Self Improvement Site
On The Internet! Take the Self Improvement Tour
On The Internet! Take the Self Improvement Tour
Self Knowledge Articles
We are currently looking for an Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to "Self Knowledge". If you have expertise in Self Knowledge and your own website and/or product for this topic, please review this form for complete details. The Official Guide Position is part of our Premium Placement Package
- The Evolutionary Progress of Nature and the Impact of the Conscious Participation of the Soul - by Submitted on May 10, 2023 from santosh krinskySri Aurobindo describes the long, slow process of development of the universal manifestation. There is an evolution of consciousness which takes place over time spanning many millennia, and which does not involve the conscious participation of the individual. At a certain point in time, when the ...
Views: 361 - Why don’t people of our generation focus on having spiritual knowledge? Why don't they seek for wisdom? Why do they become materialistic rather than spiritualistic? - by Submitted on May 10, 2023 from Dada BhagwanWhen there is too much of attraction towards material things, one cannot be spiritual – it is but natural Don’t think it has much to do with a particular generation as such; because in any generation, the percentage of people inclined towards spiritualism is always markedly far too low; the ...
Views: 255(1 vote) - The Value of Mental, Vital and Physical Progress for Future Births - by Submitted on May 09, 2023 from santosh krinskyOf what possible value is the effort at mental, emotional, vital or physical progress to the soul if it cannot carry that progress forward into the next, and future lives. In his epic poem, Savitri: A Legend and a Symbol, Sri Aurobindo raises the issue: “But the oblivion that succeeds the fall, ...
Views: 363 - The Soul, its Evolutionary Development on Earth and the Universal Manifestation - by Submitted on May 08, 2023 from santosh krinskyIn the ancient text of India, it is said that a human birth is essential for progress, and that even the Gods, if they desire to attain some new development, need to take birth in a human form. It is clear that generally the physical body, the vital nature and the mental development dissolve ...
Views: 403 - Which incident made you realize the difference between Self Respect and Ego? - by Submitted on May 08, 2023 from Dada BhagwanOh! That’s a wonderful story. Come, let me tell you... I always thought self-respect is one of the most important ingredients in a personality. Anything which you yourself do not respect or value, how can you expect it from others? Moreover, right from childhood, I was inclined towards the ...
Views: 351(1 vote) - When the Fire Has Consumed All Its Fuel - by Submitted on May 07, 2023 from santosh krinskySri Aurobindo translates Shwetashwatara Upanishad, Chapter Six, Verse 19: “Who hath neither parts nor works, for He is utterly tranquil, faultless, stainless, therefore He is the one great bridge that carrieth us over to Immortality, even as when a fire hath burnt up all its fuel.” When we ...
Views: 407 - The Case for the Rare Instance of an Ongoing Physical, Vital or Mental Formation Surviving the Death of the Individual - by Submitted on May 07, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe have no difficulty seeing and understanding that an individual can create a legacy in the physical world we inhabit, as we see the evidence everywhere around us in the form of buildings, enterprises, religious movements, mental developments and conceptualization, and artistic creations, not ...
Views: 447 - The Case for the Rare Instance of an Ongoing Physical, Vital or Mental Formation Surviving the Death of the Individual - by Submitted on May 07, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe have no difficulty seeing and understanding that an individual can create a legacy in the physical world we inhabit, as we see the evidence everywhere around us in the form of buildings, enterprises, religious movements, mental developments and conceptualization, and artistic creations, not ...
Views: 463 - The Mental and Vital Formation May Transfer Into a Next Lifetime Under Certain Conditions - by Submitted on May 06, 2023 from santosh krinskyThere are phenomena that are inexplicable under our normal understanding of life and death. The body dissolves, certainly, and the vital being and mental disperse soon thereafter and return into their native planes. Yet we find that occasionally it seems like a particular understanding or ...
Views: 408 - Exploring Rebirth of the Soul into New Bodies and New Lives - by Submitted on May 05, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhile a segment of humanity does not accept the idea of rebirth, choosing instead to either suggest that this one lifetime is the entire frame and limit of an individual’s existence, or else, that after death they will be resurrected to go before a seat of judgment and either be assigned to ...
Views: 425 - The Two Most Powerful Levers to Enter Into Contact with the Divine in One’s Psychic Being - by Submitted on May 04, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhen an individual begins to recognise the existence of his soul, and seeks for a way to come into contact with it, and begin to thereby understand the purpose and significance of his life in the larger creation, the first question that comes to mind is ‘how do I do that?’ This leads to a ...
