CHAPTER 49 MOTHER IS EIGHTY I The Mother's 80th birth anniversary celebrations were spread over 20 and 21 February 1958. On the 20th, she went to the Ashram Theatre where she first read out a message for the All India Radio, and went round the grand flower show that had been organised in the large courtyard. There were thousands of pots with ferns and flowers in a variety of colours, and there was also a tank of white lotuses, emblazoning the Mother's symbol. Then she attended a programme of dance recitals representing the Bharat Natyam, Kathak, Manipuri and Kathakali styles. On the 21st, there was a march past in the same courtyard, and a presentation o

CHAPTER 48 SUPRAMENTAL WORLD I While the Playground talks were part of the very oxygen of life in the Ashram during the nineteen-fifties, there were other events that claimed the attention of sadhaks and visitors alike. From the visible to the inward, from the men, women and children who lived in the Ashram and the sadhaks running the services to the spirit within that moved them all; and above all, from the Mother's spoken words (instructive and enlightening as they were) to the intervening silences and the invisible vibrations from the Light and Force and Consciousness - one always wanted to be thus led from the visible to the invisible, from objective

-26_A God^s Labour.htm CHAPTER 23 A GOD'S LABOUR I From the beginning of 1926, the exhausting work of managing the community of sadhaks gathered around Sri Aurobindo, and keeping in touch with their sadhana had been devolving more and more on the Mother, but this silent transfer of responsibility and authority became visible only after 24 November, the Siddhi Day. There was also the additional circumstance of the steady growth of the Ashram community year by year: a more than fourfold increase during the 1926-31 five-year period. Some few left the Ashram, but many more were coming in. All this generated the pressures of expansion, new houses, new services, new departmental

CHAPTER 47 READINGS IN "DHAMMAPADA" I From the middle of August 1957 till September 1958, every Friday evening the Mother used to read a few verses from the Dhammapada to a class consisting of students, teachers and Ashramites. Her commentaries, based on a French translation of the Pali text, were in French and were tape-recorded at the time. After reading a chapter, she would speak about the points that interested her and then asked the class to meditate on them.1* As she said once: Naturally, I took this text because I consider that at a particular stage of development it can be very useful. It is a discipline which has been crystallised in c

CHAPTER 28 ASURIC UPSURGE I As we have seen in the preceding chapters, during the seven-year period between 1931 and 1938 there were broad indications that the Yoga at the individual and even collective levels was making steady progress. The Mother's sudden and serious illness in October 1931 had been a set-back of course, a temporary triumph for the hostile forces, but presently the divine dispensation visibly reasserted itself. The whinings, grumblings and philosophic doubts punctuating several of the letters written by some of the intellectuals among the disciples at this time should be viewed only in the wider perspective of this general progress

CHAPTER 18 KARMA YOGA I During the years immediately after she had taken full charge of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, the Mother's resources - spiritual, human, material - had to be canalised simultaneously in multiple directions. With the steady increase in the number of sadhaks, there was the persistent need for renting more houses, reconditioning, fitting and furnishing them, and attending to their proper maintenance. From 25 inmates in 1926 the number rose to 150 in 1936, and was to reach 350 in 1942. There were, besides, the permitted visitors. There was also the special influx of visitors at the time of the Darshans of 21 February, 15 August and 24 November

CHAPTER 59 IMMORTAL SUNLIGHT I As 1972, the year of Sri Aurobindo's birth centenary approached, the Mother came to be more and more involved with the centenary programmes and celebrations, as also with the importance of the centenary in the context of the sadhana of integral transformation. While her body was apparently in a 'helpless' condition, while her faculties of seeing and hearing were seemingly impaired, while her physical movements were unavoidably confined to her rooms on the second floor of the Ashram, never had her consciousness been more acute or more wide-ranging, never had the Mother's spiritual puissance and energy of effective action been m

CHAPTER 44 MINISTRY OF WORDS I As the activities of the Ashram increased, there was a corresponding need for finance; and although the Mother was, as Nayana had visioned her, verily Sakambari herself and Plenty was her native gift, occasions were not wanting when the pinch was felt sharply and necessary expenses had to be stinted. In the Yoga of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, there was no rejection of life but only a determination to accept it and live it wisely and in the process to try to transform it; and no ascetic rejection of money either, but rather its acceptance with a view to utilising it in the service of the Divine. In one of his Evening Talks

CHAPTER 12 LIKE MOUNT FUJI I During the Richards' four-year stay in Japan, - first in Tokyo and later in Kyoto, with short visits to other places, - they were naturally drawn towards people with a spiritual outlook on life. But the Japanese, for all their elegance and culture, and the general atmosphere of friendliness exuded by them, were rather allergic to spirituality. They had their religions, of course - Shintoism, Buddhism, Christianity, with their many sectarian divisions - and they had their picturesque ceremonies, religious and secular, and their elaborate codes of behaviour; but somehow the Japanese as a general rule shied away from spir

CHAPTER 11 A PASSAGE TO JAPAN I The scene shifts from war-torn France to comparatively peaceful Japan. During their year of stay in beleaguered France, Mirra and Richard had their separate roles to play although they also kept in touch with Sri Aurobindo at Pondicherry. Mirra had especially her sadhana to do for ailing and tortured earth, and she made quite a few explorations into the Unknown, and spiritual conquests as well, and these were duly recorded in her prayers and meditations. Richard had now to visit Japan on an assignment, but even as in 1910 and 1914, he had combined politics and electioneering with a serious spiritual quest when he