieur Coué got hold It is just on account of this potent very important truth and cured hundreds of people by simply teaching them to imagine themselves out of misery. He once related the case of a lady whose hair was falling off. She began to suggest to herself that she was improving every day and that her hair was surely growing. By constantly imagining it her hair really began I am so tirelessly insistent in telling you to grow and even reached an enviable length owing let anything happen but, for heavens sake, not to still further auto-suggestionget depressed. The power of mental formation is most useful in Yoga also; when the mind is put Live rather in communication with the Divine Will, the supramental Truth begins to descend through the layers intervening between the mind constant hope and the highest Light and if, on reaching the mind, it finds there the power of making forms it easily becomes embodied and stays as conviction that what we are doing will prove a creative force in yousuccess. Therefore I say to you never be dejected and disappointed but In other words, let your imagination be always hopeful moulded by your faith in Sri Aurobindo; for, is not such faith the very hope and joyously plastic to conviction that the stress will of the higher TruthSri Aurobindo is bound to be done, so that the latter may find you full his work of transformation cannot but end in a supreme victory and that what he calls the necessary formations to hold its creative light. supramental world will be brought down on earth and realised by us here and now? <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/power-of-imagination#p1</u>p2</ref></span></div>

<div style="color:#000000If one knows how to use it, as I said, one can create for oneself his own inner and outer life;">one can build his own existence with his imagination, if one knows how to use it and has a power. In fact it is an elementary way of creating, of forming things in the world. I can assure you have always felt that if one didn't have the pain in capacity of imagination he would not make any progress. Your imagination always goes ahead of your life. When you think of yourself, usually you imagine what you want to be, don't you, and this goes ahead, then you follow, then it continues to go ahead and you follow. Imagination opens for you the stomach as well as many other discomforts path of realisation. People who are due 90% not imaginative—it is very difficult to wrong thinking make them move; they see just what is there before their nose, they feel just what they are moment by moment and strong imaginations—I mean that they cannot go forward because they are clamped by the material basis for them is practically negligibleimmediate thing. It depends a good deal on what one calls imagination. However... <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/1507/wrong6-thinkingjuly-and-illness1955#p1</u>p38</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">He may find out that it = What Happens When Imagination is all his imagination, for it is his imagination that makes him sick or rather gives him the impression of sickness. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/wrong-thinking-and-illness#p23</u></ref></div>not Directed Right? ==

<div style="color… people with imagination turn it upward, because up above there is everything, you know, all inspirations of artistic and literary things:#000000;">Stop imagining wrong things this comes from another domain. It comes from a much more subtle domain, much less material. So these turn upward and want to receive the light from above. But it is the same instrument. The others turn it downwards, and your miseries will stop at it is just a lack of gymnastic skill. It is the same instrument. It is the same timepower of a luminous ray upon something. But as one has made it a habit of concentrating it in a certain direction, one is no longer supple, one loses the habit of doing things otherwise. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/1505/wrong-thinking24-andjune-illness1953#p1</u>p59</ref></div>

= Imagination and Yoga == In the Vital Mind ===

<div style="color:#000000;">The imagination vital mind is like a knife which may be used for good or evil purposes. If you always dwell in the idea and feeling that you are going to be transformed, then you will help the process part of the Yoga. If, on the contrary, you give in to dejection and bewail that you are not fit or that you are incapable of realisation, you poison your own vital being. It is just on account of this very important truth that I am so tirelessly insistent in telling you to let anything happen butwhich builds, for heavens sakeplans, not to get depressed. Live rather in the constant hope and conviction that what we are doing will prove a successimagines. In other words, let your imagination be moulded by your faith in Sri Aurobindo; for, is not such faith the very hope and conviction that the will of Sri Aurobindo is bound to be done, that his work of transformation cannot but end in a supreme victory and that what he calls the supramental world will be brought down on earth and realised by us here and now? <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0328/powerthe-vital-being-and-ofvital-imaginationconsciousness#p2</u>p16</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">Children are not as "concretised", materialised in their physical consciousness as older people—as one grows up, it is as though one is coagulated and becomes more … an unbalanced vital and more gross in one's consciousness unless through a willed action one develops otherwise. For instance, the majority of children find it very difficult weak nervous system apt to distinguish their imagination, their dreams, what they see within themselves from outer things. The world is not as limited as when one is older follow its own imaginations and more precise. And they are extremely sensitive within; they are much closer to their psychic being than when they are grown up, and much more sensitive to the forces which, later, unruled impulses without any true mental will or strong vital will become invisible to them—but at this moment are not. It is not unusual for children to have some sort of fits of fear steady or even of joy in their sleeprestrain it, from dreams. Children are afraid of all sorts of things which for older people don't exist any more. Their vision is not solely material. They have a kind of perception, more or less exact and precise, of the play of so at the forces behind. So, being in that state they are influenced by forces which otherwise have no hold over people who are shut up in themselves and more gross. And these forces—the forces of destruction, for example, or forces of cruelty, forces of wickedness, mercy of ill-will—all, all these things are in the atmosphere. When one is more conscious and well-formed within, one can see that they are outside oneself and deny them any expression. But when one is very young and lives in a half-dream, these things can exercise much influence and make children do things which in their normal state they would not do. I believe it is due to that above allimaginations. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0531/30accidents-decemberpossession-1953madness#p3</u>p32</ref></div>

