3 January 1970
AM XI-13-23
Sweet Mother, I have told [an Italian disciple, a designer] to come, he is waiting outside.
Yes. There is an interesting thing.
For a long time I had been feeling something, then we spoke about it the other day and I SAW it.. . I spoke of it to [the architect), I told him to see [the designer] , and I also told him that I had SEEN what had to be done. Of course he did not say no, he said yes to everything, but I felt that he did not really intend.. . but this is what happened. I saw clearly - very, very distinctly - that is to say, it was like that and it IS still like that, it is there (gesture indicating an eternal plane) : the interior of this place [the Matrirnandir],
Shouldn't you tell it to [the designer]?
Tell him right away?... Well... It will be easier for me to speak if I am alone with you.
Yes, all right, then say it, Sweet Mother.
I can describe it for you. It came like that. It will be a kind of hall like the inside of a column. No windows. The ventilation will be artificial, with those machines (gesture indicating an air-conditioner) and only a roof. And the sun striking the centre; or when there is no sun (at night and on cloudy days) an electric spotlight. And the idea is to build right now a sort of example or "model" to hold about a hundred people. When the town is built and we have had the experience, we will make a BIG one - but then it will be very big, to hold a thousand to two thousand people. And the second one will be built around the first, that means, the first one will not go until the second one is finished. That is the idea.
Only, so as to talk about it with [the designer] (and if possible, if I see that it is possible to talk about it with [the architect]), I wanted to have a plan. I will have it made - not myself, I can't any more; I would have been able to do it at one time, but now
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I no longer see well enough. I will have it done this afternoon, in front of me, a plan, and with this plan, I will be able to explain really well. But to you I simply wanted to say what I have seen....
It will be a tower with twelve facets - each facet represents a month of the year - and the top, the roof of the tower will be like this (gesture indicating a roof which slopes upwards from the sides to the centre).
And then, inside, there will be twelve columns — the walls and then twelve columns - and right in the centre on the floor is my symbol, and above it, four of Sri Aurobindo's symbols, joined to form a square, and above that... a globe. A globe of some transparent material if possible, and with (or without) light inside, but the sun should strike the globe; then according to the month or the moment, it will come from here, from there, from there (gesture indicating the movement of the sun), you understand? There will always be an opening with a ray. Not a diffused light: a ray which strikes, which should strike. It will require some technical knowledge to be able to carry it out, and that is why I want to make a design with an engineer.
And then, there will be no windows or lights inside, it will always be in a kind of clear half-light: day and night - by day with the sun, by night with artificial light. And on the floor: nothing, except a floor like this one (in Mother's room), that is to say, first wood (wood or something else), then a sort of rubber foam, thick, very soft, and then a carpet. A carpet everywhere — everywhere except for this centre. And people can sit everywhere. And the twelve columns are for people who need support for their backs!
And then, people will not come for a "regular meditation" or anything of that kind (.but the inner organization will be made afterwards): it will be a place for concentration. Not everyone will be allowed to come; there will be a time in the week or a time in the day (I don't know) when visitors will be allowed to come, but anyway, no mixture. A fixed time or a fixed day to show people around, and the rest of the time, only for those who are,., serious - serious, sincere,- who really want to learn to concentrate.
So I think that is good.
It was there (gesture upward), I still see it when I speak of it -
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I SEE. As I see it, it is very beautiful, it is really "very beautiful... a sort of half-light: one can see, but it is VERY tranquil, and then " very clear and very bright rays of light (the spotlight, the artificial light, must be rather golden, it must not be cold - that will depend on the spotlight) onto this globe. A globe made of a plastic material or. .. I don't know.
Crystal?
If it is possible, yes. For the small temple the globe will not need to be very big: if it were as big as this (about thirty centimetres) it would be good. But for the big temple it will have to be big.
But how will the big temple be built? On top of the small one?
No, no, the small one will go.
Ah! it will go, we will make another one.
But the big one will be built later, and on a vast scale.... The small one will go only after the big one is built. But of course, for the town to be finished, it will take about twenty years (for everything to be really in order, in its place). It is like the gardens: all the gardens which are being made are for now, but in twenty years, all that will have to be on another scale; then, it will have to be something really... really beautiful. And I wonder what material should be used to make this globe, the big one? .. The small one, in crystal perhaps: a globe like that (thirty centimetres) , I think that will be enough. One must be able to see the globe from every corner of the room.
It shouldn't be raised too high above the floor either?
No, Sri Aurobindo's symbol does not need to be big, it should be so big (gesture)....
Twenty-five, thirty centimetres?
At the most, at the very most.
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That means that it will be at about eye level?
Eye level, yes, that's it.
And a VERY tranquil atmosphere. And NOTHING, you see: great columns... It remains to be seen whether the style of the columns should be... whether they will be round, or if they, too, will have twelve facets...? And TWELVE columns.
And a roof in two sections?
Yes, a roof in two sections so as to have the sun.
It must be arranged in such a way that the rain cannot come in. We cannot think of having to open and close something when it rains, it is not possible; it must be arranged in such a way that the rain cannot get in. But the sun must enter AS RAYS: not diffused. So the opening must be small... It needs a qualified engineer who really knows his job.
And when would they start?
I would like to begin at once, as soon as we have the plans. Only, there are two questions: first the plans (we can get the workers) and then the money.... I think that it is possible with this idea of making a sort of small model (of course "small" is a manner of speaking, because to be able to hold a hundred people easily it still needs to be quite big), a small model to begin with; and then while making the small model they will learn, and the big one will be made only when the town is finished - that's not right away.
I spoke about it to [the architect], who told me the next day: "Yes, but it will take time to prepare" (I didn't say anything about what I've just told you, I only spoke of doing something). And afterwards I had the vision of this room, so I no longer need anyone to see what it should be: I know. And it requires an engineer rather than an architect, because an architect... it must be as simple as possible.
I told [the designer] what you had seen, this great empty room where there was nothing; it moved him very much, in fact he was seeing the large empty room. He understands quite well. Well, "empty", that means simply a form.
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But a form... like a tower, but... (that's why I wanted to have a sketch to show), twelve regular facets, and then there should be a wall which is not straight but something like this (slightly inclined gesture), I don't know if it is possible. And inside, twelve columns. And then an arrangement must be found to catch the sun: twelve facets in such a way that at every moment of the year it can come in.... It needs someone who really knows the job.
The outside... I did not see the outside; not at all. I saw only the inside.
I wanted to explain to [the designer] when I had the papers, it would be easier, but since you have called him...
(Someone goes and brings the designer, who comes in with a garland of pink "Harmony". Mother gives him an orange hibiscus - the Auroville flower, looks at him, then begins to talk:)
Since we decided to build this temple, I saw it: I saw the inside of it. I have just tried to describe it to [the disciple]. But in a few days I will have some plans and drawings, so I will be able to explain more clearly. Because I don't at all know how the outside is, but inside I know.
[The designer:] The outside grows from the inside.
It is a kind of tower with twelve regular facets, which represent the twelve months of the year, and it is absolutely empty.... Only, it must be able to hold one to two hundred people. And then, to support the roof, there will be twelve columns (not outside: inside), and right in the centre, the object of concentration.... And with the collaboration of the sun, all year round the sun should enter AS RAYS (no diffusion: an arrangement must be made so that it can enter as rays) ; then according to the time of day and the month of the year, the ray will turn (there will be an arrangement on top) and the ray will be directed onto the centre. In the centre there will be the symbol (of Mother), as well as the symbol of Sri Aurobindo supporting a globe. A globe which we shall try to make from something transparent like crystal or... A big globe. And then, people will be allowed in to concentrate - (Mother laughs) to learn how to concentrate! No fixed meditations, none of all that, but they must stay there in
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silence, in silence and concentration.
[The designer:] It is very beautiful.
But the place absolutely... as simple as possible. And the floor in such a way that people are comfortable, so they don't have to think that they hurt here or they hurt there!
[The designer:] It is very beautiful.
And in the middle, on the floor, my symbol. At the centre of my symbol we will put in four parts (like a square) four symbols of Sri Aurobindo, upright, supporting a transparent globe.
That has been seen.
So I am going to have an engineer prepare some small plans, simple ones, to show, and then I will show you when it is ready. So. And then we will see.
The walls will probably have to be of concrete.
[The designer:] The whole structure can be in reinforced concrete.
The roof shall probably be sloped, and then, at the centre, there will have to be a special arrangement for the sun.
You said that you saw the walls as being slightly sloped.
It is either the walls or the roof which should be sloped — whichever is easiest to do. The walls could be made straight and the roof sloped. And the upper part of the roof resting on the twelve columns. And up above, the arrangement for the sun.
And inside: nothing. Nothing but the columns. The columns... I don't know, we will have to see if we make them with facets (like the roof), with twelve facets, or else simply round.
[The designer:] Round.
Or simply square - it remains to be seen.
And then, on the floor, we will put something thick and soft. Here... (you are comfortable as you are seated?... Yes?), first there is wood and then this kind of rubber, and on top of it, a
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woollen carpet.
With your symbol?
Not the carpet. For the symbol, I had thought it would, be better to make it out of something durable.
[The designer:] It should be in stone.
The symbol... everything will be around it, of course. The symbol will not cover everything, it will be only in the middle of the space - (Mother laughs) they mustn't sit on the symbol!... It will be in the middle.
