The letters reveal Nirod's unique relationship with his guru. The exchanges are suffused with a special humour.
Sri Aurobindo : corresp.
Nirodbaran's correspondence with Sri Aurobindo began in February 1933 and continued till November 1938, when Sri Aurobindo injured his leg and Nirod became one of his attendants. The entire correspondence, which was carried on in three separate notebooks according to topics - private, medical, and literary - is presented in chronological order, revealing the unique relationship Nirod enjoyed with his guru, replete with free and frank exchanges and liberal doses of humour. Covering a wide range of topics, both serious and light-hearted, these letters reveal the infinite care Sri Aurobindo devoted to the spiritual development of his disciple.
THEME/S
Take S's case—what suffering she went through for the Divine. Left her home, husband, etc. and still other sides show up. What human elements are we made of
Both J and S are made up of disparate elements which are not at all in harmony with each other—so are many others, it is a common case. Nothing to be surprised at in that, the man harmonised round something central in him is a rarity.
Now about predestination and chance. The ultimate responsibility then lies with this "Something" on which the play of forces is dependent and with those, for instance, who have gone away from here due to hostile influence—it was possible because this Something gave its sanction? No chance exists then and no free will. This free will of ours is nothing but being an instrument in the hands of forces while we think we are enjoying great freedom. And this play is again guided by Something?
There is no question of responsibility. The "Something" does not act arbitrarily, paying no heed to the play of forces or the man's nature. "Selects" does not mean "selects at random." If a man puts himself on the side of or into the hands of the hostile influences and says "This way I will go and no other. I want my ego, my greatness, my field of power and action"—has not the Something the right to say "I agree. Go and find it—if you can"? On the other, if the balance of forces is otherwise, less on one side, the selection may be the other way, the saving element being present, and determine another orientation. But to understand the working of this Cosmic Something one must see not only the few outward factors observed by the human eye, but the whole working with all its multitudinous details—that one cannot do unless one is oneself in the cosmic consciousness and with some opening at least to the Over-mind.
There is no such thing as "free" will, but there is the power of the Purusha to say "yes" or "no" to any particular pressure of Prakriti and there is the power of the mind, vital etc. to echo feebly or strongly the Purusha's "yes" or "no" or to resist it. A constant (not a momentary) Yes or No has its effect in the play of the forces and the selection by the Something.
July 1, 1935
I find that sincerity, openness, etc., are good in theory but very difficult in practice.
It has got to be done all the same.
J said one thing that struck me very much—that I have been so fortunate in having your friendship and still I indulge in trifles.
Almost everybody is like that in one way or another.
July 2, 1935
Apropos of X's tactics you have said: "The eternal feminine? Terribly so—but that is not the Real Woman."100 Who is the Real Woman, please? Anyone here?
I was not referring to anyone in particular but to the element in woman which is simple, straightforward, faithful, sympathetic—without the twist in it. I don't mean anything very high, but something straight and unspoiled and clear.
N has been suffering long from Sciatica and it is getting acute—he has to remain in bed. Go and see what can be done to get rid of the attack. He did not want to be treated, but it is getting to be too much of a bad thing.
July 5, 1935
K's cod-liver oil will be over in 3 or 4 days. We have no stock. Shall we order from Madras? He is better.
Pavitra has a medicine to replace the cod-liver oil for a month. It must be prepared by yourself (as it is concentrated drops) not by K.
Will you warn R.K. that he must not press his eyes on Mother's feet? It is dangerous for the other sadhaks.101
July 6, 1935
Somehow it seems the atmosphere is very heavy nowadays. How I suffered without any apparent cause—as if something had gripped me by the throat.
You should not allow yourself to be gripped by the throat—grip the other fellow's throat and fling him away.
It seems I am now the target of all depression. But why?
But why accept a depression which has no reason for its existence?
Is it, as our friend Jaswant says, the Asram vital that affects me, or a personal one?
In Jaswant's case it is personal—in yours it looks like surrender to the "Asram" or rather to the "anti-Asram" vital.
But I have suffered enough, enough, more than my share. One can't go on, you know, with a spiritual dietary of 3 chief elements of food. Let me remind you that vitamins of experience are essential; otherwise nervous breakdown or deficiency disease is the result. You have a lot of things in your chaddar as you said in a book...
? [Sri Aurobindo put a big question mark.]
They say that you are now handling the lower vital and so the general trouble. True?
