Changes

= Importance of What is Self-Observation =

<div style="color:#000000;">There are four necessities of man's self-expansion if he is not to remain this being We have in all functionings of the surface ignorance seeking obscurely after mentality four elements, the truth object of things and collecting and systematising fragments and sections mental consciousness, the act of knowledgemental consciousness, the small limited occasion and halfthe subject. In the self-competent creature experience of the cosmic Force which he now self-observing inner being, the object is in his phenomenal nature. He must know himself and discover and utilise all his potentialities: but to know himself and always some state or movement or wave of the world completely he must go behind his own and its exteriorconscious being, anger, he must dive deep below his own mental surface and the physical surface of Nature. This he can only do by knowing his inner mentalgrief or other emotion, hunger or other vitalcraving, physical and psychic being and its powers and movements and the universal laws and processes impulse or inner life reaction or some form of sensation, perception or thought activity. The act is some kind of the occult Mind mental observation and Life which stand behind the material front conceptual valuation of the universe….But this knowledge must be something more than a creed movement or wave or else a mystic revelation; his thinking mind must mental sensation of it in which observation and valuation may be able to accept it, to correlate it with the principle of things involved and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophyeven lost, and —so that in this act the field of mental person may either separate the truth of act and the spirit it can only be done object by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method distinguishing perception or intuitiveconfuse them together indistinguishably. </div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother, 18 June 1958)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0921/18memory-ego-juneand-1958self-experience#p3p5</ref></u></div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The Upanishad tells us that You may have a mental power of observation, a vital power of observation, a physical power of observation. When you observe ideas, for instance, the Self-existent has so set the doors train of ideas, the soul that they turn outwards and most men look outward into the appearances logic of things; only the rare soul that ideas, it is ripe for a calm thought and steady wisdom turns its eye inward, sees not altogether the Self and attains to immortality. To this turning same power of the eye inward psychological self-observation as when you look at a friend doing athletics and </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">analysis see whether he is a great and effective introductionmaking his movements correctly or not. We can look into That is, the inward capacity of ourselves more easily than we can look into the inward of things external to us because attention is there, in things outside usboth cases, we are but it works in a different field. It can't be said that it is one part of the first place embarrassed by being observing the form and secondly we have no natural previous experience of that in them which is other than their physical substance….psychological self-knowledge others; it is only the experience faculty of the modes observation developing in each part of the Selfbeing—that is, it is not the realisation faculty of the Self in its pure beingconcentration and attention.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2306/the27-status-ofjanuary-knowledge1954#p7p34</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The true and ultimate, as distinguished from the immediate or intermediate importance of our observing, reasoning, inquiring, judging intelligence is that it prepares the human being for the right reception and right action of a Light from above which must progressively replace in him the obscure light from below that guides the animal..Man can bring an enlightened will, an enlightened thought and enlightened emotions to the difficult work of his self-development; he can more and more subject to these more conscious and reflecting guides the inferior function of desire. In proportion as he can thus master and enlighten his lower self, he is man and no longer an animal. When he can begin to replace desire altogether by a still greater enlightened thought and sight and will in touch with the Infinite, consciously subject to a diviner will than his own, linked to a more universal and transcendent knowledge, he has commenced the ascent towards the superman; he is on his upward march towards the Divine.~</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/self-consecration#p17</refcenter>

= What This sensational thought-mind which is based upon sense, memory, association, first ideas and resultant generalisations or secondary ideas, is common to Observe =all developed animal life and mentality….The intelligence and will of the animal are involved in the sense-mind and therefore altogether governed by it and carried on its stream of sensations, sense-perceptions, impulses; it is instinctive. Man is able to use a reason and will, a self-observing, thinking and all-observing, an intelligently willing mind which is no longer involved in the sense-mind, but acts from above and behind it in its own right, with a certain separateness and freedom. He is reflective, has a certain relative freedom of intelligent will. He has liberated in himself and has formed into a separate power the buddhi. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/purification-intelligence-and-will#p4</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">There are many voices, and The ordinary mind knows itself only as an ego with all are not divine; this may be only a voice the movements of desire. All that keeps one faithful to the Truth nature in a jumble and insists on peace, purityidentifying itself with these movements, devotionthinks "I am doing this, feeling that, sinceritythinking, a spiritual change in joy or in sorrow etc." The first beginning of real self-knowledge is when you feel yourself separate from the nature can be listened to with profit; the rest must be observed with discrimination in you and its movements and not followed blindly. Keep the fire then you see that there are many parts of aspiration burningyour being, but avoid all impatient hastemany personalities each acting on its own behalf and in its own way.</div> <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/3028/innerthe-voicespsychic-and-indicationbeing#p84</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The idea of the three essential modes of Nature is a creation of the ancient Indian thinkers '''Active and its truth is not at once obvious, because it was the result of long psychological experiment and profound internal experience. Therefore without a long inner experience, without intimate self-observation and intuitive perception of the Nature-forces it is difficult to grasp accurately or firmly utilise. Still certain broad indications may help the seeker on the Way of Works to understand, analyse and control by his assent or refusal the </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">combinations of his own nature. These modes are termed in the Indian books qualities, guṇas, and are given the names sattva, rajas, tamas. Sattwa is the force of equilibrium and translates in quality as good and harmony and happiness and light; rajas is the force of kinesis and translates in quality as struggle and effort, passion and action; tamas is the force of inconscience and inertia and translates in quality as obscurity and incapacity and inaction. Ordinarily used for psychological self-analysis, these distinctions are valid also in physical Nature. Each thing and every existence in the lower Prakriti contains them and its process and dynamic form are the result of the interaction of these qualitative powers.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-three-modes-of-nature#p2</ref>Passive Observation'''

= Process Your consciousness becomes a screen or mirror; but this is when you are in a state of Selfcontemplation, a mere observer; when you are active, it is like a searchlight. You have only to turn it on, if you want to see luminously and examine penetratingly anything in any place. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/30-Observation =june-1929#p7</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">You project yourself on the screen and then observe and see all that '''Observation is moving there and how it moves and what happens. You make a little diagram, it becomes so interesting then. And then, after a while, when you are quite accustomed to seeing, you can go one step further and take a decision. Or even a still greater step: you organise—arrange, take up all that, put each thing in its place, organise in such a way that you begin to have a straight movement with an inner meaning. And then you become conscious of your direction and are able to say: "Very well, it will be thus; my life will develop in that way, because that is the logic of my being. Now, I have arranged all that within me, each thing has been put in its place, and so naturally a central orientation is forming. I am following this orientation. One step more and I know what will happen to me for I myself am deciding it....".</div>Not Discernment'''

