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29 September 1971
Durga Puja: Victory Day (Vijaya Dashami)
It was clear, very clear today, a strong Pressure to say: Victory, it is Harmony; Victory, it is the Divine; and for the body, Victory is good health. Each and every ailment, each and every illness is a falsehood. It came this morning. And it was so clear. It was convincing. So, it is all right. It is as though by the Pressure all Falsehood had come out. The most unexpected things – in people, in objects, in circumstances. And it is truly… no imagination can equal that. It is unbelievable.
But it is a good sign, isn’t it?
Oh, yes! Oh, yes!… It is as though there had been a poison, yes, and by pressing, the poison came out to disappear, and it is coming out!… Later on, one will be able to speak of it. It is truly interesting, truly. Yes, it is a good sign, a very good sign.
Yes, it means that all these forces that for thousands of years lay hidden below… Yes. …have lost their refuge.
Yes, it is that. It is so. We shall see. It is not time yet to speak of it. Later on. Unbelievable, my child ! But a Power ! Power, oh !… (Mother shuts her eyes and smiles.) Page – 272
How to master physical suffering?
It is just the experiences I am having now. The body is in a state in which it sees that everything depends simply on how it is linked with the Divine – upon the state of its receptive surrender. I have had the experience even during these last days. The same thing which is the cause of a – more than a discomfort – a suffering, an almost unbearable ailment, with just a change in the receptivity of the body towards the Divine, disappears all of a sudden – and can even move to a blissful state. I have had the experience several times. For me it is only a question of sincerity become intense – in the consciousness that everything is the action of the Divine and that his action moves towards the quickest possible realisation, in the given conditions. I might say: the cells of the body must learn to seek their support only in the Divine, until the moment when they are able to feel that they are the expression of the Divine. This is indeed the experience at present. The experience of changing the effect of things, that I have; but it is not mentalised, so I cannot tell it in words. But truly, the cells have begun to feel, first of all that they are wholly ruled by the Divine (this is translated by: “What Thou willest, what Thou willest”), this state, and then a kind of receptivity which is (how to say it?) passive – not immobile, it is… probably one might say a passive receptivity (Mother opens her hands with a smile), but I do not know how to explain. All words are false, but one might say: “Thou alone art” – yes, the cells feel: “Thou alone art.” Yes, it is like that. But all this, it is as though the thing got hardened – words harden the experience. There is a kind of plasticity or suppleness (a trustful, very trustful suppleness): “What Thou willest, what Thou willest.” Page – 273 (Silence)
In a certain attitude (but it is difficult to explain or define), in a certain attitude all becomes divine. And there, what is wonderful is that when one has the experience of everything becoming divine, all that is contrary disappears quite naturally, quickly or slowly, instantly or little by little, depending on things. That is indeed wonderful. That is to say, to become conscious that all is divine is the best way of making all divine – annulling all oppositions. Page – 274
I have as though the feeling that I know the why of creation. It was to realise the phenomenon of a consciousness which would have at the same time the individual consciousness – the individual consciousness that we naturally have – and the consciousness of the whole, the consciousness (how to say it?)… one might say “global”. But the two consciousnesses unite in something… which we have yet to find. A consciousness at the same time individual and total. And all this labour is for the sake of uniting the two consciousnesses into one consciousness which is that at the same time. And that is the next realisation.
