The Growth of a Flame

Introspection

Mother,

Before joining the Ashram, I used to pray to Lord Krishna but when I heard about you and Sri Aurobindo, I started adoring both of you. There was an intense urge to come here. Many times, I had a Darshan of Sri Aurobindo in my dreams when I was in Gujarat. I always prayed to Sri Aurobindo, "O Lord, take me in your refuge." Once Sri Aurobindo came in my dream and told me that I would be there within fifteen days and it happened so. Mother, I was worshipping Radha and Lord Krishna from my childhood and called them my Mother and Father. When I came here and had your Darshan I felt that I had a real Darshan of Radha and Lord Krishna. Afterwards I realized that Lord Krishna had brought me here and taken me under his protection. I call you both my Mother and Father and I truly feel it.

Mother, is it a fact or an illusion?

There is no mistake - if you have these experiences, you must consider that they are true.

(Letters addressed to the Mother used to be answered by Sri Aurobindo.)

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For the last few days as I try to become calm and remember you I feel as if your hand is on my head.

Mother, is it true?

There is always a force of the Mother with you and in it her presence. That is why you feel as if her hand is on your head.

Sri Aurobindo

What happens when one criticises someone?

If a person is in the habit of finding faults with others, what happens to him as well as the one who is faulted?

If you find fault with anybody, that fault is likely to increase in that person and to come also into you.

Mother

With Thy Divine Grace, all the wrong suggestions will go away from me. After receiving your letter today I feel peace and experience your Love and Grace, because you love me as a mother loves her child and also I feel unbounded joy in becoming your daughter. Today throughout the day I have been feeling the same love as a child feels for her mother. I feel one with you.

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Mother, it is my humble prayer that I should have this type of experience frequently.

Mother, is this my imagination or is it true?

It is not imagination - it is true. These are the true feelings and this is your true relation with the Mother.

Sri Aurobindo

Mother,

I had written before that I go to sleep in meditation. When I got up from meditation, I felt sleepy and idle. But now onwards, when I get up from meditation, I feel that I have not slept nor I had any thought. Then what did I do? I feel as if my body has become inert, it is not laziness.

It is not sleep - you go inside losing the outer consciousness, that is all. The body remains inert — the inner consciousness is elsewhere.

Mother,

Since 11.30 a.m. today, I feel like crying. Although I am trying to remain calm, I cannot. Mother, I wish to have peace with Thy Grace. Mother, Mother, keep Thy child at Thy feet. But what is the reason?

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You should throw it off and remain quiet and open for the 21st.

Mother,

You have not replied to my question why I feel tired.

Is tiredness related to aspiration? What should I do to develop aspiration? I humbly pray at Thy Lotus feet to let me know about it.

A tired condition of the body brings tamas and it is the tamas that prevents the aspiration, because the mind gets inert also. The cause of the fatigue is not clear from what you have written.

It is by opening yourself and calling down the Mother's force into you that you can get back the aspiration and get rid of the fatigue — whatever the cause of the fatigue may be.

Mother,

Today I felt that you are displeased with me.

No, Mother was not displeased with you. Why should she be?

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Mother,

Today you were looking at me intently. When you look at me you take your face away from me, what you see in me - good or bad - I don't know. I wanted to surrender myself more and more at Thy feet.

But the Mother always looks intently at people like that when she wants to see in them or put something in them. Why should you suppose anything unusual?

Today after pranam I was remembering you and I feel that my heart is fully open and taking something from you. This feeling remained upto 11 a.m. Mother, is this true?

It must have been true.

You don't like that I keep your photo with me when I go to bed?

Why not? You can freely do so.

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Mother,

I asked you yesterday if there was any call or aspiration in me? You have not yet replied to me. What is the reason for not replying?

I was under the impression that I had answered it. Certainly, you have the call and the aspiration — the very fact that you could not remain in Gujarat is a sufficient proof of it.

Mother,

For the last so many days, I feel I have not been open towards you. Is it true or false? I humbly pray at Thy Lotus feet to make me aware of it or to make me understand it.

