The Mother spoke of this creation as the creation of a progressive equilibrium and hence it will escape the general law of dissolution or pralaya that has been the fate previous six creations so far. We dwell a little deeper on this subject of Equilibrium with the help of the Mother.
Words of the Mother
You feel you are constantly – constantly – on the way to a great discovery, then you make that discovery, and then you realize it had always been made! … It’s only (laughing) that you look at it in another way.
This morning, there was an experience; it seemed an extraordinary revelation, and … it’s something that was always known. So you mentalize it – the moment you mentalize it, it becomes clear, but that’s no longer it! You see, we say this creation is “the creation of equilibrium,”25 and that in fact it is mental error which makes us want to choose one thing and reject another – that all things must be together: what we call “good,” what we call “evil,” what we call right and what we call wrong, what we find pleasant and what we find unpleasant – all that must be together. And this morning, there was the discovery that through Separation – this Separation which has been described in all kinds of different ways, sometimes pictorially, sometimes simply in an abstract way, sometimes philosophically, sometimes … all that is just explanations, but there is something, which probably is simply Objectification (Mother gestures as if to push the universe forward, out of the Nonmanifest) … But that’s still one way to explain. This so-called Separation, what is it exactly? We don’t know (or perhaps we do, after all). It in fact created (to put it in colors) black and white, night and day (that’s already more mixed – but black and white too are mixed), it’s the tendency to create two poles: the pleasant or good thing, and the unpleasant or bad one. And as soon as you want to return to the Origin, the two tend to merge together again. And it is in perfect equilibrium, that is, where no division is possible anymore and the one has no influence over the other, where the two have become one again, it’s there that lies this famous Perfection which we are trying to rediscover.
Rejection of the one and acceptance of the other is childishness. It’s ignorance. All mental translations, like that of an Evil eternally evil, giving birth to the idea of hell, or that of a Good eternally good … all that, all of it is childishness.
(silence)
It may be (maybe, because as soon as you try to formulate, you mentalize, and as soon as you mentalize, it gets shrunk, diminished, limited, it loses the power of truth – but anyway …), it may be that in this universe as it is constituted, perfection is … (Mother remains absorbed for a long time). It eludes words…. We might put it this way (but it’s dry and lifeless): it’s the perception (is it only “perception”? It’s not just “perception”; it’s neither perception nor knowledge nor awareness …), it’s the awareness of the oneness of the whole – a oneness perceived, lived, realized in the individual. But that’s nothing, mere words…. The universe seems to have been created to realize this paradox of the awareness of the whole, an awareness lived (not just perceived but lived) in every part, every element making up the whole.
So in order to give form to those elements, it all began with Separation, and it was Separation that gave birth to this division between what we call good and evil; but from the point of view of sensation – sensation in the most material part – we may say it’s suffering and Ananda. And the movement is to put a stop to all separation and to realize the total consciousness in every part (which mentally speaking is absurd, but it’s like that).
That’s far too philosophical for my taste, not concrete enough. But this morning’s experience was concrete, and concrete because it stemmed from extremely concrete sensations in the body, from the presence of this constant duality which looks like an opposition (not only opposition, but mutual negation) between … we may take the symbol of suffering and Ananda. And the true state (which for the moment appears impossible to formulate in words, but which was lived and felt) is an all-containing totality; but instead of containing everything as clashing elements, it’s a harmony of everything, an equilibrium of everything. And once this equilibrium is realized in the creation, the creation will be able … (if you put it into words, it’s no longer that) … we might say, able to go on progressing without break.
But that’s not it.
These last few days, seen again in the present imperfect consciousness, there repeatedly came (but it’s all methodical and organized by an overall organization infinitely superior to anything we can imagine) a state which is the state causing a break in the equilibrium, that is, the dissolution of the form – what’s usually called “death.” And that state went up to the extreme limit, like a demonstration, with at the same time the state (not a perception – the state) that prevents the break in the equilibrium and allows progress to go on without break. The result, in the body consciousness, is the simultaneous perception (so to speak simultaneous) of what we might describe as the extreme anguish of dissolution (though it’s not quite that, but anyway) and the extreme Ananda of union – the two simultaneously.