=== You Can Make a Marvel The source from which these imaginations come has nothing to do with the reason and does not care for any rational objections. They come either from the vital mind, the same source from which come all the fine imaginations and long stories which men tell themselves in which they are the heroes and do great things or they come from little entities attached to the physical mind which pick up any random suggestion anywhere and present it to the mind just to see whether it will be accepted. If one watches oneself closely one can find the most queer and extraordinary or nonsensical things crossing the mind or peeping in on it in this way. Usually one laughs or hardly notices and the thing falls back to the world of Your World ===incoherent thought from which it came. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-vital-being-and-vital-consciousness#p20</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">...one must have a lively power of imagination, for―I seem to be telling you stupid things, but it is quite true―there is a world in which you are the supreme maker of forms: that is your own particular vital world. You are the supreme fashioner and you can make a marvel of your world if you know how to use it. If you have an artistic or poetic consciousness, if you love harmony, beauty, you will build there something marvellous which will tend to spring up into the material manifestation. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/18-april-1956#p55</u></refcenter>~</spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">If one knows how to use it, as I said, one can create for oneself his own inner and outer life; one can build his own existence with his imagination, if one knows how to use it and has a power. In fact it is an elementary way of creating, of forming things in the world. I have always felt can assure you that if one didn't have the capacity of imagination he would not make any progress. Your imagination always goes ahead of your life. When you think of yourself, usually you imagine what you want to be, don't you, and this goes ahead, then you follow, then it continues pain in the stomach as well as many other discomforts are due 90% to go ahead wrong thinking and you follow. Imagination opens strong imaginations—I mean that the material basis for you the path of realisation. People who are not imaginative—it is very difficult to make them move; they see just what is there before their nose, they feel just what they are moment by moment and they cannot go forward because they are clamped by the immediate thing. It depends a good deal on what one calls imagination. However..practically negligible. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0715/6wrong-julythinking-1955and-illness#p38</u>p1</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>''Men of science must be having imagination!''~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">A lot. Otherwise they would never discover anything. In fact, what He may find out that it is called all his imagination is a capacity to project oneself outside realised things and towards things realisable, and then to draw them by the projection. One can obviously have progressive and regressive imaginations. There are people who always imagine all the catastrophes possible, and unfortunately they also have the power of making them come. It's like the antennae going into a world that's not yet realised, catching something there and drawing it here. Then naturally for it is an addition to his imagination that makes him sick or rather gives him the earth atmosphere and these things tend towards manifestation. It is an instrument which can be disciplined, can be used at will; one can discipline it, direct it, orientate it. It is one impression of the faculties one can develop in himself and render serviceable, that is, use it for definite purposessickness. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0715/6wrong-julythinking-1955and-illness#p40</u>p23</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>''Sweet Mother, can one imagine the Divine and have the contact?''~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">Certainly if you succeed in imagining That [repetitive imaginative thinking] is the Divine you have ordinary activity of the contact, vital mind which is always imagining and thinking and you can have the contact with planning what you imagine, in any case. In fact it is absolutely impossible to imagine something which doesn't exist somewhere. You cannot imagine anything at all which doesn't exist somewheredo about this and how to arrange about that. It is possible that it doesn't exist has obviously its utility in human nature and human action, but acts in a random and excessive way without discipline, economy of its powers or concentration on the earth, it is possible things that it's elsewhere, but it is impossible for you have really to imagine something which is not already contained in principle in the universe; otherwise it could not occurbe done. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0728/6the-vital-being-and-julyvital-1955consciousness#p42</u>p18</ref></div>

