It's neither life nor death.. BOTH are being changed.. into something still unknown.. dangerous and wonderful. On Nov 17, 1973, she left her body - why?
"Before dying falsehood rises in full swing. Still people understand only the lesson of catastrophe. Will it have to come before they open their eyes?" This is the year of Watergate, of Nixon's first trip to China, the assassination of the Israeli athletes in Munich, the first oil embargo. This is Mother's last lap. A lap strewn with heartrending little cries and stunning visions. The end of one world, the beginning of another.... whether we want it or not. "Sometimes, it is so new and unexpected, it's almost painful." And I would ask her, "But is it a state outside matter?" "I don't go outside of physical life, but.... it looks different. But it is strange. And it is PHYSICAL, that is the extraordinary thing! As if the physical had split in two.... A new state in matter. And it is ruled by something that is not the sun, I don't know what it is.... I am touching another world. Another way of being.... dangerous but wonderful." How I listened to her little breath as she gasped for air, a breath that seemed to come from another side of the world: "There is no difference between life and death. It's neither life nor death, it is.... something. It is not the disappearance of death you understand: BOTH are being changed.... into something still unknown, which seems at once extremely dangerous and absolutely wonderful." And what if "death" were merely the other, MATERIAL side of our human bowl, the sunlit shore for a species to come? A new condition on both sides of the world, in which life and death change into.... something else? "I am treading a very thin and narrow line...." And then this cry, this entreaty: "Let me do the work!" On November 17, 1973, she passed away - why?
(The day before, Mother came out on her balcony for the November 24 "darshan.")
How was it yesterday, on the balcony?
(Mother returns the question) How was it?
I don't know.... Seemingly quite good, in any case!
Where were you?
At the door of Sujata's house, downstairs. And for you, how was it?
(long silence)
(Smiling) The apprenticeship of personal nonexistence.
I don't know....
It's difficult.
Yes.
A growing sensation that without the Divine there's no existence.
Forgetting the Divine even for a minute is becoming catastrophic, you see.
Now and then, for a few seconds, the true beatific consciousness comes—but only now and then and for a few seconds. That's all. Otherwise, I am like this (gesture, fists clenched to stand firm in the struggle).
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(silence)
And you?
I have a lot of difficulties with my outer consciousness. I seem to be unable to open it up.
(Mother vigorously nods her head)
And so it's very painful, you know, everything is very painful.
That's it, exactly that! One quite feels the inability of the outer consciousness to participate in the experience... to be up to the mark.
Yes! Exactly, absolutely.
Well, that's my continuous condition.
How to...? And then once a day—once, twice, for a few seconds (tone of amazed wonder): "Oh!..." And it's gone.
Is this... this body to be left and another one built? I don't know.... It doesn't fit with.... I have not been told that it has to be that way.
No.
Although I haven't been told either that this body is capable of transformation. So I don't know.
But Sri Aurobindo did tell you that you would do the work.
(In a dubious tone:) Yes, he told me....
Because if you left, what would we do here? Truly, we are completely useless, there's nothing else to do but leave. Because the only place....
But it has no desire to leave.
Yes, I know, Mother.
It doesn't know, Yet... I can't exactly say I suffer but there's
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constant discomfort.
There's obviously discomfort for you, but for us, the only moments we feel truly alive are those spent with you.
Oh, mon petit... (Mother takes Satprem's hands).
It's true, the factual truth. I know the Grace it is to be here.
(long silence holding Satprem's hands)
That is the conviction the body needs to have: that INDEED it serves some purpose.1
Oh, but of course!... But of course, it does!
You see, being here, with you, is the only moment when one feels... ah, this is IT. IT, you know.
(Mother plunges in still holding Satprem's hands)
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