The proportion of the symbol to the whole will have to be seen very carefully, in relation to the height.
[The designer:] And the room is quite large?
Oh yes, it has to be... it should be like a sort of half-light with these rays of sunlight - so that the ray can be SEEN.
A ray of sunlight.
Then, according to the time of day, the sun will turn (with the time of day and the month of the year). And then at night, as soon as the sun disappears, reflectors will be lit which will have the same effect and the same colour. And day and night the light remains there. But no windows nor lamps nor anything like that - nothing. Ventilation with air-conditioners (they are built into the walls, it is very easy).
And SILENCE. Inside no one speaks!
That will be good.
So, as soon as my papers are ready, I will call you and show them to you.
[The designer:] Very good.
(To [an Ashramite]:) Give me a rose for him.
(Mother gives two red roses; [the designer] leaves)
I did not ask [the designer] if he had seen [the architect]
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because... [the architect] is completely in the "practical" atmosphere of today.
It is good - it must get started!
You see, this is what I have learned: the failure of the religions it is because they were divided — they wanted people to be religious to the exclusion of the other religions; and every branch of human knowledge has been a failure because they were exclusive; and man has been a failure because he was exclusive. And what the new Consciousness wants (it is on this that it insists) is: no more divisions. To be able to understand the spiritual extreme, the material extreme, and to find... to find the meeting point, the point where... that becomes a real force.
[passage omitted]
From the practical point of view I will try to make [the architect] understand. But I have seen, it seemed to me that what is needed... [the architect], when he is here, looks after Auromodele, the practical side of all that (it is very necessary, it is very good), and for the building of the Centre, I would like [the designer] to do it, and so I would like [the designer] to stay when [the architect] is away; [the designer] should be here when [the architect] is gone, and we shall do it with [the designer]. Only I don't want either of them to feel that it is one of them against the other. They must understand that it is to complement one another.
I think [the designer] will understand.
But [the architect] might take that as an encroachment on his province?
Perhaps not. I will try, I will try.
No, when I told him that it was necessary to build this Centre
-that I had seen it and that it had to be done - he did not object. He only told me, "But it will take time." I told him, "No, it must be done at once." And that is why I am having these sketches made by an engineer, to show him, because it is not an architect's job: it is an engineer's job, involving very precise calculations for the sunlight, very precise. It needs to be someone who really knows. The architect has to see that the columns are beautiful, that the walls are beautiful, that the proportions
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are correct - all that is very good - and then the symbol at the centre. The aspect of beauty, of course, is the province of the architect, but the whole aspect of calculation.... And the important thing is the play of the sun on the centre. Because that becomes the symbol - the symbol of the future realization.
AM XI-33-37
I have a letter from [the designer]...
I am going to see him this afternoon.
I told you that I had seen the central building of Auroville... I have a plan, would you be interested to see it?... There are some rolls, there (Mother unrolls the plan as she explains):
There will be twelve facets. It's a circle. And, at an equal distance from the centre, twelve columns. At the centre, on the ground, is my symbol, and at the centre of my symbol, there are four of Sri Aurobindo's symbols, upright, forming a square; and on the square, a translucent globe (we don't know yet in what material). And then, from the top of the roof, when the sun is shining, the sunlight will fall onto it in a ray (nowhere else: only there); when there is no sun, there will be electric reflectors which will send a ray (also A ray: not a diffused light) exactly onto it, onto this globe.
And then, there are no doors, but... going deep down, one comes up again into the temple; one goes under the wall and comes up again inside - again it is a symbol. Everything is symbolic.
And then there is no furniture, but as with this floor here, there is first wood, probably; then over the wood, a thick "Dunlop"; and over that, a carpet, like here. The colour is yet to be chosen. The whole place will be white. I am not sure if the symbols of Sri Aurobindo will be white... I don't think so. I did not see them white, I saw them in some indefinable colour which was between gold and orange. A kind of colour like that. They will be upright, they will be carved in stone. And a globe which is not transparent but translucent. And then, right at the bottom (under the globe), there will be a light which Will be directed
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upwards, shining diffusely into the globe. And then, from outside, there will be rays of light falling onto the centre. And no other lights: no windows, electric ventilation. And not a single piece of furniture: nothing. A place... for trying to find one's consciousness.
Outside, it will be something like that (Mother unrolls another plan)... we don't know if the roof will be completely pointed or... Very simple, very simple.
It will be able to hold about two hundred people.
So, [the designer's] letter?
Very Sweet Mother,
I saw [the architect] on Sunday, he came to my room,
we had lunch together.
With love, I arranged for You and for [the architect] some very beautiful flowers. You were with us. We talked a lot.
I felt [the architect] as a brother.
I told him that Auroville cannot start like any other town (city-planning problems, social, economic problems, all that: later). The beginning ought to be "something else". That is why we should begin with the Centre. This Centre must be our lever, our fixed point, the thing on which we can support ourselves to try to leap to the other side -because it is only from the other side that we can begin to understand what Auroville ought to be. And this Centre should be the form which manifests in Matter the content which You can transmit to us on all the planes (occult also). As for us, we should be only the open and sincere medium through which you can materialize that. And I told him that I have felt the need to approach all that by living the experience inwardly and all together, — people of the East and West — in a wide movement of love, because that is the only possible concrete for building "something else "...
What he says is good.
... And the Centre can give us this love at once because it is love for You!
I told him that practically we could begin with a moment of silence, all together, and try to make a total blank, and
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with everyone's aspiration bring down the indications for the beginning into that blank. But all united and all together, especially those who are spiritually most advanced: the Indians.
[The architect] agreed perfectly. He said really this should be done.
(Mother nods approvingly)
I will see [the designer] this afternoon to give him this plan. Because that is what I saw, you know.
We will make it in white marble. [An Ashram engineer] said that he will fetch the marble, he knows the place.
The whole structure in white marble?
Yes, yes.
But [the designer] told me something which I feel is quite right. He said: We are going to build this Centre, we are going to put all our heart and aspiration into it, into this Centre...
Yes, yes.
And over the years it will become more and more "charged"....
Yes.
So this Centre must be the real thing: this temple should not be removed so as to build another, bigger one later.
I said that to reassure the people who think that something huge is needed. I said, "We will begin with this, and then we will see," you understand? I said, this Centre should be there until the town is completely built, and afterwards we will see — afterwards no one will want to remove it!
Because there are many who were thinking of something "gigantic".
But he says that from the architectural point of view, it is quite possible to extend the thing from the outside, without touching
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what has already been built.
Yes, oh! it is quite possible.
You see, [the architect] told me, "And then what will we do afterwards?" I said, "Well, we will think about that later!" That's it! They don't know... they don't know that one must NOT THINK! I didn't think about it at all, at all, at all - one day, I saw it like that, as I see you. And even now, it is so living that I only have to look and I see it. And what I saw was the centre and the light which falls on it and then, QUITE NATURALLY, while looking at it I noticed, I said, there, it is like that. But it was not "thought", I did not think "twelve .columns and then twelve facets and then..."; I did not think all that: I saw.
It is like these symbols of Sri Aurobindo.... When I am speaking of the centre I still see these four symbols of Sri Aurobindo, which support each other at the corners, like that, and this colour... a strange colour... I don't know where we could find that. It is an orange-gold, very warm. And it is the only colour in the place; all the rest is white. And the translucent globe.
[The designer] said that he would go at once to enquire in Italy, at Murano - the place where they make the big crystals - to find out how large a globe can be made of crystal, say 30 cm, for example.
The exact measurement is given on the plan, it must be marked.
There is a big glass-works there.
Oh! They make marvellous things over there.
Isn't it marked, the size of the globe?
Seventy centimetres.
It can be hollow. It need not be solid, so that it is not too heavy.
165
He is good, [the designer].
(silence)
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Yes, Sweet Mother.
This underground entrance.... One will enter at a dozen or so metres away from the wall, at the foot of the urn. The urn itself will mark where the descent begins. I must choose from which side exactly.... And then, it is possible that, later on, the urn, instead of being outside, will be WITHIN the enclosure.
So perhaps we could simply put a great wall all around, and then the gardens. Between the surrounding wall and the building we are going to build now, we could have the gardens and the urn. And that wall will have one entrance (one or several, ordinary doors): people will be able to walk around the garden.
And then one should fulfil certain conditions to have the right to go down into the underground passage and come out into the temple.... That must be something like an initiation, not just "like that", no matter how.
(silence)
I said to [the architect], "We will see in twenty years!" So that calmed him down.
But the original idea was to surround it with water, to make an island so that one would have to cross the water to be able to reach the temple. It is quite possible to make an island....
AM XI 38-57
What did you want to tell me?
I had a visit from /the designer] and [an Italian disciple].... There are two things. But first there is the plan of the Centre — more precisely, of the outside of the Centre.
The outside, I have seen nothing. There is a sketch, it is a sketch by [an Ashram engineer]. I did not see anything at all and I am open to all suggestions. And then?
[The designer] explained something to me which I found very beautiful, which I would like to submit to you.... When you
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spoke about this Centre, as a matter of fact, for the outside you said, "I don't know if the walls will be sloping or if it is the roof which will slope." You seemed to have some hesitation. So [the designer] says that he received a kind of inspiration, and that he has seen something very simple, like a great shell, one part of which would come out of the surface and another part which would be buried in the ground. And he has drawn a sort of diagram which I would like to show you.
