What Causes the Wind?

A young child was asked what causes the wind. The child replied: “When the trees move their branches and leaves, that is what makes the wind!” This extremely logical observation mirrors the way we tend to look at the world. We think that we make the decisions, that we are ‘in charge’ of what we do, and we fail to see that there are larger universal forces that move all action in us and others and in the world at large. When we pose for ourselves the analogous question, where do our feelings come from, or where do our thoughts come from, we tend to give the same response as the child about the wind!

If we reflect a little, however, we soon begin to recognise that there are indeed larger forces at work. We can see different societies that have developed different frames of reference, and the individuals in those societies tend to respond according to the pattern of their own society or culture.

The Bhagavad Gita states: “The Lord, O Arjuna, is seated in the heart of all beings turning all beings mounted upon a machine by his Maya.. [Ch 18, S. 61] We respond according to the action and interplay of the three Gunas. We speak of the ‘time spirit’ to describe a general approach to understanding life, action and our role in the world. This is an implicit recognition that there are universal forces that shape and guide our lives, our actions and our reactions, and as these forces move, so we move under their impulsion.

The question then arises as to how we can begin to know and understand these universal, cosmic forces that act upon us and determine situations and our responses to them. As long as we remain fixated on the outer world and the physical senses, we remain essentially oblivious to their action. When we shift our standpoint inwards or upwards, bring calm and clarity to our awareness, we can begin to experience the impact of these forces in our lives.

Sri Aurobindo observes: “Universal forces means all forces good or bad, favourable or hostile, of light and darkness that move in the cosmos.”

“They [the cosmic forces] act on everyone, according to the person’s nature — and his will and consciousness.”

“These [impersonal forces of the world] we know only by their results, by the little that we can seize of their visible action and consequence. Among them it is mostly the physical world-forces of which we have some knowledge, but we live constantly in the midst of a whirl of unseen mind-forces and life-forces of which we know nothing, we are not even aware of their existence. To all this unseen movement and action the subliminal inner consciousness can open our awareness, for it has a knowledge of it by direct contact, by inner vision, by a psychic sensitiveness; but at present it can only enlighten our obtuse superficiality and outwardness by unexplained warnings, premonitions, attractions and repulsions, ideas, suggestions, obscure intuitions, the little it can get through imperfectly to the surface. The inner being not only contacts directly and concretely the immediate motive and movement of these universal forces and feels the results of their present action, but it can to a certain extent forecast or see ahead their further action; there is a greater power in our subliminal parts to overcome the time barrier, to have the sense or feel the vibration of coming events, of distant happenings, even to look into the future. It is true that this knowledge proper to the subliminal being is not complete; for it is a mixture of knowledge and ignorance and it is capable of erroneous as well as of true perception.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, The Hidden Forces of Life, Ch. 4 Cosmic and Universal Forces, pp. 81-82