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Idea

It is intellect that puts ideas in the form of thoughts, gathering and organising the thoughts at the same time. There are great ideas which lie beyond the ordinary human mentality, which can put on all possible forms.

There is a power in the idea—a force of which the idea is a shape. Again, behind the idea and force and word there is what is called the spirit,—a consciousness which generates the force.

There is a part of the mind which receives ideas, ideas that are formed in a higher mind.

Ignorance

Ignorance means Avidya, the separative consciousness and the egoistic mind and life that flow from it and all that is natural to the separative consciousness and the egoistic mind and life. This Ignorance is the result of a movement by which the cosmic Intelligence separated itself from the light of the Supermind (the divine Gnosis) and lost the Truth,―truth of being, truth of divine consciousness, truth of force and action, truth of Ananda. As a result, instead of a world of integral truth and divine harmony created in the light of the divine Gnosis, we have a world founded on the part truths of an inferior cosmic Intelligence in which all is half-truth, half-error. All in the consciousness of this creation is either limited or else perverted by separation from the integral Light; even the Truth it perceives is only a half-knowledge. Therefore it is called the Ignorance.

Illness

Illness is a deformation of the physical nature just as lust, anger, jealousy, etc., are deformations of the vital nature and error and prejudice and indulgence of falsehood are deformations of the mental nature.

Illness marks some imperfection or weakness or else opening to adverse touches in the physical nature and is often connected also with some obscurity or disharmony in the lower vital or the physical mind or elsewhere.

Immortality

For immortality in its fundamental sense does not mean merely some kind of personal survival of the bodily death; we are immortal by the eternity of our self-existence without beginning or end, beyond the whole succession of physical births and deaths through which we pass, beyond the alternations of our existence in this and other worlds: the spirit’s timeless existence is the true immortality.

To live in the Divine and have the divine Consciousness is itself immortality and to be able to divinise the body also and make it a fit instrument for divine works and divine life would be its material expression only.

Impersonal

The Impersonal Brahman is inactive, aloof, indifferent, not concerned with what happens in the universe.

To seek after the Impersonal is the way of those who want to withdraw from life, but usually they try by their own effort and not by an opening of themselves to a superior Power or by the way of surrender; for the Impersonal is not something that guides and helps, but something to be attained, and it leaves each man to attain it according to the way and capacity of his nature.

Impulse

The vital is the receptacle of all the bad impulses, all wickedness, cowardice, weakness and avarice.

When the vital is converted, the impulses are good instead of being bad; wickedness is replaced by kindness, avarice by generosity; weakness disappears and strength and endurance take its place; cowardice is replaced by courage and energy.

Incapacity

Our incapacity does not matter―there is no human being who is not in his parts of nature incapable―but the Divine Force is also there. If one puts one’s trust in that, incapacity will be changed into capacity. Difficulty and struggle themselves then become a means towards the achievement.

One ought not to settle down into a fixed idea of one’s own incapacity or allow it to become an obsession; for such an attitude has no true justification and unnecessarily renders the way harder. Where there is a soul that has once become awake, there is surely a capacity within that can outweigh all surface defects and can in the end conquer.

Incarnation

An incarnation is something special and individual to the individual being. It is the substitution of the Person of a divine being for the human person and an infiltration of it into all the movements so that there is a dynamic personal change in all of them and in the whole nature; not merely a change of the character of the consciousness or general surrender into its hands, but a subtle intimate personal change. Even when there is an incarnation from the birth, the human elements have to be taken up, but where there is a descent, there is a total conscious substitution. This is a long, subtle and persistent process. The incarnating Person first overshadows as an influence, then enters into the centres one after the other, sometimes in the same form, sometimes in different forms, then takes up all the nature and its actions. An incarnation is destined, is chosen for you; the human person cannot choose or create an incarnation for himself by his own personal will. To attempt it is to invite a spiritual disaster.

Inconscient

Inconscient is an appearance, a dwelling place, an instrument of a secret Consciousness or a Superconscient which has created the miracle we call the universe. Matter is the field and the creation of the Inconscient.

If there is a negation of something, it is truly the Inconscient, it is the negation of everything. It has not even the capacity of emptiness.

Indifference

For the most part the condition is one of calm and profound indifference; the being feels neither desire nor repulsion, neither enthusiasm nor depression, neither joy nor sorrow. It regards life as a spectacle in which it takes only a very small part; it perceives its actions and reactions, conflicts and forces as things that at once belong to its own existence which overflows the small personality on every side and yet to that personality are altogether foreign and remote.

To become indifferent to the attraction of outer objects is one of the first rules of yoga, for this non-attachment liberates the inner being into peace and the true consciousness.

Inertia

Inertia is the very character of the physical consciousness left to itself—it is accustomed to be passive to forces and to be their instrument or give a mechanical response to them.

The hold of inertia always increases when the working comes down into the physical and subconscient. Before that the inertia is overpowered though not eradicated by the action in mind and vital—afterwards it comes up in its natural force and has to be met in its own field.