(Silence)
For us it seems to take time (it is translated for us by time), as though it is “being done”, as though something is “to be done”. But that is the illusion in which we are. Because we have not… crossed over to the other side. But the individual consciousness is not at all a falsehood; it must be linked with the consciousness of the whole in such a way that it makes another consciousness which for the moment we do not yet possess. Not that it must abolish the other, you understand? There has to be an adjustment, a different aspect, I do not know… in which the two are manifested simultaneously. For example, at this moment there is a whole series of experiences about the power of creation that is latent in the individual consciousness, that is to say, the capacity for knowing things – knowing, or what we call “willing” – in the individual consciousness before they have come into being. We say “we will that”, but it is an intermediary,¹ it is the consciousness which is on the way towards something where it is at the same
¹ Mother means an intermediary consciousness. Page – 275 time the vision of what has to be and the capacity to realise it. That is the next step. Afterwards … So, for us, that is to say, for the individual consciousness, the thing is translated by time, the time needed for… I do not know how to say it. I feel it like that: you are not this, you are not yet that, and you must not leave this to become that – the two must become one and form something new. And that explains everything – everything, everything, everything. And that annuls nothing. It is a hundred times more wonderful than anything we can imagine. The question is to know whether that (Mother’s body) will be able to follow…. In order to follow, not only must it endure but acquire a new form, a new life. That, I do not know. In any case, it does not matter – the consciousness is clear and the consciousness is not subject to that (Mother points to her body). If that can be made use of, so much the better, otherwise… There are things still to be found. Yes, things to be found! The old routine is ended. It is ended. What is to be found is the plasticity of Matter, so that Matter is able to progress always. There you are. How long will it take? I do not know. How much experience is needed? I do not know. But now the way is clear. The way is clear. Page – 276
Very strange. The whole view of things has changed…. And then, forgotten. So totally changed…
But in this change of view, what makes the difference?
(After a long smiling silence) It is as if the consciousness was not in the same position with regard to things – I do not know how to say it. So they appear altogether different. (Silence)
I do not know how to explain…. The ordinary human consciousness, even when it has the widest ideas, is always at the centre, and things are like this (gesture of convergence from all sides, like a spider’s web). Things exist (all that one says only diminishes), they exist in relation to a centre. Whereas (gesture indicating a multitude of scattered points). I believe this is how it is best expressed: in the ordinary human consciousness one is at a point and all things exist in their relation to this point of consciousness (same gesture of a spider’s web). And now, the point exists no more, so things exist in themselves. This is the most exact thing to say. It is not that but… So, my consciousness is in the things – it is not “something” – which is receiving, it is much better than that, but I do not know how to say it. It is better than that because it is not merely “in the things”, it is in “something” which is in the things and which… makes them move. I could say it in words. I could say: “It is no longer one being among others, it is,” I could say, “it is the Divine in Page – 277 all things.” But it is not like this that I sense it… It is “that which moves things or which is conscious in things”. Evidently it is a question of consciousness, but not a consciousness as human beings have ordinarily. It is the quality of consciousness that has changed. Page – 278
I heard something written by Sri Aurobindo, saying that for the Supramental to manifest upon earth the physical mind must receive it and manifest it – and it is just the physical mind, that is to say, the body-mind, the only thing that remains in me now. And then, the reason why only this part has remained became quite clear to me. It is on the way to being converted in a very rapid and interesting manner. This physical mind is being developed under the supramental Influence. And it is just what Sri Aurobindo has written, that this is indispensable so that the Supramental can manifest itself permanently upon earth. So, it is going on well… but it is not easy (Mother laughs).
Yes, this is just the problem which I put to myself; because I have seen one thing, that this transformation is not possible unless there is a sort of radical change of position in the consciousness or a change of view. Yes. Unless one sees things and beings in another way. Yes, yes. But then I ask myself, how is this possible?
It is possible in this way.
But it must be something very radical.
But it is radical, my child ! You can’t imagine, it is like… I Page – 279 could say truly that I have become another person. There is only this (Mother touches the outer form of her body) which remains as it was…. To what extent will it be able to change? Sri Aurobindo has said that if the physical mind were transformed, the transformation of the body would follow quite naturally. We shall see.
But could you give me a key or a lever to bring about this radical change?