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother ,29 July 1953)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/29-july-1953#p47</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">But you must begin when very small, and consciously, very consciously; you must begin with a see of observation of all For the movements in yourself, of their relation with others, of—precisely, of your degree of independence, real individuality, of knowing where impulses come from, where other movements come from: whether it is contagion from outside or something that arises from within yourself. A very profound study of all the movements in oneself is necessary in order to succeed simply in crystallising a being who is a little conscious, a little conscious.</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother,22 September 1954)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/22-september-1954#p43</ref></u></div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is not a physical retirement that is needed, but an inner detachment from the mental formations and vital desires. To find the real self above and within and live in that, not in the mind's conceptions or the vital's reactions. These must be observed and looked at not as one's own but as movements of a surface ignorant nature.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-with-others-and-the-practice-of-yoga#p111</ref></u></span> = Conditions for Self-Observation = == Quiet Mind == <div style="color:#000000;">It is only when we follow the yogic process of quieting the mind itself that a profounder result of our self-observation becomes possible.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and-the-indeterminable#p12</ref></u></span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is in the quiet mind that the true observation and knowledge come.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/quiet-and-calm#p40</ref></u></span> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">A quiet mind does not mean that there will be no thoughts or mental movements at all, but that these will be on the surface and you will feel your true being within separate from them, observing but not carried away, able to watch and judge them and reject all that has to be rejected and to accept and keep to all that is true consciousness and true experience.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/peace#p10</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">But if you remain very quiet, only if you observe—as though you were silently looking at something, you understand—then you will begin seeing more precisely, and little by little distinguishing between different categories capacity of things. You will be able to know what one thing is and what another etc., whether it comes from you or from outside, whether it is on a material plane or on another plane. All this is learnt through a very quiet observation, quiet but very sharp, you understand; because there are very tiny shades, very tiny, between different things, and when you get used to distinguishing these nuances, you can discern exactly what it is.</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother,20 October 1954)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/20-october-1954#p46</ref></u></div> == Silence == <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is really an inner silence that is needed—a something silent within that looks at outer talk and action but feels it as something superficial, not as itself and is quite indifferent and untouched by it. It can bring forces to support speech and action or it can stop them by withdrawal or it can let them go on and observe without being involved or moved.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p76</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">...You must be able to silence your head absolutely and be completely detached, not to have (for example, when you are looking for the solution of a problem), not to have already in your head the solution that seems to you right or the best or most profitable. That must not be there. You must become absolutely like a blank paper, with nothing on it. And you proceed in that way, confused with a very sincere aspiration to know the truth, without assuming beforehand that it will be like this or like that; because otherwise you will see only your own formation. The very first condition is that the head must keep completely silent during the time one is observing.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 30 September 1953)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/30-september-1953#p13</ref></u></span> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To silence the mind it is not enough to throw back each thought as it comes, that can only be a subordinate movement. One must get back from all thought and be separate from it, a silent consciousness observing the thoughts if they come, but not oneself thinking or </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">identified with the thoughts. Thoughts must be felt as outside things altogether. It is then easier to reject thoughts or let them pass without their disturbing the quietude capacity of the minddiscernment.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/interactions-with-others-and-the-practice-of-yoga#p99</ref> = Right Attitude for Self-Observation = == Witness Attitude == <div style="color:#000000;">Have you never felt this? As though you were a little behind or above things, and were looking at them taking place but were not doing anything yourself? Witness means an observer, someone who looks on and does not act himself. So, when the mind is very quiet, one can withdraw a little in this way from circumstances and look at things as though he were a witness, a spectator, and not participating in the action himself. This gives you a great detachment, a great quietude, and also a very precise see of the value of things, because it cuts the attachment to action. When you know how to do this with yourself, when you can withdraw and watch yourself acting, you learn many things about yourself. When you are all mixed up and take part in the action, you do not observe yourself acting, you don't know what you are like. But when you draw back and look at yourself, you can perceive many imperfections which you wouldn't have seen otherwise.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother,13 October 1954)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/13-october-1954#p2</ref>  <div style="color:#000000;">It has been seen that a most effective way of purification Discernment is for the mental Purusha to draw back, to stand as the passive witness and observe and know himself and the workings of Nature in the lower, the normal being; but this must be combined, for perfection, with a will to raise the purified nature into the higher spiritual being. When that is done, the Purusha is no longer only a witness, but also the master of his prakriti, īśvara.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-action-of-the-divine-shakti#p7</ref></u></div> <div style="color:#000000;">The witness Purusha in the mind observes that the inadequacy of his effort, all the inadequacy in fact of man's life and nature arises from the separation and the consequent struggle, want of knowledge, want of harmony, want of oneness. It is essential for him to grow out of separative individuality, to universalise himself, to make himself one with the universe. This unification can be done only through the soul by making our soul of mind one with the universal Mind, our soul of life one with the universal Life-soul, our soul of body one with the universal soul of physical Nature.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-perfection-of-the-mental-being#p15</ref></u></div> == Being Sincere and Impartial == For that you must be absolutely sincere and impartial. You must observe yourself as if you were observing and criticising a third person. You must not start with an idea that this is your life's mission, this is your particular intellectual capacity, this you are to do or that you are to do, in this lies your talent or genius, etc. That will carry you away from the right track. It is not the liking or disliking of your external being, your mental or vital or physical choice that determines the true line of your growth. Nor should you take up the opposite attitude and say, "I am good for nothing in this matter, I am useless in that one; it is not for me." Neither vanity and arrogance nor self-depreciation and false modesty should move you. As I said, you must be absolutely impartial and unconcerned. You should be Something like a mirror that reflects the truth and does not judge. <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother ,12 November 1952)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/12-november-1952#p6</ref></u></span> == Being Vigilant == <div style="color:#000000;">One can be quiet, happy, cheerful without being all that in a light or shallow way—and the happiness need not bring any vital reaction. All that you need to do is to be observant and vigilant,—watchful so that you may not give assent to wrong movements or the return of the old feelings, darkness, confusion etc. Not fear, but vigilance. If you remain vigilant, then with the increase of the Force upholding you, a power of self-control will come, a power to see and reject the wrong turn or the wrong reaction when judgment already enters into it comes.</div> <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/fear#p12</ref> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">But you have only to observe yourselves... you can observe yourself, catch yourself at least a hundred times a day, with a mind which decides everything, knows everything, judges everything, knows very well what is good, what bad, what is true, what false, what is right... And also how one should act, what this person should have done, how to resolve that problem.... All men know, you see... If they were at the head of governments, for instance, they would know very well how to manage everything! But people don't listen to them... that's all!</span><span style=we call "background-color:transparent;color:#000000;discrimination">(The Mother,21 July 1954)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/21-july-1954#p40</ref></u></span> == Becoming Aware of Desire == <div style="color:#000000;">For that you must observe yourself very, very attentively, and if there is anything in you which produces something like a small intense vibration, then you may be sure that there lies a desire. For example, you say, "This food is necessary for me"—you believe, you imagine, you think that you need such and such a thing and you find the necessary means to obtain the thing. To know if it is a need or a desire, you must look at yourself very closely and ask yourself, "What will happen if I cannot get can distinguish between the thing?" Then if the immediate answer is, "Oh, it will be very bad", you may be sure that it is a matter origin of desire. It is the same for everything. For every problem you draw back, look at yourself and ask, "Let us see, am I going to have the one thing?" If at that moment something in you jumps up with joy, you may be certain there is a desire. On the other hand, if something tells you, "Oh, I am not going to get it", and you feel very depressed, then again it is a desire.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 25 January 1951)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/25-january-1951#p3</ref>  == Becoming Conscious == <div style="color:#000000;">But a time comes when instead of doing things automatically, impelled by a consciousness and force of which one is quite unaware—a time comes when one can observe what goes on in oneself, study one's movements, find their causesanother, and at the same time begin to exercise a control first over what goes on within us, then on the influence cast on us from outside which makes us act, in the beginning altogether unconsciously and almost involuntarily, but gradually more and more consciously; and the will can wake up and react. Then at that moment, the moment there is a conscious will capable reciprocal value of reacting, one may say, "I have become conscious." This does not mean that it is a total and perfect consciousness, it means that it is a beginning: for example, when one is able to observe all the reactions in one's being and to have a certain control over them, to let those one approves of have play, and to control, stop, annul those one doesn't approve of.</div> <div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother, 28 November 1956)</div> <div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/28-november-1956#p19</ref></u></div> = Limitations of Self-Observation = == Surface Level Observation == <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">As a general rule, with a few very rare exceptions, men are content to observe more or less accurately everything that happens around them, and sometimes within themselves, and to classify all these observations according to one superficial system of logic or another. And they call this organisation, these systems, "knowledge". It has never occurred to them, they have not even begun to perceive that all the things they see, touch, feel, experience, are false appearances and not reality itself.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/10/aphorism-7#p3</ref></u></span> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is evident But that our state on the surface is indeed a state of knowledge, so far as it goes, but a limited knowledge enveloped and invaded by ignorance and, ought to a very large extent, by reason of its limitation, itself a kind of ignorance, at best a mixed knowledge-ignorance. It could not be otherwise since our awareness of the world is born of founded on a separative and surface correct observation with only an indirect means of cognition at its disposal; our knowledge of ourselves, though more direct, is stultified by its restriction to the surface of our being, by an ignorance of our true self, the true sources of our nature, the true motive-forces of our </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">action. It is quite evident that we know ourselves with only a superficial knowledge,—the sources of our consciousness and thought are a mystery; the true nature of our mind, emotions, sensations is a mystery; our cause of being and our end of being, the significance of our life and its activities are a mystery: this could not be if we had a real self-knowledge and a real world-knowledge.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/knowledge-by-identity-and-separative-knowledge#p7</ref></u></span> <div style="color:#000000;">One throws oneself out all the time; all the time one lives, as it were, outside oneself, in such a superficial sensation that it is almost as though one were outside oneself. As soon as one wants even to observe oneself a little, control oneself a little, simply know what is happening, one is always obliged to draw back or pull towards oneself, to pull inwards something which is constantly like that, on the surface. And it is this surface thing which meets all external contacts, puts you in touch with similar vibrations coming from others. That happens almost outside you.</div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother , 20 June 1956)</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/20-june-1956#p49</ref></u></div> == Ignorance == <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">As the surface mental entity moving from moment to moment, not observing his essential self but only his relation to his experiences of the Time-movement, in that movement keeping the future from himself in what appears to be a blank of Ignorance and non-existence but is an unrealised fullness, grasping knowledge and experience of being in the present, putting it away in the past which again appears to be a blank of Ignorance and non-existence partly lighted, partly saved and stored up by memory, he puts on the aspect of a thing fleeting and uncertain seizing without stability upon things fleeting and uncertain. But in reality, we shall find, he is always the same Eternal who is for ever stable and self-possessed in His supramental knowledge and what he seizes on is also for ever stable and eternal; for it is himself that he is mentally experiencing in the succession of Time.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/memory-self-consciousness-and-the-ignorance#p15</ref></u></span> == Observing Invisible Forces == <div style="color:#000000;">If we observe a happening, we judge and explain it from the result and from a glimpse of its most external constituents, circumstances or causes; but each happening is the outcome of a complex nexus of forces which we do not and cannot observe, because all forces are to us invisible,—but they are not invisible to the spiritual vision of the Infinite: some of them are actualities working to produce or occasion a new actuality, some are possibles that are near to the pre-existent actuals and in a way included in their aggregate; but there can intervene always new possibilities that suddenly become dynamic potentials and add themselves to the nexus, and behind all are imperatives or an imperative which these possibilities are labouring to actualise.</div> <div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/brahman-purusha-ishwara-maya-prakriti-shakti#p7</ref></u></div> = Personality and Self-Observation = == Three Guna’s and Self-Observation == <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">In this progression the first step is a certain detached superiority to the three modes of Nature. The soul is inwardly separated and free from the lower Prakriti, not involved in its coils, indifferent and glad above it. Nature continues to act in the triple round of her ancient habits,—desire, grief and joy attack the heart, the instruments fall into inaction and obscurity and weariness, light and peace come back into the heart and mind and body; but the soul stands unchanged and untouched by these changes. Observing and unmoved by the grief and desire of the lower members, smiling at their joys and their strainings, regarding and unoverpowered by the failing and the darknesses of the thought and the wildness or the weaknesses of the heart and nerves, uncompelled and unattached to the mind's illuminations and its relief and sense of ease or of power in the return of light and gladness, it throws itself into none of these things, but waits unmoved for the intimations of a higher Will and the intuitions of a greater luminous knowledge.</span> <div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-three-modes-of-nature#p13</ref></u></div> = Parts and Planes of the Being = <div style="color:#000000;">Have you ever practised distinguishing what observation comes from your mind, what comes from your vital, what comes from your physical?... For it is mixed up; it is mixed up in the outward appearance. If you do not take care to distinguish, it makes a kind of soup, all that together. So it is indistinct and difficult to discover. But if you observe yourself, after some time you see certain things, you feel them to be there, like that, as though they were in your skin; for some other things you feel you would have to go within yourself to find out from where they come; for other things, you have to go still further inside, or otherwise you have to rise up a little: it comes from unconsciousness. And there are others; then you must go very deepfirst, very deep to find out from where they comediscernment follows. This is just a beginning.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 10 June 1953)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0503/1030-june-19531929#p31p7</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To work for your perfection, the first step is to become conscious of yourself, of the different parts of your being and their respective activities. You must learn to distinguish these different parts one from another, so that you may become clearly aware of the origin of the movements that occur in you, the many impulses, reactions and conflicting wills that drive you =What to action. It is an assiduous study which demands much perseverance and sincerity. For man's nature, especially his mental nature, has a spontaneous tendency to give a favourable explanation for everything he thinks, feels, says and does. It is only by observing these movements with great care, by bringing them, as it were, before the tribunal of our highest ideal, with a sincere will to submit to its judgment, that we can hope </span><span styleObserve ="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">to form in ourselves a discernment that never errs. For if we truly want to progress and acquire the capacity of knowing the truth of our being, that is to say, what we are truly created for, what we can call our mission upon earth, then we must, in a very regular and constant manner, reject from us or eliminate in us whatever contradicts the truth of our existence, whatever is opposed to it. In this way, little by little, all the parts, all the elements of our being can be organised into a homogeneous whole around our psychic centre. This work of unification requires much time to be brought to some degree of perfection. Therefore, in order to accomplish it, we must arm ourselves with patience and endurance, with a determination to prolong our life as long as necessary for the success of our endeavour.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/the-science-of-living#p5</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">….You may have One can prepare the body through a mental power series of observationobservations, a vital power of observationstudies, a physical power of observation. When you observe ideasunderstandings, for instance, the train of ideas, the logic of the ideasby showing it examples, making it is not altogether the same power of observation understand things as when you look at one makes a friend doing athletics and see whether he is making his movements correctly or not. That ischild understand them, either by observing its own movements―but generally, the capacity of attention is there in both casesthis, but it works one is comparatively blind!―or by observing those of others. And in a different fieldmore general way, this preparation will be based on recognised studies, on clear facts. It can't be said Like this, for instance: that it is one part a certain number of the being observing the others; it is the faculty of observation developing persons, placed in exactly similar circumstances, experience, each part one of the being—that isthem, the faculty of concentration and attentionvery different effects. For the capacity One may go even further: in a given set of observation must not be confused with the capacity of discernment. Discernment definite circumstances, there is an intellectual capacity. Something like a judgment already enters into itcertain number of particular, definite individuals, what we call "discrimination": you can distinguish between the origin of one thing and of anotherin apparently quite identical conditions, and for some the reciprocal value of these thingseffects are catastrophic, while others escape without any harm. But that ought to be founded on a correct observation. The power of observation comes first, discernment follows<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/4-july-1956#p15</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;">For a larger mental being is there within usHave you ever practised distinguishing what comes from your mind, a larger inner what comes from your vital being, even a larger inner subtle-what comes from your physical being other than our surface body-consciousness, and by entering into this or becoming ?... For it, identifying ourselves with is mixed up; it, we can observe is mixed up in the springs of our thoughts and feelingsoutward appearance. If you do not take care to distinguish, the sources and motives it makes a kind of our actionsoup, the operative energies all that build up our surface personalitytogether. For we So it is indistinct and difficult to discover and can know the inner being that secretly thinks and perceives in us. But if you observe yourself, after some time you see certain things, you feel them to be there, the vital being like that secretly feels and acts upon life through us, the subtle-physical being that secretly receives and responds as though they were in your skin; for some other things you feel you would have to go within yourself to the contacts of find out from where they come; for other things through our body and its organs. Our surface thought, feelingyou have to go still further inside, emotion is or otherwise you have to rise up a complexity and confusion of impulsions little: it comes from within and impacts from outside usunconsciousness. And there are others; our reasonthen you must go very deep, our organising intelligence can impose on it only an imperfect order: but here within we very deep to find the separate sources of our mental, our vital and our physical energisms and can see clearly the pure operations, the distinct powers, the composing elements of each and their interplay in out from where they come. This is just a clear light of self-visionbeginning.</div><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2105/knowledge-by-identity-and10-separativejune-knowledge1953#p12p31</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">There For a larger mental being is there within us, a state of larger inner vital being experienced in Yoga in which we become , even a double larger inner subtle-physical being other than our surface body-consciousness, one on the surfaceand by entering into this or becoming it, smallidentifying ourselves with it, active, ignorant, swayed by we can observe the springs of our thoughts and feelings, grief the sources and joy and all kinds motives of reactionsour action, the other within calm, vast, equal, observing the operative energies that build up our surface being with an immovable detachment or indulgence or, it may be, acting upon its agitation to quiet, enlarge, transform itpersonality. So too For we discover and can rise to a consciousness above and observe know the various parts of our inner being, inner that secretly thinks and outer, mentalperceives in us, the vital being that secretly feels and physical and the subconscient below allacts upon life through us, and act upon one or other or the whole from subtle-physical being that higher status. It is possible also secretly receives and responds to go down from that height or from any height into any the contacts of these lower states things through our body and take its limited light or its obscurity as our place of working while the rest that we are organs. Our surface thought, feeling, emotion is either temporarily put away or put behind or else kept as a field complexity and confusion of reference impulsions from within and impacts from which we can get supportoutside us; our reason, sanction or light and influence or as a status into which we our organising intelligence can ascend or recede and from impose on it observe only an imperfect order: but here within we find the inferior movements. Or we can plunge into tranceseparate sources of our mental, get within ourselves our vital and our physical energisms and be conscious there while all outward things are excluded; or we can go beyond even this inner awareness see clearly the pure operations, the distinct powers, the composing elements of each and lose ourselves their interplay in some deeper other consciousness or some high superconscience. There is also a pervading equal consciousness into which we can enter and see all ourselves with one enveloping glance or omnipresent awareness one and indivisibleclear light of self-vision.</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/brahmanknowledge-purushaby-ishwaraidentity-mayaand-prakritiseparative-shaktiknowledge#p23p12</ref></u></div>

