25 September 1968

 

I have found some old papers, I do not know what they are. There is an envelope from you.

 

It is a question on Aphorisms.

“When I hear of a righteous wrath, I wonder at man's capacity for self-deception.''  

Sri Aurobindo, Thoughts and Aphorisms 

It is wonderful!

 

There was a question: “It is always ‘in good faith' that one deceives oneself: it is always for the good of others that one acts or in the interest of humanity and for serving you, it goes without saying. How does one come to deceive oneself and how to know it truly?'' ¹

 

It is terribly true.

Even yesterday, without even reading it, I had a long vision on the subject; it is astonishing. But it was on such a different plane....

Yes, when you take the higher part of your mind as judge of your action, then you can “deceive yourself in good faith''. That is to say, the mind is incapable of seeing the truth and it judges by its own capacity, which is limited – not only limited but unconscious of the truth; so for the mind, it is in good faith, it does as well as it can. It is this.

Naturally, for those who are fully conscious of their psychic, it is not possible to deceive themselves, for if they refer their problem to the psychic, they can from there have the divine answer. But even for those who are in relation with their

 

 ¹ Mother's answer to this question is published in On Thoughts and Aphorisms, Cent. Vol. 10, pp. 80-82.

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 psychic, the answer has not the same character as the mind's, which is precise, categorical, absolute, asserting itself; it is something more of a tendency than an assertion, something which can still have different interpretations in the mind.

I come back to my experience of yesterday. After having looked at it, I came to the conclusion that it is impossible to reproach a human being who does as well as he can according to his consciousness, for how can he go beyond his consciousness?... This is just the error that the majority of people make: they judge one another according to their own consciousness, but the other has not their consciousness! Therefore they cannot judge (I speak only of people of goodwill, naturally). According to the vision of a more total or higher consciousness, another person deceives himself, but according to the person himself, he does to the utmost whatever he believes he must do.

This amounts to saying that it is absolutely impossible to lay the blame upon anyone who acts sincerely according to his own limited consciousness. And in fact, if we come to that, everyone in the world has a limited consciousness, excepting the Consciousness. It is only the Consciousness which is not limited. But every manifestation is necessarily limited, unless it comes out of itself and unites itself with the supreme Consciousness, then there... In what conditions can that be done?

It is the problem of identification with the Supreme, which is the Supreme One – One which is All.

 

(Silence)

 

There is a whole side of human thought that has the conception that identification with the supreme Consciousness can come only by annulling the individual creation, but Sri Aurobindo precisely has said that it is possible without abolishing the creation. They have this notion that creation must be abolished, for they limit the creation to the human level – it is impossible for man, but it is possible for the supramental being.  

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And it is this that will make the supramental being essentially different: he will be able, without losing a limited form, to unite his consciousness with the supreme Consciousness.

But for man, it is impossible. That I know.

As I have said, you have it, you have the experience, but as soon as you want to express it, it is gone, it becomes again... (gesture of being closed). That is to say, the substance of which we are built up is not sufficiently purified, enlightened, transformed (it does not matter what word) to express the supreme Consciousness without deforming it.  

(Silence. Mother enters into an experience.)

 

It is a certain opacity in Matter, in the substance that makes it unable to manifest the Consciousness... and it is this same (I do not know how to say it) opacity that gives it the sense of existing.

This is part of the experience of these last days. I have lived for... I do not know, for weeks, in a kind of fluidity – transparent fluidity – and as this transparent fluidity is replaced by this something that I call now “opacity'', there comes a kind of concretisation of the existence of the body.

So, the direct contact of the psychic being with the substance of the body, without any intermediary, gives the sensation... is it a “sensation''? I do not know; it is not a sensation, it is not a perception; it is a kind of “felt vision'' (and this vision is very precise, very precise) of the value of vibrations in relation to a higher vibration which is (all that I can say about it) more directly the expression of the supreme Vibration.

It is very difficult to express, but the body is going through an experience which it never had; it is as though passing from an imprecision to a precision, from a kind of fluidity to... it is not a concrete thing, but from a thing fluid – fluid and imprecise – to a thing precise. All the happenings (no matter how small), which vary, are the occasion for a new perception. Before,

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everything was fluid and imprecise; now it is beginning to be more precise – more precise, more exact. But it loses a little of its fluidity.

It is very difficult to express.

I had never thought of it. It is strange, it is not willed. Just now I have had the experience. So it is not yet very clear.

Indeed, the mind gives a precision that is lacking when it is not there. Its role in creation is just to give precision, to explain, and at the same time to limit.

 

An ordinary mind could ask: “But what is the advantage of this imprecision?”

 

There is no advantage!

It is altogether certain that when the Supramental manifests, it will replace the mental precision (how to say it?) that diminishes – the precision that limits and therefore falsifies things in part – by a clarity of vision, another kind of vision that does not diminish. It is that which is being built up.

