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23 January 1957
“The meeting of man and God must always mean a penetration and entry of the Divine into the human and a self-immergence of man in the Divinity. “But that immergence is not in the nature of an annihilation. Extinction is not the fulfilment of all this search and passion, suffering and rapture. The game would never have been begun if that were to be its ending.” “Delight is the secret. Learn of pure delight and thou shalt learn of God”. “What then was the commencement of the whole matter? Existence that multiplied itself for sheer delight of being and plunged into numberless trillions of forms so that it might find itself innumerably”. “And what is the middle? Division that strives towards a multiple unity, ignorance that labours towards a flood of varied light, pain that travails towards the touch of an unimaginable ecstasy. For all these things are dark figures and perverse vibrations. “And what is the end of the whole matter? As if honey could taste itself and all its drops together and all its drops could taste each other and each the whole honeycomb as itself, so should the end be with God and the soul of man and the universe. “Love is the key-note, Joy is the music, Power is the strain, Knowledge is the performer, the infinite All is the composer and audience. We know only the preliminary discords which are as fierce as the harmony shall be great; but we shall arrive surely at the fugue of the divine Beatitudes.”
Thoughts and Glimpses, Cent. Vol. 16, p. 384 Page – 20 How can one “learn of pure delight”?
First of all, to begin with, one must through an attentive observation grow aware that desires and the satisfaction of desires give only a vague, uncertain pleasure, mixed, fugitive and altogether unsatisfactory. That is usually the starting-point. Then, if one is a reasonable being, one must learn to discern what is desire and refrain from doing anything that may satisfy one’s desires. One must reject them without trying to satisfy them. And so the first result is exactly one of the first observations stated by the Buddha in his teaching: there is an infinitely greater delight in conquering and eliminating a desire than in satisfying it. Every sincere and steadfast seeker will realise after some time, sooner or later, at times very soon, that this is an absolute truth, and that the delight felt in overcoming a desire is incomparably higher than the small pleasure, so fleeting and mixed, which may be found in the satisfaction of his desires. That is the second step. Naturally, with this continuous discipline, in a very short time the desires will keep their distance and will no longer bother you. So you will be free to enter a little more deeply into your being and open yourself in an aspiration to…the Giver of Delight, the divine Element, the divine Grace. And if this is done with a sincere self-giving – something that gives itself, offers itself and expects nothing in exchange for its offering – one will feel that kind of sweet warmth, comfortable, intimate, radiant, which fills the heart and is the herald of Delight. After this, the path is easy.
Sweet Mother, what is the true Delight of being?
That very one of which I am speaking!
Then, Sweet Mother, here when Sri Aurobindo speaks of an existence “that multiplied itself for sheer delight Page – 21 of being”, what is this delight?
The delight of existing. There comes a time when one begins to be almost ready, when one can feel in everything, every object, in every movement, in every vibration, in all the things around – not only people and conscious beings, but things, objects; not only trees and plants and living things, but simply any object one uses, the things around one – this delight, this delight of being, of being just as one is, simply being. And one sees that all this vibrates like that. One touches a thing and feels this delight. But naturally, I say, one must have followed the discipline I spoke about at the beginning; otherwise, so long as one has a desire, a preference, an attachment or affinities and repulsions and all that, one cannot – one cannot. And so long as one finds pleasures – pleasure, well, yes, vital or physical pleasure in a thing – one cannot feel this delight. For this delight is everywhere. This delight is something very subtle. One moves in the midst of things and it is as though they were all singing to you their delight. There comes a time when it becomes very familiar in the life around you. Of course, I must admit that it is a little more difficult to feel it in human beings, because there are all their mental and vital formations which come into the field of perception and disturb it. There is too much of this kind of egoistic asperity which gets mixed with things, so it is more difficult to contact the Delight there. But even in animals one feels it; it is already a little more difficult than in plants. But in plants, in flowers, it