== Witness and Parts '''The Three Modes of Being ==Nature'''

<div style="color:#000000;">It The idea of the three essential modes of Nature is difficult to say generally what a creation of the ancient Indian thinkers and its truth is conscious; but naturallynot at once obvious, if something observesbecause it was the result of long psychological experiment and profound internal experience. Therefore without a long inner experience, without intimate self-observation and intuitive perception of the Nature-forces it is always difficult to grasp accurately or firmly utilise. Still certain broad indications may help the seeker on the "witness" element in this part—in each part Way of Works to understand, analyse and control by his assent or refusal the being there is something which is a "witness", which looks oncombinations of his own nature. There is even a physical witness which can get very much These modes are termed in the way; for instanceIndian books qualities, guṇas, and are given the names sattva, if it watches you playingrajas, this can paralyse you considerablytamas. There Sattwa is also a vital witness which looks at you, sees your desires the force of equilibrium and translates in quality as good and harmony and happiness and enjoys highly all that happenslight; it acts also as a brake. There rajas is the mental witness which judges ideas, which says, "This idea contradicts this other"force of kinesis and translates in quality as struggle and effort, passion and which arranges everything. Then there action; tamas is the great psychic Witnessforce of inconscience and inertia and translates in quality as obscurity and incapacity and inaction. Ordinarily used for psychological self-analysis, who is these distinctions are valid also in physical Nature. Each thing and every existence in the lower Prakriti contains them and its process and dynamic form are the result of the inner divinityinteraction of these qualitative powers. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-three-modes-of-nature#p2</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Sometimes there is no relation among these different witnesses—there ought Now the procedure to be, but it is not always theredeal with dreams and the dreamland. But if there is in the being a will to First become perfect, conscious—conscious of your dreams. Observe the relation is established quite quickly; one can refer to another between them and finally, if there is a sufficient sincerity, sufficient concentrationthe happenings of your waking hours. If you remember your night, you come will be able to trace back very often the condition of your day to the supreme inner Witness who can judge all thingscondition of your night. But generally it may be said that it In sleep some action or other is always a part of the mind, more going on in your mental or vital or less enlightened, in a little closer contact with the inner being, which observes other plane; things happen there and judgesthey govern your waking consciousness. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/21-april-1929#p6</spanref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother, 22 March 1951)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/22-march-1951#p7</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">A man with It is a very developed introspective mind often identifies himself with tremendous field of observation—there is no end to the witness part of his mind and observes his own thoughts and studies their naturediscoveries you can make in your dreams. That But there is one important point: you must not go to sleep when you are very tired, for if you do, you fall into a beginning sort of unconsciousness in which makes it easy for the full detachment dreams do whatever they like with you, and you have no reaction. Just as I said that you should not eat without having taken rest, I would advise everyone to rest before going to comesleep. For others it is less easyAnd for that, but it can be done by allyou must know how to rest.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3015/inner-detachment-and-the1-witnessfebruary-attitude1951#pp14</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">You have to become conscious—that is to sayAs the inner consciousness grows by sadhana, there must be something these dream experiences increase in you which is not carried away by thoughts number, clearness, coherence, accuracy and after some growth of experience and feelingsconsciousness, we can, if we observe, but looks at come to understand them and observes how they work their significance to our inner life. Even we can by training become so conscious as to follow our own passage, usually veiled to our awareness and how they affect you. The part that observes memory, through many realms and knows is called the Witness sākṣī in manprocess of the return to the waking state. It is always possible to develop At a certain pitch of this inner wakefulness this in oneselfkind of sleep, a sleep of experiences, can replace the ordinary subconscient slumber.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/innerthree-detachmentexperiences-andof-the-witnessinner-attitudebeing#p25p6</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:[[#000000;">...behind there is the psychic which supports the development, the growth of the being and gives this continuity of consciousness, makes one feel that he is the same being even while being absolutely different, absolutely different. If later one observes himself sufficiently, he can see that the things he understood and could do at that time are things which seem top|Back to him absolutely inconceivable now, and that he could never do a similar thing because he is no longer that person at all. And yet, because within there was the psychic consciousness which is immortal, one has the feeling that it is always the same being which was there and continues to be there and will continue to be there with more or less progressive and more or less conscious changes.</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 29 June 1955)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/29-june-1955#p28</ref></u></span>Contents]]

<div style="color:#000000;">The ordinary mind knows itself only as an ego with all the movements of the nature in a jumble and, identifying itself with these movements, thinks "I am doing this, feeling that, thinking, in joy or in sorrow etc." The first beginning of real selfWhy is Self-knowledge is when you feel yourself separate from the nature in you and its movements and then you see that there are many parts of your being, many personalities each acting on its own behalf and in its own way. The two different beings you feel are—one, the psychic being which draws you towards the Mother, the other the external being mostly vital which draws you outward and downwards towards the play of the lower nature. There is also in you behind the mind the being who observes, the witness Purusha, who can stand detached from the play of the nature, observing it and able to choose.</div><div styleObservation Important? ="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-psychic-being#p84</ref></u></div>

<span style="background...if he [man] is not to remain this being of the surface ignorance seeking obscurely after the truth of things and collecting and systematising fragments and sections of knowledge, the small limited and half-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The actions are competent creature of importance only as expressing what the cosmic Force which he now is in the his phenomenal nature. You have He must know himself and discover and utilise all his potentialities: but to be conscious know himself and the world completely he must go behind his own and its exterior, he must dive deep below his own mental surface and the physical surface of Nature. This he can only do by knowing his inner mental, vital, physical and psychic being and its powers and movements and the universal laws and processes of whatever in your actions is not in harmony with the Yoga occult Mind and to get rid Life which stand behind the material front of itthe universe. ... But for that what is needed this knowledge must be something more than a creed or a mystic revelation; his thinking mind must be able to accept it, to correlate it with the principle of things and the observed truth of the universe: this is your own consciousness, the psychicwork of philosophy, observing from within and throwing off what is seen to in the field of the truth of the spirit it can only be undesirabledone by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method or intuitive.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2909/work18-andjune-yoga1958#p45p3</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The mental being within watches, observes and passes judgment on all that happens in you. The psychic does not watch and observe in this way like a witness, but it feels and knows spontaneously in a much more direct and luminous way by the very purity of its own nature and the divine instinct within it, and so, whenever it comes to the front it reveals at once what are the right and what the wrong movements in your nature.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-jivatman-in-the-integral-yoga#p40</ref></u></spancenter>

