The Mother's brief written statements on various aspects of spiritual life including some spoken comments.
This volume consists primarily of brief written statements by the Mother on various aspects of spiritual life. Written between the late 1920s and the early 1970s, the statements have been compiled from her public messages, private notes, and correspondence with disciples. About two-thirds of them were written in English; the rest were written in French and appear here in English translation. The volume also contains a small number of spoken comments, most of them in English. Some are tape-recorded messages; others are reports by disciples that were later approved by the Mother for publication.
The movement that stores up and concentrates is no less needed than the movement that spreads and diffuses.
13 April 1935
Concentration does not aim for any effect, but is simple and persistent.
Concentration on a precise goal is helpful to development.
The more we concentrate on the goal, the more it blossoms forth and becomes precise.
The Yogi knows by his capacity for a containing or dynamic identity with things and persons and forces.
11 April 1935
"Knowledge can only come by conscious identity, for that is the only true knowledge,―existence aware of itself."1
There is always some kind of unconscious identification with the surrounding people and things; but by will and practice one can learn to concentrate on somebody or something and to get consciously identified with this person or this thing, and
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through this identification you know the nature of the person or the thing.
20 May 1955
Nothing is impossible for one who is attentive.
It is said that the faculty of concentrated attention is at the source of all successful activity. Indeed the capacity and value of a man can be measured by his capacity of concentrated attention.2
In order to obtain this concentration, it is generally recommended to reduce one's activities, to make a choice and confine oneself to this choice alone, so as not to disperse one's energy and attention. For the normal man, this method is good, sometimes even indispensable. But one can imagine something better.
At times I try to silence the mind, at times to surrender and at times to find my psychic being. Thus I cannot fix my attention on a single thing. Which one should I try first?
All should be done and each one when it comes spontaneously.
16 October 1964
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