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WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

Domain of death

10 March 1954

What is the difference between entering consciously into death and consciously going out of one's body? Many people can go out of their body, can't they?

Yes, but they don't all go into the world of death.

Is it the same method as for going out of one's body?

Yes, but that is only the beginning. One begins by learning how to go out of one's body. Many people, when they sleep, go out of their body. They do it more or less consciously--the majority unconsciously, but still there are a few who do it consciously. They go out of their body but remain in the physical domain. At the most they go into some mental region but they do not go into the domain of death.

There are some who go there, but then, for the process to be complete... you must know that when one goes out of one's body, one remains tied to the body by a certain number of links--what shall I call them? They may be vital links, links of the mind, psychic links--when one goes out, it can be all kinds of things which go out of the body. Usually what goes out is something quite subtle, like the mind or the higher vital, and much remains in the body, enough for the body not to enter into [old p. 53]trance. Among sleepers some even move about often in their sleep: there is one part of their being which is exteriorised but the most material part of their vital being is in the body. And as [new p. 53]long as that is there, it is altogether in the domain of life. First of all, it is not easy to detach from the body exactly that part which leaves it at the moment of death. This asks for a very rigorous discipline practised for a very long time. There is a process of exteriorisation to follow in order to succeed in making all the parts which leave at death go out; and in this case the body enters into a cataleptic state. It goes into the state in which it is found when one dies. It even becomes very rapidly completely rigid. Well, this is something one must learn to do, and it is not very easy; and if one wants to do it quite completely, somebody must always be there to watch the body so that nothing may happen. One can never do it all alone. Somebody must be there to guard the body.

But even if one does all that, that is not quite the experience I am speaking about. The experience I am speaking about is still much more difficult. Once one has gone out like that and left his body in a cataleptic state, one cuts the links. So, one is really dead; that is, the heart beats no longer. But as there is still "the life of the form", and it is not through an accident that one has left, as it is by an act of will with knowledge and power, one can force one's way back, re-establish the connection and come back forcibly into one's body. It is not a comfortable business--the whole thing is difficult. Like that, on paper it seems to be nothing at all. But it is not easy.

You have said here: "It is within the reach of so few." So this means there are people who have done it. Hence they have attained immortality, but so far...

Immortality! No, I have not said that this was immortality. I have said that they got rid of all fear of death. That is quite a different thing. [old p. 54]

But they enter the domain of death, don't they? [new p. 54]

Yes, but at that moment the body is in a good condition. The body is in good order and one can find it again--it is not a question of remaining outside for long like that!

But they have had the experience, so when they really die they try once again the same thing?

If their body is in good condition. But usually, when one dies something has happened to the body, you know. There is something seriously out of order in the body. But still, it is not yet certain that having gone out of one's body, one cannot keep the ability to put what is disturbed back into order unless it is something very serious like a stab in the heart or when the head's cut off! That is grave enough but still if the body remains intact, if it is only a disequilibrium, it can be re-established.

Mother, what happens if the links are broken?

If the links are broken?--One dies.

But the part that has gone out of the body?

That, if it is conscious, remains absolutely conscious. It has its own independent life, it remains absolutely conscious. Cut off or not, that changes nothing in its life. It does not give it more consciousness, does not take away any from it--the consciousness it has, the knowledge it has, the power it has, these it keeps. One who is able to do this does not depend upon the body. That is, in order to be conscious, one does not depend at all--at all--upon the body. He has an altogether independent consciousness.

"Domain of death" means what? [old p. 55]

Every religion has spoken about it differently. The Greeks had their "Elysium", one crossed over in a "boat". There are all the paradises, all the hells. [new p. 55]

No, not religions.

Generally, "domain of death" is the name given to a certain region of the most material vital into which one is projected at the moment one leaves one's body. The part--how to put it?--of one's life that's usually the most conscious is projected there at the moment of death. Well, that region, that material vital world is very dark, it is full of adverse formations having desires at their centre or even adverse wills, and these are very, very elemental entities which have a very fragmentary life and are like vampires, in the sense that they feed on all that is thrown out from human beings. And so, at that moment, from the shock of death--for very few die without a shock, go out consciously, in full knowledge of the thing, there are not many such--usually it is an accident: a last accident; well, at that shock of death, those entities rush in upon this, upon this vitality that goes out, and feed upon it. So long as a person is alive, they cannot touch him. For, you have all had the experience of a nightmare in which, when the situation becomes really very dangerous, suddenly you wake up--you come back into your body, for the body is your protection. In the physical they can do nothing to you but when you are completely outside the physical (and even this link I spoke about serves as a protection to a certain extent when you go out), but if the links are broken and you are entirely without a body, well, unless you take advantage of special circumstances... as for instance when a person is much loved by others who are yet alive; if at that moment these people who love him concentrate their thought and love on the departed one, he finds a refuge therein, and this protects him completely against those entities; but one who passes away without anyone's having a special attachment for him, either because he is surrounded by [old p. 56]people he has harmed and who do not love him or by people who are in a terribly unconscious state--he is like a prey delivered to these forces. And that indeed is an experience that's difficult to bear. They cannot touch anything [new p. 56]else except what belongs to their own domain, that is, the most material vital--the higher vital escapes them altogether, they can do nothing there. And so, this material vital goes out but the other remains; and this higher vital is attacked by other dangers, simply that. And if it also disappears, the mind remains. But behind all this is the psychic being which nothing can touch, which is above all possible attacks, and it indeed is free to go where it wants. Usually--unless it has a special opportunity and has reached a state of complete development--it goes to rest in the psychic worlds. There it enters into a kind of beatific contemplation in which it remains, and this is an assimilation of all its experiences, and when it has finished assimilating them and resting, well, it starts preparing to come down again for a new life. That being nothing can touch. But so very few are conscious of their psychic that one can hardly say that it is such and such a person whom one has known, for people as we know them are made of what?--of all their physical experiences, all their vital reactions, all their mental formations--that is, the body, the character, the thought--and with these we have a human being! Well, all that cannot persist after death unless it is organised and centralised around the psychic being and to the extent it is perfectly unified with the psychic. Otherwise all this mixture is dissolved and the psychic being alone remains, at times just as a flame, at times as a completely conscious being.

This of course is the general law. Now there are bridges, as it were, "protected passages" which have been built in the vital world in order to cross over all these dangers. There are atmospheres which receive people leaving their body, give them shelter, give them protection. There are all kinds of other conditions; what I have told you just now is the normal state of those who die, of ordinary human beings, but as soon as we come to a [old p. 57]little higher type of humanity, all these conditions change. The general law remains unless there is a special higher development within the being. There are people with so total a cohesion in [new p. 57]their being that they no longer depend upon the body--not at all--whether it be there or not there.

But all this development does not come about just like that, simply by thinking about it from time to time, desiring it still less often and forgetting it most of the time--no, it is not like that that it can happen. These are disciplines, I may say, at least as arduous as the strictest spiritual disciplines.... Essentially it is for this that we are on the earth. Truly speaking, human beings were made for this purpose, to do that work, and it is perhaps because they refuse to do it that there is so much chaos in the world. If they did it truly, things would go much better.