Enlarging Auroville to the world

Auroville Today: What was the objective of the “Seeking Our Inner Being” project?

Dan: Our initial aim was to help people explore and express their experiences of their inner being as a means of strengthening human unity, of going beyond our differences and finding new solutions to our present challenges. For if we can relate to each other from this inner place, then we can be together in a different way and create something truly different in Auroville. This is why the main aim of this project was to bring spirituality to the core of our lives here. If all of us decided to get into contact with the inner being, I am sure that Auroville would be a very different place, filled with love and care for one another. For it’s not a matter of improving the old world but of discovering a completely new one, and this can only happen with a shift in consciousness through the connection to one’s inner, deeper being.

Another objective was to make discussion of this topic more acceptable, more a part of our communal lives, for we see that when we are talking about the inner being, a particular mindset or heart-set is naturally put in place—we bring it forward.

How would you summarise the most important outcomes of the project?

Dan: The project involved Aurovilians from many different backgrounds and nationalities. We did over 50 interviews where people spoke of exploring and experiencing their inner guidance, and there were also almost 30 group discussions in the languages of the participants on the theme of organising Auroville from a psychic perspective. Some of these discussions were with groups consisting only of women or of youth.

Svenja: When the interview with Bhagwandas came out as a podcast, a few of the French at the French Pavilion came together to listen to it and started discussing it. And that gave birth to other meetings in the Tibetan Pavilion and the French Pavilion. These were deliberately not recorded. However, anybody was welcome to attend these meetings and quite a few people came to reflect upon the topic of the inner being.

Dan: In this way, as well as through making all the interviews available on YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/@TheInnerBeingProject]

I think we succeeded in involving many people in speaking about this topic and making it more a part of our public discourse. The one-on-one interviews also provided many insights into how people experienced their inner being. These included a sense of increased aliveness, of peace, joy, faith, effortless flow, empathy and aspiration; of guidance shaping the course of their lives; of clarity and intuition as a guiding compass; and a profound sense of purpose, meaning and fulfillment in their lives.

They also spoke of the challenges of keeping contact with their inner being. These included inflation of the ego arising from spiritual experiences, the difficulty of embracing vulnerability and letting go of control, and the influence of ingrained belief systems and the social environment.

The discussions on organisation from a psychic perspective were held with eight different nationalities in their native languages (Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Korean, Spanish and Tamil). While the youth and women’s groups definitely brought their unique angle to every topic, one commonality which emerged from all the groups was that they all shared this fundamental need to feel safe, acknowledged for who they are as individuals, and heard in any group dynamic. What also emerged is that there is something universal in our ability to access psychic qualities like intuition, peace, and compassion. It looks like we are all wired with the same inner capacities.

Another commonly held perception in the groups was the need to make the shift from the ‘me versus you’ way of thinking and behaving toward something more inclusive and collective. And when we asked what we should do in order to make things happen in a better way here, it seemed that all groups felt that an inner work needs to be done, that an inner clearing and cleaning needs to take place, but oriented towards love and compassion for the other, rather than to selfish fulfillment, as is too often the case. Like all participants, we do believe that the next step of evolution for humanity will necessarily be the collective.

The discussions had this lovely quality of being both thoughtful and humble—people shared their genuine experience and observations without making definitive statements.

All the material which has been documented for this project will be handed over to the Archives because we feel this belongs to Auroville and everybody should have access to it.

What has been the impact upon you two of being involved in this project?

Svenja: It confirmed for me that when we are able to transcend our mental state, something else like a collective energy emerges.

Dan: Since childhood I have had this quest to discover my inner being, but listening to people speak about their inner being has helped it become more tangible for me. Now it gives sense to everything I do, and I have faith and trust in its inner guidance.

As it has been so important for you and so many other people, why are you closing the project? After all, it could be argued that at such a difficult time in Auroville’s history, it is particularly important that the community focuses more upon this topic. 

Dan: We are closing this project as it has been run so far in Auroville and expanding it to include the larger world. By this, I mean that now we will continue the exploration of the inner being with people and communities outside Auroville. This is because we feel that the concept of The Dream, the inner being and even what it means to be a true Aurovilian, cannot be limited to a given place. Countless people and groups worldwide are working towards a shift in consciousness, collaborating to create a new paradigm, and they could also be called true Aurovilians, even though they might never have heard about Auroville.

So this new project would be a first step in redefining Auroville as not simply a small place in South India but also as something which exists as a vibration, a perspective, elsewhere in the world.

Svenja: The expansion of the project has already begun organically because the last interviews we conducted were with one Korean and two Russian communities outside Auroville and with other individuals who are not Aurovilians. We were asking for their connection to The Dream, which we had translated into different languages for this purpose. A page on our website was created where people from all over the world could share with us their understanding and experiences of how the Dream of the Mother could indeed apply to any place in the world, irrespective of the outer circumstances.