is so wonderful! They speak all their joy, they express it. And as I said, in all familiar objects, the things around you, which you use, there is a state of consciousness in which each one is happy to be, just as it is. So at that moment one knows one has touched true Delight. And it is not conditioned. I mean it does not depend upon…it depends on nothing. It does not depend on outer circumstances, does not depend on a more or less favourable state, it does not Page – 22 depend on anything: it is a communion with the raison d’être of the universe. And when this comes it fills all the cells of the body. It is not even a thing which is thought out – one does no reason, does not analyse, it is not that: it is a state] in which one lives. And when the body shares in it, it is so fresh – so fresh, so spontaneous, so…it no longer turns back upon itself, there is no longer any sense of self-observation, of self-analysis or of analysing things. All that is like a canticle of joyous vibrations, but very, very quiet, without violence, without passion, nothing of all that. It is very subtle and very intense at the same time, and when it comes, it seems that the whole universe is a marvellous harmony. Even what is to the ordinary human consciousness ugly, unpleasant, appears marvellous. Unfortunately, as I said, people, circumstances, all that, with all those mental and vital formations – that disturbs it all the time. Then one is obliged to return to this ignorant, blind perception of things. But otherwise, as soon as all this stops and one can get out of it…everything changes. As he says there, at the end: everything changes. A marvellous harmony. And it is all Delight, true Delight, real Delight. This demands a little work. And this discipline I spoke about, which one must undergo, if it is practised with the aim of finding Delight, the result is delayed, for an egoistic element is introduced into it, it is done with an aim and is no longer an offering, it is a demand, and then.…It comes, it will come, even if it takes much longer – when one asks nothing, expects nothing, hopes for nothing, when it is simply that, it is self-giving and aspiration, and the spontaneous need without any bargaining – the need to be divine, that’s all.
Mother, will you explain this “drop of honey”?
Oh! the honey.…But that is an image, my child. Page – 23 He says: “If one could imagine....” It is simply to give a more concrete approach than intellectual abstractions. He says: If you can imagine, for example, a honeycomb, well…a honeycomb which would have the capacity to taste itself and at the same time each drop of honey; not only to taste itself as honey, but to taste itself in each drop, being each drop of the honeycomb, and if each one of these drops could taste all the others, itself and all the others, and at the same time if each drop could taste, could have the taste of the whole honeycomb as if it were itself. So, it would be a honeycomb capable of tasting itself and tasting in detail all the drops in the honeycomb, and each drop capable of tasting itself and all the others individually and the honeycomb as a whole, as itself.…It is a very precise image. Only you must have some power of imagination!
Like that I understand. I am asking what it means.
Honey is something delicious, isn’t it? So, these are the sweetnesses of divine Delight. And just now, when I was evoking this joy which is in things, spontaneous, simple, this joy which is at the heart of everything, well, for the physical body it has something truly…oh! naturally, the taste of honey is very crude and gross in comparison – but something like that, something extremely delicious. And very simple, very simple and very integral in its simplicity; very complete in its simplicity and yet very simple. You see, this is not something to be thought out, one must have the power to evoke it, one must have some imagination. So, if one has this capacity, one can do that simply by reading, then one can understand.…It is an analogy, it is only an analogy, but it is an analogy which truly has a power of evocation
But everyone will imagine something different, won’t he, Mother? Page – 24 Obviously. But that doesn’t matter! It will be good for him. (Silence) Is that all? I had brought some questions I have been asked, but I think it is already rather late. (Mother glances at some questions.) There is one which is terribly intellectual which we shall leave for another day. There is another…which is only a semblance, and then there is a third which is interesting but needs a detailed reply, and this evening it is already a little late. However here is a question which can be answered very easily, it is from one of my own writings where it is said:
“It is a great mistake to suppose that the Divine Will always acts openly in the world.”
And then in Sri Aurobindo’s Synthesis of Yoga:
“If we see unity everywhere, if we recognise that all comes by the divine will…etc.”
