AGENDA 1961

March 1961


04. March 1961 – Always Keep Smiling!

...But it doesn't matter, we must always keep smiling. In the end, good always comes out of such things — it's a sorting-out! A splendid, splendid sifter!

The truth is, VERY FEW people are ready to be here, very few. We have taken in all types—we accept, we accept, we accept — afterwards, we sift. And the sifting goes on more and more. Actually, we accept everything, the entire earth, and then... (gesture) there's a churning. And everything useless goes away.

The opposition is clearly becoming stronger and stronger, a very good sign — it means we are advancing. But circumstances are growing more and more difficult: the least thing becomes an opportunity to demonstrate bad will and spite — on the part of the government, on the part of people here and so on. Seen from a superficial viewpoint, we are more than ever in the soup. But this makes my heart rejoice! I take it as a sign that we are getting nearer.

Don't let it trouble you, you must always smile. Smile, be absolutely above it all — absolutely.

07. March 1961 – Mother's body is a battlefield

The body is waging a magnificent battle, oh, a magnificent battle! And it’s faring quite well.

It’s a rather difficult business and could last a long time: I don’t want it to stay dormant and then resurface with the next attack of this or that. So I am proceeding slowly and cautiously, which means it takes time: I concentrate and work on it for one hour after lunch every day. (I used to do my translation then, but since I’m at least two or three years ahead of the Bulletin, it doesn’t matter, I won’t be delaying the work! I have almost finished ‘The Yoga of Divine Love’; now there’s only ‘The Yoga of Self-Perfection’ – that’s quite a job, oh!... I miss it – this translation was my pleasure.) But the work on the body is useful – something must be attempted in life; we are here to do something new, aren’t we?!

I don’t claim to be totally universal, but in any case I am open enough to receive.... You see, given the quantity of material I have taken into my consciousness, it’s quite natural that the body bears the consequences. There is nothing, not one wrong movement, that my body doesn’t feel; generally, though, things are automatically set in order (gesture indicating that Mother automatically purifies and masters the vibrations coming to her). But there are times – especially when it coincides with a revolt of adverse forces who don’t want to give up their domain and enter into battle with all their might – when I must admit it’s hard.... If I had some hours of solitude it would be easier. But particularly during the period of my Playground activities, I was badgered, harassed; I would rush from one thing to the next, one thing to the next, I had no nights to speak of – nights of two and a half or three hours rest, which isn’t enough, there’s no time to put things in order.

Under those conditions I could only hold the thing like this (same gesture of muzzling the illness or holding it in abeyance).

All the same, wasn’t it a mosquito that bit you?

Yes, it was a mosquito.

It was a mosquito but there was an INSTANTANEOUS, localized poisoning. It was... hideous! I knew it when I got the bite and I tried... but it was at the Playground, I was busy and I couldn’t do anything about it until an hour or an hour and a half later. Then it was too late, it was already circulating in the blood.

I have had three bites like that, but not of the same thing; I knew this last bite was filariasis. It was on the arm. Since my legs are covered when I am outside they don’t get bitten; but my arms....

Long ago when Sri Aurobindo was still here, I was once bitten by a mosquito that had just come from a leper. He was sitting on the street corner, although I didn’t know it at the time (I was in my bathroom, just opposite the corner). Suddenly I was bitten here, on the chin, and I knew IMMEDIATELY: ‘Leprosy!’ Within a few seconds it became terrible – hideous! I did what was necessary at once (as I was in the bathroom, I had what I needed). Then I suddenly got the impulse to go and look out the window – there was the leper. And I understood: the mosquito had been kind enough to fly from him to me! But in that instance I was able to check it right away (it lasted three or four days) – I say ‘check’ because they claim leprosy sometimes takes fifteen years to surface, so....

But now it has been more than fifteen years (Mother laughs), so it’s finished!

No, the difference, the great difference, is that when one is conscious, the thing is KNOWN immediately and one can react.

11. March 1961 – Mother on Aphorisms 56 & 58

56 – When, O eager disputant, thou hast prevailed in a debate, then art thou greatly to be pitied; for thou hast lost a chance of widening knowledge.

How fine! Many things could be said....

What use are discussions? In general, those who like to discuss need the stimulation of contradiction to clarify their ideas.

It’s a thing I live almost constantly: I have people like that around me!

It’s clearly the sign of a rudimentary intellectual stage.

But if you can ‘witness’ a discussion as an impartial spectator (I mean even if you are involved in the discussion), you can always gain a lot from it by considering a question or a problem from several points of view; and by trying to reconcile opposing opinions, you can broaden your ideas and rise to a more comprehensive synthesis.

What is the best way to make others understand what you feel to be true?

By LIVING it – there is no other way.

58 - The animal, before he is corrupted, has not yet eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; the god has abandoned it for the tree of eternal life; man stands between the upper heaven and the lower nature.

Was there actually an earthly paradise? Why was man banished from it?

