“The ideal Yogin is no withdrawn and pent-up force, but ever engaged in doing good to all creatures, either by the flood of the divine energy that he pours on the world or by himself standing in the front of humanity, its leader in the march and the battle, but unbound by his work and superior to his personality.” — Sri Aurobindo
Being a Yogi is not about shunning ones duties and becoming an ascetic—that’s escapism. Yes, the Yogi connects with God, but more as a conduit for God to pour Itself upon the world through his actions.
Per Sri Aurobindo, the Yogi:
- works perfectly with love and zeal without feeling anxious about results, eager for victory, or afraid of defeat,
- devotes all his work to God and lays every thought, word, and deed as an offering on the divine altar,
- gets rid of fear, hatred, repulsion, disgust, and attachment, and works like the forces of Nature—perfectly, persistently, unhurried, yet unresting,
- rises about the thought that he is the body, the heart, or the mind, or the sum of these, and in the process, finds his true self,
- becomes aware of his immortality and the unreality of death (thus understanding that his work will continue until he keeps taking birth),
- experiences the advent of knowledge and surrenders to the divine force that pervades his mind, speech, senses, and all his organs, and,
- becomes incapable of grief, disquiet, or false excitement because he dwells permanently in the Lord, the Lover, the Helper of humankind.
Such a state isn’t a utopia. Time and again, we have read or heard of people who have achieved it. And we have not heard of many others who have, because they don’t need the world to know.
Let Sri Aurobindo’s description of a Yogi not frighten us. Rather let it become the lighthouse that helps us steer our ship through the stormy waters of life. Let us not lose ourselves in the semantics of texts, rituals, and āsanas, but use them as a means towards attaining Yoga.
The Isha Upanishads teach us,
“Abandon all that thou mayst enjoy, neither covet man’s possessions. But verily do thy needs in this world and live thy hundred years; no other way is given thee that this to escape the bondage of thy acts.”
We cannot reach such a level in a single lifetime, but we can keep inching towards it. All the progress we make carry forward into our next life, unlike the unused work leaves that lapse at the end of the year.
The more progress we make (for which indriya nigraha is the sine qua non), the more peace, joy, and strength we find.