September 19, 1970
(Mother looked better the previous Wednesday.)
Do you have something?
Now Mother, nothing special…. Have you seen any changes?
(Mother shakes her head negatively)
(Long meditation,
Mother pants for breath)
Do you have any questions?
(Mother shakes her head)
But it’s over now, isn’t it?
Oh yes, completely over.
(meditation again with labored breathing)
Do you have anything to ask?
I saw a text by Sri Aurobindo that I found interesting….
Oh!
Theresa question in fact. …It’s a letter [[In fact a conversation: see Talks with Sri Aurobindo by Nirodbaran, part I, p 179-180. ]] in which he refers to the
first period in the Ashram, when everyone was having "great
experiences"; afterwards, there was a descent to the physical
level. So he says:
"Working on the physical is like digging the ground; the
physical is absolutely inert, dead like stone. When the work
began there, all former energies disappeared, experiences
stopped; if they came they didn’t last. The progress is
exceedingly slow. One rises, falls; rises again and falls again,
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constantly meeting with the suggestions of the Vedic Asuras, ‘You can’t do anything, you are bound to fail.’
"You have to go on working and working year after year, point after point, till you come to a central point in the subconscient which has to be conquered and it is the crux of the whole problem, hence exceedingly difficult…. This point in the subconscient is the seed and it goes on sprouting and sprouting till you have cut out the seed."
7 January 1939
(after a silence)
Then doesn’t he say something more … more encouraging? (laughter)
(long silence)
What did he say, "a point"?
"A central point in the subconscient … and it is the crux of the
whole problem."
(after a long silence)
He didn’t say what it was?
No, Mother.
(Mother gestures to say she does not know
long concentration)
Nothing, nothing comes, nothing.
(long, panting silence)
Nothing, there’s nothing to say. No experiences, nothing. What time is it?
Eleven, Mother.
Is there no work?… Working avoids concentrating. You see, it gives me a discomfort all over like this (gesture at the top of the chest).
But what gives you this?
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I don’t know, I have it now.
Does it come from me?
No! No … I live in a … (Mother shakes her head).
(long silence)
It’s better to read me something.
(Satprem reads a few Aphorisms of Sri Aurobindo
for the next issue of the Bulletin)
159 – He who recognizes no Krishna, the God in man,
knows not God entirely; he who knows Krishna only,
knows not even Krishna….
That’s good, it’s very GOOD.
Yet is the opposite truth also wholly true that if thou
canst see all God in a little pale unsightly and scentless
flower, then hast thou hold of His supreme reality.
Then I have hold of my supreme reality, but…! (Mother laughs) All right, it’s good, it’s some consolation! (laughter)
(Satprem goes on reading,
then asks) Does it tire you?
Tire? Oh, no…. It comforts me a little! It doesn’t tire me at all.
(silence
Satprem lays his forehead
on Mother’s knees)
The next time, you’ll read to me. At least it’s … [comforting?].
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