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=How to Cultivate the Right Attitude?=
 
 
==Prerequisites for the Right Inner Attitude==
 
 
The Sage[The Sage of the Isha Upanishad] has laid down his fundamental positions in the first three verses,—(1) the oneness of all beings in the universe, (2) the harmony of renunciation & enjoyment by freedom from desire & demand, (3) the necessity of action for the fulfilment of the one purpose for which the One inhabits this multitude of names & forms. The object is to establish the possibility of absolutely sorrowless & fearless enjoyment here in this world & in this body on the eternal & unassailable foundations of the Vedantic truth, ''sarvam khalu idam Brahma''. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/17/a-commentary-on-the-isha-upanishad#p48</ref>
 
 
==By Surrender==
 
 
The first step is to consecrate all our works as a sacrifice to the Divine in us and in the world <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-master-of-the-work#p9</ref>
 
 
It is only when one understands that all external things, all mental constructions, all material efforts are vain, futile, if they are not entirely consecrated to this Light and Force from above, to this Truth which is trying to express itself, that one is ready to make decisive progress. So the only truly effective attitude is a perfect, total, fervent giving of our being to That which is above us and which alone has the power to change everything. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/29-october-1958#p13</ref>
 
 
The transformation Sri Aurobindo speaks about here is a reversal of consciousness: instead of being egoistical and turned towards personal satisfactions, the consciousness is turned towards the Divine in surrender. And he has explained clearly that the surrender could be partial at first—there are parts which surrender and parts which don't. So it is only when the entire being, integrally, in all its movements, has made its surrender, that it is irrevocable. It is an irrevocable transformation of attitude. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-april-1951#p6</ref>
 
The core of this inner surrender is trust and confidence in the Divine.
 
 
==By Equality==
 
 
The effort towards a passive or purely receptive equality may start from three different principles or attitudes which all lead to the same result and ultimate consequence,—endurance, indifference and submission.<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-way-of-equality#p2</ref>
 
 
The soul which seeks mastery may begin by turning upon these reactions the encountering and opposing force of a strong and equal endurance. Instead of seeking to protect itself from or to shun and escape the unpleasant impacts it may confront them and teach itself to suffer and to bear them with perseverance, with fortitude, an increasing equanimity or an austere or calm acceptance. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-way-of-equality#p3</ref>
 
 
The second way is attitude of impartial indifference. Its method is to reject at once the attraction or the repulsion of things, to cultivate for them a luminous impassivity, an inhibiting rejection, a habit of dissociation and desuetude.
 
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-way-of-equality#p4</ref>
 
 
The third way is that of submission … to the will of God, or an unegoistic acceptance of things and happenings as a manifestation of the universal Will in time, or a complete surrender of the person to the Divine, to the supreme Purusha. As the first was a way of the will and the second a way of knowledge, of the understanding reason, so this is a way of the temperament and heart and very intimately connected with the principle of Bhakti.
 
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-way-of-equality#p5</ref>
 
 
==By Quietude==
 
 
Always get back to quietude. It is through the quietude that the right attitude and understanding and movements come back. It is natural for the lower vital to be made up of feelings, impulses and desires and to be attached to outer things—but that is only a part of you. There is also the psychic and the higher mind and higher vital which only need quietude and the help of the Force and Peace behind them to come forward more strongly and dominate over the lower vital and help to change it. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/quiet-and-calm#p24</ref>
 
 
==By Humility==
 
 
It is very simple, when people are told "be humble", they think immediately of "being humble before other men" and that humility is wrong. True humility is humility before the Divine, that is, a precise, exact, living sense that one is nothing, one can do nothing, understand nothing without the Divine, that even if one is exceptionally intelligent and capable, this is nothing in comparison with the divine Consciousness, and this sense one must always keep, because then one always has the true attitude of receptivity—a humble receptivity that does not put personal pretensions in opposition to the Divine. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/13-may-1953#p10</ref>
 
 
==Attitude Towards Work==
 
 
Work done without desire or ego, rejecting all movements of desire, demand or ego when they come, done as an offering to the Divine.
 