Indeed, it can be said (it is not exactly this): in order to give precision, the mind limits and separates; and evidently there is a precision that can come from a more exact vision, without division and without separation. And it is that precision which will be the precision of the supramental vision. With the precision will come, at the same time, the vision of the relation of all things to one another, without separating them.

But that is something in preparation. It comes as a flash, for a minute, and then lapses back into its old way.

The same can be said of the vital. The vital gives an intensity which nothing else seems capable of giving; well, this same intensity exists in the Supramental, but without division. It is an intensity that does not separate.

These two experiences I have had, but very momentarily. These are things that are being worked out just at present. 

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23 November 1968

 

I have had an interesting experience.... Not last night, but the night before, someone, whom I shall not name, told me, “I am wholly down in the physical consciousness: no more meditation, and the Divine has become something up there, so far away.'' Then immediately, as he was speaking, the whole room got filled with the divine Presence. I told him, “Not up there: here, here itself.'' And at that moment, everything, the whole atmosphere... it was as though the air had changed into the divine Presence (Mother touches her hands, her face, her body), well, everything was touched, touched, pervaded, but with... the thing that was particularly there was a dazzling Light, a Peace like this (gesture of massiveness), a Power, and then a Sweetness... something... one had the feeling that it could melt a rock.

And it did not go away. It stayed.

It came in that way, and then it stayed.

And so the whole night it was like that – everything. Even now, the two are there: a little of the ordinary consciousness, as if in a mechanical way, but I have only to be quiet or concentrated for a moment and it is there. And it is the experience of the body, you understand, physical, material, the experience of the body: everything, everything is full, full; there is only That, and we are like... everything is as though shrivelled, a dried up rind, something like that, dried up. One has the feeling that things are (not entirely, but superficially) hardened, dried up, and that is why you do not feel That. That is why you do not feel Him; otherwise, all is That, That, there is nothing but That. You cannot breathe without breathing Him in; you move, it is within Him that you move; you are... everything, everything, the whole universe is within Him – but materially, physically, physically.

It is the cure for this “drying up'' that I am now looking for.

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---

I feel it is something fantastic, do you understand?

And then when I listen, He tells me things also. I said to Him, “But then why do people always go up there?'' And with the most extraordinarily unusual humour the answer comes: “Because they want me to be very far from their consciousness!'' Things like that, but not formulated in such a precise manner: impressions only. Many a time – many – I had heard: “Why do they go so far in search of what is'' – of course there are tenets that said: It is within you  “what is everywhere?''

I did not say it to this person, first because the experience was not, as it is now, a continuous thing.

And then there was this particularly: no new religions, no dogmas, no fixed teachings. One must avoid – one must avoid at all cost the thing becoming a new religion. Because as soon as it is formulated in a way that is elegant and imposing and has a force, it would be the end.

You have the feeling that He is everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, everywhere; there is nothing else. And we do not know it because we are... shrunken, I do not know how to say it, dried up. We have made great efforts (Mother laughs) to separate ourselves – and succeeded ! Succeeded, but succeeded only in our consciousness, not in fact. In fact, It is there. It is there. There is nothing but That. Whatever we know, whatever we see, whatever we touch, it is as though bathing, floating in That; but it is penetrable; it is penetrable, quite penetrable: That passes through it. The sense of separation comes from this (Mother touches her forehead, indicating the mind).

The experience came, perhaps, because for several days there was a very great concentration to find out, not exactly the why or the how, but the fact, the fact of the separation, everything appearing so stupid, so ugly.... I was assailed, assailed by various living memories of all kinds of experiences (all kinds: books, pictures, cinemas, and life, people, things), memories of this body, all the memories that might be called “anti-divine'',  

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in which the body had the sensation of something that was repulsive or evil, like negations of the divine Presence. It began in that way; for two days I was like that, so much so that the body almost sank into despair. And then the experience came and after that it did not move. It did not budge. It came: brrff ! finished, and it did not budge. Well, the experiences come and then they withdraw: it did not move. At this moment it is there. And then the body tries to be fluid (Mother makes a gesture of pouring herself out), it tries to melt; it tries, it understands what it is. It tries – it does not succeed, evidently ! (Mother looks at her hands), but its consciousness knows.

Only, the experience has its effects: people have felt relief all of a sudden; one or two were completely cured. And when something goes wrong in the body, it need not ask: quite naturally it is set right.

And that has not even given to the body the need to do nothing and be wholly concentrated upon its experience: no, there is no desire, nothing at all. Like this, to float in a luminous immensity... which is within ! It is not only outside: it is within. It is within. That (Mother touches her hands), that which appears as separate, truly the feeling is that it is... I do not know how to say it, but it is real only in the distortion of the consciousness, but not the human consciousness: something has happened, something has happened in the consciousness.... (Mother shakes her head) I do not understand.