Ah ! I do not know, because for me everything has simply been taken away from me – the mind has left completely. If you like, in appearance I became stupid, I knew nothing. And it is the physical mind that developed little by little, through successive revelations. For me, I do not know, the work has been done for me – I did nothing. It has been done in a quite radical way. It could be done because I was very conscious of my psychic (the psychic being which has been formed through all the lives), I was very conscious and it has remained; it has remained and it, precisely, has allowed me to have dealings with men without this making any difference, due to this psychic presence. That is why there has been so little apparent change. So I can say only what I know, and I say this: the psychic must remain there dominating the whole being – the whole bodily being – and guiding the life; then the mental has time to transform itself. My own mind proper has simply been sent away. Well, the transformation of the body-mind was indispensable because I had only that, nothing more, do you understand?… Very few people would accept that (Mother laughs). As for me, it has been done without asking my opinion. The work was very easy. That is exactly what has happened.
I would like to have something radical… Page – 280 (Mother laughs) But would you accept what has happened to me, that is to say, the individual, the person, feeling absolutely imbecile?
I am ready.
Would that not make you despair?
No, no – no.
Well, it is a thing that settles itself, so to say, in a permanent way: the nothingness of the person, its absolute nothingness, incapacity. And then you are … you are at ease, you are quite naturally like a child; you say to the Divine: “Do everything for me” (there is nothing else to do, there is nothing else one can do!), then everything becomes all right immediately – immediately. Well, the body has given itself entirely, it had even said to the Divine: “I pray to you to make me will for my dissolution if I am to die”, so that even there I do not resist if it is necessary for the body to die – even to will for my dissolution. That is its attitude, it was like that (gesture with open hands). And instead of that there came a sort of … (I could translate it by words, but they were not words): “If you accept suffering and ailments, transformation is better than dissolution.” And so when there is ailment, it accepts. It is not that, what I say is… it is not really that, but it is something difficult to explain. It is really a new attitude and a new sensation. I am not able to say it. And evidently, for each one it must be different…. For me it has been very radical – I had no choice, you understand: it was like that, it is like that. There you are. But one must really… What has made the thing easy is that the psychic consciousness was wholly in front and governed the life. So it continued quietly without being disturbed. Page – 281 Likewise for seeing and hearing, I came to know that it was not a physical decline, it was simply this: I understand and hear people only when they think clearly what they say. And I see only that which is … which expresses the inner life, otherwise it is … hazy or veiled; and it is not that the eyes do not see, it is “something”, it is some other thing – everything is new. (Silence)
It is true, the body must have much goodwill – mine happens to have goodwill. And it is not a mental goodwill, it is truly a bodily goodwill. It accepts all inconveniences…. But it is the attitude that is important, not the consequences (I am sure that the inconveniences are not indispensable); it is the attitude that is important. Well, it must be like this (gesture of open hands). In fact I have found that in the majority of cases surrender to the Divine does not necessarily mean trust in the Divine – because you surrender to the Divine, you say, “Even if you make me suffer, I surrender myself”, but it is an absolute lack of trust! Yes, it is really amusing, surrender does not imply trust; trust is something else, it is… a kind of knowledge – an “unshakable” knowledge which nothing can disturb – that it is we who change into difficulties, sufferings and miseries what, in the Divine Consciousness, is… perfect Peace. It is we who bring about this little transformation. And extraordinary examples have come… hours would be needed to explain. Indeed it is the consciousness that must change, even the consciousness of the cells, you understand? … That is a radical change. And we have no words to express that, because that does not exist upon earth – it was latent but it was not manifested. All words are … beside the mark; it is not quite that. (Silence) Page – 282 If you like, one could say that at every minute one has the feeling that one may live or one may die (gesture of a slight tilt to one side or the other) or one may live eternally. At every minute it is like that. And the difference (between the two sides) is so imperceptible that one cannot say: do this and you will be on this side, do that and you will be on the other side. This is not possible. It is a way of being that is almost indescribable.¹
¹ On 15 January 1972, at the time of publishing this conversation, Mother added: “That experience is becoming more and more constant – at one time it is this, at another it is that and it has become very acute. At the same time the knowledge (Mother raises her index finger): ‘This is the moment of winning the Victory’, which comes from the psychic and through it from above. … ‘Hold fast, it is the moment of winning the Victory.’ ” Page – 283
