September 1969

06. September 1969 – Afraid of the Invisible

There’s a curious thing: most people are afraid of the invisible, to such a point that when someone is dead (someone they loved when he was alive), they don’t want to see him after his death!

I’ve had one more example today It’s a woman who was murdered; I immediately took care of her psychic, it went away there. But a part of her vital stayed on, and she stayed on with them [the family]. I thought they would be happy – they were scared!... It’s a curious thing. So I said, “Oh, it’s very simple (laughing), I’ll take her with me, like that....” You know, I have a crowd around me – it’s not cumbersome in the least.

I don’t understand. What is it?... I don’t understand, because even when I was small and knew nothing (I didn’t even know it really existed), I was never afraid of invisible things.... Why?... Someone without a body is less cumbersome than someone with a body – someone with a body takes up room, needs room; someone who’s not alive doesn’t take up any room, he may be there without hampering in the least.... So is it only the appearance people love – the body?... Strange.

But I’ve had hundreds of examples. Someone who, eight days earlier, was friendly with a person; the person dies, and eight days later, when he sees her in his dream, he drives her away brutally!...

It happened several times.

It’s strange.

Maybe because they’re scared of misleading appearances – things of that sort? But one should be able to feel the difference... (Mother feels the air).

06. September 1969 – Sri Aurobindo explains the Path

I must have seen your brother lately, because two nights ago, I think, Sri Aurobindo met someone and explained something to him, and in French; the person was surprised, so I said, “Oh, but Sri Aurobindo knows French very well!” He was explaining in French (I saw, we were on a road), and I am pretty certain it was your brother.

But it was really interesting: there was an overall vision of things to be learned, and we were on a beautiful road, quite a smooth road, and Sri Aurobindo said, “No, see, you have to climb that” – it was a steep path going up, a path of black, gluey soil (one wondered if one’s foot wasn’t going to slip at every step), as difficult as could be, and he said, “See, that’s what you have to climb; when you reach the top, you will truly see.” I was there, saying to myself (he was speaking to someone, I didn’t notice who it was, but now I think it must have been your brother), I said to myself, “It’s strange” (because I didn’t think Sri Aurobindo felt that way), “It’s strange; so then, one should never be afraid of difficulty...” It went on for a long time, but it struck me a lot. I still see him, I remember, I saw Sri Aurobindo next to someone who was taller (your brother is tall, isn’t he?), and he spoke to him, explained, then showed him the path; I saw the path: a path of quite a disgusting black soil, going up almost sheer, it was difficult. And he said, “That’s it, that is what you must climb, and at the top, you see – at the top, you have the vision.”

10. September 1969 – A painstaking Work

My body is going through extraordinary experiences, but they can’t be told... It’s as if it were shown how, in all sorts of circumstances – innumerable circumstances – how one goes towards death and how one goes towards life: with everything, everything, you understand, every part of the body, every organ, every activity, one after another – impossible to tell. One can’t talk about it.

It’s interesting.

But this body was built in a curious way, because every time it’s in external contact with wickedness, that is, the will to hurt, the will to destroy, the will to cause harm, it doesn’t understand, and that gives it... you know, like a kind of child’s sorrow: “How can that be?...” And I see that it’s used for a certain work, but...

(silence)

There is also a whole little teaching of every minute with regard to the different ways of receiving sensations (of the body, of course), like the teaching you are given when you do the yoga: the attitude with regard to all thoughts, reactions, feelings, all those things; you are taught to have the true attitude (all that is the past). Well, the body is given the same teaching in detail: the attitude to be taken with regard to every sensation: every sensation – every event, everything that happens, every contact. It’s a painstaking work, in details. And it’s accompanied by a general attitude; but the general attitude, the body has taken it, it’s a settled thing – it’s the working out, that is, the painstaking work of every minute.... It’s not interesting. It’s only the body that finds it interesting; even then, it’s not fascinated – it’s something painstaking, a painstaking work. The reactions to the attitudes in action – not what people say, not that, only their gestures, their attitudes, all that. How to have constantly the true bodily attitude.

It’s a long, painstaking work, without... without anything fascinating.

