The Psychic Being

Can there be a conscious contact with the Mother through the psychic before the latter comes fully forward?

Yes, the psychic is always there.

How is the psychic to be brought forward?

It comes forward of itself either through constant love and aspiration or when the mind and vital have been made ready by the descent from above and the working of the Force.

To bring the psychic forward, selfishness and demand (which is the base of the vital feelings) must be got rid of — or at least never accepted.

Get rid of the dissatisfactions, they prevent the permanent psychic opening.

When the psychic being is coming out can it not brush aside vital non-cooperation, depression etc.?

If it has come out entirely, it can.

When the psychic works on the external parts of the being they begin to aspire for the Divine. In my case, its influence seems to be spreading to the lower vital with the result that the latter is making demands on the Divine. Is that the usual movement?

Yes, so long as the psychic has not transformed the lower vital.

You wrote, “The heart is the seat not only of the psychic, but also of the emotional vital which covers it.” Does it not mean that the emotional being itself works as a veil to the psychic?

Yes, when it is full of vital movements or accustomed more to a vital than a psychic way of emotion.

When there is a strong working or pressure on the heart-centre, is it some action on the psychic being?

Action does not take place on the psychic being, but on the emotional vital. That may result in the release of the psychic being.

Why is not my psychic being coming out in its fulness after such a long and strenuous sadhana? The absence of love is felt very keenly in my life. The ego and desires are still persisting.

How do you expect the psychic to be in full activity with these things there and not thoroughly rejected? Moreover if the love comes forward in full what is to prevent the selfish vital taking hold of it and making demand on the Mother which she will certainly refuse to satisfy — as so many have done and afterwards revolted because “the Mother does not love them”, otherwise she would do whatever they want?

I promise you that henceforth no part of my nature will be allowed to respond to any desire, demand, right etc. I hope this fulfils your condition for the psychic opening.

The thing has to be done, not merely promised. If you do it, the psychic is bound to come out of itself.

This is my appeal to the Mother: Either give me the psychic love or death. Let no third thing come to me — a final resolution.

That is altogether the wrong attitude. It is once more the vital coming in — it is not a psychic attitude. If in asking for the psychic love, you take an attitude that is vital not psychic, how do you expect the psychic to come?

Only I do not allow this matter of love to interfere with my peace, silence or self-realisation.

That is better.

Leaving aside the higher station, since yesterday I am trying to concentrate more and more on the Mother in the heart centre, with the attitude: Let me live in her, with her and it is enough.

The attitude is good for awakening the psychic and the inner being generally. But if the higher experience comes, it should not be stopped.

Along with the ascending movement in the spine, there has been a great intensity in the area of the heart. Something from there rises up ardently. Is that the soul?

Something from the psychic at any rate.

Does your answer mean that the psychic has unveiled itself now?

It is trying to open.

What is the matter again with my psychic being? It has not appeared in front for a long time.

It will come out when the rest is prepared — till then it acts from behind the veil.

During the experience of this morning I was living or rather made to live only inwards. Excepting for the Mother’s work, if I spoke even on good subjects some part protested strongly and pressed me to be quiet. Was it the inner being that did it?

The psychic probably.

While looking at the Mother in the evening, something opened to her from within my heart, just like the disclosing and blooming of a flower. Would you kindly enlighten me as to what it was?

The psychic, I suppose.

What is meant by “having a psychic basis”?

The psychic in front and supporting the whole experience.

It seems that the psychic being has begun to work directly on the outer consciousness with love and devotion as its main means.

Yes, certainly that is the working of the psychic.

The pressure from the cardiac centre down to the navel centre is felt deeply and powerfully. It descends and ascends unceasingly.

It means a strong working to connect the psychic and vital closely together.

This morning my consciousness felt an intensely burning fire in the heart. Till the evening it continued along with the experiences felt above the head.

It is obviously the psychic.

When I had asked you, “Cannot the psychic-realisation and self-realisation go on simultaneously?”, your reply was that such an action would be rare. Is it really such a difficult process?

I meant that usually one comes first and the other after the first, whichever it be, is sufficiently established. Afterwards they progress together[1].

I can see why the mind or the inner being gets veiled by the tamas, but find no reason for the soul or self to be so, especially after a long sadhana.

You forget that the self and the soul were covered for a long time, thousands of lives. So now although they are unveiled, it needs still some tapasya to keep them always so.

Some part of my being appears to be acting as a mediator between my higher nature and the lower, but it is always fluttering. A mediator is supposed to remain detached from both the parties. Has the psychic taken up this role?

I don’t know what is this mediator. The only parts that can mediate are the psychic being or else the mental Purusha or mental will. But the psychic does not flutter. If it is either of the other two, you ought to be able to know.

I wrote a prayer in French to the Mother. Her answer was: “Ouvre ton caur et tu me trouveras deja la” (“Open your heart and you will find me already there”) What exactly does this signify?

What Mother meant was this, that when there is a certain opening of the heart, you find that there was always the eternal union there (the same that you experience always in the self above).

We believe that the Mother is doing the sadhana in all of us, particularly through the heart; but how is it we scarcely feel this? There must be some veil in us.

It is a veil which disappears when the Mother’s working as well as her presence is consciously felt at all times.

I experience a strong movement to unify my entire being — inner, outer and lower — around the psychic being. At present I hear only two words, ‘Mother’ and ‘psychic’, like the word OM, surging out from the depths of my consciousness. In the external consciousness the tamas is still there. I suppose when the outer being is psychicised the tamas will be changed into peace.

Yes, these experiences open the way towards that psychicisation of the being.

Some deeper being is becoming more and more prominent. It has started exerting its pressure on the mechanical and subconscient mind. So the inertia has to remain below. If sometimes it still forces itself up it is fought out. Is it right to say it is the psychic being?

Your description at the end shows that it must be the psychic.

Instead of staying at the heart-centre why does my psychic being stay mostly on the Sachchidananda plane above the head? It is from there that it manifests love and joy and governs the human nature.

Probably it joins the central being there.

What is meant by the psychic being joining the central being?

Any part of the being can go upward and meet its source there. The central being is always above; the psychic is its outer part below. If the psychic goes up it may be also to join its source, the central being.

On some other occasions I found the psychic below, but surely it does not become the lower Prakriti (Nature)?

It is not the lower Prakriti in the usual sense. It is the inmost being supporting the lower Prakriti and urging it towards the Higher.

I feel Mothers presence on the head and in the heart simultaneously. At times the consciousness on the head or in the heart descends or ascends into the other and then spreads all over the being.

It is good.

[1] The development of these two realisations is discussed further in Part VI, Two Fires.