A letter of Sri Aurobindo was read to me in which he said that for the Supramental to be fixed here (he had seen that the Supramental came into him and then it withdrew, and then it came back again and again withdrew – it was not stable); for it to become stable it must enter and settle itself in the physical mind.¹ It is this work which is being done in me for months now: the mind has been withdrawn and the physical mind has taken its place, and precisely, for some time, I have noticed that it was … (I was telling you that it was seeing everything in a different way, that its relation with things was different), I have noticed that this physical mind, the mind that is in the body, became wide, it had a global view of things, and its entire way of seeing was absolutely different. I have seen, it is this: the Supramental is at work there. I am passing through extraordinary hours. What is happening is that it is only things that resist – one feels (I have already told you) that it is as though at every moment (and it is becoming stronger and stronger), at every moment: Do you want life, do you want death; do you want life, do you want death? … And it is like that. And then, life, it is union with the Supreme, and the consciousness, an altogether new consciousness comes. And it is this way, it is that
¹ Mother may be referring to a passage like the following: “There is too an obscure mind of the body, of the very cells, molecules, corpuscles. Haeckel, the German materialist, spoke somewhere of the will in the atom, and recent science, dealing with the incalculable individual variation in the activity of the electrons, comes near to perceiving that this is not a figure but the shadow thrown by a secret reality. This body-mind is a very tangible truth; owing to its obscurity and mechanical clinging to past movements and facile oblivion and rejection of the new, we find in it one of the chief obstacles to permeation by the supermind Force and the transformation of the functioning of the body. On the other hand, once effectively converted, it will be one of the most precious instruments for the stabilisation of the supramental Light and Force in material Nature.” (Letters on Yoga, Cent. Vol. 22, p. 340) Page – 284 way (Mother makes a gesture of tilting from one side to the other). But yesterday or the day before, I do not know, all of a sudden the body said: No! It is finished – I want life, I want nothing else. And since then, things are getting better. Oh! Volumes would be needed to narrate what is happening…. It is… extraordinarily interesting and altogether new. New altogether.
(Mother goes deep within.)
Because of physical death, the subconscient is a defeatist. Well, the subconscient has the feeling that whatever be the progress, whatever the effort, it will always end by that, because till today it has always ended that way. So the work that is being done is to try to introduce faith, the certitude of transformation, into the subconscient. And that… it is a struggle of every moment. Page – 285
It is the festival of the Light – Noel is the festival of the returning Light…. It is very much older than Christianity. And next Saturday is the first of January.
I hope 1972 is going to be better!
(Mother shakes her head) I am more and more convinced that we receive things and react in a way that creates difficulties – I am more and more convinced of it. Because I have experiences hardly agreeable, physically, materially, and then everything changes according to whether one pays attention to it or not, according to an attitude like this (gesture turned to oneself) in which one looks at oneself living, or else an attitude in which one is (gesture of wideness) in all things, in movement, in life, and an attitude in which one gives importance only to the Divine; if one is able to be like this all the time, there is no difficulty – and things remain the same. This is the experience: the thing in itself is of a certain kind, and it is our reaction with respect to the thing which differs. The experience is more and more conclusive. There are three categories: our attitude towards things, the things in themselves (these two always bring difficulties), and there is a third category in which everything, everything exists in relation to the Divine, in the Consciousness of the Divine – everything goes on wonderfully! Easy! And I speak of material things, of the material physical life (morally speaking it has long been known to be like that), but things material, that is to say, the small inconveniences of the body, its reactions, having pain or not, circumstances going bad, not being able to swallow – things most trivial to which no attention is paid when one is young and strong and healthy; no attention is paid and for everybody it is so; but when one lives in the consciousness of his body and of what happens to Page – 286 it, the way it receives, what comes and all that – oh! it is misery. When one lives in the consciousness of others, of what they want, what they need, their relation with you – it is misery! But if you live in the Divine Presence and if the Divine does all, sees all, is all … it is Peace – it is Peace – time has no more duration, everything is easy and … it is not that one feels a joy nor that one feels … it is not that, it is the Divine who is there. And that is the only solution. And it is towards that that the world is moving: towards the Consciousness of the Divine – the Divine who does, the Divine who is, the Divine … And then identically the same circumstances (I do not speak of different circumstances), identically the same circumstances (this is my experience of these days, so concrete!) – the day before yesterday I was quite unwell, and yesterday the circumstances were the same, my body was in the same state, everything the same and … all was peaceful. Of this I am absolutely convinced. This explains everything. This explains everything, everything, everything. The world is the same – it is seen and felt in an absolutely opposite way. Everything is a phenomenon of consciousness – everything. Only, not this consciousness, neither this one nor that one; it is not that. It is our way, the human way of being conscious, or the divine way of being conscious. There you are. The whole matter is there. And I am absolutely convinced.