From an historical viewpoint (not psychological, but historical), based on my memories (only I can’t prove it, nothing can be proved, and I don’t believe any truly historical proof has come down to us – or in any case, it hasn’t been found yet), but according to my memories.... (Mother shuts her eyes as if she were going off in search of her memories; she will speak all the rest of the time with eyes closed.) Certainly at one period of the earth’s history there was a kind of ‘earthly paradise,’ in the sense that there was a perfectly harmonious and perfectly natural life: the manifestation of Mind was in accord – was STILL in complete accord – and in total harmony with the ascending march of Nature, without perversion or deformation. This was the first stage of Mind’s manifestation in material forms.

How long did it last? It’s hard to say. But for man it was a life like a sort of flowering of animal life. My memory is of a life where the body was perfectly adapted to its natural surroundings. The climate was in harmony with the needs of the body, the body with the demands of the climate. Life was wholly spontaneous and natural, as a more luminous and conscious animal life would be, with absolutely none of the complications and deformations brought in later by the mind as it developed.

I have a recollection of this life, for I relived it when I first became conscious of the life of the entire earth; but I can’t say how long it lasted or what area it covered – I don’t know. I only remember the conditions at that time, the state of material Nature and the human form and human consciousness, and this state of harmony with all the other elements of the earth: harmony with animal life and a great harmony with plant life – there was a kind of spontaneous knowledge of how to use the things of Nature, the qualities of plants, fruits and all that vegetal nature could offer. There was no aggressiveness, no fear, no contradictions or frictions, and no perversion – the mind was pure, simple, luminous, uncomplicated.

It was certainly with the progress of evolution, the march of evolution, when the mind began to develop for and in itself, that ALL the complications, all the deformations began. Indeed, this story of Genesis that seems so childish does contain a truth. The old traditions like Genesis resembled the Vedas in that each letter was the symbol of a knowledge; it was the pictorial résumé of a traditional knowledge, just as the Veda contains a pictoral résumé of the knowledge of its time. But what’s more, even the symbol had a reality in the sense that there was truly a period when life upon earth (the first manifestation of mentalized Matter in human forms) was still in complete harmony with all that preceded it. It was only later that....

The tree of knowledge symbolizes this kind of knowledge... a material knowledge, no longer divine because its origin was the sense of division – and this is what began to spoil everything. How long did this period last? I am unable to say. (Because my recollection is of an almost immortal life; it seems that it was through some sort of evolutionary accident that the destruction of forms became necessary for progress.) And where did it take place?... From certain impressions (but these are only impressions), it would seem that it was in the vicinity of either this side of Ceylon and India or the other, I don’t know exactly (Mother indicates the Indian Ocean either west of Ceylon and India or to the east between Ceylon and Java), although certainly the place no longer exists; it must have been swallowed up by the sea. I have a very clear vision of the place and a consciousness of that life and its forms, but I can’t give precise material details. Did it last for centuries, was it...? I don’t know. To tell the truth, when I was reliving those moments I wasn’t curious about such details (for one is in another mental state where there is no curiosity about material details: all things turn into psychological facts). It was something so simple, luminous, harmonious, far removed from all our usual preoccupations – those very preoccupations with time and space. It was a spontaneous life, extremely beautiful, and so close to Nature – a natural flowering of animal life. There were no oppositions or contradictions, nothing of the kind – everything happened in the best way possible.

(silence)

A similar memory has recurred several times under different circumstances – not exactly the same scene and the same images, because it wasn’t something I was seeing but A LIFE I was living. During a certain period, at any time, night or day, I would experience a particular state of trance in which I was rediscovering a life I had lived. I was fully conscious that this life had to do with the first flowering of the human form upon earth, the first human forms able to incarnate the divine being from above. This was the first time I could manifest in a particular terrestrial form (not a general life but an individual form); that is, for the first time, through the mentalization of this material substance, the junction between the higher Being and the lower being was made. I have lived that several times, and always in a similar setting and with quite a similar feeling of such joyous simplicity, without complexity, without problems, without all these questions. It was the blossoming of a joy of life – nothing but that; love and harmony prevailed: flowers, minerals, animals all got along together perfectly.

Things began to go wrong only a LONG time afterwards, long after (but this is a personal impression), probably because certain mental crystallizations were necessary, inevitable, for the general evolution, so that the mind might prepare itself to move on to something else. That was when... oh, it seems like a fall into a pit – into ugliness, darkness! Everything became so dark, so ugly, so difficult, so painful. Really... really the sense of a fall.

(silence)

Theon used to say it wasn’t... (how to put it?) inevitable. In the total freedom of the manifestation, this voluntary separation from the Origin is the cause of all the disorder. How to explain it?... Words express these things so poorly. We can call it ‘inevitable’ because it happened! But outside of this creation, a creation can be imagined (or could have been) where this disorder would not have occurred. Sri Aurobindo saw it in approximately the same way: a sort of ‘accident,’ as it were – but an ‘accident’ allowing the manifestation a far greater and more total perfection than if it had never occurred. But this is all still in the realm of speculation, and useless speculation at that. In any case, the experience, the feeling, is that all at once... (Mother makes the gesture of a brutal fall)oh!

