Sri Aurobindo and Bangladesh Behind the jostle of temporary points of view and instant interests there are the Eternal Landmarks. To lose sight of them is to lose one's very way and steer onto the reefs of expediency and comfortable compromise upon which we shall founder a moment later. Behind the little frontal events is the greater tide of history and to lose sight of it is to lose one's direction and the golden thread that leads to our perfect fulfillment, be it individual or national. Those who have left their unique mark upon the labyrinth of history are the very ones who have seized the golden thread and affirmed the Greater

(The disciple asks for permission to poison some cats who have been disturbing him every night. Mother replies.) I once had a cat with almost a child's consciousness, and someone poisoned it. And when he came back poisoned, dying, I cursed all people who poison cats. And that's serious, so you mustn't do it. It was a real curse - I was with Sri Aurobindo, so it was serious - so don't do it. But there is a way.... You know, I made a pact with cats, with the King of the Cats - it goes back very, very far. And it's extraordinary (it happened in Tlemcen, entirely on the occult plane), extraordinary! For certa

Yesterday I saw a seven-month-old baby ... who is a sage. He looks at you with his soul. When I looked at him, his eyes lit up. Doesn't cry, doesn't speak, but he made a sort of noise - he stretched out his arms to me and seemed to say, "Aaah!" Then I took him in my arms, and he laid his head there, on my heart - he didn't close his eyes, he became ecstatic. Extraordinary! I have never seen that before, it's the first time ever. Then Champaklal (who had brought the baby) didn't want him to go without having touched my feet (I thought it was going to cause a disaster): Champaklal put him on the floor, bent hi

There is a way of looking at things - an all too human way - which sees me as VERY dangerous, very dangerous. It has been said time and time again.... There was an Englishwoman who came here after an unhappy love affair. She had come to India seeking "consolation," and stumbled onto Pondicherry. It was right at the beginning (those English Conversations[[ Conversations with the Mother, 1929. ]] are things I said to her; I spoke in English and then translated it - or rather said it all over again in French). And at the end of a year's stay, this woman said to me (with such despair!), "When I came here I was still able to love and feel goodwill towards people; b

So, mon petit, I have talked the whole time and we still haven't done anything - another day without working! (Mother laughs) It's a curious thing ... speaking evidently helps me follow the experience. But I can't just begin speaking all alone up in my room! And talking to a tape recorder is useless. Up to now, it certainly flows the best with you - by far. I haven't tried with others, although occasionally I've said something to Nolini, but his receptivity is fuzzy (I don't know whether you can understand this impression: it's as though my. words were going into cotton-wool). Once, as I told you, I spoke with R., and with him I felt that three qua

There's something I SENSE there, without being able to express or understand it mentally. There must be some difference, even in the behavior of the cells, when you leave your body. It must be another phenomenon that takes place. During all that period of concentration and meditation on what happens in a body after death (I am speaking of the body's experience after what is now called "death"), well, several times the same kind of vision came to me.... I had been told (shown and told) of certain saints whose bodies did not decompose (there's one here, there was one in Goa - fantastic stories). Naturally, people always romanticiz

I remember the whole experience, of course, but the body-consciousness forgot. The slightest difficulty, even the shadow or the recollection of a difficulty, was enough for it to start up all over again: "Oh ... oh! Now what's going to happen?" The same old anxieties and stupidities. So I realize that we have to keep on trying. What's annoying, though, is that in order to shake it all up, I have to go through some pretty bad moments physically. So don't worry, I understand how it is for others! I myself never lose either consciousness or contact with ... not with Knowledge, but with the total EXPERIENCE of identification. Only here in M

(A little later, Mother listens to Satprem read various letters of Sri Aurobindo, then a letter she herself wrote in English during World War II about the attitude of the disciples toward Hitler and the Allies.) "The world situation is critical today. India's fate too is hanging in the balance. There was a time when India was a absolutely secure, there was no danger whatever of her being victim to Asuric aggression. But things have changed. People and forces in India have acted in such a way as to invite Asuric influences upon her: these have worked insidiously and undermined the security that was the

There's a letter from T.F. complaining about the films shown [at the Ashram] and saying that films should be instructive and show admirable things.... But for a film to show admirable things, people should live those admirable things, no?! She even wrote to me that they were a whole group of teachers who intended to write and circulate a letter asking for a change - I don't like all that. It's a small-town boarding-school spirit. So yesterday evening, I wrote an answer. (Mother reads) "We would like to be able to show the children pictorial representations of what life should be, but we still have not reached that stag