Kindling the Viewless Fire

We suddenly find ourselves living in an age where it looks as if a colossal cupboard has opened containing previously hidden problems and all are falling out at an accelerated tempo. To name a few: environmental degradation of water and soil, overpopulation, poverty, food shortages, gender inequality, drug trafficking, corruption, terrorism. The threat of terrorism has become the dominant global issue.

“For Nature is slow and patient in her methods. She takes up ideas and half carries them out, then drops them by the wayside to resume them in some future era with a better combination. She tempts humanity, her thinking instrument, and tests how far it is ready for the harmony she has imagined; she allows and incites man to attempt and fail, so that he may learn and succeed better another time.”

In an increased tempo, because the time and the moment have arrived, the Yoga of Nature is now initiating the stage for major changes and external readjustments. And what is the change that is being asked of us?

“The solution lies not in the reason but in the soul of man, in its spiritual tendencies.”

Humanity as whole is being offered the opportunity to evolve from being a ‘thinking instrument’ towards becoming an intuitive instrument, and this is no small change.

As an individual at the age of 18, I encountered the writings of Mother and Sri Aurobindo. I received that amazing Grace of having Mother’s darshan at 21. Despite “the anguish of the soul’s long strife” experienced during my 65 years, I ardently practice kindling the viewless Fire.

We all receive a portion of the Highest, a tiny flame lodged within; this tiny eternal flame is hidden and veiled. A major part of our effort and early travels is connected with re-discovering and kindling this essential messenger and go-between, the viewless Fire, which provides the bridge between the Highest and mankind. Likewise, we are all given certain hurdles to solve during our life span. Those are weaknesses or darker facets in our character. Discovering those flaws, and consequently trying to transform them, is an individual task, long and hard, but essential for making a contribution towards establishing more Light and Truth within ourselves during our stay upon earth.

“Heaven we always possessed, but not the earth, and the aim of my yoga is to make, in the words of the Veda, heaven and earth equal and one.”

It’s a discipline in the beginning to repeat a simple Mantra. Gradually it becomes easier; and eventually a time arrives when the words repeat themselves during moments of silence or when there is an open space in the daily routine of the nonstop action of the mind. It’s like the equipment used to drive piles into the ground at construction sites. It bangs a pillar deeper and deeper into the soil in order to provide a safe foundation for a building. Repeating a mantra helps one to go deeper and deeper within oneself, cleaning the dark spaces while helping to establish clarity, truthfulness and the perception of the full circle instead of only a segment. This repeated action always goes together with noise, smoke and setbacks, just like what happens on a construction site.

It is useful to invoke and invite Mother and Sri Aurobindo to enter your inner space and ask for protection and help. The more sincere and intense the request is made, the more effective the help and protection becomes.

To overcome persistent difficulties, weaknesses, shortcomings, Mother and Sri Aurobindo mentioned again and again a simple remedy: offer your difficulty to the Light, with honesty and sincerity. Don’t try to wrestle with it on the mental level because the weakness will beat you hands down.

Offering ones difficulties to the Light means that Agni takes up within us the task of bringing its Light not only into the ‘higher regions’ of our being but also into the ‘lower regions’, since it works in a hidden way in both regions simultaneously. Most of our difficulties are embedded in the sink of our evolutionary past, the Vast without Light, the period connected with the creation of the world, which still makes up part of our being. We can request Agni to work in that region to break up the rock, the hurdles, and bring Light and Truth into that part of us that is still connected with the Vast Darkness.

In this ‘chaotic’ period it is imperative to kindle the viewless Fire within oneself, so that “At last the struggling Energy can emerge”.