Dullness, uneasiness, weakness, feeling old and worn out or ill, are the reactions that come when the inertia of the physical Nature resisting the Light.

Infinite

There is then a supreme Reality eternal, absolute and infinite. Because it is absolute and infinite, it is in its essence indeterminable. It is indefinable and inconceivable by finite and defining Mind; it is ineffable by a mind-created speech; it is describable neither by our negations, neti neti,—for we cannot limit it by saying it is not this, it is not that,—nor by our affirmations, for we cannot fix it by saying it is this, it is that, iti iti.

But although thus indeterminable to Mind, because of its absoluteness and infinity, we discover that this Supreme and Eternal Infinite determines itself to our consciousness in the universe by real and fundamental truths of its being which are beyond the universe and in it and are the very foundation of its existence.

The Self-existent is the Infinite and its way of being and of action must be the way of the Infinite, but our consciousness is limited, our reason built upon things finite: it is irrational to suppose that a finite consciousness and reason can be a measure of the Infinite; this smallness cannot judge that Immensity; this poverty bound to a limited use of its scanty means cannot conceive the opulent management of those riches; an ignorant half-knowledge cannot follow the motions of an All-Knowledge.

Inner Guidance

One has to watch, observe one’s experiences and try to discriminate and understand,—waiting for two things, the opening of a wider higher consciousness from above and the coming forward of the psychic being from behind. When these two things happen, then the chance of error is diminished and the true inner guidance begins to make itself more and more felt in the sadhana.

As for the feeling from within, it depends on being able to go inside. Sometimes it comes of itself with the deepening of the consciousness by bhakti or otherwise, sometimes it comes by practice—a sort of referring the matter and listening for the answer—listening is, of course, a metaphor but it is difficult to express it otherwise—it doesn’t mean that the answer comes necessarily in the shape of words, spoken or unspoken, though it does sometimes or for some; it can take any shape. The main difficulty for many is to be sure of the right answer. For that it is necessary to be able to contact the consciousness of the Guru inwardly—that comes best by bhakti. Otherwise, the attempt to get the feeling from within by practice may become a delicate and ticklish job. Obstacles: (1) normal habit of relying on outward means for everything; (2) ego, substituting its suggestions for the right answer; (3) mental activity; (4) intruder nuisances.

Inner Guide

The supreme Guide and Teacher is the inner Guide, the WorId-Teacher, jagad-guru, secret within us. He discloses progressively in us his own nature of freedom, bliss, love, power, immortal being. He has no method and every method. His system is a natural organisation of the highest processes and movements of which the nature is capable. In his yoga there is nothing too small to be used and nothing too great to be attempted. The full recognition of this inner Guide, Master of the Yoga, lord, light, enjoyer and goal of all sacrifice and effort, is of the utmost importance in the path of integral perfection. This inner Guide is often veiled at first by the very intensity of our personal effort and by the ego’s preoccupation with itself and its aims.

Inner Sight

When one tries to meditate, the first obstacle in the beginning is sleep. When you get over this obstacle, there comes a condition in which, with the eyes closed, you begin to see things, people, scenes of all kinds. This is not a bad thing, it is a good sign and means that you are making progress in the yoga. There is, besides the outer physical sight which sees external objects, an inner sight in us which can see things yet unseen and unknown, things at a distance, things belonging to another place or time or to other worlds; it is the inner sight which is opening in you.

Inner vision is vivid like actual sight, always precise and contains a truth in it. In mental vision the images are invented by the mind and are partly true, partly a play of possibilities. Or a mental vision like the vital may be only a suggestion,- that is a formation of some possibility on the mental or vital plane which presents itself to the sādhaka in the hope of being accepted and helped to realise itself.

Inspiration

It means receiving something which is beyond you, which was not within you; to open yourself to an influence which is outside your individual conscious being. Fundamentally it is a moment of openness to something which was not within your personal consciousness, which comes from outside and rushes into you and makes you do something. This is the widest formula that can be given. Now, generally, when people say: “Oh! he is an inspired poet”, it means he has received something from high above and expressed it in a remarkable manner. But one should rather say that his inspiration is of a high quality.

All poetry is an inspiration, a thing breathed into the thinking organ from above; it is recorded in the mind, but is born in the higher principle of direct knowledge or ideal vision which surpasses mind. It is in reality a revelation. The prophetic or revealing power sees the substance; the inspiration perceives the right expression.

Instrument

To be able to receive the Divine Power and let it act through you in the things of the outward life, there are three necessary conditions: (i) Quietude, equality—not to be disturbed by anything that happens, to keep the mind still and firm, seeing the play of forces, but itself tranquil.

(ii) Absolute faith—faith that what is for the best will happen, but also that if one can make oneself a true instrument, the fruit will be that which one’s will guided by the Divine Light sees as the thing to be done—kartavyam karma.