Views: 378 - The Value of Enthusiasm - by Submitted on May 03, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhen we think about what qualities within ourselves are aids to achieving conscious contact with the psychic being, the soul, we would likely not name ‘enthusiasm’ as one of them. The Mother, however, makes the case for this quality. Those things that motivate us to learn, to expand our ...
Views: 366 - Discovering One’s Role or Mission in Life - by Submitted on May 02, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhen we are fixed in the external personality we take our cues about our role in life from our family, our friends, the social and economic environment and, with that framing, our particular interests and aptitudes. As a child we may want to emulate people in uniforms and thus, may want to be a ...
Views: 364 - How to Use Love to Transform Obstacles and Suffering - by Submitted on May 02, 2023 from Maetreyii Ma NolanAll beings have suffered. Sometimes in life, things go your way; sometimes, they go the opposite—be it physical, mental, or spiritual, be it loss of loved ones, loss of health, or loss of well-being in one form or another. These periods where something difficult happens can be very challenging, ...
Views: 446 - The Maturation of the Soul Across Lifetimes in Fulfillment of Its Evolutionary Role - by Submitted on May 01, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe Maturation of the Soul Across Lifetimes in Fulfillment of Its Evolutionary Role Posted on May 2, 2023 There is a considerable amount of time, amounting to innumerable lifetimes, when the spark of the soul, the psychic being, is subordinated, hidden, virtually unseen and unheard in the ...
Views: 379 - Your Greatest Weakness Identifies Your Greatest Strength - by Submitted on Apr 30, 2023 from santosh krinskyA particular propensity arises through affinity with an energetic flow through a particular energy center, or chakra. If the individual is receptive on that level, he is able to manifest the powers that are at play through that chakra centre. At the same time, it must be recognised that a ...
Views: 421 - The Complex Make-Up of the Human Personalities - by Submitted on Apr 29, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe tend to look on ourselves as being of a specific nature and having a specific personality. We see main lines of understanding, of reaction, and of action and look upon these as ‘who we are’. If we take a closer look, however, we soon begin to see that we are not as simple and homogeneous as ...
Views: 375 - Complex Interaction of the Gunas Can Bring About Opposite Responses from an Individual Under Various Circumstances - by Submitted on Apr 28, 2023 from santosh krinskyAs we take our standpoint primarily in the external nature, we are clearly subject to the action of the three Gunas, or ‘qualities’ of Nature. These qualities do not remain constant and are ever-changing, and they then determine the type of reaction and action an individual has in any particular ...
Views: 383 - The Growth and Evolution of the Soul - by Submitted on Apr 27, 2023 from santosh krinskyMost people are not directly aware of their soul, although it is frequently talked about. There seems to be much confusion. Western scientists have tried to determine the existence of the soul like they would measure particular chemical elements within the body. They weigh the body immediately ...
Views: 363 - The External Being and the Inner Being - by Submitted on Apr 26, 2023 from santosh krinskyMost people identify closely with their active external personality, and as a result, they consider that to be the extent of their existence. They leave on the surface, interact with others, family, friends, acquaintances, associates and other members of society, and respond to the outer ...
Views: 436 - The Growth of the Soul - by Submitted on Apr 25, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe become so used to all of the dark tendencies, hurtful energies and bad faith displayed throughout the world that we sometimes believe that this is the unchanging way that life is meant to be. What we often do not see is the secret evolutionary development of the soul, through time and ...
Views: 360 - The Essential Process of Ascent and Integration of Spiritual Progress - by Submitted on Apr 24, 2023 from santosh krinskyBy putting emphasis on ‘headline’ spiritual experiences and attempting to hold onto them or repeat them, the seeker is potentially losing sight of the larger process that is taking place to effect the transformation of the nature. All progress represents what may be called a ‘vertical ascent’ to ...
Views: 377 - Spiritual Progress Requires Non-Attachment to Specific Spiritual Experiences - by Submitted on Apr 23, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe external being wants to have a stable basis by which it can understand and act in the world. The tools that support this stable basis include habit, fixed tendencies, instincts, education, memory and even the way the mental processes work, comparing new impulses of the senses to past memory ...
Views: 353 - One Should Be Greater Than One’s Experience - by Submitted on Apr 22, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhenever an individual has any kind of powerful emotion or experience, he tends to “lose himself” in that experience. He becomes angry, or lustful, or ecstatic, or joyful and the feeling takes over his entire being and for a time, he “is” that force. The same thing can, and does, tend to happen ...
Views: 416 - The Spiritual Experience Gets Watered-Down or Lost As It is Transcribed into the Mental Framework - by Submitted on Apr 21, 2023 from santosh krinskyHuman beings are essentially dependent on their mental perception in order to function in the world. This mental perception frames what we see, how we experience it, and our interpretation. We thus try to transcribe anything provided to us by our senses (or provided directly to the mind without ...
