Religions & Spiritual Traditions  Integral Yoga FAQs  FAQ
How does one work with resistance and inner obstacles in Integral Yoga?

Resistance and inner obstacles are regarded as movements of the nature that are not yet aligned with the soul’s deeper aspiration, and they are approached through a combination of awareness, aspiration, rejection, and surrender. A central key is the discovery of the psychic being, the soul-consciousness behind the heart, whose quiet influence can illuminate and correct the mind, vital, and body. As contact with this inner guide grows, resistances are more easily recognized as something that arises in the being but is not the true self. This inner poise is supported by a witness consciousness that observes thoughts, desires, fears, and habits without hatred or indulgence, allowing unconscious patterns to come into the light. Such observation makes it possible to distinguish the specific resistances of the mental, vital, and physical parts and to see how they obstruct the divine working.

Alongside this inner seeing, there is a deliberate practice of aspiration and rejection. Aspiration is a persistent will for the Divine to manifest, a call for peace, light, and force to descend into all parts of the being. Rejection complements this by a firm refusal of consent to wrong movements—anger, jealousy, doubt, inertia, egoistic desire—without harsh suppression or violent revolt. This non-cooperation with lower impulses is strengthened by mental clarification: understanding the roots of obstacles in egoism, fear, attachment, or collective suggestions, and replacing discouraging formations with truer ideas about the inevitability of difficulty and the action of grace. In this way, psychological perfection is pursued through consciously cultivating the opposite of habitual weaknesses, such as meeting anger with patience and compassion.

Surrender and reliance on divine grace form the deeper foundation of this work. The practitioner progressively offers the whole being—strengths, imperfections, and resistances—to the Divine, recognizing that personal effort alone cannot accomplish complete transformation. This surrender is not passive resignation but an active consecration of thoughts, feelings, actions, and difficulties, with the will that they be transformed by the Divine Shakti rather than by ego-force. As the psychic being comes forward, its fire can burn away impurities and guide choices by a truer discrimination than mental or vital preferences. The sense of being upheld by a power greater than the individual helps to prevent guilt, despair, and the idea of unfitness, which are themselves forms of resistance.

Finally, the transformation of resistance is understood as a gradual, integral process involving all levels of the nature. The vital, often the chief seat of resistance, is treated like an unruly child—firmly yet patiently—offered higher satisfactions such as peace and the joy of progress in place of lower excitements. Physical and subconscious inertia are addressed through regularity, moderation, and quiet persistence, bringing consciousness even into mechanical habits and automatic reactions. Daily life and work become a field where resistances reveal themselves in relationships, failures, and frictions, each situation serving as a mirror and instrument for growth. Throughout, equality—calm poise in pleasure and pain, success and failure—together with patience, faith, and steady practice, allows the descending peace and light to reshape the resisting parts over time.