Consciousness and health
Man and beyond Man
Abstract
Life is evolving constantly at different paces. What about man? This article discusses certain lines of human evolution so far and the further prospects of future evolution of going beyond man.
Three kinds of life
Human beings experience at least three kinds of life that roughly correspond to the three layers of the brain. There is first, a material or physical life that is centred around the body. Tied to the bodily needs, this layer of humanity lives largely by instinct and is driven by hunger, thirst and the urge to reproduce. Such a humanity is deeply attached, in fact tied like a sheep to its flock, to the circumstances of his birth, the people he encounters in his little space, the language spoken by his kind, the custom and traditions in which he is born and the gods that are worshipped in his house. He labours to preserve rather than expand his comfort-zones and is bound to the images that he has experienced around him. To progress beyond his feeding space and his kind, to seek and understand anything greater, higher or even other than what he has been handed over by heredity, is a venture he is unwilling to undertake. His comfort is in the numbers, his safety is in multiplying his type.
Such a life is slow-paced and moves like a bullock cart along the fields of Time. To preserve rather than create, to conserve rather than grow, discover and invent is his preoccupation. It revels in memories of the old bygone days and dreads any change in its mechanical routine. The old-world charm and the little things of life are its source of joy.
Climbing further we see yet another kind of life that humanity knows. It is a life of desires and ambitions. Here, impulse and passions drive the engines and life runs on fast gears. It may take a leap or crash through the roads. Speed rather than arriving at a settled poise is the joy here. Change for change’s sake, such as we see in the world of fashion, is the way of life. This life is a life of adventure, the life of the explorer, the inventor, the man who courts even peril and danger, preferring risks over security, wide expansion over comfort-zones, revolt over conformity, change over convention. The obvious role of this layer of humanity in ushering unexpected new ways of life is well known. Yet this is not what is meant by the new life since this child of rajas moves in an expanding and contracting circle of ignorance. It changes appearances but ever remains the same within.
When this ascending current of life meets a sweet stream, emerging from the depths, then its rhythm changes into a graceful pace. This deeper stream is the current of emotions whose origin is in the flame of love that dwells within all. This psychic touch from the secret soul depths gets muddy and turbid as it mixes with ambition and passion, like mixing poison-sting to the ambrosia of the gods. Yet it brings its own unique charm, a beauty and sweetness, dreams of a perfect world where all is bright and beautiful, a glad harmony that uplifts the human towards the divine. We see its stirring in the higher animals such as the bear and elephant, cow and horse, dogs and cats, dolphins and seals. It can be felt in children and in human beings whose ambitions have been tempered with feelings of camaraderie, sympathy and affection. One can see it still in a humanity that is closer to the animal in its simplicity and far from the rut and race of competition and lust for power and money. In some, this deeper psychic life does not get its full chance to emerge as the consciousness shoots rather abruptly towards the third kind of life that humanity knows.
This third layer of humanity, that is yet developing, is a mentalised intellectual human being. Here the chariot of life is driven by engines of thought. Reason replaces instinct and impulse. Desires and ambitions are brought under moderation and emotions assume a restrained glow. The will to understand before action, the need for balance, equilibrium and harmony, governing life by a luminous understanding of the rules of life, rather than a mechanical adherence or revolt for the sake of revolt is the way of living here. Its gifts are a healthy balanced life, lived in moderation and with self-control, a glad inner and outer harmony and the stirring of light in the human consciousness that is waking up to the mysteries of existence.
Its fine flowers are those of the thinker rather than the hero, the philosopher rather than the martyr, the calm, detached sage rather than the other two who are attached either to obscurity and blind servitude to mechanical rule, or to the objects of desires and to wealth, power and position. This life moves cautiously in slowly expanding circles of ignorance, taking the help of information, opinions and viewpoints. It can expand endlessly since the mind, though finite, has no limit to exploring its own domain.
Climbing beyond the Mind
But a time comes, when tired of the incertitude of thought, the mind and the intellect begin to enter into pure reflection, a meditation upon the deeper mysteries, an intellectual search for the final Truth if any. The merely curious man and the analytical thinker begin to pass into the high philosopher and the compassionate sage. Climbing to peaks of luminous thought, one begins to see and feel within the mind some far-off ray of the Source of all things. Taking hold of this yet insubstantial ray, man the thinker begins a new journey towards a new life. His climb is met with a response from the heights and new faculties of knowledge such as inspiration, revelation and intuition are born. This ascension gives birth to the mystic and the seer. This spiritual life that is yet rare and difficult is the next evolutionary project undertaken by Nature. Until now available to the few, there is a hastening and quickening of this life in the womb of humanity. It is this that is leading to an increasing tension and restlessness on the one hand and, on the other, an almost explosion in the multiplication of sects and cults and paths, each claiming to facilitate the delivery of this new life through a minimum of labour pain.