== Mind To work for your perfection, the first step is to become conscious of yourself, of the different parts of your being and Selftheir respective activities. You must learn to distinguish these different parts one from another, so that you may become clearly aware of the origin of the movements that occur in you, the many impulses, reactions and conflicting wills that drive you to action. It is an assiduous study which demands much perseverance and sincerity. For man's nature, especially his mental nature, has a spontaneous tendency to give a favourable explanation for everything he thinks, feels, says and does. It is only by observing these movements with great care, by bringing them, as it were, before the tribunal of our highest ideal, with a sincere will to submit to its judgment, that we can hope to form in ourselves a discernment that never errs. For if we truly want to progress and acquire the capacity of knowing the truth of our being, that is to say, what we are truly created for, what we can call our mission upon earth, then we must, in a very regular and constant manner, reject from us or eliminate in us whatever contradicts the truth of our existence, whatever is opposed to it. In this way, little by little, all the parts, all the elements of our being can be organised into a homogeneous whole around our psychic centre. This work of unification requires much time to be brought to some degree of perfection. Therefore, in order to accomplish it, we must arm ourselves with patience and endurance, with a determination to prolong our life as long as necessary for the success of our endeavour. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/the-science-of-Observation ==living#p5</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>Gradually, as the action is prolonged and the outer being begins to assimilate this action, there awakens a capacity of observation, first in the mental consciousness, and a kind of objectivisation occurs: something in the mind looks on, observes and translates in its own way. This is what you call understanding, and this is what gives you the impression (smiling) that you are having an experience. But that is already considerably diminished in comparison with the experience itself, it is a transcription adapted to your mental, vital and physical dimension, that is, something that is shrunken, hardened—and it gives you at the same time the impression that it is growing clearer; that is to say, it has become as limited as your understanding.~</divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent… if each element which comes with its ignorance, its unconsciousness, its egoism, is put before the will to change and one remains awake, compares, observes, studies and slowly acts, that becomes infinitely interesting, one makes marvellous and quite unexpected discoveries. One finds in oneself lots of small hidden folds, little things one had not seen at the beginning;colorone undertakes a sort of inner chase, goes hunting into small dark corners and tells oneself:#000000;">(The MotherWhat, I was like that! This was there in me, 31 October 1956)</span><span style=I am harbouring this little thing"background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;—sometimes so sordid, so mean, so nasty. And once it has been discovered, how wonderful! One puts the light upon it and it disappears and you no longer have those reactions which made you so sad before, when you used to say, "><u>Oh! I shall never get there. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0804/3119-octoberapril-19561951#p19p14</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>...We have in all functionings of the mentality four elements, the object of mental consciousness, the act of mental consciousness, the occasion and the subject. In the self-experience of the self-observing inner being, the object is always some state or movement or wave of the conscious being, anger, grief or other emotion, hunger or other vital craving, impulse or inner life reaction or some form of sensation, perception or thought activity. The act is some kind of mental observation and conceptual valuation of this movement or wave or else a mental sensation of it in which observation and valuation may be involved and even lost,—so that in this act the mental person may either separate the act and the object by a distinguishing perception or confuse them together indistinguishably. ~</spancenter>

<div style="color:#0066ccIf you had that observation (from the inner spiritual, not the outer intellectual and ethical viewpoint), then it would be comparatively easy for you to get out of your difficulties;"><u>for instance you would find at once where this irrational impulse to flee away came from and it would not have any hold upon you. Of course, all that can only be done to the best effect when you stand back from the play of your nature and become the Witness-Control or the Spectator-Actor Manager. But that is what happens when you take this kind of self-seeing posture. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2131/memorymental-egodifficulties-and-selfthe-need-of-experiencequietude#p5p23</ref></u></div>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>So the man of real merit or the more civilised man has a whole mental construction to which he must conform in order to be in harmony with the ideal of the environment in which he lives. But someone who does not conform at least to the smallest part of this construction would be considered a savage and would be thrown out of the society immediately. In fact, people who are criminals or half-mad are those who obey their impulses without any mental control. There isn't a single person among you who gives way without control to all the impulses that get hold of him. You have only to observe yourselves living, you spend your time saying, "No, this I can't do", or "This I can", or in restraining one movement or encouraging another. This is mental control.~</divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother true and ultimate, 15 September 1954)</span><span style="backgroundas distinguished from the immediate or intermediate importance of our observing, reasoning, inquiring, judging intelligence is that it prepares the human being for the right reception and right action of a Light from above which must progressively replace in him the obscure light from below that guides the animal. ...Man can bring an enlightened will, an enlightened thought and enlightened emotions to the difficult work of his self-color:transparentdevelopment;color:#0066cche can more and more subject to these more conscious and reflecting guides the inferior function of desire. In proportion as he can thus master and enlighten his lower self, he is man and no longer an animal. When he can begin to replace desire altogether by a still greater enlightened thought and sight and will in touch with the Infinite, consciously subject to a diviner will than his own, linked to a more universal and transcendent knowledge, he has commenced the ascent towards the superman;"><u>he is on his upward march towards the Divine.<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0623/15self-september-1954consecration#p9p17</ref></u></span>

== Vital and Self-Observation =How to Observe Oneself? =

<span style="background-color:transparentBut you must begin when very small, and consciously, very consciously;color:#000000;">What happens usually is that something touches you must begin with a sense of observation of all the vitalmovements in yourself, often without one's of their relation with others, of—precisely, of your degree of independence, real individuality, of knowing where impulses come from, where other movements come from: whether it, and brings up the old ordinary is contagion from outside or external consciousness in such a way something that the inner mind gets covered up and arises from within yourself. A very profound study of all the old thoughts and feelings return for movements in oneself is necessary in order to succeed simply in crystallising a time. It being who is the physical mind that becomes active and gives its assent. If the whole mind remains quiet and detached observing the vital movementa little conscious, but not giving its assent, then to reject it becomes more easy. This established quietude and detachment of the mind marks always a great </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">step forward made in the sadhanalittle conscious.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3106/the-vital-and-other22-levelsseptember-of-being1954#p45p43</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-colorYou project yourself on the screen and then observe and see all that is moving there and how it moves and what happens. You make a little diagram, it becomes so interesting then. And then, after a while, when you are quite accustomed to seeing, you can go one step further and take a decision. Or even a still greater step:transparent;color:#000000;">After you organise—arrange, take up all that, put each crisis there is something gainedthing in its place, if there has been organise in such a way that you begin to have a victory straight movement with an inner meaning. And then you become conscious of your direction and rejection. The gain is are able to externalise the vital disturbancesay: "Very well, so that even if it returns it will be felt so much an outside force thus; my life will develop in that way, because that is the observing consciousness (mentallogic of my being. Now, higher vital) cannot be disturbed. If you keep I have arranged all thatwithin me, each thing has been put in its place, and so naturally a central orientation is forming. I am following this orientation. One step more and I know what will happen to me for I myself am deciding it will be an immense advance.</span>...". <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3105/wrong-movements-of29-thejuly-vital1953#p68p47</ref>

