Daily Offerings
Sheer Soul-Stuff
All there was soul or made of sheer soul-stuff;
A sky of soul covered a deep soul-ground.
All here was known by a spiritual sense:
Thought was not there but a knowledge near and one
Seized on all things by a moved identity,
A sympathy of self with other selves,
The touch of consciousness on consciousness
And being’s look on being with inmost gaze
And heart laid bare to heart without walls of speech
And the unanimity of seeing minds
In myriad forms luminous with the one God.
Life was not there, but an impassioned force,
Finer than fineness, deeper than the deeps,
Felt as a subtle and spiritual power,
A quivering out from soul to answering soul,
A mystic movement, a close influence,
A free and happy and intense approach
Of being to being with no screen or check,
Without which life and love could never have been.
Body was not there, for bodies were needed not,
The soul itself was its own deathless form
And met at once the touch of other souls
Close, blissful, concrete, wonderfully true.
[Savitri: Book Two Canto 14]
The Victor and the Victory
May 25, 1914
O Divine Master of love and purity, grant that in its least stages, its smallest activities, this instrument which wants to serve Thee worthily may be purified of all egoism, all error, all obscurity, so that nothing in it may impair, deform or stop Thy action. How many little recesses lie yet in shadow, far from the full light of Thy illumination: for these I ask the supreme happiness of this illumination.
Oh, to be the pure flawless crystal which lets Thy divine ray pass without obscuring, colouring or distorting it!—not from a desire for perfection but so that Thy work may be done as perfectly as possible.
And when I ask Thee this, the “I” which speaks to Thee is the entire Earth, aspiring to be this pure diamond, a perfect reflector of Thy supreme light. All the hearts of men beat within my heart, all their thoughts vibrate in my thought, the slightest aspiration of a docile animal or a modest plant unites with my formidable aspiration, and all this rises towards Thee, for the conquest of Thy love and light, scaling the summits of Being to attain Thee, ravish Thee from Thy motionless beatitude and make Thee penetrate the darkness of suffering to transform it into divine Joy, into sovereign Peace. And this violence is made of an infinite love which gives itself and a trustful serenity which smiles with the certitude of Thy perfect Unity.
O my sweet Master, Thou art the Triumpher and the Triumph, the Victor and the Victory!
[Prayers and Meditations of the Mother]
Difficulties in Yoga
The nature of your difficulty indicates the nature of the victory you will gain, the victory you will exemplify in Yoga. Thus, if there is persistent selfishness, it points to a realisation of universality as your most prominent achievement in the future. And, when selfishness is there, you have also the power to reverse this very difficulty into its opposite, a victory of utter wideness.
When you have something to realise, you will have in you just the characteristic which is the contradiction of that something. Face to face with the defect, the difficulty, you say, “Oh, I am like that! How awful it is!” But you ought to see the truth of the situation. Say to yourself, “My difficulty shows me clearly what I have ultimately to represent. To reach the absolute negation of it, the quality at the other pole—this is my mission.”
Even in ordinary life, we have sometimes the experience of contraries. He who is very timid and has no courage in front of circumstances proves capable of bearing the most!
To one who has the aspiration for the Divine, the difficulty which is always before him is the door by which he will attain God in his own individual manner: it is his particular path towards the Divine Realisation.
There is also the fact that if somebody has a hundred difficulties it means he will have a tremendous realisation—provided, of course, there are in him patience and endurance and he keeps the aspiring flame of Agni burning against those defects.
And remember: the Grace of the Divine is generally proportioned to your difficulties.
[The Mother: CWM 3]
Songs of the Soul: November 19, 2024
Mother Divine, to live in division is to be always in misery. It immediately diminishes us with the sense of I ness and My ness bringing with it all the pettiness and smallness to which the average consciousness is easily prone, rather it is the way of life and they cannot conceive of any other way. But to live in Thy Unity, not the unity of an idea or religion which again divide, but Thy Unity is to be released in Thy vastness and infinity, it is to be freed from all suffering and misery that springs from the state of division, it is to be cured of all ignorance and the pain that springs from it.
What a peace and marvel and joy it is to feel Thee everywhere and in everything. True the individual channel lends its own unique turn, a flavour that may or may not appeal to the mind and the senses. But that is a diminution and distortion due to the natural limitation of the human channel. Our vision glued to the surface distortion is unable to get past and hence we too get limited and love and act in a limited way.
Maa may we live in an uninterrupted state of oneness, seeing Thee everywhere and in everything even though dealing with different forms and forces according to their law. May we live constantly in Thy vastness and peace and bliss even while dealing with the smallest instrument and finite forms. May we be pure and perfect channels of Thy infinite Love wanting nothing, expecting nothing, hoping nothing except the joy of loving and serving Thee in countless ways and through countless forms.
Maa Maa Maa Maa Maa Maa Maa Maa
Sri Aurobindo’s Symbol
The Mother reveals to us the truth that Sri Aurobindo’s symbol represents as follows:
“The descending triangle represents Sat-Chit-Ananda. The ascending triangle represents the aspiring answer from matter under the form of life, light and love. The junction of both—the central square—is the perfect manifestation having at its centre the Avatar of the Supreme— the lotus. The water—inside the square—represents the multiplicity, the creation.”
It is not enough to know the meaning of this symbol intellectually. Like a mantra, like the yantra of tantric worshippers we can meditate upon this symbol and on the Truth that it represents.
It means to know Sri Aurobindo not only as the Master of Integral Yoga but also and more importantly as the Avatar who has descended into creation in response to the human aspiration for Light and Love and Life Divine. He brings with Him as a gift to creation the perfect consciousness and the Supramental creation of the Future.
It is the meeting of the two, – of the human aspiration for terrestrial Perfection and the Divine answer that leads to the ascension of our soul out of the state of Ignorance and mortality into a state of Freedom and Truth and Immortality. It is by His advent that the earth and humanity become ready to manifest the Supramental Perfection.
Can I help a friend who has no spiritual turn?
Q: Can I help a friend who has no spiritual turn?
ALOKDA:
Dear S., it is difficult to help anyone unless the person is ready and himself wanting to come out of his condition. In fact, trying to help without the person’s active collaboration can sometimes give rise to resistances that delay future openings.
Still if you want to help your friend you can quietly pray for him goodwill in your heart. As a practical measure you can advise him to do physical exercises and play some soothing uplifting music in the background. It is also helpful to keep oneself busy.
Beyond it one cannot do much except trust the Divine and His ways and leave the rest to the unfolding of destiny.
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