Views: 377 - Why Speaking About One’s Spiritual Experiences Can Be Counter-Productive to the Sadhana - by Submitted on Apr 20, 2023 from santosh krinskyIt is a quite natural impulse. An individual has an extraordinary, unusual and in some cases, inexplicable experience, outside of his normal realm of experiences. Either through vital enthusiasm, a feeling of ego-aggrandisement due to the extraordinary nature of the experience, or through sense ...
Views: 416 - The Experience of Samadhi - by Submitted on Apr 19, 2023 from santosh krinskyIt is impossible for the mental consciousness to imagine what the state of Samadhi actually is. If we try to sit for meditation, we find all kinds of perceptions, feelings, nervous impulses, random thoughts and emotions flitting across our minds. We can observe an almost endless stream of inner ...
Views: 382 - The Need for Spiritual Discrimination, the Ability to Distinguish the Pure from the Impure - by Submitted on Apr 18, 2023 from santosh krinskyAs the spiritual seeker develops the sadhana over time, eventually he is confronted with lights, voices, and energies that come to him. It is not sufficient for him to simply accept that whatever comes is to be seen as valid and supportive of his spiritual aspiration. Spiritual discrimination, ...
Views: 366 - Three Rules for the Spiritual Practitioner with Respect to Experiences - by Submitted on Apr 17, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhat to do about spiritual experiences when they come? When we have a revelation of some sort, when we hear a communication that provides us insight or guidance, how are we to know whether it is truthful or misleading? Can we determine the source of the clairvoyant or clairaudient communication ...
Views: 342 - The Process of Changing Human Nature - by Submitted on Apr 16, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhen we take up the question of how to go about changing human nature, we are confronted with the difficulty of that attempt. Instincts, habits, trained responses, ‘nature’ and ‘nurture’ all conspire to maintain the status quo. When we attempt to make any change, we run up against the opposition ...
Views: 373 - The Superman: an Evolutionary Leap Is Not Limited to the Mind’s Extrapolation from Its Present Status - by Submitted on Apr 15, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe human mind has difficulty imagining the possibility of an entirely new direction for evolutionary development, and tends to try to “read” the future by extrapolation from the present and the past. Thus, we see Nietzsche describing the “superman” as someone who has a higher mental ...
Views: 408 - The Supramental Society Is Based in a New Consciousness of Realisation of the Divine Reality of Oneness with Diversity - by Submitted on Apr 15, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe “master race”, the “white man’s burden”, “white supremacy”, “manifest destiny”, the “superman” of Nietzsche all represent past attempts of the mind to translate the urge to transcend the limits of the human mind-life-body and assert power and control over the society through what may be ...
Views: 417 - The Supramental Evolution Represents the Fulfillment of Life, Not the Abandonment of Life - by Submitted on Apr 15, 2023 from santosh krinskyFor much of human history, spirituality has been looked upon as a contradiction of an active life in the world. The anchorite in the desert, the renunciate, the Sannyasin, the monk or nun in the cloister are held up to us as the examples of dedication to spiritual growth and purpose. All of ...
Views: 386 - The Role of Spiritual Experiences in the Change of Human Nature - by Submitted on Apr 15, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe vital ego is attracted to the excitement of having experiences that are unusual or powerful. It therefore wants to find ways to repeat or expand upon them once they have had such an experience. In reality, however, there is very little of long-term value in this approach. The experiences ...
Views: 399 - Intensity of an Experience Does Not Guarantee Its Veracity - by Submitted on Apr 14, 2023 from santosh krinskyThere are occasions when an individual experiences something that is so powerful, so intense, that it causes him to trust the experience. Spiritual experiences in particular can have a force that overwhelms the normal mental standpoint of the individual and impose themselves upon the seeker in a ...
Views: 379 - The Connection to the Psychic Being Minimizes the Dangers of the Intermediate Zone - by Submitted on Apr 13, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe process of the yogic sadhana inevitably begins to shift the consciousness inward and upward, and exposes the seeker to powers, forces and energies that are not easily seen or understood from the standpoint of the external mind and life. Thus, there is what we may call a natural opening to ...
Views: 386 - The Intermediate Zone and Its Dangers - by Submitted on Apr 12, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe see many examples through time of individuals who began a spiritual quest with good intention and who later came to grief as they got caught up in the snares of what Sri Aurobindo calls the ‘intermediate zone’. When we leave behind the safety and security of the external consciousness and its ...