And something else, from my Prayers and Meditations:
“It is Thou who art the doer in each thing and each being, and he who is near enough to Thee to see Thee in all actions without exception, will know how to transform each act into a benediction.” 10 December 1912
And so, I am asked how to reconcile these contradictions. But I don’t see any contradiction. For in the first sentence it is said: “It is a great mistake to suppose that the Divine Will always acts openly in the world....” I should say: it is extremely rare for it to act openly. It always acts, but not openly. And when it acts Page – 25 openly, that is what men call “miracles”. And it is something extremely rare. Most of the time it does not act openly, but that doesn’t mean it does not act. It doesn’t act openly, that’s all. So there’s no contradiction. That was all I meant. It is an altogether superficial contradiction arising from a misunderstanding of the words. The Divine Will acts, but not openly. When it acts openly, well, men call that miracles. That’s all. But that does not prevent it from acting. Page – 26
“The whole world yearns after freedom, yet each creature is in love with his chains; this is the first paradox and inextricable knot of our nature. “Man is in love with the bonds of birth; therefore he is caught in the companion bonds of death. In these chains he aspires after freedom of his being and mastery of his self-fulfilment. “Man is in love with power; therefore he is subjected to weakness. For the world is a sea of waves of force that meet and continually fling themselves on each other; he who would ride on the crest of one wave, must faint under the shock of hundreds. “Man is in love with pleasure; therefore he must undergo the yoke of grief and pain. For unmixed delight is only for the free and passionless soul; but that which pursues after pleasure in man is a suffering and straining energy. “Man hungers after calm, but he thirsts also for the experiences of a restless mind and a troubled heart. Enjoyment is to his mind a fever, calm an inertia and a monotony. “Man is in love with the limitations of his physical being, yet he would have also the freedom of his infinite mind and his immortal soul. “And in these contrasts something in him finds a curious attraction; they constitute for his mental being the artistry of life. It is not only the nectar but the poison also that attracts his taste and his curiosity.” Thoughts and Glimpses, Cent. Vol. 16, p. 385 Sweet Mother, what does “artistry” mean?
What most men call “artistry” is just contrast. Artists say and feel Page – 27 that it is the shadows which make the light, that if there were no contrasts, they would not be able to make a picture. It is the same thing with music: the contrast between “forte” and “piano” is one of the greatest charms of music. I knew some poets who used to say, “It is my enemies’ hatred which makes me value the affection of my friends....” And it is the almost inevitable likelihood of misfortune which gives all its savour to happiness, and so on. And they value repose only in contrast with the daily agitation, silence only because of the usual noise, and some of them even tell you, “Oh! it is because there are illnesses that good health is cherished.” It goes so far that a thing is valued only when it is lost. And as Sri Aurobindo says here: When this fever of action, of movement, this agitation of creative thought is not there, one feels one is falling into inertia. Most people fear silence, calm, quietude. They no longer feel alive when they are not agitated. I have seen many cases in which Sri Aurobindo had given silence to somebody, had made his mind silent, and that person came back to him in a kind of despair, saying: “But I have become stupid!” For his thought was no longer excited. What he says here is terribly true. Men want freedom but they are in love with their chains, and when one wants to take them away, when one wants to show them the path of true liberation, they are afraid, and often they even protest. Almost all man’s works of art – literary, poetic, artistic – are based on the violence of contrasts in life. When one tries to pull them out of their daily dramas, they really feel that it is not artistic. If they wanted to write a book or compose a play where there would be no contrasts, where there would be no shadows in the picture, it would probably be something seemingly very dull, very monotonous, lifeless, for what man calls “life” is the drama of life, the anxiety of life, the violence of contrasts. And perhaps if there were no death, they would be terribly tired of living.
(Long silence) Page – 28 I have been asked a question about what I said in one of the former classes:
“The difficulties and obstacles met on the path when one wants to attain a certain aim – are they sometimes a sign that this decision, this plan or project was faulty from the beginning and that hence one should not persist or, on the contrary, do these difficulties indicate a victory to be won, a transformation to be attained? Are they a sign that one must persevere and hold fast? I am not speaking here of the decision to follow the path of Yoga, but of the little things connected with work, sports or other activities. In other words, how to recognise and interpret the Guidance which comes through circumstances or relations with others and through experience?”