Has he seen [the architect] too? Because [the architect] had two ideas; he came
to see me with two ideas, and I told him which of the two I preferred, but
nothing is decided yet. And [the architect] is making a sketch of his ideas. So
I will see what [the designer] says and then I will tell you [the architect's]
ideas.
(The disciple unrolls the plan) So you see, here is the outside, which would be simply like a shell. The inside is exactly as you have seen it: this great bare carpet, and then the ball at the centre. And what led [the designer] to his inspiration was that you had said one should go underground and come up again. So he had the idea of going deep down, of making a spiral staircase here, which would come up again, and just here there would be a kind of series of staircases branching out in all directions (in the lower part of the shell) which would lead into the temple itself. So, the entire lower portion would be in black marble and the upper portion in plain white marble. And the whole thing is like a great bud, you see, as if it were growing out of the earth.
Are you sure that he hasn't seen [the architect]? Because [the architect] told me, "I want to make a great circle; the interior is an exact semi-circle and the other semi-circle would be underground."
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He used almost the same words.
Because [the designer] told him his idea.
Ah! [The designer] had told him! Ah, that's it.
It is like a bud coming out of the earth.
Yes, yes, that was the first idea [the architect] told me, almost identically word for word. And then, his second idea was a pyramid: to leave the temple as we had said, and then make a pyramid. But I had also thought of a pyramid and I told him, "I thought of a pyramid...." But he said that he would make both plans and that then we would see. But if that agrees with [the designer's] idea, it is very good.
But [the architect's] idea is in fact [the designer's] idea.
Yes, that's it.
So, when one arrives at the top of the "stalk", there is a whole series of stairways in all directions, so that one can come up into the temple from any side And then the centre is absolutely bare, and all around there is a kind of gallery by which one comes out from below; that is where all these stairways will be. And everything will be empty. There will simply be this huge carpet held from corner to corner by these galleries. It will look as if it is suspended. All white, all uniform. And there was the question of the twelve columns.... [The designer] said that he felt the columns were yet another ancient symbol which didn't really go with the shell, and he suggested instead of twelve columns, symbolically one could put twelve supports, twelve column bases, which would serve as back rests.
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Oh! But the columns have a use, because at the top of the columns we will put the spotlights which will direct the light onto the centre: there will be light night and day; in the daytime, the opening will be arranged, but as soon as the sun sets, the spotlights will be lit and the spotlights are fixed on top of the twelve columns and converge onto the centre.
But, Sweet Mother, if the columns are only useful for the spotlights, the spotlights could also he fixed on the walls?
The columns are not near the walls, the columns are here, exactly half-way between the centre and the wall.
Because [the designer] saw this space in the centre completely bare, with only the symbol in the middle and this big uniform carpet, not broken up by columns. But in their place, to put something like big blocks — twelve big blocks — which would indicate the position of the columns and would serve at the same time as supports. Twelve large blocks about 50 cm high.
That has no meaning.
A symbolic meaning? Because you spoke a lot about these pillars being like a support for people who would like to sit down.
Oh, for their backs!
So he said that each of these twelve blocks could be, for example, in a different material, like a symbol: twelve different materials.
I saw columns, myself.
On the outer walls the general ventilation will be arranged, which will be electric (no windows), and then on the columns, there was the light - I saw columns, I clearly saw the columns.
Oh well, I will tell him that.
As for the surrounding gallery, I don't know if I like that very much... I did not see it: I saw the walls completely bare, without
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windows, and then the columns, and then the centre. That I am sure of, because I saw it, and I saw it for a long time.
How do you like the shell shape?
That means that it makes a perfect circle: half above, half below.... It will do.
Only an arrangement must be made for the sun.
Yes, [the Italian disciple] knows very well about the problem of lighting with prisms, because if one wants to catch a single ray of the sun, one must use prisms. He says he will easily solve the problem, he is taking care of it. One has simply to put prisms at a certain number of places, which will capture just one ray of the sun.
It must be ONE ray. I SAW the ray.
That's it, with a prism one sees the ray. So there will be a certain number of geometrical openings according to the movement of the sun.... But inside, on the inside walls, the twelve facets will be reproduced.
Yes, yes.
And this, in theory (the disciple points to the circular gallery), these were the entrances by which one came out from the underground passage.
I don't know if it is good to multiply the entrances like that.... There will be a practical problem to solve: if there is only one entrance and a very strict supervision at this entrance, it is all right, but if there are several entrances and if there is not enough light, there will be disasters.
No, no, Sweet Mother, there will only be one entrance from the outside, but when one comes out at the base of the shell there would be these many entrances. No, on the outside, there is only one descent which comes out down here, at the foot of this spiral staircase.
(silence)
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[The designer] had thought of this gallery all around because he said that would make all this central white carpet stand out more, give it the air of floating detached, instead of being stuck against the wall.
I did not think of it as "stuck against the wall", there was always a passage around the wall.
So it is this passage, with a certain number of galleries by which people will come out. And it was also this idea of bareness which made him remove the columns.
What I don't like is this idea of galleries, for the walls were quite straight, from top to bottom, in white marble.
Ah! But the galleries are not high, they are about 30 cm above the floor.
Yes, that is all right.
And besides, he said that in these galleries, or rather on this border which restricts the passage all around, the carpet could come right up to the angle, cover the angle.
That's all right.
(silence)
Good, that's all right. So they must come to an understanding. But that must be half done already since [the architect] has spoken to me about the idea. If I had known that it was [the designer's] idea, I would have said yes right away. But it will work out. It's all right.
So then I will tell him to work on this basis.... The only question yet to be decided is the outside: should we leave a space around the shell so that the underside of the shell can be clearly seen? Otherwise, if everything is filled up, it will simply look like a hemisphere resting on the ground. So that one understands clearly that this shell is also underground, he thought of making an opening all around.
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I don't know. I tell you, I have seen nothing for the outside, so I don't know.
But it will be dangerous. One could fall.
Or perhaps we could make some kind of a moat with water all around, clear water which would show the lower curve of the shell, for example?
Yes, yes, that might be good.
There is also a question of measurements. According to the plan, you have given 24 m - 12 m on each side of the globe. But can we keep a little additional space on each side for the passage? The plan shows 24 m in diameter, and 15 m 20 cm in height.
Ah?
[The designer] is asking if the proportions can be changed? To keep 24 m for the base of the carpet, but with the possibility, for example, of keeping 2 or 3 m on each side for clearance.
Then the wall would come where?
The wall would be here (the disciple points to the outside of the circular gallery).
It is the wall which must be 24 m away.
He says that if these passages are to be there, 24 m would be a little short.
(silence)
And the height is also in question.
The question, exactly, was that it should make a perfect circle.
If it makes a perfect circle, then the height will be the radius of the distance between the two walls.
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Yes.
(silence)
The thing that would really please me, would be if they could both come to an agreement and present me with a project from both of them at once. Like that, it would be easy to carry it out.... Hasn't [the architect] adopted [the designer's] idea? Why don't the two of them see together how to carry it out?
Yes, that would simplify things.
Oh, very much!
(silence)
What will happen down there?... (Mother points to the underground part of the shell) All that is mental. But when you are going to have a big dark basement, what is going to happen in there?... What is going to happen? - Lots of unmentionable things. Humanity is not transformed, one should not forget it! And all kinds of people will come.... Even if there is a control at the entrance, you can't prevent people from going to see, so then what is going to happen down there?... That was my first objection when [the architect] told me, "We could make wonderful underground passages!" I told him, "That's all very well, but who will control what happens down there?"
I had thought it was your idea, the descent?
My idea was a rather short descent, which came out there (Mother points to the single opening of the original plan). Quite a short descent, not a great tunnel like that.... But it is possible, it is a matter of control, that's all. Only there is a big difference between a passage with room for two lines of people (one going up and one going down) and coming out there, and an enormous tunnel like this one, there is a big difference! And now, on top of that, he says that it will be all dark!
In black marble, yes.
Yes, then? That means that one will not see very clearly in there Then what is going to happen in there?
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These underground areas are not in the form of tunnels: it is a central spiral stairway, and when one reaches the top of the stairway, it branches out into a series of open stairways, suspended like bridges. It is not enclosed, it is all floating.
There won't be any accidents?... Ah! There are people with their heads in the clouds who are ail ready to break their heads on the floor.... You see, it's a bit too mental for my taste, I mean that from the mental point of view it is very attractive, but in vision...
The main idea was to build the lower part collectively, like a symbol....
(long silence)
We'll see! (Mother laughs)
(silence)
In any case they must get together. And then I will see.
I would like to be able to see them both together with their paper. Then that would be very good.
Because the one doesn't tell me that it's the, other's idea - he presents it as if it were his own (!), and then the other one doesn't tell me that he has spoken to the first one!...
But he didn't have a chance to tell you.
No, but you said it because I told you.... But I know. So you see, we are working for "human unity", and the workers don't understand or agree with each other!
And I see, I see very well with each of them something like that (gesture of twisting). It's not that I am shocked, but... My logic is as follows: "Yes, it's very fine, you are very nice, you are working towards human unity - at least stand united!..." You understand?
