The One Essential Thing in Spiritual Development is an Inward Focus of the Awareness on the Divine Presence

In the Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2, v. 54, Arjuna asks Sri Krishna how to recognise the enlightened man. Sri Aurobindo translates: “What is the sign of the man in Samadhi whose intelligence is firmly fixed in wisdom? How does the sage of settled understanding speak, how sit, how walk?” Sri Aurobindo goes on to explain: “Arjuna, voicing the average human mind, asks for some outward, physical, practically disce
ible sign of Samadhi. No such signs can be given, nor does the Teacher attempt to supply them; for the only possible test of its possession is inward and that there are plenty of hostile psychological forces to apply. Equality is the great stamp of the liberated soul and of that equality even the most disce
ible signs are still subjective.” [Bhagavad Gita and Its Message]

In Chapter 2, v. 55, Sri Krishna explains further: “When a man expels, O Partha, all desires from the mind, and is satisfied in the self by the self, then is he called stable in intelligence.” Sri Aurobindo adds: “The test of Samadhi is the expulsion of all desires, their inability to get at the mind, and it is the inner state from which this freedom arises, the delight of the soul gathered within itself with the mind equal and still and high-poised above the attractions and repulsions, the alte
ations of sunshine and storm and stress of the exte
al life. It is drawn inward even when acting outwardly; it is concentrated in self even when gazing out upon things; it is directed wholly to the Divine even when to the outward vision of others busy and preoccupied with the affairs of the world.”

This response also relates to the entire life and standpoint of the individual. Exte
al actions, such as focus on sattwic diet, moderation in eating, regulation of one’s exte
al activities, have their place, but the real test for the seeker is the shift to the inner psychic standpoint and identification with the divine Presence. To the extent the seeker fixates so much on exte
al details and fails to direct his awareness and energies towards the spiritual realisation, he is actually defeating his own purpose. Systematically removing the element of vital desire in all its forms, and creating the inner attitude of surrender to the Divine is the one essential thing to be done.

Sri Aurobindo observes: “All these [giving up indulgence in food, tea, etc.] are exte
al things that have their use, but what I mean [by ‘the complete attitude of the sadhak’] is something more inward. I mean not to be interested in outward things for their own sake, following after them with desire, but at all times to be intent on one’s soul, living centrally in the inner being and its progress, taking outward things and action only as a means for the inner progress.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Looking from Within, Chapter 5, Attitudes on the Path, pp. 167-168