== Physical If one begins to find out, to understand what a feeling is and Selfwhat a thought is, and how it works, then one can already go quite far on the path with that. One must at the same time observe how his feelings and thoughts have an action on the body, what the reciprocity is. And then, there is another exercise which consists in looking into oneself for what is persistent, what is lasting, something which makes one say "I", and which is not the body. For obviously, when one was very small, and then when each year one grows up, if one takes fairly long distances, for example a distance of about ten years, they are very different "I"s from what one was when as small as this (gesture), and then what one is now; it is difficult to say that it is the same person, you see. If one takes only this, still there is something which has the feeling of always being the same person. So one must reflect, seek, try to understand what it is. This indeed can lead you far on the path. Then if one also studies the relation between these different things—between thoughts, feelings, their action on the body, the reciprocal action of the body on these things—and also what it is that says "I" permanently, what it is that can trace a curve in the movement of the being, if one seeks carefully enough, it leads you quite far. Naturally if one seeks far enough and with enough persistence, one reaches the psychic. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/9-march-Observation ==1955#p23</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>One can prepare the body through a series of observations, studies, understandings,by showing it examples, making it understand things as one makes a child understand them, either by observing its own movements―but generally, in this, one is comparatively blind!―or by observing those of others. And in a more general way, this preparation will be based on recognised studies, on clear facts. Like this, for instance: that a certain number of persons, placed in exactly similar circumstances, experience, each one of them, very different effects. One may go even further: in a given set of definite circumstances, there is a certain number of particular, definite individuals, in apparently quite identical conditions, and for some the effects are catastrophic, while others escape without any harm.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 4 July 1956)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/4-july-1956#p15</ref></u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">If it It is not a physical retirement that is needed, but an inert tamasic passivity subject to any influence inner detachment from the mental formations and unable to react, then it is subjection to Naturevital desires. If it is a sattwic passivity of To find the Witness observing real self above and understanding within and live in that, not in the mind's conceptions or the vital's reactions. These must be observed and looked at not as one's own but as movements of Nature, then it is an intermediate condition, often necessary for knowledge. If it is a luminous passivity open to the Divine, shut to all other influences, then it is not subjection to Nature but surrender to the Divinesurface ignorant nature.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/difficultiesinteractions-with-others-ofand-the-physicalpractice-of-natureyoga#p24p111</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>For the giddiness, it may be that in concentration you go partly out of your body; then, if you get up and move before the whole consciousness has come back, there is just such a giddiness as you describe. You can observe in future and see whether it is not this that happens. One has to be careful not to move after deep concentration or trance, till there is the full consciousness in the body.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/difficulties-of-the-physical-nature#p59</ref></u></span> = Consciousness and Self-Observation = <div style="color:#000000;">Your consciousness becomes a screen or mirror; but this is when you are in a state of contemplation, a mere observer; when you are active, it is like a searchlight. You have only to turn it on, if you want to see luminously and examine penetratingly anything in any place.</div> <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 30 June 1929)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/30-june-1929#p7</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">However, if one observes things a little deeply, one perceives that there is progress, that things become better and better, though apparently they do not improve. And for a consciousness seated a little higher, it is quite evident that all evil—at least what we call evil—all falsehood, all that is contrary to the Truth, all suffering, all opposition is the result of a disequilibrium. I believe that one who is habituated to seeing things from this higher plane sees immediately that it is like that. </div><div style="color:#000000;">(The Mother , 8 January 1951)</div><div styleBy Vigilance =="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/8-january-1951#p13</ref></u></div>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">There are two centres or parts of the consciousness—one is a witnessOne can be quiet, sākṣīhappy, and observes, the other consciousness is active and it is this active consciousness cheerful without being all that you felt going down deep into in a light or shallow way—and the happiness need not bring any vital beingreaction. If your mind had not become active, All that you would have known where it went and what it went there need to experience or do. When there is an experienceto be observant and vigilant, —watchful so that you should may not begin give assent to think about itwrong movements or the return of the old feelings, darkness, confusion etc. Not fear, but vigilance. If you remain vigilant, for that is then with the increase of no use at all and it only stops the experience—you should remain silentForce upholding you, a power of self-control will come, observe a power to see and let reject the wrong turn or the wrong reaction when it go on to its endcomes.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/3031/suggestions-for-dealing-with-experiencesfear#p8p12</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">At But you have only to observe yourselves... you can observe yourself, catch yourself at least a hundred times a day, with a certain stage of the sadhanamind which decides everything, knows everything, judges everything, knows very well what is good, in the beginning (or near it) of the more intense experienceswhat bad, it sometimes happens that there what is the intense realisation of some aspect of the Divinetrue, a sort of communion with itwhat false, and that what is seen everywhere and all as right... And also how one should act, what this person should have done, how to resolve thatproblem.... All men know, you see... It is a transitory phase and afterwards one gets If they were at the larger experience head of the Divine in all its aspects and beyond all aspectsgovernments, for instance, they would know very well how to manage everything! But people don't listen to them. Throughout the experience there should be one part of the being that observes and understands—for sometimes ignorant sadhaks are carried away by their experience and stop short there or fall into extravagance. It must be taken as an experience through which you are passing.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>that's all! <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3006/suggestions-for-dealing21-withjuly-experiences1954#p10p40</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Thoughts are not the essence But a time comes when instead of mind-beingdoing things automatically, they are only an activity impelled by a consciousness and force of mental nature; if that activity ceaseswhich one is quite unaware—a time comes when one can observe what goes on in oneself, study one's movements, find their causes, and at the same time begin to exercise a control first over what appears goes on within us, then as a thought-free existence that manifests on the influence cast on us from outside which makes us act, in its place is not a blank or void the beginning altogether unconsciously and almost involuntarily, but something very real, substantial, concrete we may say—a mental being that extends itself widely gradually more and more consciously; and the will can be its own field wake up and react. Then at that moment, the moment there is a conscious will capable of existence silent or active as well as the Witnessreacting, Knowerone may say, Master of "I have become conscious." This does not mean that field and its action. Some feel it first as is a voidtotal and perfect consciousness, but it means that it is because their observation a beginning: for example, when one is untrained able to observe all the reactions in one's being and insufficient and loss of activity gives to have a certain control over them the sense , to let those one approves of blank; an emptiness there ishave play, and to control, but it is an emptiness of the ordinary activitiesstop, not a blank annul those one doesn't approve of existence.</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/3008/three28-experiencesnovember-of-the-inner-being1956#p3p19</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is only gradually, very slowly, through the movements of life and a more or less careful and thorough education that you begin to have sensations which are personal to you, feelings and ideas which are personal to you. An individualised mind is something extremely rare, which comes only after a long education; otherwise it is a kind of thought-current passing through your brain and then through another's and then through a multitude of other brains, and all this is in perpetual movement and has no individuality. One thinks what others are thinking, others think what still others are thinking, and everybody thinks like that in a great mixture, because these are currents, vibrations of thought passing from one to another. If you look at yourself attentively, you will very quickly become aware that very few thoughts in you are personal. Where do you draw them from?—From what you have heard, from what you have read, what you have been taught, and how many of these thoughts you have are the result of your own experience, your own reflection, your purely personal observation?—Not many.~</divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The MotherTake one hour of your life, the one which is most convenient for you, 20 February 1957)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>and during that time observe yourself closely and say only the absolutely indispensable words. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0903/20-february-1957anger#p6p15</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To observe your thoughts, you must first of all separate yourself from them. In the ordinary state, the ordinary man does not distinguish himself from his thoughts. He does not even know that he thinks. He thinks by habit. And if he is asked all of = By Developing a sudden, "What are you thinking of?", he knows nothing about it. That is to say, ninety-five times out of a hundred he will answer, "I do not know." There is a complete identification between the movement of thought and the consciousness of the being.</span><span styleQuiet Mind =="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/conjugate-verses#p12</ref></u></span>

<div style="color:#000000;">...when undesirable thoughts come, if you look at them, observe them, if you take pleasure in following them in their movements, they will never stop coming. It is only when we follow the same thing when you have undesirable feelings or sensation: if you pay attention to them, concentrate on them or even look at them with yogic process of quieting the mind itself that a certain indulgence, they will never stopprofounder result of our self-observation becomes possible. But if you absolutely refuse to receive and express them, after some time they stop<ref>http://incarnateword. You must be patient in/cwsa/21/indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and very persistent.-the-indeterminable#p12</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 22 September 1954)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/22-september-1954#p19</ref></u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>Most people—and not only those who are uneducated but even the well-read—can have the most contradictory, the most opposite ideas in their heads without even being aware of the contradictions….And if you observe yourself, you will see that you have many ideas which ought to be linked by a sequence of intermediate ideas which are the result of a considerable widening of the thought if they are not to coexist in an absurd way.~</div><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother, 20 February 1957)</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/20-february-1957#p8</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>The error comes from thinking that your thoughts are your own and that you are their maker and if you don't create thoughts (i.e. think), there will be none. A little observation ought to show that you are not manufacturing your own thoughts, but rather thoughts occur in you.~</div><div style="color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thought-and-knowledge#p3</ref></u></divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">When one practises Yoga and observes What happens usually is that something touches the thoughtsvital, often without one sees that they come from outside's knowing it, from universal Nature, from and brings up the mental, vital old ordinary or subtle physical worlds etc. The proper thing is then to stand back from these thoughts, voices or suggestions, to reject them or else control them, to make external consciousness in such a way that the inner mind free gets covered up and quiet all the old thoughts and open only to feelings return for a time. It is the divine light, force, knowledge physical mind that becomes active and the presence of the Divine…gives its assent.Aspire, get into contact with If the Light whole mind remains quiet and detached observing the true Forcevital movement, reassert your will but not giving its assent, then to reject these suggestions it becomes more easy. This established quietude and voices. Do not take interest detachment of the mind marks always a great step forward made in these voices, keep the mind quietsadhana.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/thoughtthe-vital-and-knowledgeother-levels-of-being#p5p45</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">This sensational thought-mind which is based upon senseBut if you remain very quiet, memoryonly if you observe—as though you were silently looking at something, associationyou understand—then you will begin seeing more precisely, first ideas and resultant generalisations or secondary ideas, little by little distinguishing between different categories of things. You will be able to know what one thing is common to all developed animal life and mentality…what another etc.The intelligence and will of the animal are involved in the sense-mind and therefore altogether governed by , whether it and carried on its stream of sensations, sense-perceptionscomes from you or from outside, impulses; whether it is instinctiveon a material plane or on another plane. Man All this is able to use learnt through a reason and willvery quiet observation, quiet but very sharp, a self-observingyou understand; because there are very tiny shades, thinking and all-observingvery tiny, an intelligently willing mind which is no longer involved in the sense-mindbetween different things, but acts from above and behind when you get used to distinguishing these nuances, you can discern exactly what it in its own right, with a certain separateness and freedom. He is reflective, has a certain relative freedom of intelligent will. He has liberated in himself and has formed into a separate power the buddhi.</spanref>[http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2406/purification-intelligence20-andoctober-will1954#p4 http:p46<//incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/purification-intelligence-and-will#p4]ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">….But it It is through sensations really an inner silence that you learn: by seeing, observing, hearing. Classes develop your sensations, studies develop your sensations, the mind receives things through sensations. By the education of the senses the growth of one's general education is aided; if you learn to see well, exactly, precisely; if you learn to hear well; if you learn through touch to know the nature of things; if you learn through the see of smell to distinguish between different odours—all these are a powerful means of education. In fact, they should be used for thisneeded—a something silent within that looks at outer talk and action but feels it as something superficial, not as instruments of observation, control itself and is quite indifferent and knowledgeuntouched by it. If one is sufficiently developed, one It can bring forces to support speech and action or it can know the nature of things through sight; through the see of smell one may also know the value, the different nature of things; stop them by touch one withdrawal or it can recognise thingslet them go on and observe without being involved or moved. It is a question of education; that is, one must work for it<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p76</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 31 March 1954)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/31-march-1954#p13</u></spancenter>

= Education You must be able to silence your head absolutely and Selfbe completely detached, not to have (for example, when you are looking for the solution of a problem), not to have already in your head the solution that seems to you right or the best or most profitable. That must not be there. You must become absolutely like a blank paper, with nothing on it. And you proceed in that way, with a very sincere aspiration to know the truth, without assuming beforehand that it will be like this or like that; because otherwise you will see only your own formation. The very first condition is that the head must keep completely silent during the time one is observing. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/30-Observation =september-1953#p13</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>The indispensable starting-point is a detailed and discerning observation of the character to be transformed. In most cases, that itself is a difficult and often a very baffling task. But ~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">there is one fact which the old traditions knew and which can serve as the clue in the labyrinth of inner discovery. It is that everyone possesses in a large measure, and the exceptional individual in an increasing degree of precision, two opposite tendencies of character, in almost equal proportions, which are like the light and the shadow of the same thing. Thus someone who has the capacity of being exceptionally generous will suddenly find an obstinate avarice rising up in his nature, the courageous man will be a coward in some part of his being and the good man will suddenly have wicked impulses. In this way life seems to endow everyone not only with the possibility of expressing an ideal, but also with contrary elements representing in a concrete manner the battle he has to wage and the victory he has to win for the realisation to become possible. Consequently, all life is an education pursued more or less consciously, more or less willingly. In certain cases this education will encourage the movements that express the light, in others, on the contrary, those that express the shadow. If the circumstances and the environment are favourable, the light will grow at the expense of the shadow; otherwise the opposite will happen. And in this way the individual's character will crystallise according to the whims of Nature and the determinisms of material and vital life, unless a higher element comes in in time, a conscious will which, refusing to allow Nature to follow her whimsical ways, will replace them by a logical and clear-sighted discipline. This conscious will is what we mean by a rational method of education.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/vital-education#p6</u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">.To silence the mind it is not enough to throw back each thought as it comes, that can only be a subordinate movement.The child One must get back from all thought and be taught to observeseparate from it, to note his reactions and impulses and their causes, to become a discerning witness of his desiressilent consciousness observing the thoughts if they come, his movements of violence and passion, his instincts of possession and appropriation and domination and but not oneself thinking or identified with the background of vanity which supports thoughts. Thoughts must be felt as outside things altogether. It is then easier to reject thoughts or let them, together with pass without their counterparts disturbing the quietude of weakness, discouragement, depression and despairthe mind.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/1231/vitalinteractions-with-others-and-the-practice-of-educationyoga#p14</u>p99</spanref>