But I am sure that [the designer] wants only to come to an agreement with [the architect].
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But you can very well grasp that if [the architect] took [the designer's] idea, it's because he admires [the designer's] intelligence, otherwise he wouldn't have taken it; so, consequently, why is one side like that and the other side.... We do not want such pettiness any more.
But when [the designer] showed me this plan, I got a feeling that it was something very beautiful... 111 tell you what I felt; I felt, I am present at the birth of Auroville.
No, it is not true.
The material birth, I mean.
Yes, yes, I understand, but this is not true.
(Mother goes into a lengthy contemplation)
We're going to let it settle down. For you understand that in order for me to agree to changes, I have to be certain that the source of the inspiration is of the same quality as the one I had.... For the execution itself, I am very well aware that people who know their profession are needed to do the work, but for the inspiration, I have to be positive that the source of inspiration is AT LEAST on the same level as mine.... And I am not sure, because I saw so very clearly. And immediately, with [the designer's] ideas, I saw a mixture coming in. All of his ideas are mental ideas, I guarantee you because it's easy for me to see that. Well, they all bring in the same MIXTURE that is found in everything that's being done in the world. And that... what point is there in beginning again-again-again...?
There is something that disturbs me. To enter underneath is very good, but this huge underground area?... (Mother makes a pouting gesture)
(silence)
We'll see. Let it settle down, we'll see.
And for the top, shall we leave this idea of the shell, or should
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it be studied further?
A shell... the idea was a sphere. Why a shell?
"Shell", well, a round form, a spherical form.
An eggshell is elongated, it is not spherical. A real egg is rather like a spinning top; so the upper part would be wider and the base narrower, with just these stairs... That is quite possible.
Give me a piece of paper... (Mother draws an egg as she explains) And then, there, right at the bottom, there would be only stairs. Like that, yes.
His idea was to reproduce the egg of Brahman: you know, the primeval egg. That the temple should represent the primeval egg-
But then, what is it like, the egg of Brahman!...
I don't know.... Like an egg, I think!
The bottom of an egg is always narrower than the top. So if we take an egg like that (Mother draws) and at the base comes the staircase, and the spiral staircase mounts to the temple.... For example, seven stairway openings.
Seven instead of twelve.
And here (Mother draws the median half of the "egg"), it is 24 m and only 15 m 50 in height. Then like that it is correct.
Twenty-four metres total width or for the carpet?
No, the walls must be straight, the walls cannot be curved. I saw them straight.
Straight, and then curving up.
According to what I had seen, the columns were higher than the walls, and that is why the roof sloped. And the electric light was on the columns.
Page-176
And the widest point of the egg would be here (Mother draws a line at the level of the carpet).
At floor level.
Yes.
And you said seven openings?
Seven stairways.
And then an underground passage which leads to the base of the egg from which these seven stairways start.
That is possible.
In short, the inner walls of the temple ought to be straight.
That is to say that one can, for the outside, for the sake of appearance, make them rounded, but inside, the wall must be straight.
The wall straight, and a dome over the straight wall.
Yes, a dome over the straight wall. But the dome can be the dome of the egg, and I had thought that the place where the dome fits in with the walls would be on the columns.
Twelve columns.
And here, for the outside, they can continue their wall in a rounded form, like that (Mother draws).
There would even be another possibility: which is to have a space between the inner passage wall. To make a space. That is to be seen.
That means, in addition to the 24 m?
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Yes, that's understood: the 24 m ends at the walls.
And the openings for the seven stairways?
I would prefer to have them, outside the wall.
Yes, that would be better, because it would give more space to the centre.
Oh! yes, and the interior would be much cleaner. The sight of all these stairways didn't please me. Even one stairway I didn't like, but to see seven of them... Whereas outside, it is all right.
So a passage outside.
The passage outside.
Yes, like in India when one goes around the temple.
Yes. That is all right.
And the seven stairways start directly from the base of the shell without this "stalk" rising from the bottom?
That is how they want it. Down below, I don't mind. If they want it to be a stairway like that or a stairway... as long as it is not too steep.
(silence)
[passage omitted]
What else do you have?
There is the second part of the problem.
Ah! What is it?
[The Italian disciple] and [the designer] have realized that if Auroville or the building of this Centre is left to the people of Auroville, as distinct from the Ashram, it will never work: there will never be the true force, the people who are there are
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not receptive enough to do the work. If there is this division between the Ashram and Auroville, we'll never make it, they will make another "fabrication" but not something true. According to them, the only hope is that really this Centre be built not by the Aurovilians, but by all the people of the Ashram, with no distinction between Aurovilians and non-Aurovilians: that all the energy should unite in constructing this Centre: not to abandon the Aurovilians to an external separation. Just as all the disciples built "Golconde", in the same way all the disciples should build the Centre of Auroville, without any outside labour.
At Giaconda, there was outside labour.
Anyway, limiting the outside element as much as possible, so that it may be a work of consecration. Otherwise, they tell me, (especially [the Italian disciple]): the people in Auroville are all full of arrogance, of incomprehension, they see the outside of things. The force of the people from here must mingle with that. And if the people of the Ashram do not mix in with them, do not come to infuse the force, nothing will be achieved.... At the present moment, [the designer] told me, Auroville as seen from outside looks like a necropolis.
(Mother laughs)
It is the "living" fruit of egoism. The only thing which can save it is for the people of the Ashram to get involved and do the work, and for the others to be assimilated into that, otherwise...
(after a long silence)
But at the Ashram, we have three centres which are engaged in construction: there is [name], who looks after the maintenance of the houses, [name] and [the Ashram engineer]. [Name] isn't equipped for that, and besides he is too busy because he's busy not only with construction but also with the cars and all these lands; in my opinion he is already fully occupied and he is doing a good job, and if he were asked to do more than he does now, he would not be able to do it well.... [The Ashram engineer] is very interested, he even said he would
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take up the responsibility of getting the white marble; he would go look for it and choose it himself. He is very interested, if I were to tell him to do it.... But that wouldn't be any better.
But that was not what [the Italian disciple] meant, he was not speaking at all of a construction problem: he was speaking of the question that the disciples should work with the Aurovilians.... [The Italian disciple], as an engineer and with the money collected, will do the construction, but all the labour should be provided by the people of the Ashram as a whole, who should mix with the Aurovilians. That is the idea.
It is not possible. All the people of the Ashram who are of working age are all working, they have all got their work.
[The Italian disciple] saw a kind of rotation, each one giving, for example, an hour per day, or one day per week. Because otherwise...
They would simply love that! For them it would be extraordinary fun. I have more trouble to prevent them from dispersing themselves than I would ever have to get them to do something. It would be an amusement for them.
Because he says that without the inner force of the people of the Ashram mingling with the Aurovilians, the people from Auroville will remain what they are. There is a breach between Auroville and the Ashram.
As for myself, I don't find it wide enough.
The gap?
Yes.
Ah! well!
I don't find it wide enough. It isn't at all the same plane. Here, people...
(silence)
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You have only to imagine if I weren't here.
What!
Just imagine that and you'll see, you'll see right away what will happen.
Well then, it's the only hope.
If they come to say, "YOU [Mother] have to take the responsibility," then I would say, "Ah, they're right about that," that's a very different thing.
They were nearby. It's not that.
But, Sweet Mother, I believe that's what they mean, isn't it?
(Mother laughs) They do not think clearly! It's a confused thought.
When they say that all the disciples here should get involved in the construction of Auroville, as they did with Golconde, what they mean is that you might direct all the disciples to come and participate in the work. That was the idea. But, on the contrary, you say that there should be a bigger gap - and no mixing.
(laughing) If you knew how things are!... The people in Auroville bring drugs in here,... all sorts of things.
Yes, yes, I know — I know, Sweet Mother. But that's just why he says that the only hope is...
It's that they go out there and catch all these things!
He says, "Otherwise there is no hope. "
Oh no, he does not know! It is all in the mind, it is all mental. They do not know. What does he know? It is only when one sees. There's not a single one of them who sees.
It's all thoughts, thoughts, thoughts - thoughts do not build.
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The elements in Auroville can do the work?
I am working, working (kneading gesture) to bring together the energies that can do it. And a sifting out is required out there.
Yes.
(silence)
But, you understand, they are talking about physical work, and for physical work there are only the young people who are at the School - all the Ashramites have grown old, my child! There are only the young people at the School. And the young ones who are at the School are not here to be Ashramites: they are here to be educated — it is up to them to choose.... Many, many of them want to go to Auroville. So it would be the educational side of the Ashram which would go to Auroville -there are many of them. But... give me some names, who can go and work with his hands?
But, Sweet Mother, the only possibility is that you should SPEAK, and then tomorrow I will go and spend two hours in Auroville filling "baskets " [shallow pans for carrying earth].
(Mother laughs) My child, you are one of the youngest... can you see me telling [a senior Ashramite], go there and work?
Ah, but that would attract all the others.... In any case, that is [the designer's] and [the Italian disciple's] idea.
(Mother laughs) Poor [senior Ashramite]!
(long silence)
If you knew how many letters I receive from so-called Aurovilians who say, "Oh, I want to be quiet at last, I want to come to the Ashram, I do not want to be an Aurovilian any more...." There, it is just the opposite: "I want to be quiet."