For the earth it probably happened like that, all at once: a sort of ascent, then the fall. But the earth is a tiny concentration – universally, it’s something else.

(silence)

The recollection of those times is stored somewhere in the terrestrial memory, that region where all the earth’s memories are inscribed. Those who contact this memory can tell you that the earthly paradise still exists somewhere. But it doesn’t exist materially.... I don’t know, I don’t see it.

Of course, these things can always be explained symbolically. Théon explained man’s ‘exile’ like this: when the Being – the hostile Being – assumed the position of the Lord Supreme in relation to the terrestrial realization, he didn’t want humanity to progress mentally and gain a knowledge permitting it to stop obeying him!... That is Théon’s occult explanation.

According to Théon, the serpent wasn’t the spirit of evil at all: it was the evolutionary Force. And Sri Aurobindo fully agreed; he used to tell me the same thing: the evolutionary power – the mental evolutionary power – is what drove man to gain knowledge, a knowledge of division. And it’s a fact that along with the sense of Good and Evil, man became conscious of himself. Naturally, this ruined everything and he couldn’t stay: it was his own consciousness that drove him out of Paradise - he could no longer stay.

Then was man banished by Jehovah or by his own consciousness?

These are just two ways of seeing the same thing!

In my view, all these old Scriptures and ancient traditions have a graduated content (gesture showing different levels of understanding), and according to the needs of the epoch and the people, one symbol or another was drawn upon. But a time comes when one goes beyond these things and sees them from what Sri Aurobindo calls ‘the other hemisphere,’ where one realizes that they are only modes of expression to put one in contact – a kind of bridge or link between the lower way of seeing and the higher way of knowing.

A time comes when all these disputes – ‘Ah, no, this is like this, that is like that’-seem so silly, so silly! And there is nothing more comical than this spontaneous reply so many people give: ‘Oh, that’s impossible!’ Because with even the most rudimentary intellectual development, you would know you couldn’t even think of something if it weren’t possible!

(silence)

Truly, they have ruined the earth, they have ruined it – they have ruined the atmosphere, they have ruined everything; and for it to become something like the earthly paradise again, ohh! What a long way to go – psychologically, above all. Even the very structure of Matter (Mother fingers the air around her), with their bombs and their experiments and their... oh, they have made a mess of it all! They have truly made a mess of Matter.

Probably... no, not probably, it’s absolutely certain that this was necessary for kneading matter, churning it, to prepare it to receive THAT, the new thing yet to manifest.

Matter was very simple and very harmonious and very luminous not complex enough. This complexity is what ruined everything, but... it will lead to an INFINITELY more conscious realization – infinitely more conscious. And when the earth again becomes as harmonious, simple, luminous, pure – simple, pure, purely divine – then, with this complexity added, something can be achieved.

(Mother gets up to leave)

It doesn’t matter. Fundamentally, it doesn’t matter. Yesterday, while I was walking... I was walking in a kind of universe that was EXCLUSIVELY the Divine – it could be touched, felt: it was within, without, everywhere. For three-quarters of an hour, NOTHING but that, everywhere. Well, I can assure you, at that moment there were certainly no more problems! And what simplicity – nothing to think about, nothing to want, nothing to decide: to BE, be, be!... (Mother seems to dance) To be in the infinite complexity of a perfect unity: all was there but nothing was separate; all was in movement yet nothing changed place. Truly an experience.

When we become like that, it will be very easy.

Good-bye, petit. You know, I enjoy myself, I enjoy myself every day!

(Mother notices a brilliant crimson canna in a vase)

Ah, there were many flowers just like that in the landscape of this earthly paradise – red, and so beautiful!

14. March 1961 – Filariasis in Mother's body

Generally speaking, the progress is undeniable, but the physical body... has a terrible need of rest. It’s annoying, for it prevents me from working.

How to explain it?... It’s rather strange: the cells’ attitude and their state of consciousness is changing with extraordinary rapidity; yet from the ordinary viewpoint of ‘health,’ there is no corresponding progress, quite the contrary. One could say things aren’t going too well, but I see clearly that it’s not true. I see that it isn’t true, it’s only an appearance – but reconciling the two is difficult.

I have been honored with a form of filariasis which occurs perhaps not once in a million cases.... The doctor isn’t tearing his hair out because that’s not his way, but he is perplexed.