(Silence) After all, the world is as it should be at every instant. Yes. It is we who see it wrongly or feel it wrongly or receive it wrongly. Page – 287 It is like death. Well, it is a transitional phenomenon and it appears to us that it has been always so – for us it has been always so because our consciousness is like that (Mother cuts a small square in the air) – but when you have this Divine Consciousness, oh! … things become almost instantaneous, you understand. I cannot explain. There is a movement, there is a progression, there is what is translated for us by time; that exists, it is something … it is something in the consciousness…. It is difficult to say … it is like a picture and its projection. It is something like that. All things are, and for us it is as though we see them projected on the screen, they come one after another. It is somewhat like that.
Yes, Sri Aurobindo said that in the supramental consciousness the past, the present and the future existed side by side, as though on a single map of consciousness.¹
Yes, it is so. It is so. But for me, it is an experience. It is not a thing that I “think” (I do not think), it is an experience. And it is difficult to explain. And the effect the thing produces in us, the sensation it brings to us depends exclusively on the attitude of our consciousness. And then, the consciousness of being in oneself or in everything: to be in everything is already a little better than to be oneself egoistically, but it has advantages, it has inconveniences, and it is not the Truth; the Truth is … the Divine as the totality – the totality in time and in space. And that is a consciousness which the body can have, for this body had it
¹ “For while the reason proceeds from moment to moment of time and loses and acquires and again loses and again acquires, the gnosis dominates time in a one view and perpetual power and links past, present and future in their indivisible connections, in a single continuous map of knowledge, side by side. The gnosis starts from the totality which it immediately possesses; it sees parts, groups and details only in relation to the totality and in one vision with it…” (The Synthesis of Yoga, Cent. Vol. 20, p. 464 ) Page – 288 (momentarily, for moments), and so long as it has it, everything is so much … well, it is not delight, it is not pleasure, it is not happiness, it is nothing of the kind… a kind of blissful peace… and luminous… and creative…. It is magnificent. Only, it comes, it goes, it comes, it goes…. And when you come out of it, you have the feeling of dropping into a horrible hole – our ordinary consciousness (I mean the ordinary human consciousness) is a horrible hole. But you know also why it was momentarily so; that is to say, it is necessary in order to pass from the one to the other – all that happens is necessary for the full unfoldment of the goal of the creation. One might say: the goal of the creation is that the creature must become conscious like the Creator. There! It is a phrase, but it is in that direction. The goal of this creation is this Consciousness of the Infinite, the Eternal who is Omnipotent – Infinite, Eternal, Omnipotent (called God by our religions: for us, in relation to life, it is the Divine) – Infinite and Eternal, Omnipotent … beyond time; each individual particle possessing this Consciousness, each individual particle containing this same Consciousness. It is division that has created the world and it is in division that the Eternal manifests itself. Our language is … (or our consciousness) inadequate. Later on I shall be able to say. Something is happening – there you are (Mother laughs). Bon Noel, my child – the festival of the Light. Page – 289 |