My Savitri work with the Mother

29 February 1960

29.2.60

THE GOLDEN DAY

Dorinavant, le 29 fevrier sera le jour du Seigneur.
Henceforth the 29th of February
will be the day of the Lord.

On the outside of the folder she had written:

27.2.60

To My dear little child Huta
with love and blessings

This is what I shall distribute on the 29th February.

Your parcel has just arrived bringing all the nice things for my birthday. They have been fully appreciated.

Inside the folder there was a message in French on the left side and its translation , in English on the right:

During the Common Meditation on Wednesday the 29th February 1956

This evening the Divine Presence, concrete and material, was there present amongst you. I had a form of living gold, bigger than the universe, and I was facing a huge and massive golden door which separated the world from the Divine.

As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that the time has come,' and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow, one single blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces.

Then the supramental Light and Force and Consciousness rushed down upon earth in an uninterrupted flow

29.2.1960

The Mother

Here I recall the following verses from Savitri, Book One, Canto 2:

The great World-Mother now in her arose:
A living choice reversed fate's cold dead turn,
Affirmed the spirit's tread on Circumstance,
Pressed back the senseless dire revolving Wheel
And stopped the mute march of Necessity. ||4.47||
A flaming warrior from the eternal peaks
Empowered to force the door denied and closed
Smote from Death's visage its dumb absolute
And burst the bounds of consciousness and time. ||4.48||

The Mother has emphasised in her writing:

The manifestation of the Supramental upon earth is no more a promise but a living fact, a reality.

It is at work here, and one day will come when the most blind, the most unconscious, even the most unwilling shall be obliged to recognise it.

There was a meeting at Doris's. All the people present read the message the Mother had sent me. They were highly appreciative. It was a luminous day for us. That very night I wrote a letter to the Mother.

“My dearest Mother,

Pranam.

Please accept my gratitude for sending me messages and Bulletins unfailingly.

I am extremely happy you liked the things I had sent you.

In the depth of my heart there is always a stream of love for you, flowing serenely, sweetly.

Outwardly I am meeting with hideous difficulties and setbacks.

Harrowing experiences, confusions and sufferings have besieged me.

Now gradually I am waking up to the fact that I cannot sail along in a smooth and tranquil sea expecting everything to be marvellous.

Ma, I feel empty—as if I have forgotten my goal. I do await the new page of my life to be turned by the Supreme.

Believe me, I am far from doing worthwhile things. My heart grieves with sorrow.

Your Force, Grace and Love make me go on—and I live. Again and again I thank you for loving me.

Yours, Huta”

February gave way to a wild and windy March. The chilliness increased in the air. Everything was freezing—these were the days of solitude and silence. Snow whirled and spattered against my windows. Often I longed to curl up on my couch with many blankets over me. Now I was at Mrs. Bee's House. My room was big and centrally heated. I telephoned Aunt Margaret asking her to accompany me and help in my enrolment at St. Martin's School of Art.

We stood in the queue together. Then after paying the fees and filling the form we went to the school canteen for a cup of tea. I told Aunt that if I could get accommodation in the YWCA—Young Women's Christian Association—at Great Russell Street it would be convenient for me because it was close to my colleges. She promised me that she would inquire and let me know.

Three times a week in the evening I started going to St. Martin's School of Art, which was a huge place. I came across a few interesting professors. One of them was very short—hardly five feet tall—and was extremely humorous. I entered his class which was ice-cold. There were quite a number of students busy with their work. He welcomed me and gave me a place near a nude who was reclining luxuriously on a couch. I was asked to sketch her. I felt awkward and uneasy, because I did not know how to draw a human figure properly. After several attempts, at last I sketched her. The professor saw my work and remarked: "Why, Miss Hindocha, do you think that eyes must be on the forehead?" The whole class was in a roar of laughter, along with the model. I was taken aback but soon regained my composure. Now it was up to me to show the professor my skill in conveying my vision of her. He then altered it a little and advised me: "You should practise drawing human figures more and more. You must join the exclusive drawing class. Here you are doing drawing and painting both. You see, all artists must learn the human figure accurately."

After I had finished the painting the model got up and examined it. She also went around to peep at everybody else's painting. It was the intermission. We were still fumbling with our painting materials. Meanwhile the model wore her dressing gown and left for a cup of tea.

I joined another class. Here an old man came and sat beside me. He taught me how to draw holding my hand, which I disliked. As a matter of fact, he did all the sketches. I learnt nothing. I left the class.

I found yet another class of life drawing. It was a big hall with a dais, chairs, benches, stands and stools. I saw a nude model seated on a narrow stool. She was pregnant, in her last months. I felt uncomfortable when I drew her, because I had to look at her constantly in order to capture her in my sketch book.