(silence)
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You know, I do not believe in external decisions. I simply believe in one thing only: the force of the Consciousness which is making a PRESSURE like that (crushing gesture). And the pressure goes on increasing... which means that it will sift out the people.
[passage omitted]
I believe only in that: the pressure of the Consciousness. All the rest is things that men do: they do them more or less well, and then it lives, and then it dies, and then it changes, and then it gets distorted, and then — everything they have done. It is not worth the trouble. The power of execution must come from above, like that, (gesture of descent) imperative! And for that, this (Mother points to her forehead) must keep quiet. Not to say, "Oh, that must not be, oh! this must be, oh! we ought to do..." Peace, peace, peace, He knows better than you do what is needed. There.
So since there are not many people who can understand, I say nothing: I watch and I wait.
(silence)
I LOOK... You see, when people give me a paper like you just did when you gave me this drawing, I look like that, and I see very well what on the paper has come from above and what has been mixed in and what is... like that. But we're not going to say that! - besides they wouldn't believe me.
(silence)
I understand very well - very well - why Sri Aurobindo did not say "superman", why he said supramental. He didn't say superman because he didn't want it to mean "a man who is perfecting himself", it's not that. He said supramental because... He was saying: leave all that.
Supramental - SUPRA, understand?
The last few days I saw photographs of the men who went to the moon. Did you see them? Didn't you notice how they were dressed?
Yes, I saw them.
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Oh!... well, they've become machines.
That's it: robots.
Yes, so (laughing) the Russians said: why not send robots, it's not worth the trouble...!
That's how it is.
(silence)
You see, [the Italian Ashramite] has spent his time saying as many bad things about [the architect] as he could, saying that all his plans were bad and that his work couldn't succeed. [The architect] has spent his time saying: "[The Italian Ashramite] has spoilt all my work!" And somebody else says, "That one..." and that one says, "This one...", and they are all like that! And I can see for sure that IF the work has to be done, they have to FIRST rise above this very petty and mean humanity. They " see", they have "ideas" (they all have many ideas), they have ideas, and they see; the others see something else and have other ideas, and then: "Oh, that's worth nothing, it 's my idea that's good.... " They're like that! And" my whole action is like this: a PRESSURE on them to make them renounce their small personalities. So long as that doesn't abdicate, the work CANNOT be done.
And in fact they look for all sorts of reasons not to see what is true.
They must... Oh, for a little air!
The body - this body here — is receiving a discipline, you know, it's terrible. But it does not complain; it is happy, it asks for it. And it SEES the extent to which we are full of VERY SMALL THINGS which are getting in the way of the action of the Force all the time. So, one has to start by getting rid of that. One has to be like this (gesture of abandon, openness ) and receive the Force. Then all the inspirations will come, and not only the inspirations but the MEANS to execute them, and the TRUE Thing. Otherwise.. .
And as none of them are that ready, I do as the Consciousness does: I put on the Pressure and say nothing I wait. (Mother laughs)
(silence)
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If you only knew everything that is going on, it would amuse you a lot. Everything regarding agriculture, it's the same thing; everything regarding education, the same thing; everywhere, the same thing. International concerns, the same thing again, literally everywhere: Man (Mother carries her head high), Man puffing himself up.
They must understand FIRST: abdication. Then we shall see.
Shall I convey your message?
Oh no, my child, they would be appalled, poor fellows!
Do you think so? It would do them some good.
Oh, no, no, it would overwhelm them. Pressure is the best thing. Because they do not understand what you're thinking, they don't understand what you're saying; they only understand what they've got in their own heads. They change the meaning of words... like [name], who took it as a personal attack.
Yes. it's true! It's true, I've noticed that: they take it as a personal attack.
That's it. But it is like that everywhere, that's the difficulty. It's the person first. So that spoils everything.
One speaks the truth objectively as one sees it - and it is as if one were attacking them!
Yes, as if one were attacking them.
So we have to w-a-i-t until they're ready. You see, we're losing a lot of time. It's better not to say anything: apply the Pressure. That's where I'm pitiless! (Mother laughs a lot)
So what shall I do in the midst of all these people?
You can tell them that.... In fact, [the architect] had spoken to me (it was the same thing with different words), and I said neither yes nor no. I was waiting because I wanted to know how the others saw it. So now I've seen, I see that they agree.
If they can come to an agreement, the work will go faster.
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Objections-about details have no importance, because one sets out with one idea and one arrives with another... one makes a lot of progress in between. So that does not need to be discussed, it is only.... Only try to put your energies together to get started more quickly, that's all! (Mother laughs)
AM XI-75-77
I had the impression there was something... What?... Oh, the Aphorisms... Did you read the one from yesterday?
On the state of anarchy?
Yes. It's good, isn't it?
(The disciple reads:)
"321. The anarchic is the true divine state of man in the end as in the beginning; but in between it would lead us straight to the devil and his kingdom.
And what do I answer to the aphorism before that? .
Oh, yes.'...
"320. Governments, societies, kings, police, judges, institutions, churches,...
Yes, he put everything in it: religions and police together.
Yes, they go together!
I was delighted.
"... laws, customs, armies are temporary necessities imposed on us for a few groups of centuries, because God has concealed His face from us. When it appears to us again in its truth and beauty, then in that light they will vanish."
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And what did I answer?
You said: "The anarchic state is the self-government of each individual, and it will be the perfect government only when each one becomes conscious of the inner Divine and will obey only Him and Him alone."
I write, and then the rest comes, but I don't have time to write it down....
Someone from Auroville wrote me that he thought he had come here to obey only himself (or something like that) and he found there were rules and laws. And he said, "I won't do it! I'm free. I refuse to do it." Naturally they reported it to me, so I wrote to him (I don't remember), "One is only free when one is conscious of the Divine and it is the Divine who makes the decisions in each one, otherwise one is the slave of one's desires, habits, all the conventions...." And I sent it, and afterwards he kept quiet.
That's what I wanted to add there (in this aphorism). It should say: one is only free when it is the Divine who makes the decisions in each one of us, otherwise men are the slaves of their desires, their habits, all the conventions, all the laws, all the rules... And the more they think they're free, the more bound they are!
(silence)
AM XI-98-100
I had a funny dream, which is perhaps linked to that.... I don't know, I was with you, and Sri Aurobindo was there (but I didn't see him).
Oh!
No, I didn't see him, but he was there, and then all of a sudden you fell ill, at least you were lying down, and Sri Aurobindo told me just then (I didn't see him but he told me): "Mother must eat cold meat and cold vegetables!" And it's as if he sent me on an errand to the one who should do it.. .. So I left and
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went all around, and I came to [name's], the people of Auroville, in a room that was very dark and full of people....
(Mother nods her head)
And [name] shouted in there, "Silence!" And [name] had a very dark face, you know, almost blackened, and he was shouting "Silence!" in there; and apparently it was to these people that I had come to say that Mother had to take cold meat and cold vegetables!
(Mother laughs) What can it mean?... Didn't you have a feeling of what it meant?
I had the impression that those people were terribly excited, that they were making you ill, and that they had to give you cold food!
(Mother laughs)
But then, a very dark world.
Very dark.
Oh, a confusion!... But I don't know, at night, I'm very often tuned in to the people of Auroville, and it's as tiring as anything, you know.
Oh, that's curious.
Very often.
But that proves that you have something to do there.
Yes, but in truth, it doesn't interest me!*
(Mother laughs) It's because everyone is reading your book. Yes, they came to ask me if I wanted to speak on the radio —
* And it is true, Auroville began to interest us only after Mother's passing, when we saw that Mother's work there was in peril.
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I said no!
Oh! (Mother laughs) They didn't tell me that, or I would have answered.
But there are quite a few coming little by little from there to see me.
Yes, many, many are reading the book; the book is having an enormous impact.... All the time I receive letters from people: "I've read The Adventure of Consciousness, it was a revelation", all the time, all the time. And it's also starting to have a lot of impact in the United States and Canada. So naturally that gives you... tiring nights!
(silence)
AM XI-121-123
A system of "coupons for hours of work", and a scale for the quality or degree of the work one does.
Where is that practised?
I don't know, in my imagination!
Oh, it's you! But yes, that's very good!
Something based on work.
Yes.
Coupons for hours of work. So you can say that the coupon of a coolie is worth one, and the coupon of an engineer is worth five, for example, that's all.
A whole organization would have to be developed. There will have to be... something like that in Auroville.
Based on work.
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Yes, an activity. You can define work as an activity that has a collective utility, not egoistic.
(silence)
The difficulty is the appraisal of the value of things. You know, you have to have a very broad vision for that. The easy thing about money was that it became mechanical.... But this other system can't become quite like that, and so.... But for example, the idea is that those who will live in Auroville won't have money - there's no circulation of money - but to eat, for example, everyone has the right to eat, naturally, but... From the strictly practical standpoint, one had conceived the possibility of every possible food according to the taste or needs of each one (for example, there are vegetarian kitchens, non-vegetarian kitchens, diet kitchens, etc.), and then those who want to receive food from them must do something in exchange. So work, or... it's difficult to organize practically, quite practically.... You know, we had foreseen a lot of the land around the city would be used for large-scale agriculture for the consumption of the city. But to cultivate these lands, money or materials are needed at the moment. So... I have to face the problem in every detail now, and it's not easy!
There are some who understand.