Yet the cells sense so perfectly that.... All the experiences in the subconscient at night are quite clear proofs that a... a WORLD of things and vibrations is being cleaned out – all the vibrations opposed to the cellular transformation. But how can one poor little body do all that work! The body is quite aware of being a sort of accumulation and concentration of things (yet there is inevitably a selection – Mother laughs – because if everything had to be worked out in one center like this [her body] it would be... it would be impossible!). Oh, if you knew how deeply and perfectly convinced these cells are, in all their groups and sub-groups, each one individually and within the whole, that everything is not only decreed but executed by the Divine, everything! They have a kind of constant awareness so filled with... a conscious faith in His infinite wisdom, even when there is what the ordinary consciousness calls suffering or pain. That’s not what it is for the cells – it’s something else! And the result is a state of... yes, a state of peaceful combat. There is a sense of Peace, the vibration of Peace, and simultaneously an impression of being... (how to put it?) on the alert, in constant combat. Taken all together it creates a rather odd situation.

And within... oh! It’s like waves, constantly, the equivalent of those nuances of color I was speaking about, waves of this joy of life, the joy of life rippling past, touching; but instead of being.... At times, you see, the body is in a sort of equilibrium (what we, in our ordinary outer consciousness, call ‘equilibrium’ – that is, good health), and then this joy is constant, like swells on the sea (Mother shapes great waves): it seems to flow on behind everything; it comes and shows its face for a moment, then vanishes. In the very tiny things of life – yes, physical life – the joy of these things, the joy life contains, this luminous, special kind of vibration, rises up as if to remind us that it’s here; it is here, it mustn’t be forgotten, it’s here – but it’s kept down by this... tension.

Then, from time to time, everything seems to be on the edge of a precipice; the body doesn’t fall simply because it keeps its balance – but without this higher state of perfect faith, one would surely fall!

All together, as a whole, it’s something so... peculiar!

(long silence)

There is the sense of all things being organized, concentrated and arranged according to a rhythm, and if one manages to maintain the equilibrium of this rhythm, something permanent results.

(Mother remains absorbed within herself) The equilibrium of this rhythm – the progressive, ascending equilibrium of this rhythm – is what, for Matter, must constitute Immortality.

Yet even so....

17. March 1961 – Mother on Aphorism 57

57 – Because the tiger acts according to his nature and knows not anything else, therefore he is divine and there is no evil in him. If he questioned himself, then he would be a criminal.

What might be man’s true, ‘natural’ state? Why does he question himself?

Man on earth (Satprem later asked if this ‘on earth’ wasn’t superfluous and Mother replied: ‘This precision is not superfluous; I said “on earth” meaning that man does not belong only to the earth: in his essence, man is a universal being, but he has a special manifestation on earth.’) is a transitional being and as a consequence, in the course of his evolution, he has had several successive natures following an ascending curve which they will continue to follow until he touches the threshold of the supramental nature and is transformed into a superman. This curve is the spiral of mental development.

We tend to apply the word ‘natural’ to all spontaneous manifestation not resulting from a choice or a preconceived decision – that is, with no intrusion of mental activity. That’s why a man with an only slightly mentalized vital spontaneity seems more ‘natural’ to us in his simplicity. But this naturalness bears a close resemblance to the animal’s and is quite low on the human evolutionary scale. Man will not recapture this spontaneity free of mental intrusion until he attains the supramental level, until he goes beyond the mind and emerges into the higher Truth.

Up to that point, all his modes of being are naturally natural! But with the mind’s intrusion, evolution was, if not falsified, then deformed, because by its very nature the mind was open to perversion and it became perverted almost from the start (or to be more exact, it was perverted by the asuric forces). And what appears unnatural to us now is this state of perversion. At any rate, it’s a deformation.

You ask why man questions himself, but this is the nature of the mind!

Along with the mind came individualization, an acute sense of separation and a more or less precise feeling of a freedom of choice – all of that, all these psychological states, are the natural consequences of mental life and open the door to everything we see now, from the worst aberrations to the most rigorous principles. Man’s impression of being free to choose between one thing and another is the deformation of a true principle that will be totally realizable only when the soul or psychic being becomes conscious in him; were the soul to govern the being, man’s life would truly be a conscious expression of the supreme Will translated individually. But in the normal human state, such a case is still extremely rare and doesn’t seem at all natural to ordinary human consciousness – it seems almost supernatural!

Man questions himself because the mental instrument is made for seeing all possibilities and because the human being feels he has freedom of choice... and the immediate consequences are the notions of good and evil, right and wrong, and all the ensuing miseries. This can’t be called a bad thing: it’s an intermediate stage – not a very pleasant stage, but nevertheless... it was certainly inevitable for a total development.

17. March 1961 – Mother's experience

Between 2 and 3 o’clock this morning, I had an experience... something resurging from the subconscient: it was appalling, my child, the disclosure of an appalling inefficiency! Disgraceful!