This life is characterised by a growing intuitive sense of a greater life, a higher possibility, a divination of the Godhead within man, an emphasis on higher values based on a deeper and more complete understanding. The sign of a perfect mentalised humanity is that he controls the animal by the moral and ethical values that its discerning intellect provides. By doing so, man transcends the animal-type of humanity that is centred around bodily needs and the rākṣasic and asuric humanity centred around desires and ambitions. In fact, it humanises them. The animal is chained but not tamed. The Rākṣasa and the Asura are modified to wear acceptable masks but they always lurk behind. At any time, the animal and the Asura may break free and sully our thoughts and actions. The true spiritual life, on the other hand, transcends the human and modifies it by providing an intuitive light and a higher sense of values that replaces the ordinary human moral sense.
The Mother describes this new life beautifully:
“The civilisation which is ending now in such a dramatic way was based on the power of mind, mind dealing with matter and life. What it has been to the world, we have not to discuss here. But a new reign is coming, that of the Spirit: after the human, the divine.
Yet, if we have been fortunate enough to live on earth at such a stupendous, a unique time as this one, is it sufficient to stand and watch the unfolding events? All those who feel that their heart extends further than the limits of their own person and family, that their thought embraces more than small personal interests and local conventions, all those, in short, who realise that they belong not to themselves, or to their family, or even to their country, but to God who manifests Himself in all countries, through mankind, these, indeed, know that they must rise and set to work for the sake of humanity, for the advent of the Dawn (1).”
The New Race
The new life which is emerging out of the mentalised life of man is not just an improvement upon the old. Nor is it simply a vague sense of spirituality, a philosophical understanding or a religious aspiration, not even occasional spiritual glimpses. These things are at best preparations for an emerging spiritual life. What truly defines spiritual evolution is a change of consciousness, a shift of the centre of action. It is not just a new conception but a new understanding and vision, a new way of life, a new way of feeling and willing, a new way of action whose basis is no more in the ego or its desires. It is a radical change, not merely an ethical life or saintliness, least of all a multiplication of ‘holy men’. It will be a diviner living and not an other-worldly saint, who lives his life in seclusion and withdrawal from the material world and worldly life. The Mother reveals:
“At present, man governs his life through reason; all the activities of the mind are of common use for him; his means of knowledge are observation and deduction; it is by and through reasoning that he takes his decision and chooses his way — or believes he does — in life.
The new race shall be governed by intuition, that is to say, direct perception of the divine law within. Some human beings actually know and experience intuition — as, undoubtedly, certain big gorillas of the forest have glimpses of reasoning.
In mankind, the very few who have cultivated their inner self, who have concentrated their energies on the discovery of the true law of their being, possess more or less the faculty of intuition. When the mind is perfectly silent, pure like a well-polished mirror, immobile as a pond on a breezeless day, then, from above, as the light of the stars drops in the motionless waters, so the light of the supermind, of the Truth within, shines in the quieted mind and gives birth to intuition. Those who are accustomed to listen to this voice out of the Silence, take it more and more as the instigating motive of their actions; and where others, the average men, wander along the intricate paths of reasoning, they go straight their way, guided through the windings of life by intuition, this superior instinct, as by a strong and unfailing hand.
This faculty which is exceptional, almost abnormal now, will certainly be quite common and natural for the new race, the man of tomorrow. But probably the constant exercise of it will be detrimental to the reasoning faculties. As man possesses no more the extreme physical ability of the monkey, so also will the superman lose the extreme mental ability of man, this ability to deceive himself and others.
Thus, man’s road to superman-hood will be open when he declares boldly that all he has yet developed, including the intellect of which he is so rightly and yet so vainly proud, is now no longer sufficient for him, and that to uncase, discover, set free this greater power within, shall be henceforward his great preoccupation. Then will his philosophy, art, science, ethics, social existence, vital pursuits be no longer an exercise of mind and life for themselves, in a circle, but a means for the discovery of a greater Truth behind mind and life and the bringing of its power into our human existence. And this discovery is that of our real, because our highest self and nature (2).”
The Superman
The word that has been used by Sri Aurobindo and the Mother for this new being is Superman. Mankind has often dreamed of exceeding its limits. In fact, we can even say that man is characterised by his urge to exceed, even cross all limits. Man is born with an instinctive need to explore beyond the last limits. He is soft-wired to seek the ultimate freedom, the last bedrock of Reality, the final Truth. Man is also born with the dream of changing his earthly life and the world he inhabits. This search for going beyond the limits has taken two paths that are known in Indian thought as the path of the gods and the path of the titans. The path of the gods is a vertical ascent of man by transcending his ego-self. At the same time this transcendence does not mean getting disconnected with the life of humanity. It is rather a taking up of it, refining and sublimating it. The path of the titans is, in contrast, a horizontal expansion of man, aggrandising his ego-self and the empire of his ambition and desire. This is how the Mother explains it:
“Actually, in human life, the whole moral problem is concentrated in the conflict between the vital will with its impulses and the mental power with its decrees. When the vital will is submitted to the mental power, then the life of the individual or of the society becomes moral. But it is only when both, vital will and mental power, are equally submissive to something higher, to the supermind, that human life is exceeded, that true spiritual life begins, the life of the superman; for his law will come from within, it will be the divine law shining in the centre of each being and governing life from therein, the divine law multiple in its manifestation but one in its origin. And because of its unity this law is the law of supreme order and harmony.
