We live perennially with a burden on our shoulders, something that bows our heads down, and we feel pulled, led by all kinds of external forces, we don't know by whom or what, nor where to - this is what men call Fate, Destiny. When you do yoga, one of the first experiences - the experience of the kundalini, as it is called here in India - is precisely one in which the consciousness rises, breaks through this hard 'lid,' here, at the crown of the head, and at last you emerge into the Light. Then you see, you know, you decide and you realize - difficulties may still remain, but truly speaking one is above them. Well, as a result of the supramental manifestation, it is THIS experience that came into the body. The body straightened its head up and felt its freedom, its independence.

page 112 , Mother's Agenda , volume 1 , 17th Oct 1957
(Ah, let me say parenthetically that it wasn't AT ALL the ascent of a force like the ascent of the Kundalini! It had absolutely nothing to do with the Kundalini movement and the centers, it wasn't that at all.) But while re-descending, it was as though WITHOUT LEAVING THIS STATE, without leaving this state which remained conscious ALL the time, this supreme Consciousness began to reactivate the different centers: first here (Mother points to the center above the head and then touches the crown of the head, the forehead, throat, chest, etc.) then there, there, there. At each there was a pause while this new realization organized everything. It organized and made the necessary decisions, sometimes down to the most minute details: what had to be done in this case or said in that case; and all of that TOGETHER, at once, not one by one but seen entirely as a whole. It kept on descending - I noted many things, it was extremely interesting - down and down, farther and farther, right to the depths. Everything went on at the same time, [[Later, Mother added: 'All the experiences took place one after the other, but the new experience did not cancel the preceding one. The Consciousness - this supreme Unity that I had - remained all the time, to the very end, even while the other centers were awakening. And each center that awakened was a kind of addition, taking away nothing from what had come before. So at the end it was all simultaneous: a kind of global consciousness - total and simultaneous - of everything.... You see, while rising up (one is obliged to say "rising" and "descending" for otherwise one would never be understood), while "rising up" to reach this supreme Consciousness, all the rest was annulled, there was only That. When the supreme Consciousness was realized, it remained ALL the time, continuously, to the very end, it did not move; but meanwhile, the other centers began to awaken one after another. And each awakening center assumed its place but canceled nothing either of what had come before or of what was about to come, so that when I reached the end, all of it together was a simultaneous whole - the Supreme Consciousness.' When Satprem asked if this Supreme Consciousness was the 'New Consciousness,' Mother replied, 'Not "new!" One can't say "new" - Supreme Consciousness.' ]] simultaneously, and at the same time this supreme Consciousness was organizing everything separately. [[This entire experience and Mother's insistence that it all happened 'without moving,' unlike the experience of the ascent of the Kundalini, suggests that it is the supramental consciousness concealed in the depths of the cells, that somehow emerges and traverses all the layers until the junction is made with the most material body-consciousness. ]]

This descending reorganization ended exactly when the clock struck one. At that moment I knew that I had to go into trance for the work to be perfected, but until then I was wide awake.

So I slipped into trance.

page 42 , Mother's Agenda , volume 2 , 24th Jan. 1961

This "rising of the kundalini," I had it in ... I was still in Paris. It was before I came to India. I had read Vivekananda's books about it.... And when the Force rose, it emerged from the head through here (gesture at the top of the head); the [classic] experience was never described in that way. The Force came out and the consciousness settled here (gesture about eight inches above the head). So when I came here, I told Sri Aurobindo about it; he told me it had been the same thing with him, and that according to the teaching of [ancient] texts, you "cannot" live when that takes place: you die! So ... (laughing) he told me, "Here are two who haven't died!" The consciousness has remained there (gesture above), it didn't come down again; it's there, its always there.


But I often feel it there. I don't know if it's an illusion, but I feelit there much more often than below.

Yes. Oh, but it must be communicable.

Here, slightly above the head (same gesture about eight inches), like this.

Whenever I try to know something, it's always the same: everything stops and I listen there (gesture above), that's where I listen.

(silence)

And then, when I went back from here [to France, in 1915] ... I did something deliberately: all the energies of the last center [at the base of the spine] were drawn up here (gesture to the heart).

But I felt centers BELOW the feet.

I felt a center below the feet.... [[Sri Aurobindo writes this about the chakra at the base of the spine: "The Muladhar is the centre of the physical consciousness proper, and all below in the body is the sheer physical, which as it goes downward becomes increasingly subconscient, but the real seat of the subconscient is below the body, as the real seat of the higher consciousness (superconscient) is above the body." (Bases of Yoga, p. 133) ]] There was one below the feet, one at the knees, one here (gesture at the base of the spine), and all of it (Mother gestures, drawing the energies upward), like this, drawn up, and it came here (gesture to the heart).


page 257-58 - Mother's Agenda , volume 11 , 11th July - 1970