There were men models whose physiques were superb. They were tall, with broad shoulders and muscular chests, tapering down to lean hips and long legs. Young women nudes were symmetrically charming and beautiful. I marvelled at the seriousness of the young students who never raised their voices or passed any vulgar remarks. There was always a total hush save for muffled instructions by professors to the pupils.

"Miss Hindocha, how does it go, eh?" The tall professor asked, filling his pipe with a fine aromatic tobacco. Fishing in his pocket for a lighter, he thumbed it into flame and lit the pipe and drew deeply on it. He came and stood beside my bench, studying my work and offering comments: "Let your drawings flow, use your eyes. There is an art in seeing. To see well is rather difficult — it requires keenness of eyes. Also you should develop skill in your hands."

One day the female nude stood posing near a stand. The students formed a thick semi-circle near her and began sketching. An aged man who was sitting by me told me in his bass-tone: "Miss, hasn't she got a fabulous figure?" I smiled and nodded. This reminds me of Rodin's words on a nude:

"The beauty of a naked woman is the beauty of God."

I was amazed to see old men and women above sixty or seventy coming to learn art so enthusiastically. I believe that in Western countries people go on progressing regardless of their age. They never waste their time.

Apart from the life drawing and portrait paintings, I wished to learn still life painting. I went to the inquiry office and followed one of the queues. Everyone stared at me curiously. I was perplexed. Soon I summoned my common sense and asked a girl who was in front of me whether I was in the right line. She said: "Well, this queue is for models." My God! I slipped out quietly to join the right one. After paying the fees and filling the form, I entered a very big room. There were two sections, so the students could paint whatever they liked: still-life or portrait. As I approached two gentlemen, their attention swerved from their deep discussion to me. I spoke to one of them and showed the form that entitled me to attend his class. The other, a young man, was listening to me intently. When he had heard my account, the person I was addressing chuckled and said: "Sorry, Miss, I am not the professor, but a student." Then he pointed to the young man beside him and informed me: "He is the professor." We three looked at one another and burst out laughing. In fact, the man whom I had taken to be the professor was well suited for the role. He had an elegant trimmed beard, his attire of fine English worsted was dark blue and well cut, the jacket fitted nicely across his shoulders, one hand in his pocket and the other holding a book. He wore the perfect expression of a professor. That was why I had poured out my story to him. I was really struck by his patience as well as the patience of the real professor. They both were typical Englishmen relishing fully the piquant situation. Then I talked to the real one and wished them both good night.

The following evening, I joined the class. Both of them smiled and greeted me. To my disgust, I had to paint dead pigeons. However, I painted them. But most of the painting was done by the professor to show me the true technique. He said: "You must give long and short brush strokes with sensitiveness in your eyes and skill in your hands. Your eyes must act as an intermediary between you and the object and your hands must accomplish what is felt and seen by the eyes." So original and practical! But nothing like what the Mother had taught me. In her Collected Works Vol. 3, pp. 104-107 & 110, she has written about authentic art and answered questions on the relation between art and yoga:

...If you want art to be the true and highest art, it must be the expression of a divine world brought down into this material world. All true artists have some feeling of this kind, some sense that they are intermediaries between a higher world and this physical existence. If you consider it in this light, Art is not very different from Yoga.

The discipline of Art has at its centre the same principle as the discipline of Yoga. In both the aim is to become more and more conscious; in both you have to learn to see and feel something that is beyond the ordinary vision and feeling, to go within and bring out from there deeper things. Painters have to follow a discipline for the growth of the consciousness of their eyes, which in itself is almost Yoga. If they are true artists and try to see beyond and use their art for the expression of the inner world, they grow in consciousness by this concentration, which is not other than the consciousness given by Yoga. Why then should not Yogic consciousness be a help to artistic creation?...

There is one way in which Yoga may stop the artist's productive impulse. If the origin of his art is in the vital world, once he becomes a Yogi he will lose his inspiration or rather, the source from which his inspiration used to come will inspire him no more, for then the vital world appears in its true light; it puts on its true value, and that value is very relative. Most of those who call themselves artists draw their inspiration from the vital world only; and it carries in it no high or great significance. But when a true artist, one who looks for his creative source to a higher world, turns to Yoga, he will find that his inspiration becomes more direct and powerful and his expression clear and deeper. Of those who possess a true value the power of Yoga will increase the value, but from one who has only some false appearance of art even that appearance will vanish or else lose its appeal. To one earnest in Yoga, the first simple truth that strikes his opening vision is that what he does is a very relative thing in comparison with the universal manifestation, the universal movement. But an artist is usually vain and looks on himself as a highly important personage, a kind of demigod in the human world. Many artists say that if they did not believe what they do to be of a supreme importance, they would not be able to do it. But I have known some whose inspiration was from a higher world and yet they did not believe that what they did was of so immense an importance. That is nearer the spirit of true art. If a man is truly led to express himself in art, it is the way the Divine has chosen to manifest in him, and then by Yoga his art will gain and not lose. But there is all the question: is the artist appointed by the Divine or self-appointed?...

