WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

Conscious surrender

23 July 1958

[...] And there comes a time when one feels a kind of inner guidance, something which is leading one very perceptibly in all that one does. But then, for the guidance to have its maximum power, one must naturally add to it a conscious surrender: one must be sincerely determined to follow the indication given by [new p. 360][old p. 360]the higher force. If one does that, then... one saves years of study, one can seize the result extremely rapidly. If one also does that, the result comes very rapidly. But for that, it must be done with sincerity and... a kind of inner spontaneity. If one wants to try without this surrender, one may succeed--as one can also succeed in developing one's personal will and making it into a very considerable power--but that takes a very long time and one meets many obstacles and the result is very precarious; one must be very persistent, obstinate, persevering, and one is sure to succeed, but only after a great labour.

Make your surrender with a sincere, complete self-giving, and you will go ahead at full speed, you will go much faster--but you must not do this calculatingly, for that spoils everything!

Collected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 09, pp. 359-60