Chapter 6

Silence – Freedom from Thoughts

Silence means freedom from thoughts and vital movements – when the whole consciousness is quite still.

It is the silence of the mind and vital – silence implying here not only cessation of thoughts but a stillness of the mental and vital substance. There are varying degrees of depth of this stillness.

It is not possible to establish a deep silence all at once unless you can separate yourself from the thoughts, feel them as coming from outside and reject them before they enter. But everybody cannot do that at once.

It is quite possible for thoughts to pass without disturbing the silence – but for that you must be perfectly detached from the thoughts and indifferent to them.

If there is absolute silence within it is quite natural that the thoughts on entering and touching it should fall off. It is the way in which silence of the outer mind usually comes.

In the entirely silent mind there is usually the static sense of the Divine without any active movement. But there can come into it all higher thought and aspiration and movements. There is then no absolute silence but one feels a fundamental silence behind which is not disturbed by any movement.