Art is nothing less in its fundamental truth than the aspect of beauty of the Divine manifestation. Perhaps, looking from this standpoint, there will be found very few true artists; but still there are some and these can very well be considered as Yogis. For like a Yogi an artist goes into deep contemplation to await and receive his inspiration. To create something truly beautiful he has first to see it within, to realise it as a whole in his inner consciousness; only when so found, seen, held within, can he execute it outwardly; he creates according to this greater inner vision. This too is a kind of yogic discipline, for by it he enters into intimate communion with the inner worlds.

In our class the majority of the students did abstract and modem paintings.

A few days later I painted a portrait of a pretty girl, not nude this time for a change. When I had finished it and shown it to the professor, he exclaimed: "Well, Miss Hindocha, don't you think the eyes are rather huge? They look like an Indian's eyes." I smiled and said: "Sir, if seen by Indian eyes, how could they be otherwise?" He laughed and affirmed: "You are absolutely right." Then I spoke to him of the "Future Painting" about which the Mother had told me. But I did not know how much he could grasp. A girl was doing a corner of the room in abstract art. The professor appreciated and praised her work a lot. As regards higher painting none in this world had any idea of the Mother's vision.

While observing and examining numerous drawings and paintings done by students I could discriminate between two opposites—truth and falsehood. I felt that a large number of the students derived their inspiration from the wrong source and the result seemed to me flat and lifeless. Within me I knew that whatever I had learnt in my colleges I would make the most of it in my future work in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram.

I got accommodation in the YWCA. I had a good number of things to carry from one place to another. I changed places far too often. It was trying and tiring. But now my colleges were within walking distance, which was very convenient.

I happened to meet an English woman at the YWCA. She seemed to be a bundle of nerves. She came into my room, which I did not approve. She did not budge. As I felt it was impolite to be rude to an elderly woman, I let her stay. Meanwhile I went to take my bath.

It struck me in a flash of illumination that I must take my gold chain with a large shining gold locket suspended from it. It had been given to me by the Mother. In the locket nestled a sacred gold-chain the Mother had worn on one of her ankles for several years. She put it round my neck when I met her for the first time in November 1954. Now it was completely worn out, so she got it secured in a gold locket. On one side of the locket there was her symbol and on the other Sri Aurobindo's symbol. The locket was on the table near my bed. It was quite heavy, so every night before going to bed I took it off my neck and slipped it under my pillow. But unhappily that day I had set it on the table. I advanced my steps to take it, but my innermost self or perhaps the Supreme Power which protects us all unfailingly in the worst moments of danger and catastrophe, whispered to me: "Do not take the locket from the table."

I retraced my steps and went to take my bath. The time was 11.45 a.m. Exactly at 12 o'clock my heart gave a jerk while I was still in my bath. I felt as if my pulse had lost its regularity. A catch of uneasiness, vague and indefinable, seemed to suggest a lurking danger of which I was totally unaware. After finishing the bath at 12.15 I entered the room. My stomach turned an abrupt somersault. A sick feeling coiled in it. I caught my breath. The woman had disappeared with the locket and some £20/- from my handbag leaving behind her a ghastly, sinister atmosphere. The incident stunned me into silence for a few minutes.

Later I reported to the warden who then rushed to the lady in charge of the YWCA. She called me. I was shaken to the core. My legs gave way under me. I plumped down into a chair. Despite the state of my mind, I found my voice sounding clear. She heard me out, then asked me severely: "Miss Hindocha, in the first place, why did you allow the woman into your room?" I felt emotionally too washed out to make any proper reply except that the woman was insistent and I could not help it. She said: "Such a thing has never happened here all these years. This is the first time it occurred." Afterwards she phoned to the CID—Criminal Investigation Department.

I was perilously close to tears, but managed to hold them back. The nauseating sensation of deep unease returned acutely as I went back to my room. Each second that passed was like a shaft piercing my heart. I longed for a sympathetic response which none gave. I felt as though I had lived years in a few hours. This was a crushing blow.

I had an unhappy, unendurable restless night. My violent urge to leave the hostel became imperative. The dawn broke—pale light shone through the side of the curtain covering the window. I threw aside the quilt and rose from my bed, exhausted. My spirit sank still lower—but with a great effort I set my feeling aside, approached the table and started writing to the Mother. The memory of the Mother enshrined in my heart was more intense than ever. I knew that when everything in my life failed me I should bear in my mind that the Mother loved me and that love would save me from all evils.