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/combining-work-meditation-and-bhakti#p42</ref>
 
 
Get rid of the "I". If it is well done, it is the Force that did it and your only part was to be a good or a bad instrument. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-force-in-work#p14</ref>
 
 
Men usually work and carry on their affairs from the ordinary motives of the vital being, need, desire of wealth or success or position or power or fame or the push to activity and the pleasure of manifesting their capacities, and they succeed or fail according to their capability, power of work and the good or bad fortune which is the result of their nature and their Karma. When one takes up the Yoga and wishes to consecrate one's life to the Divine, these ordinary motives of the vital being have no longer their full and free play; they have to be replaced by another, a mainly psychic and spiritual motive, which will enable the sadhak to work with the same force as before, no longer for himself, but for the Divine. If the ordinary vital motives or vital force can no longer act freely and yet are not replaced by something else, then the push or force put into the work may decline or the power to command success may no longer be there. For the sincere sadhak the difficulty can only be temporary; but he has to see the defect in his consecration or his attitude and to remove it. Then the divine Power itself will act through him and use his capacity and vital force for its ends. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/work-and-yoga#p14</ref>
 
 
==Attitude Towards Others==
 
 
To make the effort for one's own perfection and not to be disturbed by any mistake in others but reply by a silent will for their perfection also is always the right attitude. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/problems-in-human-relations#p8</ref>
 
 
The important thing is to keep the inner consciousness open to the Divine and grow in it. As one does that, more or less rapidly according to the inner intensity of the sadhana, the attitude towards others will change. All will be seen more and more in the Divine and the feeling, action, etc. will more and more be determined, not by the old external reactions, but by the growing consciousness within you. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-with-others-and-the-practice-of-yoga#p130</ref>
 
 
==Right Attitude during Difficulties==
 
 
Instilling in oneself, the integral courage: whatever the domain, whatever the danger, the attitude remains the same—calm and assured. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/courage#p2</ref>
 
 
If, in the presence of circumstances that are about to take place, you can take the highest attitude possible—that is, if you put your consciousness in contact with the highest consciousness within reach, you can be absolutely sure that in that case it is the best that can happen to you. But as soon as you fall from this consciousness into a lower state, then it is evidently not the best that can happen, for the simple reason that you are not in your very best consciousness.<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/power-of-right-attitude#p1</ref>
 
 
There is nothing spiritually wrong in being glad and cheerful, on the contrary it is the right thing. As for struggles and aspiration, struggles are really not indispensable to progress and there are many people who get so habituated to the struggling attitude that they have all the time struggles and very little else. That is not desirable. There is a sunlit path as well as a gloomy one and it is the better of the two—a path in which one goes forward in absolute reliance on the Mother, fearing nothing, sorrowing over nothing. Aspiration is needed but there can be a sunlit aspiration full of light and faith and confidence and joy. If difficulty comes, even that can be faced with a smile. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/cheerfulness-and-happiness#p3</ref>
 
 
The difficulties in work come not from circumstances or petty outer occurrences, they come from something which is wrong in the inner attitude, especially in the vital attitude: egoism, ambition, fixity of mental conceptions regarding work, vanity, etc. And it is always good, in order to correct the disharmony, to look for the cause in oneself rather than in others. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/collaboration-and-harmony-in-work#p8</ref>
 
 
It is therefore a principle in Yoga to recognise the determining power of what is within us—for that is the deeper truth—to set that right and establish the inward strength as against the power of outward circumstances. The strength is there—even in the weakest; one has to find it, to unveil it and to keep it in front throughout the journey and the battle. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/steps-towards-overcoming-difficulties#p10</ref>
 
  
  

Revision as of 15:19, 14 April 2021

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