So if you translate it into ordinary words: the extreme fragility (more than fragility) of the form, and the eternity of the form.
And the Truth is not just the union, but the fusion, the identification of the two.
When you mentalize it, it becomes clear for everyone – but it loses its essential quality, the something that cannot be mentalized.
It’s the awareness of the two states that must be simultaneous?
Not divided. It’s the union of the two states that constitutes the true consciousness; the union of the two (“union” still implies division), the identification of the two states is what constitutes the true consciousness. Then you get the sensation that it’s this consciousness which is the supreme Power. You understand, Power is limited by oppositions and negations: the most powerful power is the one that dominates the most – but that’s a complete imperfection! There is an all-powerful Power made up of the fusion of the two – that’s the absolute Power. And if That were realized physically … probably it would be the end of the problem.
In fact, during the few hours I lived in that state this morning, there was the impression of having mastered everything and understood everything – “understood,” I mean this sort of understanding that constitutes absolute power. But naturally, it can’t be expressed.
That’s what people who must have had the experience or a hint of it expressed by saying that this world was the world of equilibrium: in other words it’s the simultaneousness, without division, of all opposites. As soon as there is any divergence – not even divergence, any difference – it’s the beginning of division. And anything that isn’t that state cannot be eternal; it’s only that state which … not “contains,” but expresses (or how else to put it?) eternity. There have been all sorts of philosophies which tried to explain it, but it’s in the air, it’s mental, speculative. While this is lived – lived, I mean BEING it.
Is it the material equivalent of a psychological experience one has in which the perception of evil completely disappears in the perception of an absolute Good – even in evil?
Yes, that’s it. We might say that instead of being just a mental conception, it’s a concrete realization of the fact.
[…]
I’d like to know what’s the key to the cure WITHOUT REPRESSION. Because usually, as a matter of fact, one puts the Light, and the wrong movement sinks below.
Ah, yes, that’s the general rule. What’s needed is the opposite! Instead of repelling it, to offer it. It’s to put the thing, the movement itself, to CAST it into the Light …. Generally, it squirms and refuses! But … (laughing) it’s the only way. That’s why this Consciousness is so precious …. You understand, what caused the repression is the idea of good and evil – a sort of contempt or shame at what’s regarded as evil – and so one goes like this (gesture of repelling), one doesn’t want to see it, doesn’t want to let it be. What’s needed … The first thing – the first thing to be realized is that the infirmity of our consciousness is what creates this division, and that there is a Consciousness (I am sure of it now), there is a Consciousness in which that doesn’t exist, in which what we call “evil” is as necessary as what we call “good,” and if we could cast our sensation – or our activity or perception – cast it into this Light, that’s what cures.217 Instead of repressing or repelling it as something one wants to destroy (it can’t be destroyed!), one must cast it into the Light. I had in fact several days of an experience which for that reason was very interesting; instead of trying to drive far away from yourself certain things (which you don’t accept or which cause a disequilibrium in the being), instead of that, accept them, take them as a part of yourself, and … (Mother opens her hands) offer them – they don’t want to be offered, but there’s a way to compel them. A way to compel them: the resistance is lessened to the extent that we can lessen in us the sense of disapproval. If we can replace that sense of disapproval with a higher understanding, then we can do it. It’s much easier.
I had a whole baggage which remained like that, of things I did when I was young; it remained like that (gesture on the side), and in fact, after that supramental experience, I was able to gather all of it, and all of a sudden, it got entirely clarified, I understood everything, and … it evaporated. Things I had been dragging along for a very long time – I didn’t want to know, you understand, didn’t want to have anything to do with them anymore – and then it was all over. It melted, it was clarified like … Well, it was in its place.