The experience occurred in a place corresponding to ours [the main Ashram building], but immense: the rooms were ten times bigger, but absolutely... one can’t say empty – they were barren. Not that there was nothing in them, but nothing was in order, everything was just where it shouldn’t be. There wasn’t any furniture so things were strewn here and there – a dreadful disarray! Things were being put to uses they weren’t made for, yet nothing needed for a particular purpose could be found. The whole section having to do with education [the Ashram School] was in almost total darkness: the lights were out with no way to switch them on, and people were wandering about and coming to me with incoherent, stupid proposals. I tried to find a comer where I could rest (not because I was tired; I simply wanted to concentrate a little and get a clear vision in the midst of it all), but it was impossible, no one would leave me alone. Finally I put a tottering armchair and a footstool end-to-end and tried to ‘rest’; but someone immediately came up (I know who, I’m purposely not giving names) and said, ‘Oh! This won’t do at all! It CAN’T be arranged like that! Then he began making noise, commotion, disorder – well, it was awful.

To wind it all up, I went to Sri Aurobindo’s room – an enormous, enormous room, but in the same state. And he appeared to be in an eternal consciousness, entirely detached from everything yet very clearly aware of our total incapacity.

He hadn’t eaten (probably because no one had given him anything to eat), and when I entered, he asked me if it was possible to have some breakfast. ‘Yes, of course! I said, ‘I’ll go get it,’ expecting to find it ready. Then I had to hunt around to find something: everything was stuffed into cupboards (and misplaced at that), all disarranged – disgusting, absolutely disgusting. I called someone (who had been napping and came in with sleep-swollen eyes) and told him to prepare Sri Aurobindo’s breakfast – but he had his own fixed ideas and principles (exactly as he is in real life). ‘Hurry up,’ I told him, ‘Sri Aurobindo is waiting.’ But hurry? Impossible! He had to do things according to his own conceptions and with a terrible awkwardness and ineptitude. In short, it took an infinite amount of time to warm up a rather clumsy breakfast.

Then I arrived at Sri Aurobindo’s room with my plates. ‘Oh,’ said Sri Aurobindo, ‘it has taken so long that I will take my bath first.’ I looked at my poor breakfast and thought, ‘Well, I went to so much trouble to make it hot and now it’s going to get cold!’ All this was so sordid, so sad.

And he seemed to be living in an eternity, yet fully, fully conscious of... of our total incapacity.

It was so sad to see how good-for-nothing we were that it woke me up, or rather I heard the clock strike (like the other day, I didn’t count and leapt out of bed; but I quickly noticed that it was only 3 o’clock and lay back down). Then I began ‘looking’ and told myself, ‘If we really have to emerge from all this... infirmity before anything can truly be well done, then we have quite a long road to travel!’ It was pitiful, pitiful (first on the mental, then on the material plane), absolutely pitiful. And I was depending on these people! (Sri Aurobindo was depending on me and therefore on them.) ‘Good god,’ I said, ‘if I only knew where things were kept! If they had just let me handle things, it could have been done quickly.’ But no! All those people had to be involved Oust as we always depend on intermediaries in real life).

It made me wonder.

(silence)

When I told you last time about that experience [of March 11, with Pavitra] the night I met you and was saying ‘good-bye,’ I neglected to mention one very important point, the most important, in fact: I was leaving the subjection to mental functioning permanently behind That was the meaning of my ‘departure.’

For a very long time now I have been watching all the phases of the subjection to mental functioning come undone, one after another – for a very long time. That night was the end of it, the last phase: I was leaving this subjection behind and rising up into a realm of freedom. You had been very, very helpful, as I told you. Well, this latest experience was something else! It came to make me look squarely at the fact of our incapacity!

Can you imagine!

One thing after another, one thing after another! This subconscient is... interminable, interminable, if you only knew... I am skipping the details-such stupidity, oh! This person I won’t name, who so clumsily prepared breakfast, told me, ‘Ah, yes, Sri Aurobindo is a little... morose today, he is depressed.’ I could have slapped him: ‘You fool! You don’t understand anything!’ And Sri Aurobindo, although he didn’t want to show it, was completely aware of our incapacity.

(silence)

Now I should say-if it’s any consolation – that each time something like this comes into my consciousness at night, things go better afterwards. It is not useless, some work has been done – cleaning, cleaning, cleaning out. But there’s quite a lot to do!

Does this have an effect on people’s consciousness – I mean their outer consciousness?

Ah... not much!

Yes and no in the sense that I do manage to bring about a general progress. Some individuals are receptive, sometimes astonishingly so, receiving the exact suggestion exactly where it’s needed, but such a person is one in a hundred-even that is an exaggeration.

A sort of power over circumstances does come to me, however, as if I could rise above it all and give the subconscient a bit of a work-over. Naturally this has some results: entire areas are brought under control. That’s the most important thing. Individuals get the repercussions later because they are very... very coagulated, a bit hard! A lack of plasticity.

Take the case of this man I’m not naming – I’ve been training him, working with him, for more than thirty years and I still haven’t managed to get him to do things spontaneously, according to the needs of the moment, without all his preconceived ideas. That’s the point where he resists: when things have to be done quickly he follows his usual rule and it takes... forever! This was illustrated strikingly that night. I told him, ‘Just look: it’s there – it’s THERE – hurry up and warm it a little and I’ll go.’ Ah!... He didn’t protest, didn’t say anything, but he did things exactly according to his own preconceptions.