You know, the idea is that in Auroville there won't be any customs and duties and that the Aurovilians won't have any personal property: on paper that's all very well, but when it comes down to doing it practically...
And the problem is always the same: the responsibility should fall on those who have a... universal consciousness, you see, otherwise.... Wherever there is the personal consciousness, it is a being incapable of governing — we see what governments are like, it's dreadful!
(long silence)
There is a psychological viewpoint: there is something very interesting, which is that material needs diminish in proportion to the spiritual consciousness. Not (as Sri Aurobindo said) through asceticism, but rather because the attention, the concentration of the being shifts fields.... One can very well imagine
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that only material things please the purely material being; and the interest of all those who live in the emotional being and the outer mind is turned towards... for example, things of beauty, like those who need to live surrounded with beautiful things, who want to use lovely things. Now, that seems to be the height of humanity, but it's quite... what you could call a "middle region" (gesture hardly above the ground), it's not at all a higher region. But the way the world is organized, people who have no esthetic need return to a very primitive life - that's not good. There should be a place where life... where the very framework of life is not an individual matter, but a beauty which would be the natural accompaniment of a certain degree of development.
Now, the way things are arranged, you have to be rich in order to be surrounded by beautiful things, and that's a source of imbalance because wealth generally goes hand in hand with a very average, sometimes even mediocre, degree of consciousness. So everywhere there is an imbalance and disorder. There should be... a place of beauty — a place of beauty where you can live only if you have attained a certain level of consciousness. And it is not something which is decided by other people, but it is decided very spontaneously, naturally. So how to do it?...
There are starting to be problems like that in Auroville, and it makes things very interesting. Of course the means are very limited, but that too is part of the problem to be solved.
(long silence)
The conditions for organizing - for being an organizer (it's not "governing", it's ORGANIZING) the conditions for being an organizer should be as follows: no more desires, no more preferences, no more attractions, no more repulsions - a perfect equality for all. Sincere, naturally, but that goes without saying: wherever insincerity creeps in, it acts like a poison. And then, only those who are themselves in that condition are capable of discerning whether someone else is or is not.
And now, all human organizations are based on: visible fact (which is a falsehood), public opinion (which is another falsehood), and the moral sense, which is yet another falsehood! (Mother laughs) So....
(silence)
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AM XI-134-135
The French language is very literary and mental, isn't it?
Yes, it's very rigid.
Rigid, yes.
There's beginning to be a question of knowing what the language of Auroville will be.
I have the impression it will be a language that... (laughing) It's the children who provide the example: they know several languages and they make sentences using words from all the languages and... it's very colorful! Little [name] knows Tamil, Italian, French, and English; he's three years old, and so (laughing) it makes a hodgepodge.
Something like that.
It's like the Americans. They have one language... the English say they've completely ruined the language, but the Americans say that when they speak it, it has more life. It's like that.
This little [name] is nice... He's very funny. The day before yesterday was his mother's birthday, so I saw her. He was very upset because he hadn't come. And he said, "I'll see Mother -I'll see Mother tomorrow." So the whole of yesterday morning he was telling everyone, "I'm going to Mother, I'm going to see Mother." He got here — [name] told me: he's here. I said, "Go get him." (laughing) She went to get him and he said, "Oh, I don't need to see Mother any more!" (laughter).... He probably felt the Force in the atmosphere.
So they gave him a flower and he left.
I think those children have a much greater inner sensitivity -much greater. There are some little ones like that... (about that age: 2, 3, 4 years old). One little one came with his parents, they brought him; I didn't pay him any particular attention (I found the child nice, that's all); and afterwards, when he left, he said, "I'm not leaving here. I want to see Mother, I'm not leaving here." And he asked, he said, "I want to see Mother every day"!... He came back, he sat down (all the members of the family came by, received flowers, etc.), he remained sitting quietly at my feet. He didn't budge, he was quite satisfied. And what is curious is that it's not because I pay any particular
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attention to them, not at all. Not at all.
The other day one of them brought me flowers, I gave him a rose, and then he went to the other members of his family: he wanted to take their bouquets to give to me.... He came back, he sat down, then looked at his rose for a very long time, and then he came to give it to me like the thing... it was so much like: "This is the best thing I have, so I'm giving it to you!" (Mother laughs)
I gave it back to him.
They already have something more.
(silence )
Some people who speak Esperanto have written me an official letter to tell me how many of them there are (a considerable number) and to say that they would like their Esperanto to be the language of Auroville.... There are many of them speaking it, many. They're everywhere, I think. I received the letter two or three days ago.
But the language of Auroville will just have to be born spontaneously!
Yes, spontaneously, naturally! Oh, there's no need to interfere.
For the moment, I write birth certificates in French.... And when there's a central organization (which will be like a town hall or mayor's office, or I don't know what — whatever), if they give passports, they'll be world citizens.... Then everywhere they're going to start saying, "They're a little bit crazy", and then in a hundred years... it will be natural. I remember the beginning of the century (this century, before you were born), and now... but there's a TREMENDOUS
change.
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AM XI-171-172
Now, I should say one thing: when people come to see me (people I don't know - not those I see all the time), all those visitors, it's the best of themselves that comes out. Several times I've had contacts with people and had the impression that something could be done, they had a receptivity — and later on these people misbehave and create disorder or are annoying to others! But they're not the same when they're in front of me. And they feel it, they feel something else which becomes active. But it's the Presence that... compels; then, they go out (of Mother's room) and behave very badly, they quarrel, they... It's very difficult!
I see people from Auroville once a week in rotation, precisely to mould that matter, and it's really interesting (people I don't know: each time they bring me one or two or three who are new; some come every time and others take turns). I said, "Those who want a bath of silence can come in turns," and we don't say a word. And it's really interesting. Well, there are some of these people who misbehave out there [in Auroville]... And in spite of everything, they feel that what they are here is superior to what they are out there. Only the others would have to have great patience!...
(silence)
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AM XI-178
We are going to be obliged to give something for identification to the people in Auroville. Yes, because it's happened that some people came and settled on Auroville lands without asking anyone's permission, and all of a sudden you're in the presence of a gentleman or even a family.... So it's starting to get bothersome. Because it's very scattered.
(silence)
AM XI-189-194
I have something for you... (Mother indicates a written note) Two or three days ago it came imperatively like that, in connection with a story. They have meetings in Auroville, in Aspiration; I think they are meditations or something like that, I don't know. One of them came and put up my photograph; then someone else ran back to his room and came back with a cross!... And he said, "No, if you're going to put up a photograph of Mother, then I'm going to put my cross." They told me that. They told me because the one who had put up the cross came to see me with the others (they come once a week, a few, four or five), they told me nothing about it. He came and he sat down in front of me... I found his atmosphere a little prying (I didn't know anything at all, you know), and when they left, I asked who he was. Then they told me he was Catholic and they told me that story.*
After that came a whole series of things. But I must say there is literally an invasion out there (at different places in Auroville), because it's not guarded, there are free plots of land; especially at the Centre, there are people who have settled there and there are more coming all the time and settling there without asking permission. And we had thought it was going to
* Among the papers Mother gave us, we found a very interesting fragment of a letter to a French disciple; this letter seems to correspond well with the story Mother has just told: "They tell me that you intend to distribute a reproduction of the portrait you've done of me.1t would be better to introduce nothing personal into this meeting that might suggest the atmosphere of an incipient religion.
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be necessary to have a badge for those who are really Aurovilians. (Mother shows a sample of the badge) We have already been thinking of organizing all that for several days: for the first year they'll have a sort of identity card, and afterwards, if at the end of the year it's all right, they'll be given the badge.
But what came to me is this (Mother points to her notes). It's not finished... ([an Ashramite] gets ready to bring the lamp so Mother can read). I don't need light, I don't see clearly any more.
(The disciple reads:)
"Auroville is for those who want to live a life essentially religious, but who renounce all forms of religion, whether ancient, modern, new or future...*
Sweet Mother, excuse me, but why didn't you put "spiritual" instead of "religious"?
I'm not sure yet.
It gave me a funny feeling!
Yes, I noticed!... Maybe it's better to put "spiritual". I'll see.
"It is only in experience that there can be knowledge of the Truth. No one ought to speak of the Divine unless he has had experience of the Divine...
That's the important point.
"...Know the Divine, then only you will be able to speak of it....
You understand, I can put "spiritual", but...
'...The objective study of religions will form part of the historical study of the development of human consciousness...
* The next time Mother corrected the phrase "all forms of religion" and in its place simply put "all religions".
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I put religions underneath: in the realm of mind.
Yes, exactly, yes!
In the mental realm, and it was "a subject of study".
It's funny, two days ago, that came to me almost like an experience: religion is the mental world.
Yes, yes! It's the mentalization, an attempt at the mentalization of... that which greatly surpasses the mind.
"...Religions form part of the history of mankind and it is in this guise that they will be studied at Auroville — not as beliefs to which one ought or ought not to adhere, but as part of a process in the development of human consciousness which should lead man towards his superior realization."
Then, "programme"... (Mother laughs)
PROGRAMME
Research through experience of the
Supreme Truth.
A life divine
but
NO RELIGIONS.
That's good.
Oh, very good!... It's the "religious" there that bothers me.
Then we'll take it out!
Because, in fact you say, "No religions".
