SACCS-logo
SACCS-logo


WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

—The Supramental light

16 May 1956

—Sweet Mother, Sri Aurobindo has said that one must find [new p. 143]a light within, then surrender to the divine Shakti. [old p. 144]Now that the Supermind has come down, will this be easier?

Well, that is the light within, now.

What is the difficulty? Where do you see any objection or contradiction? What is your difficulty?

How can we understand that it has become easier? What is the effect of this descent?

Well, wait until it occurs in you and you will know it!

All right. Imagine that in a dark room you have put an oil lamp, one which burns oil, as we used to have fifty years ago--we had oil lamps in the rooms, as now there are lanterns; they were a little better but it was the same thing. So you were lighting your room with that, and then suddenly somebody invented the means of lighting it by electricity. So your oil lamp is replaced by a beautiful electric lamp which gives ten times more light.

What is your difficulty, your problem?

You have always had a light to illumine your room--your inner room--but instead of an oil lamp it has become an electric lamp. That's all.

You don't understand? No? It is not very difficult to understand.

One wants to see that light.

To see? Ah!... Enter the room, you will see it.

(Silence)

Mother, after the first question there is a sentence I [old p. 145]don't understand: "And for the rest [they] either detain or confuse us." What is this "rest"? [new p. 144]

Sri Aurobindo is speaking of the mental constructions, representations or conclusions of the intellect, of the suggestions and instigations of the Life-force, of the needs of the body. Now, all this, these half-lights or false lights can serve a little on the path, can help us a little, and only for a while. And all that is not this, all the rest, that is to say, all the countless thoughts and movements, sensations and feelings one has, well, all this is of no use at all. And worse than being quite useless, it detains us on the way, that's all. It confuses us. That is to say, it creates an inner confusion and must be altogether ignored.

All the countless things one thinks, experiences, feels, sees, does... all that is of no use at all. Naturally, if one looks at it from the point of view of yoga.

(Turning to the child who wanted to see the light) You have still another question?

How to enter the room?

You take a key and open the door!

You must find the key.

Or you sit down in front of the door until you have found the word, the idea or the force which opens it--as in the Arabian Nights tales.

It is not a joke, it is very serious. You must sit down in front of the door and then concentrate until you have found the key or the word or the power to open it.

If one doesn't try, it doesn't open by itself. Perhaps after thousands of years, but you want to do it immediately--so? To do it immediately, you must sit down obstinately before the door until you have found the means. It may be a key, it may be a word, it may be a force, it may be anything at all, and you remain there before the door until it opens.[old p. 146]

And you do not think of anything else.

Only of the door. [new p. 145]

Is there no key-hole through which the light can escape?

A key-hole! What do you mean? A chink through which the light can escape?... Perhaps it is escaping, but perhaps no one sees it either!

It is escaping.

But then that's another problem: you must open your eyes. You must learn to open your eyes, to look.

Very small babies do not see, even very small animals do not see, tiny baby kittens do not see. It takes them several hours or several days--they don't see.

You must learn to see.

—xxCollected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 08, pp. 144-46