8 February 1973             A: What is the best way of preparing ourselves, until we can establish a new system? Naturally, it is to widen and illumine your consciousness - but how to do it? Your own consciousness...to widen and illumine it. And if you could find, each one of you, your psychic and unite with it, all the problems would be solved.  The psychic being is the representative of the Divine in the human being. That's it, you see the Divine is not something remote and inaccessible. The Divine is in you but you are not fully conscious of it. Rather you have...it acts now as an influence rather than as a Presence. It should be a conscious Presence; you shoul

18 February 1973 A: Tonight, I am going to read you a letter from X. She gave us a letter about her class. You know that this year she has started working with the young children. Oh! A: So this is what she writes: “We would like to make it possible for each child to develop integrally and above all we want his desire to learn to remain spon- taneous.” (The letter goes on to describe the games suggested to the children, the material prepared for them and various group activities, and continues:) “But because all the tendencies of the children come into play when they are given enough free scope, sev- eral difficulties arise, e

Messages Significance of the Symbol of the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education             One of the most recent forms under which Sri Aurobindo conceived of the development of his work was to establish at Pondicherry an International University Centre open to students from all over the world. It is considered that the most fitting memorial to his name would be to found this University now so as to give concrete expression to the fact that his work continues with unabated vigour.  1951 Page – 111 Inaugural Message for the   Sri Aurobindo Memorial Convention Sri Aurobindo is present in our midst, and with all the po

III THE NEW AGE ASSOCIATION   The New Age Association was founded in 1964 as a forum of expression for the Higher Course students of the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education.   The reader will please note the meaning of the following signs which have been placed after the subjects of the quarterly seminars and the seventh and ninth annual conferences:   * = subject given by the Mother;                         ‡ = subject chosen by the Mother from a list of proposed topics;                         † = subject approved by the Mother. Page – 301 A free talk where each one is able to express what he

Correct Judgment One of the great problems in sports competitions is equity of judgment. To avoid the clashes and quarrels which would otherwise be inevitable, it has been decided once and for all that the competitors would submit without argument to the judges' decision. This may solve the problem for those who are being judged, but not for those who judge; for, if they are sincere, the more trust they are shown, the more care they should take to be absolutely correct in their judgments. That is why, to begin with, I eliminate all the cases in which the judgment is made beforehand, so to say, for reasons of policy or for any other reason. For although unfortunately this

Energy Inexhaustible   One of the most powerful aids that yogic discipline can provide to the sportsman is to teach him how to renew his energies by drawing them from the inexhaustible source of universal energy. Modern science has made great progress in the art of nourishment, which is the best known means of replenishing one's energies. But this process is at best precarious and subject to all kinds of limitations. We shall not speak about it here, for the subject has already been discussed at great length. But it is quite obvious that so long as the world and men are what they are, food is an indispensable factor. Yogic science knows of other ways of acquiring ener

  Mental Education  Of all lines of education, mental education is the most widely known and practised, yet except in a few rare cases there are gaps which make it something very incomplete and in the end quite insufficient.  Generally speaking, schooling is considered to be all the mental education that is necessary. And when a child has been made to undergo, for a number of years, a methodical training which is more like cramming than true schooling, it is considered that whatever is necessary for his mental development has been done. Nothing of the kind. Even conceding that the training is given with due measure and discrimination and does not permanently damage the b

  Vital Education Of all education, vital education is perhaps the most important, the most indispensable. Yet it is rarely taken up and pursued with discernment and method. There are several reasons for this: first, the human mind is in a state of great confusion about this particular subject; secondly, the undertaking is very difficult and to be successful in it one must have endless endurance and persistence and a will that no failure can weaken. Indeed, the vital in man's nature is a despotic and exacting tyrant. Moreover, since it is the vital which holds power, energy, enthusiasm, effective dynamism, many have a feeling of timorous respect for it and always tr

Foresight            To foresee destiny! How many have attempted it, how many systems have been elaborated, how many sciences of divination have been created and developed only to perish under the charge of charlatanism or superstition. And why is destiny always so unforeseeable? Since it has been proved that everything is ineluctably determined, how is it that one cannot succeed in knowing this determinism with any certainty? Here again the solution is to be found in Yoga. And by yogic discipline one can not only foresee destiny but modify it and change it almost totally. First of all, Yoga teaches us that we are not a single being, a simple entity which necessarily has a

Students  You who are young, are the hope of the country. Prepare yourselves to be worthy of this expectation. Blessings.  Of one thing you can be sure – your future is in your hands. You will become the man you want to be and the higher your ideal and your aspiration, the higher will be your realisation, but you must keep a firm resolution and never forget your true aim in life.  2 April 1963 *   To be young is to live in the future. To be young is to be always ready to give up what we are in order to become what we must be. To be young is never to accept the irreparable.   28 March 1967   * Only those years that are passed uselessly make