Page 10 - NAMAH-Apr-2025

Editorial

Linking the Outer Being and the Inner Being

The pursuit of personal growth requires a and disharmony. It is only at the pure
thorough understanding of the planes and psychological space of inner being that the
parts of the consciousness. Ordinarily, the physical, vital and mental planes can be
term, ’personality’ as used in contemporary disentangled from one another and can be
Western psychology, corresponds to what is de-linked from the influence of the ego.
known as the outer being in yoga psychology.
Sri Aurobindo describes a vaster inner being The inner being is connected with the
or subliminal personality behind the outer cosmic consciousness with which it has a
being, which is in continuum with the spontaneous affinity. The inner or subliminal
universal consciousness. It is not the soul but being is connected with the outer being
intermediary between the soul-principle (also through specialised centres of consciousness,
known as the inmost being and a projection initially described in Tantra and later
of the central being poised beyond and above acknowledged by yoga; it is these centres that
the manifestation). are identified as cakras in the Indian tradition.
Sri Aurobindo explains, “It [the subliminal] is,
It is difficult to pursue a programme for according to our psychology, connected with
personal growth at the level of the outer the small outer personality by certain centres of
being as there, the physical, the vital and the consciousness [Chakras] of which we become
mental planes are intermingled with each aware by Yoga (1).” The cakras are therefore,
other, while the ego, which tries to balance “…. conscious centres and sources of all the
them, is usually skewed to one plane or the dynamic powers of our being…. These centres
other, resulting in the outer being becoming are closed or half-closed within us and have
a fragile amalgam of ideas, emotions and to be opened before their full potentiality can
sensations modulated by desire. The outer be manifested in our physical nature (2).” The
being thus presents a picture of chaos cakras are thus usually not fully operative. Sri

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