The Spirit of Auroville

The Mother described her experience of 1.1.1969 in this way:

On the first, something truly strange happened ... And I was not the only one to feel it, some others also have felt it. It was just after midnight, but I felt it at two o'clock ... It was something very material, I mean it was very external —very external—and it was luminous, with a golden light. It was very strong, very powerful; but even so, its character was a smiling benevolence, a peaceful delight and a kind of opening out into delight and light. And it was like a "Bonne armee", like a greeting. It took me by surprise. It lasted, for at least three hours I felt it ... my own impression was that of an immense personality—immense, that is to say, for it the earth was small, small like this (gesture, as though holding a small ball in her palm), like a ball—an immense personality, very very benevolent, which came for ... (Mother seems to lift this ball gently from the hollow of her hands). It gave the impression of a personal divinity (and yet it was ... I do not know) who comes to help, and so strong, so strong and at the same time so gentle, so all-embracing ...

What has become of it? I do not know.

It was the beginning of the year. As if someone having the dimensions of a god (that is to say, someone) came to say "Bonne année", with all the power to make it a Bonne année. It was like this.

But what was it?...

So concrete...

I do not know.

Is it ... is it the personality?—because it had no form, I did not see any form, there was only what it had brought (Mother feels the atmosphere), the sensation, the feeling: these two, sensation and feeling—and I asked myself if it was not the supramental personality ... who will then manifest himself later in material forms.

The body, this body, feels since that moment (the thing has entered into it everywhere, deeply), it feels much more joyous, less concentrated, more lively, in a happy, smiling expansiveness. For example, it is speaking more easily. There is a note—a constant note of benevolence. A smile, yes, a benevolent smile, and all that with a great force....

The Mother, Notes on the Way: 4 January 1969