Works of Sri Aurobindo

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-026_March 29_1967.htm

March 29, 1967

(Regarding the conversation of March 7 on "death," in which

 Mother said in particular: "There really is no such thing

 as death…. There is no radical change in the vibration of

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consciousness…. You have a perception of the physical world

 which isn’t absolutely identical but with an effectiveness which

 is sometimes greater…." Mother at first authorized the publi

cation of this conversation in "Notes on the Way," then…)

I begin to think that it is not good to give this kind of "lived

 knowledge" to people who are not capable of having it, of experi

encing it.

For instance, these last few days I have clearly seen that men do not know the reality – the concrete reality – of the invisible, because if they knew it they would go insane. They have such fear of these things….

Even now, when they see in a vision someone they loved when he was living, when they see him at night, they say, “Ohh, a ghost!” And they are horribly scared!

So maybe this is going to terrify them.

It’s not terrifying since, on the contrary, it gives them hope!

Yes, but one shouldn’t try to make people reasonable when they aren’t.

I don’t know…. It may fall into the hands of someone to whom it will do much good, but is it worth running the risk of doing harm for the sake of one or two to whom it will do good? That has to be seen.

I, for one, find it comforting that you state this continuity

 of consciousness. It can’t do harm, can it?

(Mother laughs and

does not answer)

***

Soon afterwards

I was asked a question: “What is youth?” Here is what I replied (Mother holds out a note):

               "To be young is to live in the future for the future.

                To be young is to be always ready to abandon

               what one is in order to become what one ought to

                be….

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And above all, the most important:

“To be young is never to admit the irreparable.”

Then Mother takes out another note

she has just written to a disciple:

“One is always deeply disgusted at one’s own faults when one encounters them in others” (!)

***

Yet another note:

“Europeans attach the greatest importance to the words uttered. Indians are much more sensitive to the feeling, which more often than not those words veil.”

It’s about a remark by B. She said something to someone with very kind and extremely polite words, but in her heart she doesn’t like the person she spoke to; and she was shocked because the other became indignant…. But I understood immediately. She was indignant, she said, “Why? I was very polite, so why?”

But they feel, deep down they sense the feeling with which you say the thing. That’s what they feel and what they respond to.

A last note:

It’s in reply to an Ashram “association.” They asked:

       “What is the need of the hour?”

                “Do not try to deceive the Divine!”

(Mother laughs wholeheartedly)

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April