Subconscient vital physical—the lower vital is irrational, but not so utterly "without reasons" as that.
July 8, 1935
J says he has no personal difficulties; he has to suffer for the sake of the Asram.
Rubbish! His own vital has always been vehement and unstable.
You say his depression is personal, mine impersonal, while all the time I was cursing myself for my neuro-vital mechanism.
The form it has taken is not personal to you, it has all the sign of the "regulation lathi" attack. Of course it takes advantage of something in you, but that is a different matter.
... No one has ever heard of a Master doing sadhana for the sadhaks—fighting day and night. Even then troubles no less, difficulties the same, goal far-off Is it the time and circumstance that are at fault or the nature of the blessed instruments?
It is the nature of the human being—whoever told you it was an easy job?
July 9, 1935
All on a sudden, N said, he felt giddy. I didn't find any apparent reason. Giddiness in old people is an important symptom. Let me predict that this old man will give you a lot of trouble.
I fear you are right. The only chance is that he has some responsiveness, but his physical self is too weak.
He is very nervous and afraid after S's death. I wish you had adopted a modified Spartan system in your school of training.
So do I. It would have saved a lot of bother
July 11, 1935
N is slightly better. I came to know he had been taking a lot of mangoes. Won't it be better to tell him to rigorously keep to the Asram diet for the sake of his health?
If he wants to be healthy and last, he must certainly be careful about his diet. It is extremely important at his age.
My cold has given me the quick realisation that everything in this world—including the Divine—is Maya. What Shankara and Buddha realised by sadhana, I realise by a simple cold!
No need of sadhana for that—anybody with a fit of the blues can manage that. It is to get out of the Maya that sadhana is needed.
July 13, 1935
N reported just now that his "sciatica" is worse and asked me to inform you. But when I advised him to take some external medicine—well, how can he do that without your permission?
He has full permission, but he is very particular on having it in so many precise words written to himself. I will see what he has written today. What external medicine do you want to give? And what about his constipation?
July 14, 1935
For N, the external application would be a liniment, say, pot.iod. or Siju or Belladonna or any counter-irritant...
All right.
July 15, 1935
[Regarding a certain incident that had recently occurred] I was under the impression that Mother could at once know of such things. Some even say that she knows everything—all that is material or spiritual. Others maintain that she knows when the question of consciousness is involved, e.g. sex movements etc., but not so much about material things.
Good Lord! you don't expect her mind to be a factual encyclopaedia of all that is happening on all the planes and in all the universes? Or even on this earth—e.g. what Lloyd George had for dinner yesterday?
Questions of consciousness of course she always knows even with her outermost physical mind. Material facts she can know but is not bound to do it. The matter however is too complex for answer in a short space.
What would be true to say, is that she can know if she concentrates or if her attention is called to it and she decides to know. I often know from her what has happened before it is reported by anyone. But she does not care to do that on a general scale.
But if she does not know, what really is the meaning of your message: "Always behave as if the Mother was looking at you, for indeed she is always present"?
It is the emanation of the Mother that is with each sadhak all the time. In former days when she was spending the night in a trance and out working in the Asram, she brought back with her the knowledge of all that was happening to everybody. Nowadays she has no time for that.
This question of Mother's knowledge became even more interesting for me today. She gave me the flower signifying "Discipline". I began to wonder why this particular flower was given; at last I remembered that yesterday I had taken some hot khichuri with J and N.
In this respect the Mother is guided by her intuitions which tell her which flower is needed at the moment or helpful. Sometimes it is accompanied by a perception of a particular state of consciousness, sometimes by that of a material fact; but only the bare fact, usually—e.g. it would not specify that it was hot khichuri that was cooked or how J or N came in. Not that that is impossible, but it is unnecessary and does not happen unless needed.
... If not this, what is meant by "Discipline" in Yogic parlance? Anyway please tell us how far Mother and you know about our physical, material affairs.
In this case it was a general hint with a special reference to khichuri.
July 16, 1935
What you say about "Emanations" is very interesting. Mother has then about 150 emanations and, adding 150 of yours, we are each, protected by one god and one goddess! It's difficult to believe—well, still—for example our throats are gripped by malign forces, in our sleep!...