It’s a terrible slavery to the lower mind, and so widespread! Oh, all these goings-on at the School, my child, all the teaching, all the teachers.... Terrible, terrible, terrible! I was trying to turn on the switches to give some light and not one of them worked!

Of course, these scenes are slightly exaggerated because they are seen in isolation from the rest; within the whole many things crisscross and complete each other, diminishing each other’s importance. But in an experience like last night’s, things are taken singly and shown in isolation, as through a magnifying glass. And after all... it’s a good lesson.

Inefficiency.... All right, then.

And it all exists PRIMARILY because each individual is shut up in his own little personal formation (Mother forms an eggshell), a formation of the most ordinary mind, the mind that fabricates the details of everyday life; it’s like being cramped into a narrow prison.

21. March 1961 – Black magic against the Mother

Last night I had two consecutive experiences showing with extreme precision that black magic is at the root of all this (Mother is speaking of both general and personal difficulties, in the Ashram and in her body).

First of all, on the mental plane (the physical-mind, the material mind) I saw an individual.... I am not entirely certain of his identity (when I saw him last night I didn’t associate him with anyone in particular) but from his outer appearance he is evidently a sannyasi. He was pursuing me, blocking my way and trying to stop me from doing my work (it was a long, long affair). But I was very conscious and could foresee everything he was about to do, so it had no effect. After a long while I emerged from this – I had something else to do and I left – and on my way home he was everywhere, hiding and trying to catch me; but he didn’t succeed in doing anything. And I knew he had been acting in this manner for a long time.

Then I woke up (I always wake up three or four times during the night) and when I went back to bed I had an attack of what the doctor and I have taken to be filariasis – but a strange type of filariasis, for as soon as I master it in one spot it appears in another, and when I master it there it reappears somewhere else. Last night it was in the arms (it lasted quite a while, between 2:30 and 4 a.m.); but I was fully conscious, and each time the attack came, I went like this (gestures over the arms, to drive away the attack) and my arms were not affected at all. When it was over, I consciously entered the most material subtle physical, just beyond the body. I was sitting in ‘my room’ there (an immense, cubic room) reading or writing something, when I heard the door open and close, but I was busy and didn’t pay attention, presuming it was one of the people usually around me. Then suddenly I had such an unpleasant sensation in my body that I raised my head and looked, and I saw someone there. Do you know how the magicians in Europe dress, in short satin breeches and a shirt?... He was wearing something like that. He was Indian, tall and rather dark, with slicked-down hair – what you would normally call a ‘handsome young man.’ He seemed to have been ‘drawn’ there because he was standing in front of me staring into space, not looking at me. And the moment I saw him, there was the same sensation in all my cells as I have with what I’ve been calling filariasis (it’s a special, minute kind of pain) and simultaneously all the cells felt disgust – a tremendous will of rejection. Then I sat up straight (I didn’t stand up) and said to him as forcefully as possible, How do you dare to come in here! I said it so loudly that the noise woke me up! I don’t know what happened then, but things went much better afterwards.

The moment I saw this person I knew he was only an instrument, but a well-paid instrument – someone paid a great deal to have him do that! I would recognize him again among hundreds... I can still see him... I see him more clearly than with physical eyes. He is an unintelligent man with no personal animosity, merely a very well-paid instrument – someone is hiding behind him, using him as a screen.

Before that experience, as part of the attack, I also got a sore throat. I didn’t believe it would manifest, but around 9:30 this morning when I came downstairs for meditation with X, it did. It’s nothing at all, though. The whole time I was with X (and even before, when I was waiting for him), it was halted completely – everything in that room came to a halt. It started up again only after he left and I came here. But it’s nothing.

X told me he has been doing something for me in his puja – since December, it seems – so this morning I thought he should know about the experience and I sent Amrita to tell him. He replied to Amrita that this confirmed his certainty that Z has been making black magic against me since December. He had been told that Z was practicing black magic in Kashmir. Could this be the same person I saw before [during the December 1958 attack]? Since it was someone who concealed his identity, I can’t say – but this form was robed as a sannyasi. Perhaps it’s he, I don’t know. I reserve my judgment because I don’t know personally. But this is what X said, and he’s going to redouble his efforts.

That’s the situation.

I had a talk with the doctor this morning and he told me, ‘In fact, your case of filariasis has some symptoms missing and others that don’t normally exist.’ He was a bit perplexed because it’s impossible for him to understand what it might be if it’s not filariasis. I said that perhaps (because as I told you, I did have filariasis some years ago, but brought it under control) perhaps it’s being used as a base for this attack.

