Then - and this becomes rather amusing like life's play ... Depending upon each one's nature and position and bias, and because human beings are very limited, very partial and incapable of a global vision, there are those who believe, who have faith, or to whom the eternal Mother is revealed through Grace, who have this kind of relationship with the eternal Mother - and there are those who themselves are plunged in sadhana, who have the consciousness of a developed sadhak, and thereby have the same relationship with me as one has with what they generally call a 'realized soul.' Such persons consider me the prototype of the Guru teaching a new way, but the others don't have this relationship of sadhak to Guru (I am taking the two extremes, but of course there are all the possibilities in between), they are only in contact with the eternal Mother and, in the simplicity of their hearts, they expect Her to do everything for them. If they were perfect in this attitude, the eternal Mother would do everything for them - as a matter of fact, She does do everything, but as they aren't perfect, they cannot receive it totally. But the two paths are very different, the two kinds of relationships are very different; and as we all live according to the law of external things, in a material body, there is a kind of annoyance, an almost irritated misunderstanding, between those who follow this path (not consciously and intentionally, but spontaneously), who have this relationship of the child to the Mother, and those who have this other relationship of the sadhak to the Guru. So it creates a whole play, with an infinite diversity of shades.

page 210 , Mother's Agenda , volume 1 , 10th Oct. - 1958

Yes, but when you read a mantra in a book, for instance, it is said there's no force in it - how is that, since the vibration is there?
But if you have the power within yourself and read the book, you will get the force! (Mother laughs) What's required is the capacity to feel and make contact.

Ultimately, what does the guru do? He connects (gesture of junction), he is nothing but a link. It's not "his" power he gives you (that's what he thinks, but it's not true): he is the link. He brings you into contact with the Power - a contact you don't have without him. But those who don't need a guru will make contact WITHOUT a guru.

It's not at all like something he pulls out of his pocket and offers you! That's not it at all: it's the power to make contact.

(silence)

Ultimately, it's simply a question of consciousness: people (ordinary people) have a consciousness that reaches up to a certain point (a point not very far away generally), and what's beyond it, to them, is the "unconscious" (although it's full of consciousness!), but it's unconscious to them because they can't make contact. It's the same as when at night you wake up in another state of being, become conscious and have a "dream" (what people call a dream, meaning an experience), then you return to your ordinary consciousness, and as there is no contact between the two consciousnesses, you don't even remember your dream. But you can, through methodical development, extend your consciousness and make a connection between the two; and the minute the connection is made, it takes very little to remember everything. But what's difficult is to extend your consciousness.

Basically, the guru's real power is to fill up the gaps! To bring you into contact: when you are in the higher planes, to bring you into contact with the Highest. Or to bring you into contact with your soul, your psychic being within, or to bring you into contact with the Supreme - but that not many can do.

page 217 - Mother's Agenda , volume 4 , 10th July , 1963