October 26, 1966 Do you know that I played yesterday? I tried the organ. It was very entertaining: as soon as I sat down, something came into my hands, but something that LOVED music, and it came in so easily, so gently and intensely. And suddenly my hands found their past skill again - the whole half of my arm was seized by a little being. It was really lovely, it sounded very childlike and was quite charming, quite charming. It's the first time it has been so complete: it was no longer at all my hands that were playing, no longer at all. It's the first time. I don't know if it will be like that for the 30th [Satprem's birthday]. *** Soon afterwards There's something I'd l

February 26, 1966 (After the translation of "Savitri" - the dialogue with Death) Behold the figures of this symbol realm.... Here thou canst trace the outcome Nature gives To the sin of being and the error in things And the desire that compels to live And man's incurable malady of hope. (X.IV.64 3) But she will answer you!... I'd like to know what she will answer him. (silence) If we follow to its end the idea with which Sri Aurobindo wrote this, Death would be the principle that created Falsehood in the world.... It's obviously either Falsehood that created Death, or Death that created Falsehood. It's rather Falsehood that created Death! L

October 19, 1966 I am even later than usual: these are the puja days. [[Puja: ritual, ceremony. In this case, the yearly ceremonies to Durga, the divine Mother. ]] Lots of people come here for their puja. Did I tell you the story of Durga? Page 234 Recently? It didn't happen recently; I can't recall if it was last year or the year before, at the time of the puja. You once told me that Durga had "surrendered." That's it. She surrendered. That is to say, she was perfectly independent in her movements and didn't feel the need to depend on anyone, and that year ... I don't remember if it was last year or the year before - she used to come every year when I went downst

April 27, 1966 (About the "Sannyasin") We have some time for Savitri ... unless you have something to ask? I wonder why I don't see clearer in what I do? Because there are two ideas in conflict. That's why. So there is hesitation between the two standpoints. Two standpoints: the need for renunciation and the futility of fleeing. Those are the two ideas that cause the hesitation. But in the chronological order of things, it should first be the need for renunciation, then the discovery of the futility of fleeing, and then instead of a fleeing, there should be a return, free, without attachment. A return to life without attachment. Apart from that, I understand: in order to w

September 24, 1966 Is the earth responding? Is there really a response, or do you feel you are working all alone? You don't mean people? You mean the earth as the mineral, vegetal, animal world? No, I was referring to humans, to the whole earth. Oh, humans, yes, certainly - certainly, without any doubt, a very pronounced answer, strangely pronounced, from everywhere, just everywhere. A need for something, a dissatisfaction with what is, and the need for something higher. It's very, very pronounced, everywhere. I can't say the number is very large, I don't think it is, but it's everywhere. So there is progress? Oh, a lot, quite a lot. There are signs, there are even fro

January 8, 1966 (Mother reads aloud a letter by Sri Aurobindo which she intends to publish in the February issue of the "Bulletin":) "The only creation for which there is any place here is the supramental, the bringing of the divine Truth down on the earth, not only into the mind and vital but into the body and into Matter. Our object is not to remove all 'limitations' on the expansion of the ego or to give a free field and make unlimited room for the fulfillment of the ideas of the human mind or the desires of the ego-centred life-force. None of us are here to 'do as we like', or to create a world in which we shall at last be able to do as we like; we are here to do what the Div

November 26, 1966 (Mother looks very tired. This morning she did not eat anything nor did she receive anyone. When Satprem comes in, she gives him flowers and soup packets received from Israel:) But you are the one who doesn't eat! I didn't feel like it. Yet these soups are about the only thing I Page 276 take.... But you understand, I don't do any exercise, the whole day long I stay without moving, so I really shouldn't overeat! But the body still needs to be nourished, doesn't it? I don't know.... Because attacks multiply tremendously, and today, for instance, I found only one solution, which was to stay lying down: while it was going on, not to eat anything, not

July 9, 1966 V. asked me a question about the Americans and Vietnam, so I answered him (Mother looks very amused and hands the text of her answer to Satprem): Question Are the Americans' presence and intervention in Vietnam justifiable? Mother's answer From what point of view do you ask the question? If it is from the political point of view - politics is in complete falsehood and I am not concerned with it. If it is from the moral point of view - morality is the shield ordinary men brandish to protect themselves from the Truth. If it is from the spiritual point of view - the Divine Will alone is justifiable and It is what men travesty and distort in all their acti

November 9, 1966 (Satprem reads Mother a few excerpts from "The Sannyasin," in particular the scene in which the Sannyasin is standing with his back to the temple door, having lost both his "spiritual heaven" and the earth in the form of the one he loved.) This image [of the Sannyasin with his back to the bronze door] was so strong, you know! ... Every time you mention it, I see my vision again.[[See Agenda 1, November 20 and 22, 1958. ]] It was so strong! There was the temple - only the door and the wall could be seen - and the top of a mountain with the abrupt slope downward. Then there was a narrow path between the temple and the precipice, and a roaring crowd surging up, coming

April 6, 1966 After having listened to the letters and reports read by the "secretaries": What about keeping quiet a little [in meditation]?... It will do me good. These people, I can't exactly say they tire me, but the cells feel a sort of pressure of confusion that hurts them. It's like being caught in a stranglehold of confusion, and it hurts. And every day it's the same thing. I tell them - they don't believe me. They think it's blackmail! So then ... I go through a very difficult little moment, very difficult. Afterwards, it gets better again. (meditation) *** (Later, Mother copies out a few lines from "Savitri" which she has just translated, and her hand scratches out