No, I used "religious" in the other sense, but it will always create confusion.
It's taken on such a false meaning.
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Yes. I'm going to explain to you, I didn't want to put "spiritual" because, first, the word "spiritual" in French has another meaning, and then the people who live a "spiritual" life reject Matter, and we don't want to reject Matter. So it would be false.
I admit that "religious" isn't a good word because immediately.... I used "religious" in the sense of a "life essentially preoccupied with the discovery of or search for the Divine." There aren't any words in French, and it's not "spiritual".
Divine?
We have to find a word - we can put this:
"Auroville is for those who want to live a divine life..."
Yes, "a life essentially divine," yes. "Divine" is wide, Sweet Mother.
(silence)
Is it finished?... There was so much, I didn't jot everything down.... It was the day before yesterday, I think, the whole day was taken up like that in the experience, and I had the impression of the revelation of the true aim of Auroville, and it was THAT which had to be said, and THAT which... will select the people. The true Aurovilians are those who want to undertake the research and discovery of the Divine. But in fact, you know, it's not by mystical means: it's in life itself. That too should be said.
(Mother writes:)
"Our search will not be a search effected by mystic means. It is in life itself that we wish to find the divine."*
[passage omitted]
* Let us note that Mother wrote "divine" with a small letter. Later she added this sentence: "And it is through this discovery that life can really be transformed."
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Shall we put a title on these notes on Auroville?... For example, "The Position of Auroville with Respect to Religion"?
If we put, "We want the Truth"?... I use that word because no one in the world would dare to say: we don't want the truth! (laughter)
For most people it's like this: what WE want is the truth ! (laughter)
I showed [the architect] the "Auroville Programme", (laughing) his hair stood on end: "But... but people can't tolerate that now!" - Oh?...
And then, the Aurovilians must want the Truth WHATEVER IT IS. IT IS. They call what they want the Truth, whereas they must want the Truth whatever it is.
(Mother writes her last note on Auroville:)
We want the Truth.
For most men, it is what they want
that they label truth.
The Aurovilians must want
the Truth whatever it maybe.
I put "Truth" with a capital letter. (Mother laughs) Because, to tell the truth, it's not that, it is: "We want THE DIVINE." But then right away there's an argument! So it's better to put "Truth".
AM XI-201-202
[The architect] has asked me to say what we mean by religion...
(Mother hands a letter)
"Sweet Mother, the notion of religion is most often linked to the search for God. Should religion be understood in this context only? As a matter of fact, are there not
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nowadays other forms of religion?"
I wrote something down BEFORE receiving "this question . It came in English.
We give the name religion to any concept of the world or the universe which is presented as the exclusive Truth in which one must have an absolute faith, generally because this Truth is declared to be the result of a revelation.
Most religions affirm the existence of a God and the rules to be followed to obey Him, but there are some Godless religions, such as socio-political organizations which, in the name of an Ideal or the State, claim the same right to be obeyed.
To seek Truth freely and to approach it freely along his own lines is a man's right. But each one must know that his discovery is good for him alone and it is not to be imposed on others.
And then this:
In Auroville, nothing belongs to anyone in particular. Everything is collective property.
It's hard for me to talk.
AM Xl-209-211
Have you seen the booklet (on Auroville and the religions)"! It's good.... I've distributed it in Auroville. The people of Auromodele come in turns on Tuesday afternoons (five or six every Tuesday), so yesterday I gave them that.
But I see them too; one after another they come to see me.
Ah!
Yes. I get the feeling they're starting to wake up a little.
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Yes, yes, it's beginning to stir.
Several are nice...
What do they tell you? It would amuse me to know.
Most have problems of action, or rather lack of action.
Yes.
And problems of relationship among themselves, etc. So I try... I tell them what comes to me in the moment. I try to make them understand the important thing behind.
Yes, it does them good. They need to be guided.
But one even asked me if I could go out there!...
(Mother laughs)
So I told them: listen!... no, making speeches is completely useless, but all those who want to come like that to see me, I can say something for them individually, but not collectively.
(Mother approves)
You know, that's a prayer I often make: to know what to say to people.
Yes.
(silence)
There's a new ambassador from France in Delhi (the former one was... oh, he was terrible, terribly stupid), they've sent a new one, and Maurice Schumann wrote him a letter telling him he was particularly interested in the Ashram and wanted to have some information - that man didn't even come! And then
* The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who had come to Pondichery in September 1947, after having become interested in the proposals of Governor Baron. He had met Mother and Sri Aurobindo and offered to set up an lndo-French Cultural Institute under the direction of Sri Aurobindo.
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(laughing) he wrote (I found out because Schumann wrote to Baron, who sent the letter to [an Ashramite]), the gentleman wrote that he didn't have time to come, but that he had asked [the French Consul in Pondicherry, who particularly detested the Ashram] for some information! (Mother laughs) So [the French Consul] wrote... you understand what that might be!
They [the Consulate] have very much stressed the poor reception by the villagers. They even said that the villagers had thrown stones at our Auroville people.... Naturally they [the French Consul and his wife] could only have made a mess, while on the contrary, it seems to be going quite well.
[The architect] asked to see me this evening.
Oh, really! Why?
Out of the blue. I don't know. Just to make contact.
Things are stirring in [the architect]! (Mother laughs a lot) He's torn between the old man full of attachments over there, and the new life, the new consciousness which is beginning to be interesting.
(long silence)
AM XI-218-221
In fact, I saw [the architect]. I saw him twice.
Really! What did he say?
It's interesting. First, I found him considerably changed.
(Mother nods her head)
He is another man. And I found him near, not far. I had the feeling that he was very near.
(Mother nods)
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And he was enormously interested in this new consciousness. He said, "I would really like to experience this new consciousness, so what has to be done?" He told me, 'All the spiritual stories tell you you shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do that, and you have to do this, you have to meditate and... "
No, no!
So I tried to explain to him that this new consciousness just wasn't like that.
Yes. But he didn't speak to me about it.
It bothers him a lot: "What has to be done to experience the new consciousness?"
He needs to be helped.
I have the impression he's right on the brink of something.
Yes.
What's to be done to experience the new consciousness?
Well, you could help him.
I tried to tell him something; I don't know if I did...
To me, he doesn't ask anything.
Still he said to me: "Oh, I go to see Mother every morning and it's my oxygen".
Yes, we talk about what's happening out there [in Auroville], and then I tell him (very frankly, I must say) what I see and understand, that yes.... But I mean he doesn't talk to me about himself at all.
He's torn by France, by his attachments. But I tell you, I feel he's on the point of something.
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Oh, yes! Oh, yes!
He has to hang on yet for some time.
You can help him a lot.
What I tried to tell him is that this new consciousness does not demand spiritual athletics, great concentration and meditation and tapasya, or any special virtues...
No.
It simply demands trust in something else, a kind of childlike trust, and a need for something else.
Yes, that's it.
He was especially afraid it was again a "matter of spiritual discipline".
No, no, no! No question of that.
But people always fall into that! Even in Auroville: meditation! And I can't decently tell them it's useless! (Mother laughs)
He was touched by what I told him and reassured. Only he doesn't know what to do.
But you can tell him things that will help him.
It's a very good sign that he asked you to see him.
(long silence)
You have nothing to ask?
Would it be interesting for you to tell them what they can do practically to experience the new consciousness?
But that's what is so extraordinary! I worked for all the other realizations, I followed disciplines.... This one came like that (gesture of sudden descent), without my saying anything, without my seeking anything, without any effort, without...
Only afterwards, I paid attention. That's all.
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What can I tell them?
Is it translated by a more precise direction in one's actions or in what has to be done or...?
No.... What I've noticed is that the vision, the reaction (that is, the way of seeing, the way of understanding especially), was totally different. Still now, day after day, all the old things of my body: all gone. But then I see, for example, when I read something by Sri Aurobindo, I understand it in an entirely different way; so I think basically Sri Aurobindo was also in touch with this consciousness!... But the difference is that it's very practical. For example, when the government [names] informs me, "Look, there's this and this and this, what should be done?" before I would have said, "I don't know". But now I see clearly, I tell them, "This and this and this, there." And I didn't think about it for one minute: it's this Consciousness which sees.
.Only I can't give that as a direction because I don't think that for everybody it's the same thing.
One has first to sort things out inside obviously.
Yes.
Otherwise you run the risk of taking your...
It's very dangerous, I never say it to people. They might take all their impulses for revelations.
(silence)
Trust is probably a great key, isn't it?
But for me, all the work is going on in the body, and the body is... from morning till evening, evening to morning there's a constant call.... Everything, everything is referred to the Divine all the time, all the time, constantly... everything, the most microscopic things.
(silence)
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And that I can't say to or ask of anyone, because... to all these people, such as [the architect], for example, I say "the Divine" — for them it's a zero, it doesn't correspond to anything!
I say, "that something else".
That's much better. That's why I say you can help him much better than I!
Oh! (laughter)... Well, you've really transformed him in any case...
(Mother laughs)
Me too!
(long silence)
AM XI-239-243
Yesterday we started a work for Auroville, that is, we want to give the people of "Aspiration" what is basically an idea of what Aurovilians want: why they're here and what they want. Because it seems that... basically they don't know anything. Each one came with an expectation of something, but all that is not coordinated and not clear. So [the architect] asked me to express the most important things clearly. I thought it would be better to do it with the people in order to find out what they want and to get them to make an effort to find out. Otherwise... So we began yesterday (Mother picks up a sheet of paper).
