Mother has found the 'new consciousness': 'these cells, other cells, it was life and consciousness everywhere, all bodies were this body!' SALVATION is PHYSICAL.
Now Mother has found the "passage", what she calls "the new consciousness," the one capable of opening up a new world to us, just as the first breaking of the watery mirror by an amphibian opened up a new air to us: "I don't know what is happening, there's a state of intense vibration, like waves of lightning rapidity, so rapid that they see motionless. And then I go off to America, to Europe.... This body has never been so happy: these cells, other cells, it was life everywhere, consciousness everywhere, all bodies were this body!...." And all our physiological misery vanishes by the same token: "There is a sort of dilation of the cells, the sense of boundaries lessons, fades away, and the pains vanish physically." And it isn't "another world," it is this earth, our earth but lived otherwise: "As if we had entered an unreal falsehood, and everything disappears once you get out of it - it simply does not exist! And all the artificial means of getting out of it, including Nirvana, are worthless. SALVATION IS PHYSICAL! It is here, right here. All the rest, death included, really becomes a falsehood - there is no such thing as "disappearing", no "life vs death"!...." And as she breaks through the walls of our bowl, the whole world is in revolt - including Mother's entourage - as if it were under the pressure of a new air: "A considerable number of desires for it to die [Mother's body]; everywhere, they are everywhere!.... The whole gamut of feelings around me, from anxiety, eagerness for it to be over quickly, to impatient desires: free at last!.... I don't want to be put in a box, the cells are conscious.... What is going to happen? I don't know. It runs contrary to all habits." A new species is quite contrary to the old habits of the world - will the world accept it, or wind up killing it off?
(Mother first translates into French the following extract from a letter of Sri Aurobindo:)
"As for immortality, it cannot come if there is attachment to the body,—for it is only by living in the immortal part of oneself which is unidentified with the body and bringing down its consciousness and force into the cells that it can come. I speak of course of yogic means. The scientists now hold that it is (theoretically at least) possible to discover physical means by which death can be overcome, but that would mean only a prolongation of the present consciousness in the present body Unless there is a change of consciousness and change of functionings it would be a very small gain." Sri Aurobindo (Letters on Yoga, 24.1234)
"As for immortality, it cannot come if there is attachment to the body,—for it is only by living in the immortal part of oneself which is unidentified with the body and bringing down its consciousness and force into the cells that it can come. I speak of course of yogic means. The scientists now hold that it is (theoretically at least) possible to discover physical means by which death can be overcome, but that would mean only a prolongation of the present consciousness in the present body Unless there is a change of consciousness and change of functionings it would be a very small gain."
Sri Aurobindo (Letters on Yoga, 24.1234)
(Then Mother listens to a series of questions about death, asked by pupils of the School.)
The first question: "What should we do in our daily life to halt the process of death?"
Well, as Sri Aurobindo has just said, the process is, rather than remain wholly attached to the body, to attach ourselves to the Spirit, and to bring the Spirit down into the body's cells.
The process is to detach one's consciousness from the body and to concentrate it on the deeper life so as to bring this deeper consciousness into the body.
Second question: "If the sense of 'I-ness' has identified more with the mind in life, is it the same sense of 'I-ness' that has all the experiences after death, that is to say, which retains at the same time the memories of its life? I ask the question with
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regard to the mind, since after death it remains formed a little longer than the other parts do."
That's not true. It's not true that the mind lasts longer.
Read it again.
"...Is it the same sense of 'I-ness' that has all the experiences after death?"
No, not at all.
The psychic consciousness that has identified with the small part of the physical is what comes out of this small physical person. Insofar as that consciousness has fashioned one's life, it remembers what it has fashioned, and the memory is closely linked with the psychic consciousness in the past events: whenever the psychic consciousness did not participate in the events, no memory is retained. It's only the psychic consciousness that can continue.
It's not the mind that retains the memories, that's quite wrong.
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