Dan: The second reason we are closing the project in Auroville is because of everything that is happening in Auroville at present. It has become discouraging to fundraise because of the bureaucratic complications. Also, we feel that the project is clearly of a spiritual nature, but the authorities in Auroville today are giving more importance to administrative structure and rules than to growing organically from an inner guidance. So the climate is not at all conducive to our work.

There is a possibility for people to continue the work here. When we started interviewing in different languages, we expanded our team to include interviewers in Italian, French, Russian and Chinese. And when we were out of Auroville recently, this team continued interviewing Aurovilians.

However, we closed the project formally at the end of July. My goal now is to expand Auroville’s ideals to the entire world, particularly through this inner quest for our psychic being, and to bridge Auroville with other communities. In return, I hope this new project will ultimately benefit the true Auroville which is already manifesting on a subtle plane. Our spiritual path is enriched through the understanding that, while its essence is universal, it is expressed in a diversity of ways in different individuals and cultures worldwide. Also, putting people and communities with a similar orientation in contact with Auroville may provide us with new ways of dealing with our present challenges. 

Svenja: Dan has identified Aurovilian resource persons in various languages, so whenever we come across an individual or community outside that is willing to interact with Auroville, we will set up Zoom meetings with Aurovilians who can converse in their own language.

So, practically, what are your next steps now?

Dan: We will register the inner being project as a non-profit association in the Netherlands to allow us to fundraise for our activities outside Auroville. We plan to temporarily leave Auroville by the end of the year, buy a camper van and then visit other communities for a couple of years, visiting and learning from like-minded individuals and communities, and documenting everything in a blog [https://innerbeing.world/travel-blog/] for the reciprocal benefit of Auroville and the world.

Svenja: As we planned to begin visiting like-minded communities in southern Spain and southern Italy, we started to communicate with the AVIs in those countries, so one of these communities might be a starting point. And from there word-of-mouth is probably going to lead us to the next one. We are not planning far ahead.

As a trained therapist, I will also be offering workshops on the theme of exile and grief. Again, this was an organic development with links to the inner being project. It is born out of the fact that Aurovilians who have lived here for many years are leaving because of the present situation. They are having difficulty reintegrating into their own cultures, and there is a lot of grieving because they are having to tear up their roots. The online programme I have put together will last for 12 sessions over 3 months, and my role will not be so much a therapist as a facilitator to help people to work on issues of exile, grief and nomadism.

This is something I would like to offer free of charge initially to Aurovilians who have left or are thinking about leaving, but as exile and rootlessness is a worldwide phenomenon now, I will also offer it online [https://h-e-r.world/] and as shorter workshops in the communities which we visit under the principle of gift economy.

Dan: In one sense, exile is a universal phenomenon because many of us are exiled from conscious contact with our inner being. In this sense, this work is very much a continuation of the work we began here. This is why I’m sure we will continue to feel we are in Auroville, even if physically we are located elsewhere.

Svenja: We need to emphasise that we are not leaving Auroville for good or in a negative frame of mind. Right now it is just not possible for us to continue the inner being project in the way it seemed to want to go, and other doorways have been opening up with like-minded people and communities. We are simply continuing the same work we started here, but from another space-time.

How are you going to define ‘like-minded’ communities, because there are so many communities out there with different ways of doing things and different ideals from Auroville.

Dan: Agreed, but there is increasing agreement today that the problems we are facing in the world are not due to outer circumstances but to ourselves, that we are the ones who must change. This perception is reflected in things like the drawing up of Inner Development Goals and the work and orientation of many alternative communities worldwide. The communal environment plays an important part in influencing this work: it can either uplift you or bring you down. We have a couple of friends who are in Findhorn at the moment, and they tell us that this is a place where love is at the base. Unfortunately, this is not the case in Auroville today. I think when we enter a new community, we have the capacity to assess the spirit of the place, to see if we are together on the same plane. In this, we will always try to be guided by our inner navigation, our inner compass.

Svenja: What I will miss most when I am away from Auroville is the multicultural aspect, the interaction of people from all horizons and cultures and languages, and the moments when we all come together through this heartfelt energy. This is the beauty of Auroville. I don’t think we will find many other places like this, which is why I think we have to target communities with a mixture of nationalities.

Dan: The multicultural aspect is an essential part of Auroville, and one which we may not find easily elsewhere. But we feel called to do something, to try to make Auroville the world, or the other way round, and the new scope of our work will be limited by us staying here. The energy, the faith that we are doing the right thing derives from all the work we have been doing with Aurovilians in exploring the inner being. It has helped something grow stronger within us, and now we feel ready to face whatever may happen in the next few years.

Svenja: It’s just like the way we came to Auroville nine years ago. Everything in France had stopped, there was a big void and we needed to start something else. When we finally decided to go to Auroville, which had been on our minds for some years, everything fell into place very easily. And right now, the same thing is happening. Doors are closing here and opening elsewhere and we are simply following the signs, the inner guidance. How the new project will develop we don’t know, but we have profound trust that we will be guided.