At about 11.30 a.m. a man from the CID came over and asked me several questions. I endeavoured to maintain my calm as I answered him, but my nerves were frazzled. Besides, I showed him my photograph with Aunt Margaret in which I had worn the locket.

He left saying he would make investigations and would let me know. I thanked him. It was a fragile hope, but all I could cling to.

I went out to post my letter to the Mother. Now to crown it all, I received a letter from the Manager of Barclays Bank Ltd., informing me that my account was overdrawn. I was shocked. Immediately I telephoned Aunt Margaret to come with £50/-. She was a haven—always dependable. I could count on her to stand by me. She arrived with the money and told me: "Huta, I have been in terrible anxiety about you these past few hours. You really had me all a twitter with worry. Now tell me what happened and why you wish to leave this place." I said: "Aunt, I take a very grim view of this episode, because the chain along with the locket were not ordinary. They held the Mother's marvellous Force." And my eyes filled with irresistible tears. I continued: "I have the strong impression that the woman was not only a thief but a desperate character. If I had taken the locket from the table, she would not have hesitated to use violence on me in order to get possession of it. She might have murdered me. From this I can conceive that the hostile forces are everywhere out in the lists. They are actively present—bent upon mischief and how they always wait to pounce on unwary beings! Yet what possible harm can they do to me when the divine forces also are present? You see, the instinct I had of not picking up the locket proved to me that the Divine too was everywhere vigilant and victorious. Nevertheless, there have been too many shocks in my young life. Aunt, I really want to leave this place. I feel disgusted. Thank you for the money which I will credit in my account. When I get the money from my father I will repay the sum to you." Suddenly I closed my eyes against the weariness—against the problems and conflicts all around me.

Aunt Margaret said with solicitude: "How earnestly you wanted to get into the YWCA hostel and what a bad experience you had when we finally found you a place here! I know, you are not the sort of person to say things for no reason. I sympathise with you. We shall certainly find another place. Don't worry."

Later we went to the lady in charge. I told her that I wished to leave the hostel and that I would be much obliged if she would give me the refund. She consented. Then she disclosed: "The wretched woman has vanished without paying her heavy bills. She is a great thief. Moreover, I telephoned the office in the West End where she was supposed to start her new work. They said that the woman had not turned up. She took a handsome amount from the office in advance. I also found that she had borrowed money from some girls here and never returned it." Now the pieces began to fall into place when we heard the lady. We thanked her and came out of her office. In the meantime, the Bank Manager telephoned me that it was a mistake on the part of his staff—somebody had drawn the money and they thought it had been I! I told him that his letter to me was like a bolt from the blue. I requested him to be very careful. He apologised and assured me that he would not commit the mistake again. I gave the money back to Aunt Margaret with gratitude and appreciation.

I drifted aimlessly through the days. The atmosphere of the hostel was unbearable. Aunt Margaret found another accommodation in Holland Park, which was not very far from Doris's fiat. But unfortunately I still had a few more days to spend in the YWCA.

When I had no classes in the afternoon, I visited the British Museum in Bloomsbury, which was very near to the hostel. It had originated with the purchase of Sir Hans Sloane's library and collection in 1753, and of the manuscripts collected by the famous antiquarian Sir Robert Cotton. The funds were raised by public lottery. The Museum was first opened in 1759 in Montague House but a large building becoming necessary to house the new and growing acquisitions, the present one was erected on the Montague House site. It was finished in 1847, at a cost of £1,000,000. The King Edward VII Extension was built between 1908 and 1914. The reading room, with its great dome, the second largest in the world, was built in 1857, and the Museum Library contains over six million volumes.

Apart from the huge library, there was an enormous museum section. It displayed original antiquities—illustrating the histories, arts, crafts of numerous civilisations. I was fascinated to see ancient paintings, Greek sculptures, Assyrian winged bulls about forty feet high. There were priceless objects which had been excavated and now exhibited with informative notes. There were also Egyptian mummies and Sarcophaguses. I saw the mummies—some still packed, some half-opened—lying in rows with different poses. One among them was of Katebet which was striking. The whole scene gave the impression as if living spirits were still hovering over the mummies. The air was eerie and made me shudder. The Mother has revealed several things about Egyptian mummies.

There were many valuable manuscripts which owing to the passage of centuries had become brittle. I admired the countless objects of the past. The bronze statue of Tara—Nepalese 14th century A.D. or earlier—was charming. I came to know much later that Sri Aurobindo had once lived in Great Russell Street. He must have visited the library at the British Museum—the greatest, oldest and finest library in the British Commonwealth.

The lady in charge at the YWCA informed me that the man from the CID could not locate either the locket or the woman. She gave me the refund and wished me good luck.