= Results of Self-Observation = By Developing the Witness Attitude ==

<div style="color:#000000;">If you observe yourself attentively, you will see that before acting you need an inner impetus, something A man with a very developed introspective mind often identifies himself with the witness part of his mind and observes his own thoughts and studies their nature. That is a beginning which pushes youmakes it easy for the full detachment to come. In the ordinary man this impetus For others it is generally desire. This desire ought to less easy, but it can be replaced done by a clear, precise, constant vision of all. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/inner-detachment-and-the Truth.-witness-attitude#p</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 21 December 1950)~</spancenter>[http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/21-december-1950#p7 http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/21-december-1950#p7]

<div style="color:#000000;">If you observe yourself, you will see that as soon as you do something which disturbs you a little, the mind immediately gives you a favourable reason to justify yourself—this mind is capable of gilding everything. In these conditions it is difficult to know oneself. One must be absolutely sincere to be able to do it = By Sincerity and to see clearly into all the little falsehoods of the mental being.</div>Impartiality ==

<span style=For that you must be absolutely sincere and impartial. You must observe yourself as if you were observing and criticising a third person. You must not start with an idea that this is your life's mission, this is your particular capacity, this you are to do or that you are to do, in this lies your talent or genius, etc. That will carry you away from the right track. It is not the liking or disliking of your external being, your mental or vital or physical choice that determines the true line of your growth. Nor should you take up the opposite attitude and say, "background-color:transparent;color:#000000I am good for nothing in this matter, I am useless in that one;it is not for me.">(The MotherNeither vanity and arrogance nor self-depreciation and false modesty should move you. As I said, 15 January 1951)you must be absolutely impartial and unconcerned. You should be like a mirror that reflects the truth and does not judge. </span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0415/1512-januarynovember-19511952#p3</u>p6</spanref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>… if each element which comes with its ignorance, its unconsciousness, its egoism, is put before the will to change and one remains awake, compares, observes, studies and slowly acts, that becomes infinitely interesting, one makes marvellous and quite unexpected discoveries. One finds in oneself lots of small hidden folds, little things one had not seen at the beginning; one undertakes a sort of inner chase, goes hunting into small dark corners and tells oneself: "What, I was like that! This was there in me, I am harbouring this little thing"—sometimes so sordid, so mean, so nasty. And once it has been discovered, how wonderful! One puts the light upon it and it disappears and you no longer have those reactions which made you so sad before, when you used to say, "Oh! I shall never get there.~</divcenter>

If you observe yourself, you will see that as soon as you do something which disturbs you a little, the mind immediately gives you a favourable reason to justify yourself—this mind is capable of gilding everything. In these conditions it is difficult to know oneself. One must be absolutely sincere to be able to do it and to see clearly into all the little falsehoods of the mental being. <div style="colorref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/15-january-1951#000000;">(The Mother, 19 April 1951)p3</divref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/19-april-1951#p14</u></div>=By Becoming Aware of Desire ==

== Danger If you observe yourself attentively, you will see that before acting you need an inner impetus, something which pushes you. In the ordinary man this impetus is generally desire. This desire ought to be replaced by a clear, precise, constant vision of the Ego ==Truth. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/21-december-1950#p7</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">But to begin with, how many times, if one thinks, if one quite simply observes oneself, does one catch oneself saying, "It is I!" And, then, one congratulates oneself sometimes, one says, "After all I can do something, I am capable!" I am going further: how many people would be capable of doing anything at all if simply deprived =By Education of the pleasure of being able to tell themselves, "I have done this, I have realised that, I have made a progress, how well I played this game"? How many people would be able to sincerely do something if this pleasure were taken away? I have known individuals whose mind was much more developed than the rest of the being, they had understood very well (almost too well); they sat down to meditate and all their energy was gone, all vitality evaporated into a kind of peace, not unpleasant, but very still. There is no more need to do anything, no longer any need to move, one dreams.... Under a tree, arms crossed, one leaves the Divine to do everything for oneself, including feeding you if you need it. This is perhaps very well, but this shows that the instrument is not ready; it is not really at the service of the Divine, it is at the service of the ego, and when the ego is taken away, it does nothing any longer. Therefore, so long as one lives in the ego this illusion is necessary to make you act; it is necessary to keep up action until one is completely transformed or, in any case, till the true consciousness is established.</div>Senses==

<span style="background-colorBut it is through sensations that you learn:transparentby seeing, observing, hearing. Classes develop your sensations, studies develop your sensations, the mind receives things through sensations. By the education of the senses the growth of one's general education is aided;color:#000000if you learn to see well, exactly, precisely; if you learn to hear well; if you learn through touch to know the nature of things; if you learn through the see of smell to distinguish between different odours—all these are a powerful means of education. In fact, they should be used for this, as instruments of observation, control and knowledge. If one is sufficiently developed, one can know the nature of things through sight;">(The Mother through the see of smell one may also know the value,5 April 1951)</span><span style="background-color:transparentthe different nature of things;color:#0066ccby touch one can recognise things. It is a question of education;">that is, one must work for it. <uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/0406/531-aprilmarch-19511954#p14</u>p13</spanref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>...if you do your tapasya, all the time observing yourself doing it and telling yourself, "Am I making any progress, is this going to be better, am I going to succeed?", then it is your ego, you know, which becomes more and more enormous and occupies the whole place, and there is no room for anything else. ~</divcenter>

The child must be taught to observe, to note his reactions and impulses and their causes, to become a discerning witness of his desires, his movements of violence and passion, his instincts of possession and appropriation and domination and the background of vanity which supports them, together with their counterparts of weakness, discouragement, depression and despair. <div style="colorref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/12/vital-education#000000;">(The Mother , 26 April 1951)p14</divref>

[http:<center>~<//incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-april-1951#p35 http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-april-1951#p35]center>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Do not be over-eager for experience,—for experiences you can always get, having once broken the barrier between the physical mind and the subtle planes. What you have = How to aspire for most is the improved quality of the recipient consciousness in you—discrimination in the mind, the unattached impersonal Witness look on all that goes on in you and around you, purity in the vital, calm equanimity, enduring patience, absence of pride and the sense of greatness—and more especially, the development of the psychic being in you—surrender, self-giving, psychic humility, devotion... a sufficient foundation and a consciousness always self-observant, vigilant and growing in these things is indispensable—for perfect purification is the basis of the perfect siddhi.</span>[http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-danger-of-the-ego-and-the-need-of-purification#p14 http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-danger-of-the-ego-and-the-need-of-purification#p14]Observe Thoughts==

== <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>Escape attitude~</spancenter> ==

<div style="color:#000000Thoughts are not the essence of mind-being, they are only an activity of mental nature;">Constantly man rushes into external action if that activity ceases, what appears then as a thought-free existence that manifests in order its place is not to have time to observe himself a blank or void but something very real, substantial, concrete we may say—a mental being that extends itself widely and how he lives. For him this is expressed by can be its own field of existence silent or active as well as the desire to escape from boredom. IndeedWitness, for some people it is much more tiresome to remain quiet—seatedKnower, or to be stillMaster of that field and its action. So for them Some feel it represents an escape from boredom: to make first as a lot of noise, to commit many stupiditiesvoid, but that is because their observation is untrained and insufficient and become terribly restlessloss of activity gives them the sense of blank; an emptiness there is, but it is their way an emptiness of escaping boredom. And when they sit quietly and look at themselvesthe ordinary activities, they are borednot a blank of existence. Perhaps because they are boring<ref>http://incarnateword. That's very likely. The more boring one is, in/cwsa/30/three-experiences-of-the more one is bored. Very interesting people usually are not bored.-inner-being#p3</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 26 January 1955)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/26-january-1955#p14</u></spancenter>

== Focusing on It is only gradually, very slowly, through the Negative ==movements of life and a more or less careful and thorough education that you begin to have sensations which are personal to you, feelings and ideas which are personal to you. An individualised mind is something extremely rare, which comes only after a long education; otherwise it is a kind of thought-current passing through your brain and then through another's and then through a multitude of other brains, and all this is in perpetual movement and has no individuality. One thinks what others are thinking, others think what still others are thinking, and everybody thinks like that in a great mixture, because these are currents, vibrations of thought passing from one to another. If you look at yourself attentively, you will very quickly become aware that very few thoughts in you are personal. Where do you draw them from?—From what you have heard, from what you have read, what you have been taught, and how many of these thoughts you have are the result of your own experience, your own reflection, your purely personal observation?—Not many. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/20-february-1957#p6</ref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>To be always observing faults and wrong movements brings depression and discourages the faith. Turn your eyes more to the coming Light and less to any immediate darkness. Faith, cheerfulness, confidence in the ultimate victory are the things that help,—they make the progress easier and swifter.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/steps-towards-overcoming-difficulties#p28</u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">It is a subtle law of When one practises Yoga and observes the action of consciousness thoughts, one sees that if you stress difficulties—you have they come from outside, from universal Nature, from the mental, vital or subtle physical worlds etc. The proper thing is then to observe themstand back from these thoughts, of coursevoices or suggestions, but not stress to reject them or else control them, they will quite sufficiently do that for themselves—the difficulties tend to stick or even increase; on make the contrary, if you put your whole stress on faith mind free and aspiration quiet and concentrate steadily on what you aspire open only tothe divine light, force, that will sooner or later tend towards realisationknowledge and the presence of the Divine. ... It is this change of stressAspire, a change in get into contact with the poise Light and attitude of the mindtrue Force, that reassert your will be to reject these suggestions and voices. Do not take interest in these voices, keep the more helpful processmind quiet.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/dealing-with-depressionthought-and-despondencyknowledge#p22</u>p5</spanref>

<div style="color:#000000;">It is difficult to observe the difference between the action of the hostile Force and the pressure of the lower Nature because it is the latter that the Force takes hold of for its purpose. But there is Difficulties in the Force a suggestive character, a conscious arrangement of the attack so as to upset or destroy the sadhana which there is not in the ordinary movement of the lower Nature—for that only comes to satisfy itself and then ceases.</div>Self-Observation=

