A collection of short prose pieces on the Mother and her four great Aspects - Maheshwari, Mahakali, Mahalakshmi, Mahasaraswati, along with 'Letters on the Mother'.
Integral Yoga
This volume consists of two separate but related works: 'The Mother', a collection of short prose pieces on the Mother, and 'Letters on the Mother', a selection of letters by Sri Aurobindo in which he referred to the Mother in her transcendent, universal and individual aspects. In addition, the volume contains Sri Aurobindo's translations of selections from the Mother's 'Prières et Méditations' as well as his translation of 'Radha's Prayer'.
THEME/S
In the morning I was feeling that the mind is quite empty. In the afternoon I saw an intense compact golden light there in front, at some distance outside the mind.
The golden light is the promise of the higher knowledge. For the coming of that knowledge the silence of the frontal exterior mind is necessary.
Today I felt that a part of the mind is or can be always open to the higher light, but realisation has to depend on what comes from below and accordingly change in its character and intensity. Remaining for some time in this condition is like seeing the Divine, now apparent in so many things and movements. I understood how it is to be done, but a long time is necessary in order to be established in this consciousness which has no end. Rising higher also becomes a part of this movement. I feel that all will be done, only time is needed for fixing the new consciousness.
Very good.
All that you write on this page is entirely sound and accurate; it shows that you are getting the true knowledge. Most in fact of the day's experiences are signs of the true consciousness coming. The Mother's consciousness with the wideness of the light, the white light in the vital, the golden light in the silence of the outer mind, the change in the vital, the quiet and natural trust and confidence are all signs and circumstances of this opening to the true consciousness. As you say, there must be established
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the fixing of this consciousness. The constant openness of part of the mind to the higher light will bring the silence of the whole mind and it is in the silent mind that the true knowledge will come—and indeed it has begun already to come. The change you note in the vital must also continue.
26 March 1930
I remember that formerly at night I became conscious of the mind rising upward and then I saw many points all around rising up with aspiration, as if each point was aspiring in a different light that was guided by the Mother. Nowadays I think that if there is one aspiration, there will be constant contact.
Yes—one aspiration to live in the Mother's light and force which bring the true knowledge and the true power. If that aspiration is fulfilled, then all else needed can be fulfilled—all the other lights can be contained in the Divine Light.
17 February 1931
Today in meditation my entire body opened and spread out infinitely. I felt a slight uneasiness at first, but I could feel the Mother's force. It carried me deeper and deeper into dense darkness through immense worlds of disgust and depression. Though I felt no peace and joy on this long journey, I continued to walk steadily and swiftly. Someone seemed to say, "Do not be depressed. Walk on, proceed. You have to cross through still darker worlds of disgust and depression, but keep on going." Along with this experience, I felt a great force. My heart opened wide; peace and profound contentment descended into it and I saw white light playing everywhere. Crossing another dark world, I saw a vibrant golden light. How powerful and beautiful that golden light was! My body, mind and heart were satisfied. I felt a sense of fearlessness. A sadhak's life is like the life of a warrior. However long the struggle, whatever the obstacles, we will ascend to the Supreme Truth. Is this the right way to observe my problems and difficulties?
Yes, that is the attitude you have to keep. If it is kept, then
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there will be no disturbance or only a superficial unease. The experience itself was that of the descent of the Mother's light of Divine Consciousness into domains of being which are ignorant or inconscient and obscure. The Mother herself has descended into these domains and moved through them to bring light there.
10 September 1933
This morning during my meditation before the Mother, a very tender feeling rose from within me. She was sitting before us with an ocean of compassion and love which she wants to give away unconditionally and without reserve. But we cannot receive it; and instead of reproaching ourselves for our inability, we put the blame on the Mother, pouring our venom on her which she swallows and offers back to us as Amrita in return.
This experience brought me a mixed feeling of peaceful silence, self-reproach and a touch of sadness. It has remained with me all day, but now I apprehend a reaction; for usually my experiences recede, leaving me with depression or emptiness.
What you felt was an opening of the psychic being in your heart and the perceptions that came to you were perfectly true. The reaction you speak of does often come after an experience. But if the depression can be avoided, emptiness does not matter. Up to a certain stage the nature needs after an experience a quiescent period to assimilate experience. One has then not to be depressed but to remain quiet waiting and aspiring for more experience, more opening, a more continuous flow of the truth.
5 September 1934
Yesterday the whole day I felt an opening far above the head and there the individual Mother became wide and active. I felt the play of various ideas and forces and I felt her assurance that she would manifest in me. But also the intensity led to nervous disturbances. The pressure in my head-nerves was almost unbearable, and even today some disturbance in the physical is there. Is it due to some mistake I have made?
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The Mother "manifesting" in you is an ambiguous expression—it is the Mother's consciousness, the higher consciousness with the light, strength that has to come down in each sadhak, with the Mother's presence always there. Along with this experience there must have been an attempt at surrender or an initial answer in the lower vital, but as a reaction the nervous disturbance came back—the old lower vital nature not being ready to give up possession reasserted its disturbances which were about to abate.
6 November 1934
Sometimes when I sit in meditation, I find that instead of myself, the Mother is sitting. Even my body seems to be that. Pray let me know what it means.
