In the past, when Sri Aurobindo was there and I lived in that house which is now the “dormitory annex,” there was a large verandah, and I used to walk up and down on the verandah (Sri Aurobindo was in his room, working), and I would walk alone; but I was never alone: Krishna was always there — Krishna, the god Krishna as he is known, but taller, more beautiful, and not with that ridiculous blue, you know, that slate blue! Not like that. And always, we always walked up and down together – we would walk together. He was just a little behind (gesture behind, almost against the nape of the neck and the shoulders); I was a little in front, as if my head was on his shoulder, and he would walk (I didn’t have the feeling of my head resting on his shoulder, but that’s how it was), and we would walk, we would communicate. That lasted more than a year, you know, every day. Then it ended.
Afterwards I saw him from time to time (when we moved to the new house I saw him); sometimes at night when I was very tired, he would come and I would sleep on his shoulder. But I knew very well that it was a way Sri Aurobindo had of showing himself. Then when I came here [to Mother’s present room], Sri Aurobindo had left, and I began walking up and down while reciting my mantra. Sri Aurobindo came, and he was at exactly the same place as Krishna was (same gesture, just behind the head); I would walk, and he was there, and we would walk together day after day, day after day. And it was becoming so concrete, so marvelous that I started thinking, “Why look after people and things, I want to remain like this for ever!” He caught my thought, and he said, “I am not coming anymore.” And he stopped.
I said, “Very well,” and I started my mantra to the supreme Lord, and I tried a lot to have Him come and walk with me, but in no other form but Himself. And the Force, the Presence, everything was there, and I would feel Him more and more clearly, staying like that, just behind me, impersonal. For a few days, I’ve had a sort of feeling that I was close to something; and yesterday, for half an hour: THE Presence – a Presence … An absolutely concrete presence. And it is He who told me, “First Krishna, then Sri Aurobindo, then I.”
[Conversations with a disciple: 18th June 1965]