I think that’s it. All, all the movements that pull downward, we must put them in contact with the higher understanding.
Only, it’s obviously beyond the mind. Because I said just before that those Aphorisms of Sri Aurobindo were an expression intelligible to the intellect, but it still diminishes; it diminishes, it’s no longer that dazzling light of a wordless understanding-THAT is where, that is where things can be arranged.
Even when you explain them to yourself, they get diminished. We should say nothing: it’s as if … (laughing) applying a coat of distorting paint!
[…]
The farther I go, the more I have a perception of a Harmony. A harmony, that is, a vision of the Whole in which everything is in its place: qualities, movements, even forms. It’s something being worked out, a vision being worked out.
Yet outwardly, it’s apparent chaos…. You know, an equilibrium is made out of a multitude of interlockings holding one another and creating a stability. But when you want to move on to a higher equilibrium, all that must be disintegrated, so to speak (gesture of a pyramid being flattened), then reintegrated in a broader way, and all the interlockings must be formed again on a higher level. It’s the transition from one to the other that’s difficult. The disequilibrium is what prepares a new equilibrium.
We are in the middle of the chaos.
And the only solution at such a time is to draw back, as it were (gesture of drawing within), and hang on unshakably to something higher, fasten on to it while the hurricane passes by. Then you can go through.
March 16, 1968
Are you tired?
It’s as if all the vital force were going away.
(long, refreshing concentration)
You must go rest.
Now I am fine! But I don’t know why, the force goes away very quickly.
But do you get rest at night?
Oh, yes, I’m quite all right. But strangely, as soon as I exert myself in any way, I seem to …
You can’t do it.
I can’t. But why?
Because we are in a very acute phase of transformation, very acute, mon petit. So when you have one foot on the ground and another foot in midair, it’s not the time to … There are phases like that. It doesn’t last a very, very long time, but it may last a month or two, or three. Afterwards, it’s finished. Then, after that, there comes another period like that. One should remain very calm in such cases.
But I’ve noticed that when I do material things – small things – there seems to be a tremendous vital force flowing into the work, and in the end I find myself exhausted through having done nothing at all! How come all that vital energy goes away?
It’s because all the vital force is used to keep the body’s balance in the phase of transformation. That’s what I have called “the change of government,” it’s the phase of transformation. And during that change, well, all the vital force is there just to keep your balance so you don’t topple over. Because it’s difficult.
One must remain very calm and do what is indispensable, nothing more.
In ordinary life, when one doesn’t know, with people who don’t know, there is a tremendous wastage of vital forces, for no reason. Well, we no longer have the right to do that because all that vital force is there, as I said, concentrated to keep the body’s balance.
It’s a very, very widespread state in all those who … not who do the yoga, but for whom the yoga is done. And it’s done … (how can I put it?) almost without their knowledge – all that puts them in a fit state to do it is, first, aspiration, and then, trust. Those are the two things: the faith, the trust that the divine Consciousness is at work, and then the aspiration for transformation. That’s all that’s needed. And the work is done. But that work implies, in fact, not a loss of equilibrium but a change of equilibrium. A change of balance. And in order to go from one equilibrium to the other, well, one must stay very calm.
But the difficulty you are referring to is something I have every minute.
People who don’t know (there are many of them, almost all of them don’t know) feel they are ill. But it’s not an illness: it’s a change of balance, which takes on all kinds of forms depending on each one’s character and nature. So when you don’t pay attention and there is a loss of balance, something happens which results in what doctors call “an illness,” but if I had the time to have fun and ask them questions, they would be forced to tell me that each case is different – each case: there aren’t two identical cases. They say, “Yes, it looks like this or it looks like that or it looks like this.” And it’s nothing but the transition from the old millennial equilibrium to a new equilibrium which isn’t yet established, and in the transition between the two, well … one must be careful, that’s all. And cling very, very firmly to the higher Harmony.
May 22, 1966
