Keynote Presenter
Lynda Lester
Lynda Lester graduated from the University of Colorado-Boulder with a bachelor of science degree in education. She was a writer/editor for sixteen years at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, where she managed print and web communications on scientific computing, high-performance networking, and applied mathematics. Previously she was a technical writer at Ball Aerospace, owned a book-typesetting business, and worked at six newspapers.
Lynda edited the Integral Yoga journal Collaboration for ten years and is currently president of the Sri Aurobindo Association of America. She co-organized AUM 1988 and AUM 2008 and is a member of the AUM Continuity Team. She also co-moderated the Integral Yoga Forum, an online discussion group, for four years, and served on the board of Auroville International USA. She is a frequent presenter on culture and consciousness at various conferences and organizations.
Lynda now lives in Lodi, California, where she pursues writing projects and participates in the extended Integral Yoga community of Lodi and the San Francisco Bay Area.
Our Many Selves: Moving toward
Mastery of Our Complex Nature
This presentation is now available in video format:
- Introduction
- Physical (body, physical vital, physical mind)
- Vital (lower vital, mid vital, higher vital)
- Mental (sense mind, vital mind, thinking mind)
- Purusha (witness consciousness)
- Psychic Being (soul or true being)
- Quiz Show (audience tries to guess which parts of the being are being shown in a series of video clips)
Description
Sri Aurobindo says that it is part of the foundation of yoga to become conscious of the “embarrassing complexity” of our nature. We are composed not of one but many personalities, and each has its own complex individuality independent of the rest. These parts do not agree with each other and in our surface being are all mixed together.
In this talk we will look at the physical, vital, and mental parts of our nature to identify both their true functioning and their wrong functioning as imposed by the separative ignorance. We will explore two processes that are helpful in mastering and transforming these parts: identification with the witness consciousness, which brings equality and liberation, and identification with the inmost (psychic) being, which brings an intimate union with the Divine and a discerning vision of truth.
This plenary session will be a multimedia presentation that includes colorful images, music, and video clips. It will be followed by the “Our Many Selves Quiz Show,” which will give people a chance to experientially apply the knowledge they gained from the first part by watching a series of twenty video clips, guessing which parts of being are active in each one and giving reasons why.