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/=Danger of the-hostile-forces-and-the-difficulties-of-yoga#p35</u></div>Ego==

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>If you had that observation (from the inner spiritual, not the outer intellectual and ethical viewpoint), then it would be comparatively easy for you to get out of your difficulties; for instance you would find at once where this irrational impulse to flee away came from and it would not have any hold upon you. Of course, all that can only be done to the best effect when you stand back from the play of your nature and become the Witness-Control or the Spectator-Actor Manager. But that is what happens when you take this kind of self-seeing posture.~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/mental-difficulties-and-the-need-of-quietude#p23</u></spancenter>

= Other fields of Self...if you do your tapasya, all the time observing yourself doing it and telling yourself, "Am I making any progress, is this going to be better, am I going to succeed?", then it is your ego, you know, which becomes more and more enormous and occupies the whole place, and there is no room for anything else. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/26-Observation =april-1951#p35</ref>

== Meditation Focusing on the Negative==

<div style="color:#000000;">To be always observing faults and wrong movements brings depression and discourages the faith.Turn your eyes more to the coming Light and less to any immediate darkness.. when one comes out of meditationFaith, cheerfulness, some time later—usually not immediately—from within confidence in the being something new emerges in ultimate victory are the consciousness: a new understanding, a new appreciation of things, a new attitude in life—in short, a new way of being. This may be fugitive, but at that momenthelp, if one observes it, one finds that something has taken one step forward on —they make the path of understanding or transformationprogress easier and swifter. It may be an illumination, an understanding truer or closer to the truth, or a power of transformation which helps you to achieve a psychological progress or a widening of the consciousness or a greater control over your movements, over the activities of the being<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/steps-towards-overcoming-difficulties#p28</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 5 June 1957)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/5-june-1957#p20</u></spancenter>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">The mind What you have to aspire for most is always the improved quality of the recipient consciousness in you—discrimination in activitythe mind, but we do not observe fully what it is doingthe unattached impersonal Witness look on all that goes on in you and around you, but allow ourselves to be carried away purity in the stream vital, calm equanimity, enduring patience, absence of continual thinking. When we try to concentratepride and the sense of greatness—and more especially, this stream the development of the psychic being in you—surrender, self-moved mechanical thinking becomes prominent to our observationgiving, psychic humility, devotion... It a sufficient foundation and a consciousness always self-observant, vigilant and growing in these things is indispensable—for perfect purification is the first normal obstacle (basis of the other is sleep during meditation) to the effort towards Yogaperfect siddhi.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2930/concentrationthe-danger-of-the-ego-and-meditationthe-need-of-purification#p30</u>p14</spanref>

Now To become conscious of what is to be changed in the procedure nature is the first step towards changing it. But one must observe these things without being despondent or thinking "it is hopeless" or "I cannot change". You do right to deal with dreams and be confident that the dreamlandchange will come. First become conscious—conscious of your dreams. Observe For nothing is impossible in the nature if the relation between them psychic being is awake and leading you with the happenings of your waking hoursMother's consciousness and force behind it and working in you. This is now happening. If you remember your night, you Be sure that all will be able to trace back very often the condition of your day to the condition of your nightdone. <ref>http://incarnateword. In sleep some action or other is always going on in your mental or vital or other plane; things happen there /cwsa/31/speech-and they govern your waking consciousness.-yoga#p53</ref>

== <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother , 21 April 1929)~</span><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/21-april-1929#p6</refcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is a tremendous field of observation—there is no end to the discoveries you can make in your dreams. But there is one important point: you must not go to sleep when you are very tired, for if you do, you fall into a sort of unconsciousness in which dreams do whatever they like with you, and you have no reaction. Just as I said that you should not eat without having taken rest, I would advise everyone to rest before going to sleep. And for that, you must know how to rest.~</divcenter>

<span style="background-color:transparentIt is a subtle law of the action of consciousness that if you stress difficulties—you have to observe them, of course, but not stress them, they will quite sufficiently do that for themselves—the difficulties tend to stick or even increase;color:#000000;">(The Mother on the contrary, if you put your whole stress on faith and aspiration and concentrate steadily on what you aspire to, that will sooner or later tend towards realisation. It is this change of stress, a change in the poise and attitude of the mind, 1 February 1951)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>that will be the more helpful process. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/1531/1dealing-februarywith-1951depression-and-despondency#p14p22</ref></u></span>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">As the inner consciousness grows by sadhana, these dream experiences increase in number, clearness, coherence, accuracy and after some growth of experience and consciousness, we can, if we observe, come to understand them and their significance to our inner life. Even we can by training become so conscious as to follow our own passage, usually veiled to our awareness and memory, through many realms and the process of the return to the waking state. At a certain pitch of this inner wakefulness this kind of sleep, a sleep of experiences, can replace the ordinary subconscient slumber.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u><ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/three-experiences-of-the-inner-being#p6</ref></u></span>Surface Level Observation==

= Things As a general rule, with a few very rare exceptions, men are content to Remember =observe more or less accurately everything that happens around them, and sometimes within themselves, and to classify all these observations according to one superficial system of logic or another. And they call this organisation, these systems, "knowledge". It has never occurred to them, they have not even begun to perceive that all the things they see, touch, feel, experience, are false appearances and not reality itself.

<div style="color:#000000;">If one begins to find out, to understand what a feeling is and what a thought [Based on Aphorism 7—What men call knowledge is, and how it works, then one can already go quite far on the path with thatreasoned acceptance of false appearances. One must at Wisdom looks behind the same time observe how his feelings and thoughts have an action on the body, what the reciprocity is. And then, there is another exercise which consists in looking into oneself for what is persistent, what is lasting, something which makes one say "I", veil and which is not the bodysees. For obviously, when one was very smallReason divides, fixes details and then when each year one grows upcontrasts them; Wisdom unifies, if one takes fairly long distances, for example marries contrasts in a distance of about ten years, they are very different "I"s from what one was when as small as this (gesture), and then what one is now; it is difficult to say that it is the same person, you seesingle harmony]. If one takes only this, still there is something which has the feeling of always being the same person<ref>http://incarnateword. So one must reflect, seek, try to understand what it is. This indeed can lead you far on the path. Then if one also studies the relation between these different things—between thoughts, feelings, their action on the body, the reciprocal action of the body on these things—and also what it is that says "I" permanently, what it is that can trace a curve in the movement of the being, if one seeks carefully enough, it leads you quite far. Naturally if one seeks far enough and with enough persistence, one reaches the psychic./cwm/10/aphorism-7#p3</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;"center>(The Mother, 9 March 1955)~</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/9-march-1955#p23</u></spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000One throws oneself out all the time;">A hidden Power all the time one lives, as it were, outside oneself, in such a superficial sensation that it is almost as though one were outside oneself. As soon as one wants even to observe oneself a little, control oneself a little, simply know what is happening, one is always obliged to draw back or pull towards oneself, to pull inwards something which is constantly like that, on the true Lord and overruling Observer of our acts and only he knows through surface. And it is this surface thing which meets all the ignorance and perversion and deformation brought external contacts, puts you in by the ego their entire sense and ultimate purposetouch with similar vibrations coming from others. That happens almost outside you. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/20-june-1956#p49</divref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/self-surrender-in-works-the-way-of-the-gita#p6</u></div>=Observing Invisible Forces==

== Purusha If we observe a happening, we judge and Selfexplain it from the result and from a glimpse of its most external constituents, circumstances or causes; but each happening is the outcome of a complex nexus of forces which we do not and cannot observe, because all forces are to us invisible,—but they are not invisible to the spiritual vision of the Infinite: some of them are actualities working to produce or occasion a new actuality, some are possibles that are near to the pre-existent actuals and in a way included in their aggregate; but there can intervene always new possibilities that suddenly become dynamic potentials and add themselves to the nexus, and behind all are imperatives or an imperative which these possibilities are labouring to actualise. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/21/brahman-purusha-ishwara-maya-prakriti-Observation ==shakti#p7</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">It is ordinarily considered that the Yogin should draw away from action as much as possible and especially that too much action is a hindrance because it draws off the energies outward. To a certain extent this is true; and we must note farther that when the mental Purusha takes up the attitude Self Observation - Exploring Realms of mere witness and observer, a tendency to silence, solitude, physical calm and bodily inaction grows upon the being. So long as this is not associated with inertia, incapacity or unwillingness to act, in a word, with the growth of the tamasic quality, all this is to the good.</div>Consciousness=

<div style="color:#0066ccMan is a type among many types so constructed, one pattern among the multitude of patterns in the manifestation in Matter. He is the most complex that has been created, the richest in content of consciousness and the curious ingeniousness of his building;">he is the head of the earthly creation, but he does not exceed it…. If there is a perfection to which he has to arrive, it must be a perfection in his own kind, within his own law of being,—the full play of it, but by observation of its mode and measure, not by transcendence. To exceed himself, to grow into the superman, to put on the nature and capacities of a god would be a contradiction of his self-law, impracticable and impossible. <uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2322/the-release-from-subjectionman-toand-the-bodyevolution#p7</u>p8</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>It is possible for the Purusha to use it on the mental plane itself for a constant self-observation, self-development, self-modification, to sanction, reject, alter, bring out new formulations of the nature and establish a calm and disinterested action, a high and pure sattwic balance and rhythm of its energy, a personality perfected in the sattwic principle.~</divcenter>