I believe this is only an apparent contradiction. If one wants to follow a discipline of yoga, naturally, before undertaking anything one must try to discern and know if the inspiration received is a real one, coming from the Divine, or whether it is simply a reaction to outer circumstances and an impulse, either vital or mental. It is quite important, even very important, to try to discern and act in full knowledge of the cause. But there are very many things one does and about which one is not in the habit of thinking beforehand. When the circumstance comes, one obeys it, so to say. And, indeed, these things, like almost everything one does in life, are not important in themselves. The only thing that matters is the attitude with which they are done. The fact that you do something because that action is present there before you for one reason or another and that you are, so to say, always obliged to act as long as you are in the outer life – all this has a certain importance from the point of view of the management of life if these acts are liable to have far-reaching consequences in life, as for Page – 29 example, getting married or going to live in one place or another or taking up one occupation or another; these things are generally considered important, and they are so to a certain extent; but even for them, from the point of view of yoga, everything depends much more on the attitude one takes than on the thing itself. And so, above all, for all the very small actions of daily life, the importance is reduced to a minimum. There are some scrupulous people who set problems to themselves and find it very difficult to solve them, because they state the problem wrongly. I knew a young woman who was a theosophist and was trying to practise; she told me, “We are taught that the divine Will must prevail in all that we do, but in the morning when I have my breakfast, how can I know whether God wants me to put two lumps of sugar in my coffee or only one?”…And it was quite touching, you know, and I had some trouble explaining to her that the spirit in which she drank her coffee, the attitude she had towards her food, was much more important than the number of lumps of sugar she put into it.¹ It is the same with all the little things one does at every moment. The divine Consciousness does not work in the human way, It does not decide how many lumps of sugar you will put in your coffee. It gradually puts you in the right attitude towards actions, things – an attitude of consecration, suppleness, assent, aspiration, goodwill, plasticity, effort for progress – and this is what counts, much more than the small decision you take at every second. One may try to find out what is the truest thing to do, but it is not by a mental discussion or a mental problem that these things can be resolved. It is in fact by an inner attitude which creates an atmosphere of harmony – progressive harmony – in which all one does will necessarily be the best thing that could be done in those particular circumstances. And the ideal would be an attitude complete enough for the action . ¹About this story, a disciple remembers Mother telling him something to this effect: “Now I would no longer laugh at this poor lady. I am not sure that the Lord does not also attend to the number of lumps of sugar we put in our coffee!” Page – 30 to be spontaneous, dictated by something other than an outer reason. But that is an ideal – for which one must aspire and which one can realise after some time. Till then, to take care always to keep the true attitude, the true aspiration, is much more important than to decide whether one will do gymnastic-marching or not and whether one will go to a certain class or not. Because these things have no real importance in themselves, they have only an altogether relative importance, the only important thing is just to keep the true orientation in one’s aspiration and a living will for progress. As a general rule, and so that the experience may have its full benefit, when one has undertaken something one must do it with persistence, without caring for obstacles and difficulties, until an absolutely irrefutable event indicates that one no longer has to do it. This happens very rarely. Usually, things follow their own curve and when they reach an issue – either they have come to an end or have produced the desired result – one becomes aware of the reason for doing them. But the obstacles, oppositions – or encouragements – should not be considered as irrefutable signs to be followed, for these things may have very different meanings according to the case, and it is not at all on the basis of these outer events that one must judge the validity of one’s undertaking. When one is very attentive and very sincere, one can have an indication, an inner but perceptible indication, of the value of what one has undertaken or the action one is doing. Truly, for someone who has an entire goodwill, that is, who in all sincerity, with the whole conscious part of his being, wants to do the right thing in the right way, there is always an indication; if for some reason or other one launches upon a more or less fatal action, one always feels an uneasiness in the region of the solar plexus; an uneasiness which is not violent, which doesn’t compel recognition dramatically, but is very perceptible to someone who is attentive – something like a sort of regret, like a lack of assent. It may go as far as a kind of refusal to collaborate. Page – 31 But I must stress it, without violence, without brutal self-assertion: it makes no noise, does not hurt; it is at the most a slight uneasiness. And if you disregard it, if you pay no attention, attach no importance to it, after a little while it will completely disappear and there will be nothing any longer. It is not that it increases with the growing error, on the contrary, it disappears and the consciousness becomes veiled. Therefore, one cannot give this as a sure sign, for if you have disobeyed this little indication several times, well, it will no longer come. But I tell you that if in all sincerity you are very attentive to it, then it will be a very sure and precious guide. But if there is an uneasiness, it comes at the beginning, almost immediately, and when it doesn’t show itself, well, no matter what one has started, it is preferable to do it to the very end so that the experience may be complete, unless one receives, as I said, an absolutely precise and categorical indication that it should not be done. Page – 32 |