Seeking our inner being

Auroville Today: What was the origin of this project?

Dan: Partly, it was personal. I had been experiencing fear and uncertainty about my visa situation but, at the same time, I had been translating a small book by Loretta called Finding the Psychic Being into French. While diving into this for four or five hours a day, at some point I experienced a profound inner peace: there was complete relief from my anxiety. It felt that the pressure, the force of the outer challenge, was evoking something in myself that was completely peaceful. Then I understood there was a kind of inner split within me. The anxiety was related to the human stuff and the stillness, the peace, to something which was not human but divine. And I realized that this other ‘something’ had always been within me, pushing to be expressed, but I had not been capable of identifying what it was, and now I was beginning to understand it better.

When I started to discuss this with different people, I discovered that many were experiencing the same thing: that while the turbulence was affecting many people in the community, they were also experiencing something different within themselves. And a sense was emerging that actually the present chaos might be a grace because it forces us to renew ourselves: to transform something we are painfully enduring into something we can invest with psychic qualities.

So one of the main purposes of the project was to help people distinguish in themselves what belongs to the human part and what to the divine part. For, ultimately, we are all spiritual seekers with the capacity to understand that there is the human and there is the divine. And, for me, the only purpose of being alive in this human organism is to look for and find the divine, which is omnipresent but veiled in many of us.

This is not something we usually talk about. In fact, I am constantly surprised and shocked that there are so few discussions in Auroville about what we are here for. It’s like we are all living our own spirituality in our own little corner, while outwardly we are arguing and fighting and trying to make things happen on a very human level. So I thought now was an opportune moment to bring our individual experiences of the inner being to the forefront of the collective consciousness.

There is also the wider dimension. Mankind as a whole is going through a shift of consciousness, so how is it possible to hasten and to consciously collaborate in making this shift?

One of the reasons people in Auroville do not share their inner experiences is because Sri Aurobindo and Mother warned that sharing such experiences could lead to them being diluted or distorted.

Yes, when I started to talk about this project, some people told me that we usually don’t speak about this. However, in his interview Alok Pandey said that while we are not supposed to share our experiences, he thought it would be useful for others to hear about some of his, and that the time has come to document such experiences for the benefit of the entire world. I feel the same. I think that if people talk about their inner experiences, it can help others to recognise that what they are experiencing is a natural process of evolution to another humankind, and this could be a way of inspiring and connecting people. 

When I started this project, I reached out to a lot of friends to see if they would be willing to participate, and some people said they were not willing to do so. However, because I had asked them they said this was the first time they’d started to reflect on whether or not they were in contact with their inner being. In other words, asking the question already has a benefit, even if it is not answered. So this is already an outcome.

In any case, I think the more we speak about this the better, because my aim is to invite this community to put this topic, the discovery of the inner being, at the core of their lives in Auroville. Otherwise, what is the purpose of being in an intentional spiritual community?

Socrates said "Wisdom begins with the definition of terms." In this context I wonder if your use of the term ‘inner being’ without further defining it may be problematic. Sri Aurobindo points out that the inner being includes all that is subliminal, unrecognized by our waking consciousness, and therefore includes not only the luminous planes above but also the subconscient below. Without understanding this, isn’t there a danger that people may fail to discriminate concerning where their inner experiences are coming from?

It’s a good point. The seeking for an inner being is not necessarily something rewarding at first because it also involves cleansing negative aspects of our being, like anger or fear that may be linked to deep impulses in us. But we are not looking to interpret people’s experiences. We are looking for something more uplifting, something that ultimately makes sense, and brings joy and faith. Moreover, it’s a question of vibration. Everything that is related to the higher aspects of the inner being is associated with particular qualities, energies, like sweetness, compassion, care, and the expansion of human senses and possibilities. These are the predominant qualities which are shared in the experiences of the interviewees.

Were there other similarities that you noted?

There are some similarities, but I think the first outcome is to see that although all spiritual paths are unique, all emanate from the same source, like the rays of the sun. This is the beauty of it: that we all have to find our own way back to the source.

At the moment, many people in the community are very focused on the outer aspect of the turmoil they are experiencing. If this project succeeds in shifting the focus to them exploring their inner beings, could that shift also have a profound impact on outer circumstances?