...behind there is the psychic which supports the development, the growth of the being and gives this continuity of consciousness, makes one feel that he is the same being even while being absolutely different, absolutely different. If later one observes himself sufficiently, he can see that the things he understood and could do at that time are things which seem to him absolutely inconceivable now, and that he could never do a similar thing because he is no longer that person at all. And yet, because within there was the psychic consciousness which is immortal, one has the feeling that it is always the same being which was there and continues to be there and will continue to be there with more or less progressive and more or less conscious changes. <div style="color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsacwm/2407/the29-divinejune-shakti1955#p9</u>p28</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>..with regard to the movements and experiences of the body the mind will come to know the Purusha seated within it as, first, the witness or observer of the movements and, secondly, the knower or perceiver of the experiences. It will cease to consider in thought or feel in sensation these movements and experiences as its own but rather consider and feel them as not its own, as operations of Nature governed by the qualities of Nature and their interaction upon each other.~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#0066ccThere is a state of being experienced in Yoga in which we become a double consciousness, one on the surface, small, active, ignorant, swayed by thoughts and feelings, grief and joy and all kinds of reactions, the other within calm, vast, equal, observing the surface being with an immovable detachment or indulgence or, it may be, acting upon its agitation to quiet, enlarge, transform it. So too we can rise to a consciousness above and observe the various parts of our being, inner and outer, mental, vital and physical and the subconscient below all, and act upon one or other or the whole from that higher status. It is possible also to go down from that height or from any height into any of these lower states and take its limited light or its obscurity as our place of working while the rest that we are is either temporarily put away or put behind or else kept as a field of reference from which we can get support, sanction or light and influence or as a status into which we can ascend or recede and from it observe the inferior movements. Or we can plunge into trance, get within ourselves and be conscious there while all outward things are excluded;">or we can go beyond even this inner awareness and lose ourselves in some deeper other consciousness or some high superconscience. There is also a pervading equal consciousness into which we can enter and see all ourselves with one enveloping glance or omnipresent awareness one and indivisible. <uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2321/thebrahman-releasepurusha-fromishwara-subjectionmaya-toprakriti-the-bodyshakti#p4</u>p23</divref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>~</center>The Purusha and Prakriti are on In this progression the mental level as in first step is a certain detached superiority to the rest three modes of our being closely joined Nature. The soul is inwardly separated and much free from the lower Prakriti, not involved in each other its coils, indifferent and we are not able glad above it. Nature continues to distinguish clearly soul and nature. But act in the purer substance triple round of her ancient habits,—desire, grief and joy attack the heart, the instruments fall into inaction and obscurity and weariness, light and peace come back into the heart and mind we can more easily discern and body; but the dual strainsoul stands unchanged and untouched by these changes. The mental Purusha is naturally able in its own native principle Observing and unmoved by the grief and desire of mind to detach itselfthe lower members, as we have seensmiling at their joys and their strainings, from regarding and unoverpowered by the failing and the workings darknesses of its Prakriti the thought and there is then a division the wildness or the weaknesses of our being between a consciousness that observes the heart and nerves, uncompelled and unattached to the mind's illuminations and can reserve its willpower relief and sense of ease or of power in the return of light and an energy full gladness, it throws itself into none of these things, but waits unmoved for the substance intimations of consciousness that takes a higher Will and the forms intuitions of a greater luminous knowledge, will and feeling. This detachment gives at its highest a certain freedom from <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the compulsion -three-modes-of the soulby its mental -nature.#p13</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-divine-shakti#p8</ucenter>~</spancenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">"The Shakti, the power It is thus by an integralisation of our divided being that the Infinite and Divine Shakti in the Eternal descends within usYoga will proceed to its object; for liberation, worksperfection, breaks up our present psychological formationsmastery are dependent on this integralisation, shatters every wall, widens, liberates... she frees since the consciousness from confinement in little wave on the body; it can go out in trance or sleep or even waking and enter into worlds or other regions of this world and act there or carry back surface cannot control its experience. It spreads outown movement, feeling much less have any true control over the body only as a small part of itself, and begins to contain what before contained vast life around it; it achieves the cosmic consciousness and extends itself to be commensurate with the universe... It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and contact the forces at play in the world, feels their movement, distinguishes their functioning and can operate immediately upon them as the scientist operates upon physical forces, accept their action and results in our mind, life, body or reject them or modify, change, reshape, create immense new powers and movements in place of the old small functionings of the nature. We begin to perceive <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the working -ascent-of -the forces of universal Mind and to know how our thoughts are created by that working...."-sacrifice-ii#p29</divref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">(The Mother , 7 November 1956)</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.How to be in/cwm/08/7-november-1956#p1</u></span>a Witness State?==

<div style="color:#000000;">It is thus by an integralisation of our divided being that the Divine Shakti in the Yoga will proceed difficult to its objectsay generally what is conscious; for liberationbut naturally, perfectionif something observes, mastery are dependent on it is always the "witness" element in this integralisationpart—in each part of the being there is something which is a "witness", since the little wave which looks on . There is even a physical witness which can get very much in the surface cannot control its own movementway; for instance, much less have any true control over the vast life around if itwatches you playing, this can paralyse you considerably...It begins to know inwardly and directly and not merely by external observation and contact the forces There is also a vital witness which looks at play in the world, feels their movementyou, distinguishes their functioning sees your desires and can operate immediately upon them enjoys highly all that happens; it acts also as a brake. There is the scientist operates upon physical forcesmental witness which judges ideas, accept their action and results in our mindwhich says, life, body or reject them or modify, change, reshape"This idea contradicts this other", create immense new powers and movements in place of which arranges everything. Then there is the old small functionings of great psychic Witness, who is the natureinner divinity. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/22-march-1951#p6</divref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-ascent-of-the-sacrifice-ii#p29</ucenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">Man is a type among many types so constructed, one pattern among the multitude of patterns The witness Purusha in the manifestation in Matter. He is mind observes that the most complex that has been createdinadequacy of his effort, all the richest inadequacy in content fact of consciousness man's life and nature arises from the curious ingeniousness separation and the consequent struggle, want of his building; he is the head knowledge, want of the earthly creationharmony, but he does not exceed it…want of oneness. If there It is a perfection essential for him to which he has grow out of separative individuality, to arriveuniversalise himself, it must to make himself one with the universe. This unification can be a perfection in his own kinddone only through the soul by making our soul of mind one with the universal Mind, within his own law our soul of beinglife one with the universal Life-soul,—the full play our soul of it, but by observation body one with the universal soul of its mode and measure, not by transcendencephysical Nature. <ref>http://incarnateword. To exceed himself, to grow into in/cwsa/24/the superman, to put on -perfection-of-the nature and capacities of a god would be a contradiction of his self-law, impracticable and impossiblemental-being#p15</divref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/man-and-the-evolution#p8</ucenter>~</divcenter>

<div style="color:#000000;">In It is ordinarily considered that the animal mind is not quite distinct Yogin should draw away from its own life-matrix action as much as possible and life-matter; its movements are so involved in the life movements especially that too much action is a hindrance because it cannot detach itself from them, cannot stand separate draws off the energies outward. To a certain extent this is true; and observe them; but in man mind has become separate, he can become aware we must note farther that when the mental Purusha takes up the attitude of his mental operations as distinct from his life operations, his thought and will can disengage them selves from his sensations mere witness and impulsesobserver, desires and emotional reactionsa tendency to silence, can become detached from themsolitude, observe physical calm and control thembodily inaction grows upon the being. So long as this is not associated with inertia, sanction incapacity or cancel their functioning: he does not as yet know unwillingness to act, in a word, with the secrets growth of his being well enough the tamasic quality, all this is to be aware of himself decisively and with certitude as a mental being the good. <ref>http://incarnateword.in a life and /cwsa/23/the-release-from-subjection-to-the-body, but he has that impression and can take inwardly that position.#p7</divref>

<div style="color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/22/the-evolution-of-the-spiritual-man#p6</ucenter>~</divcenter>

== Chitta It is possible for the Purusha to use it on the mental plane itself for a constant self-observation, self-development, self-modification, to sanction, reject, alter, bring out new formulations of the nature and Selfestablish a calm and disinterested action, a high and pure sattwic balance and rhythm of its energy, a personality perfected in the sattwic principle. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-divine-Observation ==shakti#p9</ref>

<div style="color:#000000;"center>Chitta, the basic consciousness, is largely subconscient; it has, open and hidden, two kinds of action, one passive or receptive, the other active or reactive and formative. As a passive power it receives all impacts, even those of which the mind is unaware or to which it is inattentive, and it stores them in an immense reserve of passive subconscient memory on which the mind as an active memory can draw.But ordinarily the mind draws only what it had observed and understood at the time,—more easily what it had observed well and understood carefully, less easily what it had observed carelessly or ill understood; at the same time there is a power in consciousness to send up to the active mind for use what that mind had not at all observed or attended to or even consciously experienced. This power only acts observably in abnormal conditions, when some part of the subconscious chitta comes as it were to the surface or when the subliminal being in us appears on the threshold and for a time plays some part in the outer chamber of mentality where the direct intercourse and commerce with the external world takes place and our inner dealings with ourselves develop on the surface.~</divcenter>

...with regard to the movements and experiences of the body the mind will come to know the Purusha seated within it as, first, the witness or observer of the movements and, secondly, the knower or perceiver of the experiences. It will cease to consider in thought or feel in sensation these movements and experiences as its own but rather consider and feel them as not its own, as operations of Nature governed by the qualities of Nature and their interaction upon each other. <span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><uref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/2423/the-instrumentsrelease-from-subjection-ofto-the-spiritbody#p6</u>p4</spanref>

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Take one hour The actions are of importance only as expressing what is in the nature. You have to be conscious of whatever in your actions is not in harmony with the Yoga and to get rid of it. But for that what is needed is your lifeown consciousness, the one which is most convenient for youpsychic, observing from within and during that time observe yourself closely and say only the absolutely indispensable wordsthrowing off what is seen to be undesirable.</spanref>[http://incarnateword.in/cwmcwsa/0329/angerwork-and-yoga#p15 http:p45<//incarnateword.in/cwm/03/anger#p15]ref>

<div style="color:#000000;">There are four movements which are usually consecutiveThe mental being within watches, observes and passes judgment on all that happens in you. The psychic does not watch and observe in this way like a witness, but which it feels and knows spontaneously in a much more direct and luminous way by the end may be simultaneous: to observe one's thoughts is very purity of its own nature and the firstdivine instinct within it, and so, whenever it comes to watch over one's thoughts is the second, to control one's thoughts is front it reveals at once what are the third right and to master one's thoughts is what the fourthwrong movements in your nature. To observe, to watch over, to control, to master<ref>http://incarnateword. in/cwsa/28/the-jivatman-in-the-integral-yoga#p40</divref>

{|class="wikitable" style= Positive Attitude =="background-color: #efefff; width: 100%;"|Read Summary of '''[[Self Observation Summary|Self Observation]]'''

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">To become conscious of what is to be changed Dear reader, if you notice any error in the nature is paragraph numbers in the first step towards changing it. But one must observe these things without being despondent or thinking "it is hopeless" or "I cannot change"hyperlinks, please let us know by dropping an email at integral. You do right to be confident that the change will comeedu. For nothing is impossible in the nature if the psychic being is awake and leading you with the Mother's consciousness and force behind it and working in you. This is now happening. Be sure that all will be done.</span><span style="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword@gmail.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p53</u></span>com|}

<span style="background-color:transparent;color:#000000;">Despair and despondency are always wrong. If you make a mistake, quietly observe it and correct the tendency next time. Even if the mistake recurs often, you have only to persevere quietly—remembering that nature cannot be changed in a day.</span><span styleReferences ="background-color:transparent;color:#0066cc;"><u>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/depression-and-despondency#p67</u></span>