Those who despise physical activities are people who would not be able to take a single step on the true path of integral yoga, unless they first get rid of their contempt. Control of the body in all its forms is an indispensable basis. A body which dominates you is an enemy, it is a disorder you cannot accept. It is the enlightened will in the mind which should govern the body, and not the body which should impose its law on the mind. When one knows that a thing is bad, one must be capable of not doing it. When one wants something to be realised, one must be able to do it and not be stopped at every step by the body's inability or ill- will or lack of collaboration; and for that one must follow a physical discipline and become master in one's own home.
It is very fine to escape into meditation and from the height of one's so called grandeur look down on material things, but one who is not master in his own home is a slave.