I am not aware of any emanations of mine. As for the Mother's, they are not there for protection, but to support the personal relation or contact with the sadhaka, and to act so far as he will allow them to act. If, for instance, you sidle up to X of the beaming face in your sleep, what can the Emanation do but shake its head and say "Well, perhaps when he has finished, there may be a chance of getting something done"?
July 18, 1935
Kindly enlighten us a little more regarding the emanations. How do they support the personal relation or contact with us when we have neither the former nor feel the latter? Do they do these things even when we are not conscious, and how do they act either? I thought all personal relations were with the Mother direct, not through a deputy.
It is terribly difficult to write of these things, for you are all as ignorant as blazes about these things and misunderstand at every step. The Emanation is not a deputy, but the Mother herself. She is not bound to her body, but can put herself out (emanate) in any way she likes. What emanates, suits itself to the nature of the personal relation she has with the sadhak which is different with each, but that does not prevent it from being herself. Its presence with the sadhak is not dependent on his consciousness of it. If everything were dependent on the surface consciousness of the sadhak, there would be no possibility of the divine action anywhere; the human worm would remain the human worm and the human ass, the human ass, for ever and ever. For if the Divine could not be there behind the veil, how could either ever become conscious of anything but their wormhood and asshood even throughout the ages?
When K says that he feels the Mother's physical touch, with whom does he have the contact—the Mother or the emanation?
With the Mother—the emanation helping—which is its business.
By the way, are these brackets about emanations absolutely unbreakable or can they be withdrawn in favour of a few, e.g. J, D, and put back again?
You have already spoken to 3, she says. That does not matter; but they are not to be thrown down for others. It would only create useless mental froth and bubbles.
I dreamt I had written 4 very beautiful sonnets; are they to actualise?
Let us hope so.
July 19, 1935
In your letter on the emanation, do you mean by a "persona relation" the impersonal person that is the psychic?
The psychic is not impersonal. You must be thinking of the universal Atman. The psychic is always personal and individual.
One may not be conscious of the Presence, but the relation? Unfortunately, I don't feel any personal relation with the Mother. There lies the whole difficulty of the sadhana.
One has to become conscious by the awakening of the inner mind and vital—or best of all by the awakening of the psychic. It is quite possible for two persons to have a relation of which one is conscious and the other is not—his mental blindness or vital misunderstandings coming in the way. That is frequent even in ordinary life. Very often one becomes conscious of it only when he loses it (by the death of the other or otherwise) and is then full of repinings for his blindness.
A.B. writes in an article that through sorrow and suffering God leads us to immortality; that there is a glory, even a bliss, in their conquest. I am afraid my mystic vision and chicken heart do not see much in this theory. Conquest of sorrow and suffering is all right for brave hearts like Vivekananda's and A.B.'s, or even for poor hearts like mine when they have a Guru. like Sri Aurobindo and a mother like our Mother here to do the sadhana for them; but what about the people outside who are wallowing under the weight of their crosses?
I suppose you have not read my "Riddle of this World" ; but it is a similar solution I put there. A.B.'s way of putting it is a trifle too "Vedantic-Theistic"—in my view it is a transaction between the One and the Many. In the beginning it was you (not the human you which is now complaining but the central being) which accepted or even invited the adventure of the Ignorance. Sorrow and struggle are a necessary consequence of the plunge into the Inconscience and the evolutionary emergence out of it. The explanation is that it had an object, the eventual play of the Divine Consciousness and Ananda not in its original transcendence but under conditions for which the plunge into the Inconscience was necessary. It is fundamentally a cosmic problem and can be understood only from the cosmic consciousness. If you want a solution which will be agreeable to the human mind and feelings, I am afraid there is none. No doubt if human beings had made the universe, they would have done much better, but they were not there to be consulted when they were made. Only your central being was there and that was much nearer in its temerarious foolhardiness to Vivekananda's or A.B.'s than to the repining prudence of your murmuring and trembling human mentality of the present moment—otherwise it would never have come down into the adventure. Or perhaps it did not realise what it was in for? It is the same with the wallowers under their cross. Even now they wallow because something in them likes the wallowing and bear the cross because something in them chooses to suffer. So?
July 20, 1935
Why am [feeling so disturbed? Life seems to be a washout. Have I fallen again into the blessed lower vital dungeon?
I suppose so. It is the vital that refuses to leave its movements and yet at the same [time] can't enjoy them (i.e. why life seems to be a washout).
I am more and more relapsing into a gloom and glum.