Of course, there are certain symptoms which never appear with filariasis. And the doctor has been astounded at the control I’ve had over it: it began in the feet, I checked it there; it went higher, I checked it there; then it went higher still and I continued to control it. Finally, the other day, it tried to get into the arms, but it couldn’t hold out – and last night there was a real riot!... (Mother laughs) So perhaps it’s the deformation or transposition of some sort of mantric effort, like last time in ‘58 when there was an attempt to make me throw up all my blood but only food came out! It’s probably something similar. My impression (I’ve had it from the start) is that they have made a try at thrombosis (you know, when something blocks the circulation). Besides, it seems that X asked the doctor if blood- poisoning might be involved, so he must have seen this possibility. There has been absolutely nothing of the kind, but there has been an effort to block the circulation in the veins, probably an ‘adaptation’ of the magic attack. And along with this have come all the usual things: all the usual suggestions, all the usual ‘prophecies’ [about Mother’s departure].... But for me, these are the normal facts of life, that’s all. I am used to it. It has no importance.

Do you really believe Z could be behind this magician you saw?

It could be.

I hadn’t thought of it at all – not at all. I have seen Z’s thoughts several times, but not in this form: very, very angry thoughts but simply trying to... catch my attention. But this was something else. X said it was Z, that’s what X saw. He doesn’t seem to have attached the slightest importance to my magician – obviously this person was just a screen. It must be someone who knows magic and is being used by another as an instrument. But when I saw it all this morning, I must say I didn’t once think of Z. It’s only X who said so.

But Z... I don’t know how to explain my relationship with him. He is sheltered by a ‘light of benediction,’ so.... When he was here I opened the doors for him to a realization he was incapable of having, something light years beyond him; and it gave him an appalling ambition, totally spoiling everything. From this point of view, it’s a great blessing for him; even if he becomes a dreadful Asura, it will come to a good end! It doesn’t matter, it’s not important. That’s why this morning, even when I heard what X said about Z, it was the same thing: this great Light of the supreme Mother going out towards Z. His magic is not important, but if he indulges in it, too bad for him. It doesn’t concern me: it’s X’s business and X is doing what’s necessary – and I believe (laughing) he hits hard!

(silence)

When I came down this morning I didn’t want my cold to disturb the meditation with X, and this immobility came (Mother brings down her fists, showing a solid mass descending). It’s what he uses for healing and I must say that the same thing happens to me, even when it doesn’t come from him: a Force that seizes everything, stops everything – no more vibrations, an immobility.

I had told N. to knock at the door when he arrived with X, but he didn’t do it – luckily I heard the door opening. I stood up, still in that state... and almost fell over! X must have thought I was having a spell of weakness or something, because I was holding onto the arms of the chair, and when I took his flowers, my hands were trembling – I wasn’t in my body. And afterwards, ah, what a concentration! We remained in it for about thirty-five minutes. It was SOLID – an extraordinary solidity! I didn’t want to waste time waiting for it to subside before coming here, and you must have seen how I was when I arrived: like a sleepwalker! I said to the people I passed in the corridor, ‘I’m coming back, I’m coming back!’ That’s all I could say, like an idiot.

(silence)

I wanted to tell you about this because it’s an indication. It’s better to say such things as soon as they happen, to be sure of being accurate.

This stupid cold... in the middle of the night. It was the start of the attack.

27. March 1961 – Change of Mother's body consciousness

My body’s consciousness has changed – that much I know. Not totally, of course, but enough to feel that there’s no separation, that vibrations are unpartitioned – there are no partitions! And I felt this very strongly with X: that when we were face to face in meditation there was no longer any difference between us, that this Vibration I was feeling – this Vibration of a strong and very solid, very balanced peace – was the same for him as for me. I didn’t feel that I was here and he was there. I had only to shut my eyes and there was no difference between us. (This doesn’t happen just with him: I feel it with everyone; but I am aware of how it is with others, I can sense why they don’t feel it.) But I was under the impression that he, at least, would have felt it – I must have been mistaken! This incident came to tell me I was mistaken.

Still, it surprises me.... Because sitting in that room, one has the feeling (I say ‘one,’ it’s probably... I don’t know what it is), I thought he had the same feeling I did: oh, it could last an eternity! It’s like that: tranquil, tranquil, peaceful, balanced, strong. On other occasions there was a kind of movement: it came, went, came, went; but this time... (Mother stretches forth her arms as if time had stopped) and I am like that (not the ‘I’ here, the ‘I’ above), I see it like that. Then just as the clock is about to strike, when the half-hour is finished, something comes and tells my body, ‘Now!’ A tiny shock, and two or three seconds later the clock strikes. I always feel beforehand, ‘Now it’s over.’ Otherwise there would be no reason for it to end – it’s so peaceful! And not something diluted, as it were, but strong, compact. Compact. Then that tiny shock and the body comes to attention: ‘Ah, I’m going to have to move!’ And always after about two seconds, the clock strikes. I open my eyes, look at X and wait. Three or four seconds later, or after a minute or two, he opens his eyes, bows to me and gets up. Then I get up. It’s always the same. So I don’t know why.... I don’t understand what goes on in his consciousness. I no longer understand.

