The Psychic Being
The psychic being is the evolving soul. This inner center of individuality is different from the outer ego; it survives the death of the body, and grows from life to life through the process of rebirth. This psychic being is referred to in the Upanishads as being “no bigger than the thumb of a man.” Sri Aurobindo evoked the psychic being in his epic poem, Savitri
She puts forth a small portion of herself,*
A being no bigger than the thumb of man
Into a hidden region of the heart
To face the pang and to forget the bliss,
To share the suffering and endure earth’s wounds
And labour mid the labour of the stars.
This in us laughs and weeps, suffers the stroke,
Exults in victory, struggles for the crown;
Identified with the mind and body and life,
It takes on itself their anguish and defeat,
Bleeds with Fate’s whips and hangs upon the cross,
Yet is the unwounded and immortal self
Supporting the actor in the human scene.
Through this she sends us her glory and her powers,
Pushes to wisdom’s heights, through misery’s gulfs;
She gives us strength to do our daily task
And sympathy that partakes of others’ grief
And the little strength we have to help our race,
We who must fill the role of the universe
Acting itself out in a slight human shape
And on our shoulders carry the struggling world.
This is in us the godhead small and marred;
In this human portion of divinity
She seats the greatness of the Soul in Time
To uplift from light to light, from power to power,
Till on a heavenly peak it stands, a king.
(Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, Book VII, Canto V)
* Note: The first line of this verse describes the psychic being as being “no bigger than the thumb of man”. This is an allusion to verse 2.1.12 of the Katha Upanishad which says “The Purusha, of the size of a thumb, dwells in the body. (Realizing Him as) the Lord of the past and the future, one does not (henceforward) want to protect oneself. This verily is that (thou seekest)."
In a letter, Sri Aurobindo explained how the psychic being may be experienced in meditation:
The psychic being is in the heart centre in the middle of the chest (not in the physical heart, for all the centres are in the middle of the body), but it is deep behind. When one is going away from the vital into the psychic, it is felt as if one is going deep deep down till one reaches that central place of the psychic. The surface of the heart centre is the place of the emotional being; from there one goes deep to find the psychic. The more one goes, the more intense becomes the psychic happiness which you describe.
(Letters on Yoga, Triple transformation)