This principle is expressed in a response given by the Indian holy man, Shri Dada of Aligarh, to a questioner who took his stand on the common sense view that the world, as it impresses itself on our mind through our senses, is the only reality we know and can know. Shri Dada pointed out that our minds, in their normal worldly condition, see only 'a small blurred part' of reality. To appreciate the whole picture, efforts must be made on spiritual lines to expand the mind, stimulate its love for infinity, and wean it from its thirst for extracting short-lived joys from finite experiences. 'Then', he told his questioner, 'your lightened mind will rise higher in the spiritual atmosphere and will be able to find real opportunities of service.' He ended by saying: 'Pray to God; change your mind through an attitude of reverence to Him in inner silence, created by prayer; and I assure you, you will see more, much more.'

This 'seeing more' is not a question of seeing more in the world around us, nor is it a matter of gaining some unusual power, such as to see into the future, or to read people's minds—powers, which from the point of view of the highest wisdom, have no value at all. What is meant is the deepening of our power of spiritual vision through the awakening of our capacity to see behind the changing appearances of life, and apprehend the underlying reality.

This underlying reality transcends space and time, and words fail to do it justice. But to ease our way towards understanding its nature, we may call it 'the spiritual realm', in contrast with ordinary sensual and mental experience, which may appropriately be called 'the realm of appearances'.

This term 'the realm of appearances' is justified for at least two reasons. Firstly, we live in a world of changing forms. These include our own bodies as well as our thoughts, all of which are seen to appear, stay a while, and then disappear. Secondly, there is a more fundamental point that is established by both science and philosophy. All our information about the outer world comes to us through the channels of our sense organs. It is then selectively re-presented to our mind, which converts the information in order to make sense of it. From this point of view, the world itself is made known to us as a mental image or appearance within the mind. It is an appearance or image that is ever changing. For each individual, the way the world appears is different and uniquely personal.

But the realm of the spirit of man is not a mental image, nor does it change. It is more internal, more subtle and more abstract than thought itself. It is a realm of silence, calm and rest, an inner dimension without walls or boundaries, and which, when fully revealed, has been compared to an infinite ocean of pure consciousness, being and bliss. Nor is this spiritual realm the province of special people only. On the contrary, it interpenetrates and illumines the experience of all beings at all times, and is an ever-present reality.

So the effort to purify our minds in order to 'see more' enables us to approach with increasing certainty the freedom and the peace of the spiritual realm within us. The climax of this process of inner clarification is to realize that this spiritual realm is the 'reality' in us. It is our ultimate identity, what we really are. The word 'I' is used in Yoga to indicate its internal and subjective nature, on the understanding that we are speaking of an 'I' that underlies our limited personality, but is not itself personal or limited in any way. And the training of the spiritual Yoga is to learn how to withdraw our sense of identification from the body and the mind, and to realize: 'I am the Spirit, infinite, immortal, ever perfect, of the nature of pure intelligence and bliss'...