Yesterday I asked [one of the Aurovilians of Aspiration], "But why are we in Auroville? Why is Auroville going to be created?" Then he gave me the first paragraph:
TO BE A TRUE AUROVILIAN
l. The will to consecrate oneself entirely to the Divine.
That's what he said. I found it good.
After having listened inwardly, I added this:
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2.The Aurovilian does not want to be a slave to his desires.
The idea is this: "We come to Auroville to escape from the social and moral rules that are practised artificially everywhere, but it is not to give license to the satisfaction of all desires: it is to rise above desires into a truer consciousness." Something like that.... It seems they have great need of it! (Mother laughs) So that should be added.
We could make a whole programme, it would be rather interesting.
Yes, but practically speaking, as long as people haven't gone behind appearances a little, as long as they live on the surface of themselves, nothing will mean anything.
But all that is just what should be said!
Then the first necessity is to go into their depths a little. Because even if you say "the Divine" to them, what does it mean in their surface consciousness?
Yes.... For him, for that boy, it has a meaning, but for most of the others...
Yes, it has no meaning.
So we should put, "The first condition is the inner discovery..."
In the ideal order, the first condition is to need something other than the present earthly and human conditions.
That, of course.
And then to get there, the first condition is to go deep inside oneself to find out what one IS behind all the hereditary, social, cultural appearances, etc. — what one really is. Then from that moment on, things take on meaning, but before, they don't have any meaning. Before that, they have whatever moral or religious or philosophical value we attribute to them
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— but that has no meaning.
So let's put (Mother writes): first essential condition...
It's more than a condition: it's a necessity.
l. The first necessity is the inner discovery to find out what one really is behind the social, moral, cultural...
Racial?
Oh, yes!
...racial, hereditary appearances.
But then, they have to be told THERE IS a discovery to make, because many don't know it at all! (Mother writes:)
At the centre there is a being free, vast, aware, all-knowing, who awaits our discovery and must become the effective centre of our being and our life in Auroville.
Then, afterwards, do we put this (Mother indicates the previous paragraph on consecration to the Divine), or do we put something else?... That seems to me rather a consummation, something that should come at the end.
(long silence)
They should also be taught to liberate themselves from the idea of personal possession.... You know, everything belongs to the Divine, and the Divine, at the same time that he gives a centre (the centre of an individuality), he also gives the possibility for the personal use of a certain number of things; but everything has to be taken that way, as things LOANED
That's a very exact fact: they are in your possession for a certain
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time.
It's to uproot this sense of personal possession.
(silence)
It would be interesting: "The description of the citizen of the city of tomorrow."
There's paragraph 2 on desires and 3 would be on personal possession.
The only real way to cure desire is self-giving to the Divine and accepting what He gives you as the only things necessary. But that's already very advanced.
In the beginning you said that the Aurovilians had come "to escape all moral conventions, etc., but that- it wasn't to give free reign to license... "
Yes, that's it. (Mother writes:)
2. One lives in Auroville in order to be free from moral and social conventions; but this freedom must not be a new slavery to the ego, to its desires and ambitions.
Is that all? That's enough for today!
If you want to connect that with the other paragraph, can you say something like this: desire is the most powerful deformer of the inner discovery?
Oh, yes! (Mother writes:)
The fulfillment of one's desires bars the way to the inner discovery which can only be achieved in the peace of a perfect disinterestedness.
A word comes to me. Sweet Mother: not only peace, but transparency.
Yes. (Mother writes:)
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...in the peace and transparency of perfect dis- interestedness.
This is going to become something interesting!
That's the basis. And the third paragraph, you had said, "The Aurovilian should free himself from the idea of personal possession. "
But it's not the "idea"! It's the "sense"! (Mother writes.)
3.The Aurovilian should lose the sense of personal possession. For our passage in the material world, what is indispensable to our life and to our action is put at our disposal....
You don't say by whom?
(Mother laughs) No!... By the All-Possessing!
...according to the place we must occupy.
Sweet Mother, I would like to add: the more we are in contact with our inner being, the more exact are the means given us.
Oh, that's good! (Mother writes:)
The more we are CONSCIOUSLY in contact with our inner being, the more are the exact means given to us.
It's getting interesting!
That gives them a basis.
Oh, but we will be able to make something interesting!
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AM XI-244-245
Wouldn't it be good if you did the rest of the 'Auroville programme" with the people of Auroville, since you've started to do it?....
I had them speak to see what they would say....
They're almost all terribly lazy, and so I would like to tell them that manual work... (Mother writes:)
4. Work, even manual work, is something indispensable for the inner discovery. If one does not work, if one does not put one's consciousness into matter, the latter will never develop. To let the consciousness organize a little matter by means of one's body is very good. To establish order around oneself helps to bring order within oneself.
One other thing too:
One should organize one's life not according to outer and artificial rules, but according to an organized inner consciousness, for if one lets life go without subjecting it to the control of the higher consciousness, it becomes fickle and inexpressive. It is to waste one's time, in the sense that matter remains without any conscious utilization.
AM XI-248
We have to finish our "Auroville programme"... Auroville is to prepare the advent of the new species.
(Mother writes:)
5.The hole earth must prepare itself for the advent of the new species, and Auroville wants to work consciously to hasten this advent.
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6.Little by little it will be revealed to us what this new species must be, and meanwhile the best course is to consecrate oneself entirely to the Divine.
That's enough!... To be continued!...
AM XI-263-264
I had an experience that was interesting for me because it was the first time. It was yesterday or the day before, I don't remember now, [an American disciple] was right in front of me, on her knees, and I saw her psychic being rising above her this much (about 20 cm), bigger. That's the first time. Her physical being was small, and the psychic being was big like that. And it was a sexless being: neither man nor woman. So I thought (it's possible that it's always like that, I don't know, but in this case I noticed it very clearly), I thought, "But it is the psychic being which will materialize itself and will become the supramental being!"
I saw it, it was like that. There were particular details but they weren't very distinct, and it was clearly a being that was neither man nor woman, having the characteristics of both combined. And it was bigger than her, it extended about this much beyond her everywhere (gesture extending about 20 cm beyond the physical body). She was there and it was like this (gesture). And it was this colour... this colour... which, if it would become very material, would be the Auroville colour [orange]. It was softer, as if behind c veil, it wasn't absolutely precise, but it was that colour. There was hair, but... It was something else.
I will see better another time perhaps.
AM XI-279-280
Sweet Mother, one last thing, the one who wrote the letter asked a question: he asks if that vast "Grace-Light" or "Truth-Light" of which the Swami speaks is the supramental light?
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Which light?
That vast "Grace-Light".
Grace-Light... Oh! I liked that very much in his letter... Grace-Light. That's what is at work, you know: the work that is being done through this (the body) is precisely like that, it's just like a "Grace-Light". That pleased me very much. It's just like that.
You know, it's a light that has several degrees, and in the most material it's slightly... this must be the supramental force because it is slightly golden, slightly pink (you know this light), but very very pale. There's one (gesture indicating another, higher layer) that is white like milk, opaque - it is very strong. And there is one (gesture very high) which is a shade of white... which is of a transparent light. That one is something curious: one drop of that on the hostile forces dissolves them. They melt like that (gesture meaning "in no time at all"). I told all that to Sri Aurobindo, he confirmed it completely to me. That is essentially the Grace in its... (gesture very high) supreme state. It's a Light... it is colour less, you know, it's transparent, and that light (I have experienced it, I am speaking of it because I know it): you put it on a hostile being and... it melts just like that. It's extraordinary.... And then, in its guise of what you could call "benevolent" (that is, the Grace that succours and helps and cures), it's as white as milk. And if I want an entirely material action (but this is recent, it's recently, since that new Consciousness came), then in its physical action, on the physical, it becomes slightly coloured: it's luminous, it's gold with pink in it, but it's not pink... (Mother picks up a hibiscus near her). It's like that.
Like the Auroville flower?
Like the Auroville flower. But I DELIBERATELY chose it as the Auroville flower because of that. And I have the impression that that's the supramental colour: when I see beings of the supramental, they are... not exactly this colour. .. It's not like a flower, it 's like flesh. But it's like that (Mother indicates the colour of the flower).
(silence)
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AM XI-296
Do you have anything to say?
No, but I have a spelling question to ask you!
Oh, my child, I make as many spelling mistakes as possible! (Mother laughs)
It's for those famous "Aurovillians"...
I write it with only one "I".
Deliberately?
Deliberately, (laughing) It's not French: it's Aurovilian!
(silence)
AM XI-397
Now they're bringing me all the children born in Auroville, so I'm seeing... I'm seeing some astonishing things.
There are some (not many, one or two) who are like little animals, nothing - very nice, a very little animal. But almost all of them are conscious beings. And the parents are absolutely stupid in their manner of behaving with them, because they don't know, they don't understand.
I saw one again today (tiny gesture): he is 3, 4, 5 days old - he is just so big - and I saw the consciousness inside him, it's wonderful!
And then they treat him like a little animal - he has no means of defense.
(silence)
Are these the little ones who will become the intermediate beings?... I don't know.
(long silence)
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