 

(Silence)

 

All the theories and explanations and stories that lie at the base of each religion, all that seems to me... an amusement. And then one wonders, one wonders... I will tell you one thing: might it not be a comedy that the Lord has played to Himself?

But it is difficult to say. I have had days when I have lived truly all the horrors of creation (and in the consciousness of their horror), and then that has brought this experience, and...  

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all the horror has disappeared.

And these were not at all psychological things, but rather physical sufferings, yes, particularly physical suffering. I have seen it – a physical suffering that lasts, that does not stop, that lasts day and night. And then all of a sudden, instead of being in this state of consciousness, you are in that of this exclusive divine Presence. Pain gone ! And it was physical, altogether physical, with a physical reason. Yes, the doctors would say, “It is because of this, because of that and that'', quite a material thing, altogether physical; and pouf ! it goes away.... The consciousness changes and back it comes.

If one remains sufficiently long in the true consciousness, the appearance, that is to say, what we call physical “fact'', that itself disappears, not merely the pain.... I feel as though I had touched (there is no mind which understands, thank God !), I had touched the central experience.

Only, it is just a small beginning.

One would have the feeling, one would be certain of having touched the supreme Secret only if the physical were transformed.... According to the experience (just the little experience of a detail), it must be like that. And then, will it be at first one body in which this Consciousness will express itself, or should all, all be transformed?... A phenomenon of consciousness.

But it is so concrete, yes, it is that !  

(Silence)

 

Only, the other consciousness is still there.... Now this morning, I saw a considerable number of people. As each one came, I was looking at him (there was no “I'' that was looking: for him it was so, I was looking at him), the eyes were fixed and then it was the perception and the vision (but not the vision as one understands it: it is altogether a phenomenon of consciousness), the consciousness of the Presence, the Presence that 

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 penetrates this kind of shell, the hard thing; it penetrates, it penetrates, it is everywhere; and then when I am looking, when the eyes are fixed, that becomes something like a concentration.¹ But this is certainly an altogether temporary and intermediary state, because the other consciousness (the consciousness which sees things and deals with them, which is busy with them as usual, only with the perception of what is happening in the individual, what he is thinking – not so much what he is thinking, but what he is feeling, how he is), that is there. Evidently this too is necessary in order to maintain the contact, but...

Obviously, it is still an experience, it is not an established fact. What I mean by “established fact'' is the consciousness established in such a way that nothing else exists, that that alone is present  it is  – not yet so.  

(Long silence) 

And you? What have you got to tell me?

 

I felt a change in the atmosphere.  

Ah!  

 

Oh, yes. It is now five or six days that I had the feeling of something overwhelming (Mother laughs), overwhelming. And last night, it was rather bizarre, at one moment I saw you, you were lying fully stretched upon the ground, flat. Then I came near you and asked, “Don't you want a cushion under your head?'' You told me, “No, nothing.'' And you were lying flat on the ground... What does that mean?

 

(Mother remains silent for a long time and does not answer.)

 

¹ A concentration of the Presence. 

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But this notion of the Supramental “coming down'', and a Consciousness “having entered'', is our translation.... The experience came as the experience of an eternal fact, not at all as a thing that was happening. All that must be the outcome of states of consciousness, certainly. Whether there is something beyond, I do not know, but in any case, of this I had the positive experience. These are movements of consciousness. Why, how?... I do not know. Only, if one looks from the other side, the fact that something belonging to this earthly domain as it is has become conscious, gives the impression that something has “arrived''.... I do not know if I can make myself understood... I mean to say that this body is absolutely like all the rest of the earth, but it happens that for some reason it has become conscious in the other way: well, that normally must translate itself in earthly consciousness as an “arrival'', a “descent'', a “beginning''.... But is it a beginning? What is it that has “arrived''?... You understand, there is nothing but the Lord (I call it “Lord'' because of the convenience of language, for otherwise…), there is nothing but the Lord, there is nothing else, nothing else exists. All things happen within Him, consciously. And we are like... grains of sand in this Infinity; only we are the Lord with the capacity to be conscious of the Lord's consciousness. That is exactly what it is.

 

(Silence)

 

Before this experience, at the time when I was in the consciousness of all the sufferings, the horrors of physical life, at a certain moment something came (which did not “speak''; one is obliged to use words, but all this happens without mentalisation), it was an impression: if I translated, I would say, “Aren't you afraid of going mad?'' You understand? It is only a translation. And then the body answered spontaneously: “We are all mad, we cannot become more mad than we are!'' And forthwith, it became calm. 

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(Long silence)

 

It is here that this consciousness lies (Mother points to the chest). That (Mother points to the mind and above) is light, light (gesture of wideness). But in this body, it is here that it lies, this consciousness (Mother points again to the chest). I mean the consciousness... that one is in the Lord.

I know, the consciousness that is there knows that this way of speaking is altogether childish, but it prefers this childish way to something that would try to be exact and would be mental. 

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