Tamas of a disappointed but still recalcitrant vital.
Do you intend to give me a push or a kick this time at the Darshan, or just a touch as usual?
I think for that your vital has to make up your mind whether it is going to leave its old moorings or not. Otherwise a kick will only give it gloom and glum and a push make it tumble down and say "0 Lord! what a washout is life!"
July 21, 1935
It is because I made up my mind long ago to leave the old moorings that I was able to kick at the old life, but the moorings seem to be very deep, beyond my human reach...
Yes, you made up your mind and it remains made up—but I was speaking of your vital and its mind. It is because your vital is kicking against your made-up mind that there is the trouble. You ought to talk to it more seriously and firmly and, when necessary, give it a calm and judicious whipping until it becomes a good boy.
July 22, 1935
If the Emanation is the Mother herself, why do we have to make a big case of our troubles and depressions, and buzz it in post-haste for your hearing? Lack of receptivity? or opening? No faith in the Emanation or in its existence? What?
Nobody has to do it. People do it because they are ignorant and unconscious.
If anyone is conscious of the Mother's presence, he does not make a big case of his troubles. Even if one is not yet conscious, still those who have faith or are not touched by your Man of Sorrows are not making the row you speak of.
A.B. says if we see things impartially we'll find that happiness predominates over sorrow. It is hard for me to concur with this observation.
It is fundamentally true for most people that the pleasure of life, of existence in itself, predominates over the troubles of life; otherwise most people would want to die, whereas the fact is that everybody wants to live—and if you proposed to them an easy means of eternal extinction they would decline without thanks. That is what A.B. is saying and it is undeniable. It is also true that this comes from the Ananda of existence which is behind everything and is reflected in the instinctive pleasure of existence. Naturally, this instinctive essential pleasure is not the Ananda,—it is only a pale and dim reflection of it in an inferior life-consciousness—but it is enough for its purpose. I have said that myself somewhere and I do not see anything absurd or excessive in the statement.
He is evidently speaking from the cosmic consciousness; otherwise how could he fail to find sorrows, struggles, heartbreaks, hells, perditions gaping everywhere!
Not at all. There are plenty of people, not endowed with the cosmic consciousness, who have said and written the same thing. It is no new theory or statement.
I have no statistics about the other parts of the cosmos, but just look at India: acute epidemics, sub-acute unemployment with consequent suicides, chronic famine and starvation. People, who 10 years ago were making a good business, are breaking their heads over the future—of tomorrow, sir, only tomorrow!
All that is only a feature of the present time when everything is out of order. One can't argue from that and speak as if it were the normal existence of the human race.
Even with all this trouble and disorder are all these human beings feeling so miserable as you say? They have so much to vex and trouble them, yet they go on chatting and laughing and enjoying what they can. Why?
And still the Ananda of simply being in bone and flesh surpasses all sorrow! I would like to be an optimist, but surely not in excess!
For most people it does. All are not men of sorrows like yourself or fallen into the Byronic vein. Some of course have so miserable an existence that it stifles the innate pleasure of life—but these are after all a small minority.
You have written in "The Riddle of this World" that this is an unideal and unsatisfactory world strongly marked with the stamp of inadequacy, suffering and evil.
That is when you look at what the world ought to be and lay stress on that. The idealists' question is why should there be pain at all, even if it is counterweighed by the fundamental pleasure of existence? The real crux is why should inadequacy, limit and suffering come across this natural pleasure of life? It does not mean that life is essentially miserable in its very nature.
People will invite A.B. to come down from his hyper-optimism into the material earth-consciousness and see for himself.
A.B. is not an ass. He knows perfectly well what is taking place in the material earth-consciousness and would be very anxious to plunge into the fray to make things better, if I allowed him—but I don't and won't.
I am trying to have a dash again at poetry
Very glad to hear it.
July 23, 1935
It seems A.B. has come to the top rung of your spiritual ladder. In your heavenly Parliament he must have been in charge of a very important portfolio! Otherwise I don't see how he could, at first sight, have had a vision of the Divine in the Mother, besides other things.