I probably needed the experience.... You remember that type of detachment I spoke of when I had that experience – when the BODY had that experience [of January 24, 1961] – well, it has increased to such an extent that it now applies to anything and everything linked with action on earth. This detachment was probably necessary. It began with something like... things dissolving (Mother makes a gesture of crumbling something between her fingers); certain kinds of links between my consciousness and the Work were dissolving (not links with me, because I don’t have any, but with the body; the whole physical consciousness, all that attaches it to the things in its environment, to the Work and to the entourage – I spoke to you about that in regard to physical immortality; well, that’s what is happening now). It’s like things dissolving – dissolving, dissolving, dissolving. And it’s more and more pronounced. During these last days, things have been becoming increasingly difficult – difficulties have been coming one after another, one after another. Formerly, I had the power to get a grip on them and hold them (Mother tightens her grip as though mastering circumstances); but now that this type of detachment has begun, things drift away everywhere – everywhere, everywhere....

So this episode with X is probably part of the same process. What has been affected is a certain confidence in the REALITY of the Power, the REALITY of spiritual action; there seems to be no communication between here (above) and there (below).

Does that mean you’re breaking all contacts with the earth?

No, that’s not it. Things go on. I don’t know, I have no idea. I can’t say exactly what it is, but.... It’s a.... Don’t know. In any case, it seems obvious that the NATURE of the contact must become very different. Because in proportion to this detachment, the reality of the Vibration – and especially the vibration of divine Love – keeps growing and growing (out of all proportion to the body, even) in a FORMIDABLE manner, formidable! The body is beginning to feel nothing but that.

Is this detachment necessary, then, for divine Love to be established? I don’t know.

Yes, it’s as if I were living, as if the BODY were living (despite all the illnesses and attacks, all the ill will besetting it), living in a bath of the divine vibration – bathing in something... immense – immense, immense... limitless, and so stable! The body lives in it like this (gesture as if Mother were floating). So even when there is what we call physical pain, even when there are blows to morale (like having a cashier ask you for money and you have none to give him), well, despite it all, despite all the possible complications (coming all at the same time), EVERYTHING, everything that happens now, even things which seem extremely unpleasant to our mental conceptions or our mental reactions, everything is a bath, a bath of the vibration of divine Love. So much so that if I didn’t control my body, I would be smiling at everything all the time like an idiot. A beatific smile for everything (I don’t show it because I control myself).

(silence, the clock strikes the hour) No, no: do not brood about it. Let it be, it will work out. It will work out the way it has to work out.

X is sensitive mentally, but to what degree? And to what degree do things crystallize differently for him because of all his ideas?...

We’ll see.

But you know, it’s no joke, this transformation!

(silence)

Yesterday I had such a strong feeling that ALL constructions, all habits, all ways of seeing, all ordinary reactions, were all crumbling away – completely. I felt I was suspended in something... entirely different, something... I don’t know.

(silence)

And truly, with the feeling that ALL one has lived, all one has known, all one has done, all of it is a perfect illusion – that’s what I was living yesterday evening.

And then....

It’s one thing to have the spiritual experience of the illusion of material life (some find this painful, but I found it so wonderfully beautiful and happy that it was one of the loveliest experiences of my life); but now the whole spiritual construction as one has lived it is becoming... a total illusion! Not the same illusion, a far more serious illusion.

If That was not there.... Obviously, That [divine Love] is here, like a mattress placed so you won’t break your neck when you fall. That’s precisely the feeling: this experience of the vibration of divine Love is the mattress... so you don’t break your neck!

So, petit, don’t brood; whatever your difficulties may be (laughing), you can tell yourself they are only beginning!

And I’m not exactly a baby; I have been here forty-seven years, and for something like... yes, certainly for sixty years I have been doing a conscious yoga, with all that memories of an immortal life can bring – and see where I am! When Sri Aurobindo says you must have endurance, I think he is right!

This path is not for the weak, that’s for sure.

I believe this body has suffered as much as a body can bear without going to pieces, and it keeps going, it has never asked for mercy – not once has it said, ‘No, it’s too much,’ not once. It says, ‘As You will, Lord: here I am.’

And so it continues.

(Mother gets up to leave)

Well, I’m never going to tell people that it’s just a promenade! No, it’s nothing like a promenade. Some say, ‘Oh, you’re too severe!’ But too bad for them; it’s better to tell the truth, isn’t it?

We mustn’t get discouraged.

The absolute certainty of the Victory is unquestionable; but I am not speaking at the scale of our bounded mind. It’s up to us to CHANGE TACK – this is what’s expected of us, to change tack and not keep going round in circles.

There you are, petit.

It’s a process of tempering, you know – we get tempered.

And there’s no point in giving up, because it would just have to be started all over again next time. What I always say is: ‘Here’s the opportunity – go right to the end.’ It’s no use saying, ‘Ah, I can’t,’ because next time it will be even more difficult.