=== Seek Beyond How to Enhance the Manifestation ==Faculty of Imagination? =

<div style="color:#000000;">The universe is progressive; we said I have known people with such opposite sides in their nature, so contradictory, that constantly things manifestone day they could make a magnificent, luminous, powerful formation for realisation, more and morethen the next day a defeatist, dark, black formation—a formation of despair—and so both would go out. But for your imagination to be And I was able to go and seek beyond follow in the course of circumstances the manifestation something which will be manifested, wellbeautiful one being realised, and while it may happenwas being realised, in fact it does—I was going to tell you the dark one demolishing what the first one had done. And that is how it is in this way the larger lines of life as in its smaller details. And all that some beings can cause considerable progress to be made in the worldbecause one does not watch oneself thinking, because they have one believes one is the capacity slave of imagining something that's these contradictory movements, because one says, "Oh! Today I am not yet manifestedfeeling well. But there are not many. One must first be capable of going beyond the manifested universe Oh! Today things seem sad to be able to imagine something me", and one says this as if it were an ineluctable fate against which is not thereone could do nothing. There are already many But if one stands back or ascends a step, one can look at all these things , put them in their place, keep some, destroy or get rid of those one does not want and put all one's imaginative power—what is called imaginative—only in those one wants and which can be imaginedconform with one's highest aspiration. That is what I call controlling one's imagination. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0709/63-julyseptember-19551958#p44</u>p1</ref></div>

<div style="color:#000000;">Imagination, for instance, is when ...a good deal of our life embodies the products of our imagination. Every time you begin to picture to yourself indulge your imagination in an ideal being unhealthy way, giving a form to whom you apply all your conceptionsfears and anticipating accidents and misfortunes, and when you tell yourselfare undermining your own future. On the other hand, "Whythe more optimistic your imagination, it should be like this, like that, its form should be like this, its thought like that, its character like that," when you see all the details and build up greater the beingchance of your realising your aim. Now, writers do Monsieur Coué got hold of this all potent truth and cured hundreds of people by simply teaching them to imagine themselves out of misery. He once related the time because when they write case of a novel, they imaginelady whose hair was falling off. There are those who take things from life but there are those who are imaginative, creators; they create a character, a personage She began to suggest to herself that she was improving every day and then put him in their book laterthat her hair was surely growing. This is By constantly imagining it her hair really began to grow and even reached an enviable length owing to imaginestill further auto-suggestion. To imagine, for example, a whole concurrence The power of circumstances, a set of events, this mental formation is most useful in Yoga also; when the mind is what I call telling a story to oneself. But it can be put down on paperin communication with the Divine Will, the supramental Truth begins to descend through the layers intervening between the mind and then one becomes a novelist. There are very different kinds of writers. Some imagine everythingthe highest Light and if, on reaching the mind, some gather all sorts it finds there the power of observations from life making forms it easily becomes embodied and construct their book with them. There are stays as a hundred ways of writing a bookcreative force in you. But indeed some writers imagine everything from beginning Therefore I say to end. It all comes out of their head you never be dejected and they construct even their whole story without any support in things physically observed. This truly is disappointed but let your imagination. But as I say, if they are very powerful be always hopeful and have a considerable capacity for creationjoyously plastic to the stress of the higher Truth, it is possible so that one day or other there will be a physical human being who realises their creation. This too is truethe latter may find you full of the necessary formations to hold its creative light. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0703/6power-julyof-1955imagination#p32</u>p1</ref></div>

