WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

18 December 1971

I heard something written by Sri Aurobindo, saying that for the Supramental to manifest upon earth the physical mind must receive it and manifest it--and it is just the physical mind, that is to say, the body-mind, the only thing that remains in me now. And then, the reason why only this part has remained became quite clear to me. It is on the way to being converted in a very rapid and interesting manner. This physical mind is being developed under the supramental Influence. And it is just what Sri Aurobindo has written, that this is indispensable so that the Supramental can manifest itself permanently upon earth.

So, it is going on well... but it is not easy (Mother laughs).

Yes, this is just the problem which I put to myself; because I have seen one thing, that this transformation is not possible unless there is a sort of radical change of position in the consciousness or a change of view.

Yes.

Unless one sees things and beings in another way.

Yes, yes.

But then I ask myself, how is this possible?

It is possible in this way.

But it must be something very radical.

But it is radical, my child! You can't imagine, it is like... I [old p. 280]could say truly that I have become another person. There is only this [new p. 280](Mother touches the outer form of her body) which remains as it was.... To what extent will it be able to change? Sri Aurobindo has said that if the physical mind were transformed, the transformation of the body would follow quite naturally. We shall see.

But could you give me a key or a lever to bring about this radical change?

Ah! I do not know, because for me everything has simply been taken away from me--the mind has left completely. If you like, in appearance I became stupid, I knew nothing. And it is the physical mind that developed little by little, through successive revelations. For me, I do not know, the work has been done for me--I did nothing. It has been done in a quite radical way.

It could be done because I was very conscious of my psychic (the psychic being which has been formed through all the lives), I was very conscious and it has remained; it has remained and it, precisely, has allowed me to have dealings with men without this making any difference, due to this psychic presence. That is why there has been so little apparent change. So I can say only what I know, and I say this: the psychic must remain there dominating the whole being--the whole bodily being--and guiding the life; then the mental has time to transform itself. My own mind proper has simply been sent away.

Well, the transformation of the body-mind was indispensable because I had only that, nothing more, do you understand?... Very few people would accept that (Mother laughs). As for me, it has been done without asking my opinion. The work was very easy.

That is exactly what has happened.

I would like to have something radical... [old p. 281]

(Mother laughs) But would you accept what has happened to [new p. 281]me, that is to say, the individual, the person, feeling absolutely imbecile?

I am ready.

Would that not make you despair?

No, no--no.

Well, it is a thing that settles itself, so to say, in a permanent way: the nothingness of the person, its absolute nothingness, incapacity. And then you are... you are at ease, you are quite naturally like a child; you say to the Divine: "Do everything for me" (there is nothing else to do, there is nothing else one can do!), then everything becomes all right immediately--immediately.

Well, the body has given itself entirely, it had even said to the Divine: "I pray to you to make me will for my dissolution if I am to die", so that even there I do not resist if it is necessary for the body to die--even to will for my dissolution. That is its attitude, it was like that (gesture with open hands). And instead of that there came a sort of... (I could translate it by words, but they were not words): "If you accept suffering and ailments, transformation is better than dissolution." And so when there is ailment, it accepts.

It is not that, what I say is... it is not really that, but it is something difficult to explain. It is really a new attitude and a new sensation. I am not able to say it.

And evidently, for each one it must be different.... For me it has been very radical--I had no choice, you understand: it was like that, it is like that. There you are.

But one must really... What has made the thing easy is that the psychic consciousness was wholly in front and governed the life. So it continued quietly without being disturbed. [old p. 282]

Likewise for seeing and hearing, I came to know that it was not a physical decline, it was simply this: I understand and hear [new p. 282]people only when they think clearly what they say. And I see only that which is... which expresses the inner life, otherwise it is... hazy or veiled; and it is not that the eyes do not see, it is "something", it is some other thing--everything is new.

