Trust and Faith

We frequently remark on how young people act with a seemingly carefree attitude and take risks that older people would not take. This is due to the inherent trust they have in their body’s vital and physical resilience and powers of prevailing even in difficult or dangerous circumstances. As they age, they tend, in most cases, to gain more caution, as they come to realize that their bodies are not ‘immortal’ and they experience the pains and setbacks that tend to accompany the initial surge of trust in the life of the body.

Faith may involve a recognition of one’s own limitations and the need to rely on a power or powers greater than oneself. When we reach the end of our own effort, the path forward is through faith in the divine Grace.

A disciple asks: “A dynamic faith and a great trust, aren’t they the same thing?”

The Mother notes: “Not necessarily. One should know of what stuff the faith and the trust are made. Because, for instance, if you live normally, under quite normal circumstances — without having extravagant ideas and a depressing education — well, through all your youth and usually till you are about thirty, you have an absolute trust in life. If, for example, you are not surrounded by people who, as soon as you have a cold in the head, get into a flurry and rush to the doctor and give you medicines, if you are in normal surroundings and happen to have something — an accident or a slight illness — there is this certainty in the body, this absolute trust that it will be all right: ‘It is nothing, it will pass off. It is sure to go. I shall be quite well tomorrow or in a few days. It will surely be cured’ — whatever you may have caught. That is indeed the normal condition of the body. An absolute trust that all life lies before it and that all will be well. And this helps enormously. One gets cured nine times out of ten, one gets cured very quickly with this confidence: ‘It is nothing; what is it after all? Just an accident, it will pass off, it is nothing.’ And there are people who keep it for a very long time, a very long time, a kind of confidence — nothing can happen to them. Their life is all before them, fully, and nothing can happen to them. And what will happen to them is of no importance at all: all will be well, perforce; they have the whole of life before them. Naturally, if you live in surroundings where there are morbid ideas and people pass their time recounting disastrous and catastrophic things, then you may think wrongly. And if you think wrongly, this reacts on your body. Otherwise, the body as it is can keep this confidence till the age of forty or fifty — it depends upon people — some know how to live a normal, balanced life. But the body is quite confident about its life. it is only if thought comes in and brings all kinds of morbid and unhealthy imaginations, as I said, that it changes everything. I have seen instances like that: children who had these little accidents one has when running and playing about: they did not even think about it. And it disappeared immediately. I have seen others whose family has drummed into them since the time they could understand, that everything is dangerous, that there are microbes everywhere, that one must be very careful, that the least wound may provide disastrous, that one must be altogether on one’s guard and take great care that nothing serious happens…. So, they must have their wounds dressed, must be washed with disinfectants, and there they sit wondering: ‘What is going to happen to me? Oh! I may get tetanus, a septic fever….’ Naturally, in such cases one loses confidence in life and the body feels the effects keenly. Three-fourths of its resistance disappears. But normally, naturally, it is the body which knows that it must remain healthy, and it knows it has the power to react. And if something happens, it tells this something: ‘It is nothing, it will go away, don’t think about it, it is over’; and it does go. That of course is absolute trust.”

“Now, you are speaking of ‘dynamic faith’. Dynamic faith is something different. If one has within him faith in the divine grace, that the divine grace is watching over him, and that no matter what happens the divine grace is there, watching over him, this one may keep all one’s life and always; and with this one can pass through all dangers, face all difficulties, and nothing stirs, for you have the faith and the divine grace is with you. It is an infinitely stronger, more conscious, more lasting force which does not depend upon the conditions of your physical build, does not depend upon anything except the divine grace alone, and hence it leans on the Truth and nothing can shake it. it is very different.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Powers Within, Chapter VI Faith , pp. 59-61