(iii) Receptivity—the power to receive the Divine Force and to feel its presence and the presence of the Mother in it and allow it to work, guiding one’s sight and will and action. If this power and presence can be felt and this plasticity made the habit of the consciousness in action,—but plasticity to the Divine force alone without bringing in any foreign element,—the eventual result is sure.

A receptive silence of the mind, an effacement of the mental ego and the reduction of the mental being to the position of a witness, a close contact with the Divine Power and an openness of the being to that one Influence and no other are the conditions for becoming an instrument of the Divine, moved by that and that only.

Integral Yoga

There are many Yogas, many spiritual disciplines, paths towards liberation and perfection, Godward ways of the spirit. Each has its separate aim, its peculiar approach to the One Reality, its separate method, its helpful philosophy and its practice. The integral Yoga takes up all of them in their essence and tries to arrive at a unification (in essence, not in detail) of all these aims, methods, approaches; it stands for an all-embracing philosophy and practice.

To enter into the entire consciousness of the Divine Reality with all our being and all parts and in every way of our being and to change all our now ignorant and limited nature into divine nature so that it shall become the instrument and expression of the Divine Reality that in our self and essence we are,—this is the complete fulfilment of our existence and this is the integral Yoga.

This Yoga is called the integral Yoga, first because its object is integral covering the whole field of spiritual realisation and experience. It takes existence at its centre and in all its aspects and turns it into a harmony at once single and entire. It is the method of an integral God realisation, an integral self-realisation, an integral fulfilment of the being, an integral transformation and perfection of the nature.

It is the way of a complete God-realisation, a complete Self-realisation, a complete fulfilment of our being and consciousness, a complete transformation of our nature—and this implies a complete perfection of life here and not only a return to an eternal perfection elsewhere.

Our mind, will, heart, life, body, our outer and inner and inmost existence, our superconscious and subconscious as well as our conscious parts, must all be thus given, must all become a means, a field of this realisation and transformation and participate in the illumination and the change from a human into a divine consciousness and nature.

Integration

Everybody is an amalgamation not of two, but of many personalities. It is part of the yogic perfection in this yoga to accord and transmute them so as to ‘integrate’ the personality.

Interchange

When one is with another for sometime talking etc., there is always some vital interchange, unless one rejects what comes from others instinctively or deliberately. If one is impressionable, there may be a strong impression or influence from the others. Then when one goes to another person it is possible to pass it on to the other. That is a thing which is constantly happening. But this happens without the knowledge of the transmitter. When one is conscious, one can prevent it happening.

A certain amount of self-defence is necessary, so that the consciousness may not be pulled down or out constantly into the ordinary atmosphere or the physical strained by being forced into activities that have become foreign to you.

Intermediate Zone

[The intermediate zone is] that when the sadhak gets beyond the barriers of his own embodied personal mind he enters into a wide range of experiences which are not the limited solid physical truth of things and not yet either the spiritual truth of things. It is a zone of formations, mental, vital, subtle physical, and whatever one forms or is formed by the forces of these worlds in us becomes for the sadhak for a time the truth—unless he is guided and listens to his guide. Afterwards if he gets through he discovers what it was and passes on into the subtle truth of things. It is a borderland where all the worlds meet, mental, vital, subtle physical, pseudo-spiritual—but there is no order or firm foothold—a passage between the physical and the true spiritual realms.

Intuition

Intuition is in direct contact with the higher Truth but not in an integral contact. It gets the Truth in flashes and turns these flashes of Truth-perception into intuitions—intuitive ideas. The ideas of the true Intuition are always correct so far as they go—but when intuition is diluted in the ordinary mind stuff, its truth gets mixed with error.

The Intuition is the first plane on which there is a real opening to the full possibility of realisation—it is through it that one goes farther—first to Overmind and then to Supermind.

To live in the Intuitive it is necessary first to have the opening into the cosmic consciousness and to live first in the higher and the illumined Mind, seeing everything from there. To receive constantly the intuition from above, that is not necessary—it is sufficient to have the sense of the One everywhere and to get into contact with things and people through the inner mind and senses more than with the outer mind and senses—for the latter meet only the surface of things and are not intuitive.

Iṣṭa Devatā

God meets us first in different limited affirmations of his divine qualities and nature; he presents himself to the seeker as an absolute of the things he can understand and to which his will and heart can respond; he discloses some name and aspect of his Godhead. This is what is called in Yoga the iṣṭa-devatā, the name and form elected by our nature for its worship. In order that the human being may embrace this Godhead with every part of himself, it is represented with a form that answers to its aspects and qualities and which becomes the living body of God to the adorer.

Ishwara

The Ishwara is supracosmic as well as intracosmic; He is that which exceeds and inhabits and supports all individuality; He is the supreme and universal Brahman, the Absolute, the supreme Self, the supreme Purusha. He is the Conscious Being, Soul, Spirit, Purusha, and it is by his Nature, the force of his conscious self-existence that he is all things; the omniscient and omnipotent All-ruler, and it is by his Shakti, his conscious Power, that he manifests himself in Time and governs the universe.