Thus, the individual, no more guided by egoistical motives, laws or customs, shall abandon all selfish aims. His rule will be perfect disinterestedness. To act in view of a personal profit, either in this world or in another beyond, will become an unthinkable impossibility. For each act will be done in complete, simple, joyful obedience to the divine law which inspires it, without any seeking for reward or results, as the supreme reward will be in the very delight of acting under such inspiration, of being identified in conscience and will with the divine principle within oneself.
And in this identification the superman will find also his social standard. For in discovering the divine law in himself he will recognise the same divine law in every being, and by being identified with it in himself he will be identified with it in all, thus becoming aware of the unity of all, not only in essence and substance but also in the most exterior planes of life and form. He will not be a mind, a life or a body, but the informing and sustaining Soul or Self, silent, peaceful, eternal, that possesses them; and this Soul or Self he will find everywhere sustaining and informing and possessing all lives and minds and bodies. He will be conscious of this Self as the divine creator and doer of all works, one in all existences; for the many souls of the universal manifestation are only faces of the one Divine. He will perceive each being to be the universal Divinity presenting to him many faces; he will merge himself in That and perceive his own mind, life and body as only one presentation of the Self, and all whom we, at present, conceive of as others will be to his consciousness his own self in other minds, lives and bodies. He will be able to feel his body one with all bodies, as he will be aware constantly of the unity of all matter; he will unite himself in mind and heart with all existences; in short, he will see and feel his own person in all others and all others in himself, realising thus true solidarity in the perfection of unity (3).”
The Intermediary Species
A new evolutionary process has begun. Its signs are everywhere, such as the increase in various forms of imbalances of the body and mind. The old formats and well-established norms have been broken. The human intelligence has broken through the material façade of things into the occult worlds as well as entered into the inner spaces ushering new subjective dimensions. The thirst for new experiences, other dimensions albeit through drugs, the explosion of spiritual seeking, the wide acceptance of yoga and meditation, youth unrest with a growing number of young people with existential crisis (spiritual emergency), the soaring of human imagination into new unchartered territories, the exceeding of physical and psychological limits as is evidenced by the breaking of records in practically every sphere, an outburst of new creative impulsions in art, movies and theatre, increase in the number of child prodigies, the emergence of children who seem to be misfits but display an exceptional intelligence in spiritual dimensions and a subtle comprehension of a higher thought, new social and ethical standards that can be best described as amoral or trans-moral, even a shift in the average age and certain physical characteristics, even bombardment with strange diseases and radiation, new departures in medicine and biology, psychology and education, even in hard-core physical sciences: all these are the first preliminary signs that a new humanity and with it, a new creation, is emerging out of the old.
It is going to assert itself more and more until slowly we shall see a clear distinction between two layers of humanity, — a higher humanity moving towards a new species breaking out of the old as man broke free from the apes, and the normal humanity upgraded to a greater harmony, idealism, aesthesis and a more conscious dealing with environment and the world and its creatures. There will possibly be many other sub-species just as there were a number of them between the higher ape and man. What may happen to the rest of humanity unwilling to change and evolve under the pressure of the evolutionary forces, a humanity closer to the animal or outright dangerous to humanity itself (what was known as the rākṣasic and asuric type) is a matter of prophesy and speculation. It may collapse as others before him.
We can stop at these preliminary speculations. But the evolutionary pressure is likely to continue with increasing force as more and more human beings move towards the Evolution Next. It may continue for a couple of centuries until the number of human beings in transition towards a higher state reach a tipping-point and make a leap towards the supramental being, the creation of tomorrow. Of course, some may pass off these signs of a breakthrough new humanity and it may be interpreted in a naturalistic way. But if we accept that Nature is not something blind and mechanical but a Conscious-Force, a Supernature, driving the processes of Nature from behind, then we shall interpret these signs in another way. Whatever it may be, the evolutionary process once activated, as is clear, cannot be stopped. It is only going to increase by the years and the decades as is also evident. But of course, we still have a choice, — to collaborate with the evolutionary impulse or else to resist it. While the fate of evolution itself and of humanity at large may not depend upon it, the fate of individuals as well as of nations will surely depend upon it.
References
1. The Mother. The Collected Works of the Mother, Volume 2. 2nd ed. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust: 2003, p. 159.
2. Ibid., pp. 163-64.
3. Ibid. pp. 166-68.
Dr. Alok Pandey, an editor of NAMAH and a member of SAIIIHR, is a doctor practising at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
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