Views: 412 - Vedic Seers Describe the Sevenfold Ignorance and the Sevenfold Knowledge - by Submitted on Apr 11, 2023 from santosh krinskyAs we take up the next chapter in the Life Divine, Sri Aurobindo cites, in the headnotes, some revealing passages from the Rig Veda and the Upanishads to indicate the 7 types of Ignorance that needs to be overcome, and to point out the 7 forms of Knowledge required to achieve realisation. Before ...
Views: 447 - Heightening the Force of Consciousness is the Trend of Evolution - by Submitted on Apr 11, 2023 from santosh krinsky“All evolution is in essence a heightening of the force of consciousness in the manifest being so that it may be raised into the greater intensity of what is still unmanifest, from matter into life, from life into mind, from the mind into the spirit. It is this that must be the method of our ...
Views: 357 - An Overview of the Intermediate Zone and Ways the Seeker Can Safely Maneuver Through It - by Submitted on Apr 11, 2023 from santosh krinskyAs the seeker begins to shift the consciousness inward, he becomes aware of forces, powers, and realms that are the native venues for our physical, vital and mental energies and activities, as well as existing in and by their own form of reality and under rules that do not necessarily match up ...
Views: 406 - Establishing a Foundational Basis of Sattwic Qualities Is Important in Protecting the Seeker During the Yogic Development Process - by Submitted on Apr 10, 2023 from santosh krinskyThe importance of the development of a habit of quietude and reflection cannot be over-emphasized. The preliminary purifications of Patanjali’s yoga works to create this kind of foundational support to avoid imbalances and dangers that can arise when the seeker experiences openings to forces ...
Views: 412 - The Seven Forms of Knowledge - by Submitted on Apr 09, 2023 from santosh krinskySri Aurobindo concludes that once we have defined the seven forms of Ignorance, our aim and goal in our human lives must be to successively overcome the Ignorance through the development of the sevenfold forms of knowledge. Each aspect of the knowledge we develop addresses one of the already ...
Views: 403 - Heightening the Force of Consciousness is the Trend of Evolution - by Submitted on Apr 09, 2023 from santosh krinsky“All evolution is in essence a heightening of the force of consciousness in the manifest being so that it may be raised into the greater intensity of what is still unmanifest, from matter into life, from life into mind, from the mind into the spirit. It is this that must be the method of our ...
Views: 382 - The Seven Rays of the Infinite - by Submitted on Apr 09, 2023 from santosh krinskySri Aurobindo starts the review of the Knowledge and the Ignorance by reminding us of the sevenfold principles of existence: “In our scrutiny of the seven principles of existence it was found that they are one in their essential and fundamental reality: for if even the matter of the most ...
Views: 408 - Every Yogic Practitioner Must Develop Along His Own Path and Face His Own Difficulties - by Submitted on Apr 09, 2023 from santosh krinskyWe like to have certainty, safety, and fixed map that provides us directions, steps, milestone markers and which will lead us to the goal of our seeking. Spiritual development, however, is not quite the same as an automobile or train trip from one city to another. The complex nexus that is ...
Views: 426 - What Are Spiritual Experiences? - by Submitted on Apr 08, 2023 from santosh krinskyIn our normal human lives, we live in an externally focused standpoint and we create a distinction between ‘objective reality’ and ‘subjective reality’. Because we are so dependent on the body-life-mind complex and its relation to the outer world, we tend to assign a greater truth and reality to ...
Views: 402 - Recognizing and Understanding Spiritual Experiences - by Submitted on Apr 07, 2023 from santosh krinskyWhen we live primarily on the external surface of our being, anchored to the physical world, the vital energy and mental status of living in the world, we try to judge everything that occurs within us by the standards of what we expect and understand from our outward existence, experience and ...
Views: 375 - Cognitive Bias and Occult Experiences - by Submitted on Apr 06, 2023 from santosh krinskyWestern psychology has investigated the impact of subtle forms of bias on what and how we perceive things, and how we interpret what we perceive. An individual’s cognitive bias subtly influences what he believes has occurred, and various people, witnessing the same event, but coming from ...
Views: 409 - How can I control my mind? How can I understand myself? - by Submitted on Apr 06, 2023 from Dada BhagwanGenerally, when our mind is overloaded with thoughts, we try to find a way to escape it by using diversions or different activities. However, these are all temporary solutions. Once these activities have ended, countless thoughts continue to buzz around like a fly once again. So rather than ...
Views: 331(1 vote) - Occult Powers and the Spiritual Sadhana - by Submitted on Apr 05, 2023 from santosh krinskyIn his lectures on Raja Yoga, in the chapter titled “Powers”, Swami Vivekananda explains how various occult powers arise or can be developed. The process is an extension of the preceding efforts of purification, quieting of the ‘mind stuff’ and then gaining the ability to fix the concentration ...
Views: 400