17. September 1969 – For Auroville

I’ve written something for Auroville....

“The earth needs a place where people can live sheltered from all national rivalries, all social conventions, all contradictory moralities and antagonistic religions. A place where, freed from all those slaveries of the past, human beings will be able to wholly dedicate themselves to the discovery and practice of the Divine Consciousness that wants to manifest.

“Auroville wants to be that place, and offers itself to all those who aspire to live tomorrow’s truth.”

Now things are in the habit of coming like this (Mother brings down her two arms), and they keep pestering me until I’ve written!

20. September 1969 – Healing Hands

But this thing – healing hands – don’t you have it too?... Because A. told me that when he has some pain, he just has to put his hand and concentrate – and it goes away. As for me, I’ve been doing it for... (I was going to say for centuries!), even when I was small I used to do it. I always found it something quite natural.

You apply your hand and concentrate on... what you conceive to be a higher force – or a Force of Harmony, or a Force of Order. Like that. You apply your hand, and you feel it flow through, like that, and enter.

I think every human being has it in potentiality. At any rate, I always found it a perfectly natural thing. And when you develop it, it develops as anything else. Of course, when it takes on miraculous proportions, it’s different.

But it’s very instinctive. I don’t know, even when I was quite small, if I had a pain somewhere, or a toothache, I would do it – and when you’re very small, you don’t have any thought in mind – I would do it just like that (Mother presses her cheek), and it would relieve.

20. September 1969 – Mother's comment on Q&A 1953

“Human beings have the sense of their limitation, and they are under the impression that in order to grow, to increase, even to live on, they need to take from outside, because they live in the consciousness of their personal limitation. So, for them, what they give leaves a hole which they must fill by receiving something.... Naturally, that is wrong. And in truth, if, instead of being shut up within the narrow limits of their little person, they were able to broaden their consciousness to the point of not only identifying with others within their narrow limits, but also to break out of those limits, to go beyond, spread out everywhere, unite with the one Consciousness and become all things, then, at that point, the narrow limits would vanish – but not before. As long as you have a sense of narrow limits you want to take, because you are afraid to lose. You spend, and you want to get back. That’s why, my child! Because if you were spread out in all things, if all the vibrations that come in or go out expressed the need to merge in everything, to broaden, to grow, not remaining in our limits but breaking out of them, eventually identifying with the whole, you would have nothing to lose anymore, because you would have everything. Only, you don’t know, so you cannot do it. You try to take, to accumulate and accumulate, but it’s impossible, you cannot accumulate: you must identify. And you want to get back the little you have: you give out a good thought, and expect some gratefulness; you give out a little of your affection, and expect to be given some.... Because you do not have the capacity to be the good thought in everything, do not have the capacity to be the affection, the tenderness in everything. You feel like that, all cut off and limited, and you are afraid of losing everything, afraid of losing what you have because you would be diminished. While if you are capable of identifying, you no longer need to draw to yourself. The more you spread out, the more you have. The more you identify, the more you become. And then, instead of taking, you give. And the more you give, the more you grow.”

What year was it?

1953, Mother... sixteen years ago.

That was the condition of my mind, it was full of light – it’s gone away, but... At the time, it was very useful!

But all this isn’t just the mind!

It’s an enlightened mind.

It receives.

I mean that the Force expressed itself through the mind, while now... You know, Sri Aurobindo had said that the physical mind (that is, the body-mind) was hopeless – he had tried. And I am sure that as long as the real mind is there, this body-mind doesn’t budge, doesn’t progress. But since the mind was driven away, this one has slowly, slowly, slowly started forming and forming... and now, it’s beginning to express itself. And it has NONE of the other mind’s difficulties; for instance, it doesn’t have the sense of its superiority in the least: very modest, just like the body And always, with the least thing: the need to learn – it knows it knows nothing, needs to learn everything, and it’s constantly open, like that. With any new knowledge, it doesn’t have... it doesn’t “put on airs,” you understand.

27. September 1969 – Even the pettiest work...

Even the pettiest work isn’t a limitation! If one is capable of doing a general Work, it goes on CONSTANTLY, without a material occupation. I mean the real work is done in silence.