Mother does not find you closed.

For about a month I am having a feeling that the devotion, love and aspiration for the Divine have disappeared from me. I feel the same even during the morning pranam. Mother, I pray to Thee to shower Thy Grace and inspire me to have the devotion, love and aspiration for Thee again.

Mother, what may be the reason for this?

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You may have allowed your consciousness to go too much outward and get taken up by ordinary things? It is usually when the outer physical consciousness covers up the inner being that this happens. The aspiration is not gone, but it no longer rises to the surface. If you remain very quiet inwardly and call to the Mother, it should come back.

Mother,

Although I come to you only once a day, how do I feel if you don't smile at me? Neither can I go from here nor do I like to stay without you. Am I not progressing? Is there no aspiration in me? I did not write earlier because I felt so disappointed.

It is surely your own imagination since the Mother does smile at you; she has nothing against you, you have committed no fault and there has been no interruption in the progress. Sometimes when there are strong attacks in the atmosphere, Mother may be absorbed at the pranam, but that only happens sometimes and you are not the cause.

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Mother,

I do not want to go, I cannot remain without you.

Throw away this , Mother.

Protect me at your lotus feet.

What shall I do?

Keep quiet, do not get restless, the desire will go away. I shall see you for a few minutes this morning.

Mother,

For a month, I have been having constant thoughts of going to Gujarat and, on the other hand, I am having thoughts of staying at Thy Lotus feet. The conflict is going on.

I am quite sure that I am not going to be happy there, still I cannot prevent these thoughts. Why am I having these thoughts repeatedly?

I humbly pray at Thy feet to remove these thoughts from my inner mind.

These thoughts must be coming to you from the people over there.

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Mother,

Sometimes I got confused but still I felt that Thy grace and Thy Divine Hand were on my head. I do not know why I was confused.

It is perhaps something in the atmosphere that tried to invade you.

Mother,

It is my humble prayer to allow me to leave the Ashram. I cannot do this yoga. I shall remember you from far. It is my prayer to Sri Aurobindo to write in such a way that I can read it.

This idea of going away is a wrong suggestion - so is the idea that you will not be able to do the yoga. Do not allow these suggestions, which are moving about in the Ashram from one person to another, to affect you or carry you away.

Mother,

There is a strong desire to visit and see the different places of the world. What is the reason for it? What shall I do?

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It is a restlessness of the vital which does not want to remain in the same place. In some people as in Kantilal it is very acute and they are always going from place to place. It is one of the things in the vital that has to be kept under control by the will.

Mother,

Many times, I feel hatred towards my own self because I neither have the ability nor the skill in me to do anything. I start doing some work and then leave it undone. I have no perseverance. What is the reason for this?

These also come from a certain restlessness in the vital. Most people put a control of the will on those things and try to get rid of them in that way. But they disappear fully only when the inner being is awakened and a new Force (the Mother's) begins fully to work in the nature.

Mother,

How can I do yoga when I do not know anything about your yoga? I do not also know what to do.

There are two ways of doing yoga, one by knowledge and one's own efforts, the other by reliance on the Mother. In the last way one has to offer one's mind

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and heart and all to the Mother for her Force to act on it, call her in all difficulties, have faith and bhakti. At first it takes time, often a long time, for the consciousness to be prepared in this way and during that time many difficulties can come up, but if one perseveres, a time comes when all is ready. The Mother's Force opens the consciousness fully to the Divine, then all that must develop, develops within, spiritual experience comes and with it the knowledge and union with the Divine.

Mother,

For the last few days, sometimes I feel good and sometimes bad. I do not understand this state of my being. I feel like a puppet, sometimes happy and sometimes sad.

These vibrations are natural to the vital, but ordinarily they take the pretext of some outward cause; when no such cause is found they still come and it is then because they seem to have no reason that one feels like that — as if one were a puppet of these movements. In fact all human beings are moved like that - like puppets by the vital nature, but they don't perceive it. It is only when one gets a higher spiritual control that one is the master not the puppet of the nature.

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