WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

Death, individuality and ego

17 May 1969

Is it possible that the individuality gets dissolved after death?

These notions about individuality... they are very much changed for me, very much. Even the whole of this morning... But for a long time, for at least a month, it has been different.

When people speak of individuality, there is always as though... at least in the background, some separation, that is to say, something existing independently and having its own destiny. But now, as the consciousness in this body knows it, it is almost like a pulsation of "something" which for the moment has a separate action, but is at bottom, in essence always one; as something which is projected like this (gesture of expansion) for the moment with a form, and then which can (gesture of contraction), can at will annul this form. It is very difficult to explain, but in any case the feeling of the permanence of the separation has disappeared altogether. The universe is an exteriorisation (same gesture of pulsation) of the Supreme Consciousness; it is our incapacity for a total vision which gives us the sense of fixity; it is not there, it is something like pulsations or... in fact, it is a play of forms--there is only one Being. There is only one Being, only one, only one Consciousness, only one Being. The separation, it is truly... I do not know what has happened. And it is this that has done all the mischief--all the unhappiness, all the misery.... This body has just passed, for some days, through a series of experiences (too long to narrate), through all the states of consciousness that one can pass through, starting from the sense of the sole reality of that (Mother pinches her skin with her hand), of the substance, with all the miseries, all the suffering resulting from the belief that Matter is the sole reality; from that up to the liberation. It has been, hour after hour, a labour. [new p. 166][old p. 166]

But even before this, the consciousness of the cells had realised the unity, the true essential unity, which could become total if this sort of illusion disappeared. Indeed, the illusion that created this misery was lived so intensely that it became almost unbearable, with all the horrors and frightfulnesses created by it in the human consciousness and upon earth.... There had been things... frightful. And just after--just after--the liberation.

What still remains to be lived, that is to say, the experience still to be realised is... the next forward move of creation, of Matter--the next step to return to the true Consciousness. That, it is...

It seems decided that something like a beginning, or a trial experience, is about to be gone through (Mother touches her body).

It is a question of the intensity of faith and of the power to bear which this faith gives. All depends on the capacity of passing through the necessary experiences.

In any case, all the old notions, the old ways of understanding things, all that is gone, gone for good, has passed away.

And all that necessarily is the way of return; one had to go through that, one has still to go through that--but not the same thing, but always moving forward until one can... until that is capable of living the Truth. I do not know, the feeling is that it is moving as fast as it is possible to go; truly the Consciousness is at work making us move as fast as it is possible. It is no longer the hour of a lingering somnolence.

(Long silence)

But by individuality I do not mean an ego; I mean the something which remains the same through all lives, the same thing which progresses through all lives, following up its growth. [new p. 167]

That, it is the Supreme. [old p. 167]

Yes, but there is something which...

It is the Supreme conscious of Himself...

Yes.

... partially.

Yes, that's it, there is something...

The Supreme conscious of Himself partially.

That follows a path of growth.

Yes, that is the process.

It is the process which has been used for the evolution.

Yes, it is that which I call individuality.

That is understood. That is the process, that has been the process of the creation.

Because it was the process of the creation, men confused it with...

Separation.

Separation, ego.

But that,[Note: This "something" which persists.] it is evident. That remains, that cannot disappear.

(Silence)

What is going to happen, I do not know. [new p. 168]

The body is not concerned at all with itself; it is like this (Mother opens out her hands), it is all the time: "What Thou [old p. 168]willest, Lord, what Thou willest"... and with a smile and a perfect joy--like this, like this, like this (Mother makes a gesture indicating this side of the world or the other side or all kinds of other sides). Very strangely, it has been given a consciousness having nothing to do with time; you understand, there is no more "when it was not", no more "when it will not be", no more... it is not like that, it is wholly something moving. But truly this is very interesting. And all, all these reactions, sensations, feelings, all this has changed altogether, changed even in appearance. It is a different thing.

Well, the states in which one could be when one is in the highest consciousness, those that united, those that were automatically one with the Supreme Consciousness, that possessed the consciousness of all--that state has become the natural state of the body. Effortless, spontaneous: it cannot be otherwise. So what is going to happen, how is that going to be translated? I do not know.

It is contrary to all habits.

Does this consciousness know what has to be done materially?... I do not know. But the body does not concern itself with it; it goes on doing from second to second what it has got to do, without putting questions. No complications, no planning, nothing, nothing.

There you are.

We shall see; it is interesting.

Collected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 11, pp. 165-168