Probably you became aware of some part of your being which feels united with the Mother.
24 August 1935
From the morning I was feeling an intense aspiration to get lost in the Mother's consciousness. Then I felt my consciousness frequently rising and stationing itself above. Before Pranam I felt as if even the parts near the navel and below were being drawn upwards. After Pranam I experienced for some time a different kind of atmosphere almost concretely around me, so I imagined that the Mother may have put a strong spiritual influence on my subconscient and environmental consciousness.
It is very good. You are right about the subconscient and environmental,—for it is there that the influence must fall so that the consciousness may go upward and spread itself out widely in a free peace, light and joy connecting them down to the subconscient with the higher consciousness. It is then that the loss of the ego in the Mother's consciousness becomes possible.
25 September 1935
Over my head I see a plane of infinite and eternal Peace. The Mother is the Queen of this plane. From there I feel a ceaseless
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flow coming down towards me. It first touches the higher being and then the lower parts. When they are prepared, the Peace or silence descends like a current of water which passes through the Brahmic hole.
That is quite correct. In many however it descends in a mass through the whole head and not in a current through the Brahmic hole.
13 February 1936
The experience of a concrete presence of the Mother in the photograph and the immediate effect on the health are things of the subtle physical acting on the physical mind and body—such things can happen only when the physical consciousness has begun to open—that is why I said it was a sign. Of course the full effects of the spiritual experiences can only come when the whole consciousness is entirely open and receives and responds to them. The presence of the Mother in all can be felt when one begins to have the widening of the consciousness in which it is not shut up in the personal self and the body but is extended everywhere. That comes usually with the descent of the higher consciousness from above. But one can also feel a beginning of it through the opening of the psychic. Then of course anger and jealousy do not remain—they fall away from the sense of spiritual oneness.
3 May 1936
X told me that she was in constant touch with the Divine Mother long before she came to Pondicherry. She saw her not only in meditation or vision but before her wide-awake eyes, in a concrete form. She often conversed with her; especially when some difficulty arose, the Mother would come and tell her what to do. If what she says is correct, she must be a very advanced sadhika. How much truth do you find in her experiences and visions?
She has not related them to us. But there is nothing improbable in it. It means simply that she externalised her inner vision and experience so as to see through the physical eyes also, but it was
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the inner vision that saw and the inner hearing that heard, not the physical sight or hearing. That is common enough. It does not indicate an "advanced" sadhana, whatever that phrase may mean, but only a special faculty.
I have heard that there are people here who feel the Mother's presence or open directly to her inner knowledge. But this is not the same as seeing her with the physical eyes or having conversations with her.
These things are extremely common among those who practise Yoga everywhere. In the Asram the sadhaks are too intelligent, sceptical and matter of fact to have much of that kind of experience. Even those who might develop it are repressed by the outward-mindedness and physical-mindedness that dominates the atmosphere.
2 July 1936
The experience you had in your sleep was that of going into the vital world and meeting there one of the hostile vital beings who wished to menace or attack you, but could not attack you because of your call on the Mother. There are two things that must be acquired in these passages through the vital world—first this immediate call on the Mother's protection and, second, the throwing away of all fear. To those who do not fear them, these beings or forces can do nothing—in any meeting or conflict with them the Mother's name is a sure protection even if some fear should come.
The other experience was due to your mind dwelling in the state of the Mother's constant presence and its results. What you say is true, about these results, but it is not easy for the mind or vital or physical consciousness to get or keep the Mother's conscious presence—it is only the psychic that keeps it easily. So the thought brought down a pressure from above and a concentration within in the heart with a healing there and a pain of the yearning within followed by its sweetness. This pain is that of the psychic sorrow or perhaps rather of the psycho-vital
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sorrow and yearning—for the psychic sorrow itself is usually sweet and not painful.
2 August 1936
Nowadays I get an inspiration to see all in the Mother and the Mother in all—to see the Vishwarupa in her as Yashoda saw it in Sri Krishna. Will I ever be able to have this vision?
To see all in the Mother and the Mother in all is a necessary experience in the Yoga. There is no reason why it should not happen.
29 April 1937
Kindly let me know the significance of my frequently coming to the Mother on the vital plane. I suppose the meeting was sometimes on the supraphysical plane. Did my vital come to the Mother for refreshing its energy, for purification, etc.?
This kind of vital coming to the Mother all the sadhaks have in their sleep and dreams, if they are a little conscious there. Even those who are not sadhaks or others who do not know her come, but they are not aware of it. The vital plane is a supraphysical plane—the vital moves about in its own plane and is not limited by the physical mind or its consciousness or experience.
13 July 1937
Kindly enlighten me as to what is the object and what the result of my coming to the Mother on the vital plane during sleep or dream.
It may be for any object or without any specific object—there is no rule in such matters.
14 July 1937
This morning I saw within me a flash of golden light and felt the vivid presence of the Mother. I felt myself to be within her. I felt all to be within me and this "me" was something wider than I as a man.
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To have that is very important—to get into something wider than the I as a man—into one's own cosmic Self and universal consciousness—in the Mother.
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