(Silence)

It is true, the body must have much goodwill--mine happens to have goodwill. And it is not a mental goodwill, it is truly a bodily goodwill. It accepts all inconveniences.... But it is the attitude that is important, not the consequences (I am sure that the inconveniences are not indispensable); it is the attitude that is important. Well, it must be like this (gesture of open hands). In fact I have found that in the majority of cases surrender to the Divine does not necessarily mean trust in the Divine--because you surrender to the Divine, you say, "Even if you make me suffer, I surrender myself", but it is an absolute lack of trust! Yes, it is really amusing, surrender does not imply trust; trust is something else, it is... a kind of knowledge--an "unshakable" knowledge which nothing can disturb--that it is we who change into difficulties, sufferings and miseries what, in the Divine Consciousness, is... perfect Peace. It is we who bring about this little transformation.

And extraordinary examples have come... hours would be needed to explain.

Indeed it is the consciousness that must change, even the consciousness of the cells, you understand?... That is a radical change.

And we have no words to express that, because that does not exist upon earth--it was latent but it was not manifested. All words are... beside the mark; it is not quite that.

(Silence) [old p. 283]

If you like, one could say that at every minute one has the feeling [new p. 283]that one may live or one may die (gesture of a slight tilt to one side or the other) or one may live eternally. At every minute it is like that. And the difference (between the two sides) is so imperceptible that one cannot say: do this and you will be on this side, do that and you will be on the other side. This is not possible. It is a way of being that is almost indescribable. [Note: On 15 January 1972, at the time of publishing this conversation, Mother added: "That experience is becoming more and more constant--at one time it is this, at another it is that and it has become very acute. At the same time the knowledge (Mother raises her index finger): `This is the moment of winning the Victory', which comes from the psychic and through it from above.... `Hold fast, it is the moment of winning the Victory.' "]

Collected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 11, pp. 279-83

***

22 December 1971

A letter of Sri Aurobindo was read to me in which he said that for the Supramental to be fixed here (he had seen that the Supramental came into him and then it withdrew, and then it came back again and again withdrew--it was not stable); for it to become stable it must enter and settle itself in the physical mind. [Note: Mother may be referring to a passage like the following: "There is too an obscure mind of the body, of the very cells, molecules, corpuscles. Haeckel, the German materialist, spoke somewhere of the will in the atom, and recent science, dealing with the incalculable individual variation in the activity of the electrons, comes near to perceiving that this is not a figure but the shadow thrown by a secret reality. This body-mind is a very tangible truth; owing to its obscurity and mechanical clinging to past movements and facile oblivion and rejection of the new, we find in it one of the chief obstacles to permeation by the supermind Force and the transformation of the functioning of the body. On the other hand, once effectively converted, it will be one of the most precious instruments for the stabilisation of the supramental Light and Force in material Nature."
Letters on Yoga, Cent. Vol. 22, p. 340] It is this work which is being done in me for months now: the mind has been withdrawn and the physical mind has taken its place, and precisely, for some time, I have noticed that it was... (I was telling you that it was seeing everything in a different way, that its relation with things was different), I have noticed that this physical mind, the mind that is in the body, became wide, it had a global view of things, and its entire way of seeing was absolutely different. I have seen, it is this: the Supramental is at work there. I am passing through extraordinary hours.

What is happening is that it is only things that resist--one feels (I have already told you) that it is as though at every moment (and it is becoming stronger and stronger), at every moment: Do you want life, do you want death; do you want life, do you want death?... And it is like that. And then, life, it is union with the Supreme, and the consciousness, an altogether new consciousness comes. And it is this way, it is that [old p. 285]way [new p. 285](Mother makes a gesture of tilting from one side to the other). But yesterday or the day before, I do not know, all of a sudden the body said: No! It is finished--I want life, I want nothing else. And since then, things are getting better.

Oh! Volumes would be needed to narrate what is happening.... It is... extraordinarily interesting and altogether new. New altogether.

(Mother goes deep within.)

Because of physical death, the subconscient is a defeatist. Well, the subconscient has the feeling that whatever be the progress, whatever the effort, it will always end by that, because till today it has always ended that way. So the work that is being done is to try to introduce faith, the certitude of transformation, into the subconscient. And that... it is a struggle of every moment. [new p. 286][old p. 286]

Collected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 11, pp. 284-85