I am convinced that there is such a thing as a ‘psychic field’, and whenever someone is consciously focusing more on what is happening inside him or herself, they carry a vibration which can be felt and transmitted to others. We are starting to host circles and discussions on this topic, and something happens when a few people purposefully come together around the topic of the psychic being. In the Bible it says “where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there among them", and something like this is happening in our gatherings.

If people could acknowledge there is a value, a magic, in discussing such matters and we could spend a bit more time in our community on addressing this topic, I think the outcome, both inner and outer, would be amazing. And if all 3000 of us would decide to explore the inner being, I am sure that Auroville would be a very different place. For it’s not a matter of improving the old world but of discovering a completely new world, and this can only happen with a shift in consciousness through the connection to one’s inner, deeper being.

This is why the main aim of this project is to bring back spirituality to the core of our lives here.

Are you envisaging further steps after the interviews?

Yes. We are very much aware of the barrier of language in expressing this inner state and so we are starting to organise small sharing circles in French and in English, and, hopefully, soon in Tamil, Russian and Korean. These are confidential, not recorded, and there is an agreed framework – we only build on what has been said before, we listen deeply and don’t evaluate or reply to what others have expressed – to enable people to share deeply. 

We have also launched a discussion on the topic of “Organisation from a psychic perspective”. It began with a French group, YouthLink and Tamil groups, and it will also happen with English and a group constituted only of women. The plan is to record the discussions, to extract the key ideas and possible similarities and then make a proposal to the wider community.

Also, I would like to create a story of a spiritual seeker who begins from scratch and finally connects with their psychic being. The narrative would be extracted from the experiences shared by the 35 interviewees and then given to a theatre, dance or art therapy group to make an event focussed around the topic. I will approach artistic people to get them to participate and have already booked CRIPA Hall for the event next February. I’m fundraising for this.

This event would be a way of honouring the contributions of the interviewees but, as it will be recorded and filmed, it will also be a way of sharing this topic with the wider world.

The interviews are available on YouTube. Additionally we have set up a website where people from all over the world can share with us their understanding and experiences of the inner being, of the higher self or inner guidance. We have contacts in the US, South America and Russia and, of course, in India, with people who are willing to participate. So who knows how it will develop, for the shift of consciousness is happening everywhere, and this project could become a bridge between Auroville and this wider global movement of transformation.

The majority of interviewees are Aurovilians, although a few are guests or people connected to Auroville or to this quest for their inner being. While few of the interviewees state they are in contact with their psychic being, many spoke of an inner ‘presence’ which offers them guidance at crucial times in their lives. This guidance can come through a voice or a feeling in a particular part of the body, which is usually identified as the heart centre. The contact with the inner being is associated with experiencing synchronicities and with particular qualities. These include a sense of deep peace, freedom, joy, sweetness, wideness and harmony, being more ‘in the flow’, as well as a complete absence of fear or a wish to judge others. As one of them put it, when their inner being is in front “There is no death, no loss, endless time. And nothing can ever go wrong”. There is also the sense, as another put it, of “suddenly putting oneself back into the right place”, or of being Mother”s “instrument”.

Some of the interviewees have had profound, life-changing experiences in their lives. These include being flooded with unconditional love for Mother, travelling outside their body, seeing golden letters in the sky, passing through a door into a world of light, experiencing immortality in the body, and perceiving themselves as an eternal soul after a near-death experience.

Some of the interviewees have no way of knowing when the inner contact will come. Others employ various practices to make contact. These included meditation, repeating a mantra, prayer, centering themselves in the heart, and reading Sri Aurobindo’s and Mother’s words.

When asked what they think are the main ‘traps’ or threats that would interfere with this inner work, the most common is the pressure of outer circumstances and the emotions that arise in dealing with these, for it is generally agreed that the inner work requires both inner and outer peace: as one interviewee put it, “I need to be centred and quiet to receive guidance”. Other traps or blocks include vanity and elitism – a feeling of spiritual superiority – always wanting to be in control of the outcome, fear, and a lack of faith.

As to the possible larger impact of this work, as one of them put it, “A movement of consciousness can transform situations and relations”.

If you want to participate in this project and/or share your experience, please visit https://innerbeing.world/ or send an email to [email protected].