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It [failure in whatever one tries to do] usually comes from a certain instability in the lower vital which does not give a consistent support to the Will, but is restless and fluctuates from one interest to another. It does not mean an incapacity for success—usually one who has that could succeed in many directions, but the fluctuation prevents sustained success in any. It is a defect that has to be got over and can be got over. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/sentimentalism-sensitiveness-instability-laxity#p14</ref>
 
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The peacefulness in the lower abdomen is very good, for it means that the true consciousness is settling down in the lower vital—if the lower vital is liberated and peaceful, there is little ground for any perturbations to come. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p53</ref>
The descent of the peace is often one of the first major positive experiences of the sadhana. In this state of peace the normal thought-mind (''buddhi'') is apt to fall silent or abate most of its activity and, when it does, very often either this vital mind can rush in, if one is not on one's guard, ... Or else the lower vital mind can try to disturb; that brings up the ego and passions and their play. All these are signs of elements that have to be got rid of, because if they remain and other of the higher powers begin to descend, Power and Force, Knowledge, Love or Ananda, those lower things may come across with the result that either the higher consciousness retires or its descent is covered up and the stimulation it gives is misused for the purposes of the lower nature. This is the reason why many sadhaks after having big experiences fall into the clutch of a magnified ego, upheavals, ambition, exaggerated sex or other vital passions or distortions. It is always well therefore if a complete purification of the vital can either precede or keep pace with the positive experience—at least in natures in which the vital is strongly active. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-mind#p48</ref>
 
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When you are in connection with the higher worlds above the mental, with the mental and the psychic or even with some of the higher vital planes, then there is the peace and Ananda—but connection with the lower vital worlds can easily bring disturbance and unrest, so long as your vital itself is not changed and made full of peace and strength and quiet. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/inner-experience-and-outer-life#p12</ref>
 
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When the peace is fully established everywhere in the being, these things [reactions in the lower vital] will not be able to shake it. They may come first as ripples on the surface, then only as suggestions which one looks at or does not care to look at, but in either case they don't get inside, affect or disturb at all.
The consent of all the being is necessary for the divine change, and it is the completeness and fullness of the consent that constitutes the integral surrender. But the consent of the lower vital must not be only a mental profession or a passing emotional adhesion; it must translate itself into an abiding attitude and a persistent and consistent action. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p11</ref>
 
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Whatever there may be in these higher parts, aspiration to the Truth, devotion or will to conquer the obstacles and the hostile forces, it cannot become integral, it cannot remain unmixed or unspoilt or continue to be effective so long as the lower vital and the external personality have not accepted the Light and consented to change. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p1</ref>
 
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So long as there is fear, it is no use going on with these experiences—you have to stop and get back to the normal consciousness. Besides that, as I have already said, you must realise what it is in you that has come across and created this upsetting. It is not the descent and the experiences, for many have had them or similar things without being any the worse. It is something in you, probably in your lower vital and physical, that does not want the Higher Consciousness because it will have to change and it has no intention of changing. When this pressure acts, it gets at once a fear and shakes the physical mind and system by its fear. You will have then to get rid of this—till then it will not be safe for you to go farther. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/suggestions-for-dealing-with-experiences#p11</ref>
 
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It was inevitable that in the course of the sadhana these inferior parts of the nature [lower vital] should be brought forward in order that like the rest of the being they may make the crucial choice and either accept or refuse transformation. My whole work depends upon this movement; it is the decisive ordeal of this Yoga. For the physical consciousness and the material life cannot change if this does not change. Nothing that may have been done before, no inner illumination, experience, power or Ananda, is of any eventual value if this is not done. If the little external personality is to persist in retaining its obscure and limited, its petty and ignoble, its selfish and false and stupid human consciousness, this amounts to a flat negation of the work and the Sadhana. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-lower-vital-being#p2</ref>
 
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It is when the true contact and the Light and Force can be steadily brought down into the whole being (including the lower vital and body) that the basis and organisation [of the being] can be founded and settled. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/descent-and-the-lower-nature#p24</ref>