What top rung and what Parliament? There is no such thing as a heavenly parliament. A.B. progressed smoothly and rapidly from the beginning in Yoga, first, because he was in dead earnest; secondly, because he had a clear and solid mind and a strong and tenacious will in complete control of the nerves; thirdly, because his vital being was calm, strong and solid; finally and chiefly, because he had a complete faith and devotion to the Mother. As for seeing the Divine in the Mother at first sight, he is not the only one to do that. Plenty of people have done that, who had no chance of any portfolios, e.g. Rene's cousin, a Musulman girl, who as soon as she met her declared "This is not a woman, she is a goddess", and has been having significant dreams of her ever since and whenever she is in trouble, thinks of her and gets helped out of the trouble. It is not so damnably difficult to see the Divine in the Mother as you make it out to be.
July 24, 1935
Your general notice about the suspension of correspondence has struck terror! My only yoga consisted in this correspondence with you...
You can count yourself among the exceptions who are allowed to write (with Dilip, Arjava and others). But don't flourish your good fortune (if it is one) in the face of others—keep it dark.
July 26, 1935
We accepted G's report about his aunt's temperature being 99˚, with some suspicion...
I did not believe at all in this 99˚. G is an overmental sadhak who creates facts according to his liking by the power of Vak.102
July 28, 1935
So your remarks about A.B. only prove that he was not of the common stock.
I don't know. It only proves that he was a good "adhar'
If one comes down from the higher planes, as I understand K has done for your work, everything becomes a Grand Trunk Road for him.
Nobody has found this Yoga, a Grand Trunk Road, neither A.B. nor K nor even myself or the Mother. All such ideas are a romantic illusion.
I don't know what the Musulman lady exactly saw. From what you say it seems to be a flash of intuition.
Not at all, it was a direct sense of the godhead in her—for I suppose you mean by intuition a sort of idea that comes suddenly? That is what people usually understand by intuition. It was not that in her case nor in A.B.'s.
By seeing the Divine in the Mother, I don't mean imagination or calm, calculated reasoning. But to see actually the fully flaming, resplendent, effulgent Divine Mother in any one of her Powers—why, that is damnably difficult, Sir, at least for me who have not even seen the halo around her.
I don't believe A.B. or anybody would have that at first view. That can only come if one has already developed the faculty of vision in the occult planes. What is of more importance is the clear perception or intimate inner feeling or direct sense, "This is She". I think you are inclined to be too romantic and poetic and too little spiritually realistic in these things.
July 29, 1935
About G's aunt—to detect T.B. bacilli in the urine it has to be injected into a guinea-pig—the doctor says, for absolute certainty. The charge for it will be Rs.7. G is not very willing. I suppose it can be omitted though important for the patient.
Yes, you can insist on his forking out that, if he is unwilling. Luck for the guinea-pig!
If seeing the Divine depended on developed occult faculty, how do you explain people's seeing Ram, Krishna, Shiva, etc., in you at Darshan?—I mean by people who have apparently no such faculty. We've read about Krishna presenting himself before small boys, taking them to school, etc.—fables?
With many people the faculty of this kind of occult vision is the first to develop when they begin sadhana. With others it is there naturally or comes on occasions without any practice of Yoga. But with. people who live mainly in the intellect (a few excepted) this faculty is not usually there by nature and most have much difficulty in developing it. It was so even with me.
What I understand of the matter is that if you intend that somebody should see the Divine in you—be it a blind man—he is able to see. No faculty is required.
It would be something of a miracle to see things without the faculty of seeing. We don't deal much in miracles of that kind.
Darshan is approaching. Would it be more profitable to concentrate and meditate then to try to write poems with much difficulty?
If one can concentrate, it is always good to concentrate—darshan or no darshan.
I started 2 sonnets, wrote 4 lines of each, but could complete neither. Should my project be adjourned sine die?
It can be adjourned if you like, but not sine die.
You have permitted S to have a stove, I hear. Have you also permitted him to cook and gobble rasogollas? I ask for information—because if he is supposed to digest, it is all right—otherwise!
July 30, 1935
Yes, I permitted the stove since he was complaining of much flatulence, so that he could take milk diluted with barley and sago, but rasogollas not at all.
I am informed that he ate 2 rasogollas and offered to P. P told him to confess, but he has not done so—for fear I suppose that his stove should be taken away. X some time ago wrote that S was making sweets, but one cannot always believe X's statements, so I said nothing about it.
If the stove is taken away he will again complain of flatulence. Please see then if you can find out some way.
I don't know; but one can't be responsible for the results if he goes on like that. If he expects the Divine Force to be always fighting against his Rasogollas to protect his confounded liver!
July 31, 1935
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