<div style="colorcenter>~</center> Stop imagining wrong things and your miseries will stop at the same time. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/wrong-thinking-and-illness#000000;"p1</ref> <center>~</center>If  Imagination, for instance, is when you imagined something more beautifulbegin to picture to yourself an ideal being to whom you apply all your conceptions, and when you tell yourself, "Why, a more beautiful lifeit should be like this, like that would , its form should be worth like this, its thought like that, its character like that," when you see all the troubledetails and build up the being. Now, writers do this all the time because when they write a novel, they imagine. People There are those who take pleasure in writing ugly things show from life but there are those who are imaginative, creators; they create a great poverty of mind—it character, a personage and then put him in their book later. This is always to imagine. To imagine, for example, a sign whole concurrence of circumstances, a poverty set of mind. It events, this is infinitely more difficult what I call telling a story to tell oneself. But it can be put down on paper, and then one becomes a novelist. There are very different kinds of writers. Some imagine everything, some gather all sorts of observations from life and construct their book with them. There are a hundred ways of writing a story beautiful book. But indeed some writers imagine everything from beginning to end than to write a . It all comes out of their head and they construct even their whole story ending with without any support in things physically observed. This truly is imagination. But as I say, if they are very powerful and have a sensational event considerable capacity for creation, it is possible that one day or other there will be a catastrophephysical human being who realises their creation. This too is true. Many authors<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/6-july-1955#p32</ref> = Yogic Understanding of Imagination =  All human imaginations indeed correspond to some reality or real possibility, if though they had may in themselves be a quite inaccurate representation or couched in too physical images and therefore inapt to write express the truth of supraphysical realities. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-planes-of-our-existence#p10</ref> <center>~</center> Imagination itself is in its nature a substitute for a truer consciousness's faculty of intuition of possibility: as the mind ascends towards the truth-consciousness, this mental power becomes a story truth imagination which ends happilybrings the colour and light of the higher truth into the limited adequacy or inadequacy of the knowledge already achieved and formulated and, beautifullyfinally, would in the transforming light above it gives place wholly to higher truth-powers or itself turns into intuition and inspiration; the Mind in that uplifting ceases to be a creator of delusions and an architect of error. Mind then is not be able a sovereign creator of things non-existent or erected in a void: it is an ignorance trying to do it—they do not have enough imagination for thatknow; its very illusions start from a basis of some kind and are the results of a limited knowledge or a half-ignorance. <ref>http://incarnateword. Very few stories have in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p25</ref> <center>~</center> Our mind is an uplifting endingobserver and user of actualities, almost all end in a failure—for diviner or recipient of truths not yet known or actualised, a very simple reason, dealer in possibilities that mediate between the truth and actuality. But it has not the omniscience of an infinite Consciousness; it is much more easy limited in knowledge and has to fall than supplement its restricted knowledge by imagination and discovery. It does not, like the infinite Consciousness, manifest the known, it has to risediscover the unknown; it seizes the possibilities of the Infinite, not as results or variations of forms of a latent Truth, but as constructions or creations, figments of its own boundless imagination. It is much more difficult has not the omnipotence of an infinite conscious Energy; it can only realise or actualise what the cosmic Energy will accept from it or what it has the strength to end oneimpose or introduce into the sum of things because the secret Divinity, superconscient or subliminal, which uses it intends that that should be expressed in Nature. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p22</ref> <center>~</center> Thus the mind's story imaginations are not purely and radically illusory: they proceed on a note the basis of its experience of actualities or at least set out from that, are variations upon actuality, or they figure the "may-be"s or "might-be"s of greatness the Infinite, what could be if other truths had manifested, if existing potentials had been otherwise arranged or other possibilities than those already admitted became potential. Moreover, through this faculty forms and splendourpowers of other domains than that of the physical actuality communicate with our mental being. Even when the imaginations are extravagant or take the form of hallucinations or illusions, to make onethey proceed with actuals or possibles for their basis. The mind creates the figure of a mermaid, but the phantasy is composed of two actualities put together in a way that is outside the earth's hero normal potentiality; angels, griffins, chimeras are constructed on the same principle: some times the imagination is a genius seeking to transcend himselfmemory of former actualities as in the mythical figure of the dragon, because for sometimes it is a figure or a happening that one must is real or could be real on other planes or in other conditions of existence… Again, when we look into the origin of mental error, we find normally that it is a genius oneselfmiscombination, misplacement, misuse, misunderstanding or misapplication of elements of experience and this is not given to everybodyknowledge. <ref><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0421/26the-cosmic-februaryillusion-1951mind-dream-and-hallucination#p23p2</uref> <center>~</center> This at once raises the question of the nature of Mind, the parent of these illusions, and its relation to the original Existence. Is mind the child and instrument of an original Illusion, or is it itself a primal miscreating Force or Consciousness? or is the mental ignorance a misprision of the truths of Existence, a deviation from an original Truth-Consciousness which is the real world-builder? Our own mind, at any rate, is not an original and primary creative power of Consciousness; it is, and all mind of the same character must be, derivative, an instrumental demiurge, an intermediary creator. It is likely then that analogies from the errors of mind, which are the outcome of an intermediate Ignorance, may not truly illustrate the nature or action of an original creative Illusion, an all-inventing and all-constructing Maya. Our mind stands between a superconscience and an inconscience and receives from both these opposite powers: it stands between an occult subliminal existence and an outward cosmic phenomenon; it receives inspirations, intuitions, imaginations, impulsions to knowledge and action, figures of subjective realities or possibilities from the unknown inner source; it receives the figures of realised actualities and their suggestions of further possibility from the observed cosmic phenomenon. What it receives are truths essential, possible or actual; it starts from the realised actualities of the physical universe and it brings out from them in its subjective action the unrealised possibilities which they contain or suggest or to which it can arrive by proceeding from them as a starting-point: it selects some out of these possibilities for a subjective action and plays with imagined or inwardly constructed forms of them; it chooses others for objectivisation and attempts to realise them. But it receives inspirations also from above and within, from invisible sources and not only from the impacts of the visible cosmic phenomenon; it sees truths other than those suggested by the actual physicality around it, and here too it plays subjectively with transmitted or constructed forms of these truths or it selects for objectivisation, attempts to realise. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/the-cosmic-illusion-mind-dream-and-hallucination#p21</divref> {|class="wikitable" style= "background-color: #efefff; width: 100%;"|Read Summary of '''[[Imagination Summary|Imagination]]'''  Dear reader, if you notice any error in the paragraph numbers in the hyperlinks, please let us know by dropping an email at integral.edu.in@gmail.com|} =References=