Helping Others in the Spiritual Path

There is an impulse to share something that we find valuable in our own lives. This impulse is oftentimes harnessed by religious organizations or spiritual groups to become a method of proselytizing and conversion, and in some cases, it can become a situation filled with pressure on the individuals to bring in converts, and on converts to stay and become ever-more-deeply entwined in the community. What starts off as a joyful sharing of something unique and wonderful can get turned into a drive to control, accumulate and influence people. In all of this, there is the ego-gratification that comes from sharing one’s knowledge and experience, in a one-on-one scenario, to observing and participating in a movement that gets ever-greater and more powerful, to gaining a position of prestige and power that can accompany a powerful movement.

In the individual instance, the sense of being a mentor, being advanced compared to another individual, being able to guide and advise is also a subtle satisfaction to the ego-personality. As with everything else, the vital being tries to turn everything to its own advantage, including spiritual practices, and sharing them with others, seeming to have an advanced knowledge or position is an excellent way that the ego has found to achieve its gratification.

So we come to the question, can we help other individuals, and if so, how can we do it in a way that is both disinterested and which does not accentuate the ego-consciousness. When we look to the Gita’s exposition of the nature of gifts according to the three gunas, we see that a gift given in the wrong place, to the wrong person, at the wrong time is considered to be a tamasic gift. A gift given with an expectation of some form of recompense or for achieving a specific objective in the gift-giving is a rajasic gift. A gift given under the proper circumstances, to the suitable individual, with a disinterested motive of goodwill and well-being is a sattwic gift. Spiritual teachings can be looked on as a gift and thus, examining the underlying motivations and methods of action in the light of the gunas can be illuminating.

In the end, we find that those most focused on teaching or converting others are doing themselves and the others, in almost all cases, a disservice. Rather than trying to build up a movement, or convert people to one’s own way of thinking and believing, it is usually best to work on actually achieving a spiritual realisation internally, and recognising that each individual needs to have the freedom, time and opportunity to grow in their own way, and with the impetus of their own inward experience. Thus, developing a true spiritual attitude forestalls the impulse to proselytize or control the development of another person. It also creates an atmosphere of goodwill, compassion, inner freedom and peace that can be a basis for general progress in any community effort.

Sri Aurobindo notes: “It is true that mixing with others too closely tends to lower the condition, if they are not themselves in the right attitude and live very much in the vital. In all contacts what you have to do is to remain within, keep a detached attitude and not allow yourself to be troubled by the difficulties that arise in work or the movements of people, but keep yourself the true movement. Do not be caught by the desire to ‘help’ others — do and speak yourself the right thing from the inner poise and leave the help to come to them from the Divine. Nobody can really help — only the Divine Grace.”

“The idea of helping others is a subtle form of the ego. It is only the Divine Force that can help. One can be its instrument, but you should first learn to be a fit and egoless instrument.”

To concentrate most on one’s own spiritual growth and experience is the first necessity of the sadhak — to be eager to help others draws away from the inner work. To grow in the spirit is the greatest help one can give to others, for then something flows out naturally to those around that helps them.”

Sri Aurobindo, Integral Yoga: Sri Aurobindo’s Teaching and Method of Practice, Chapter 11, Human Relationships in Yoga, Mixing with Others, pp 332-335