May 18, 1963
(Mother asks for a box of paints to demonstrate practically the gradation of colors of the levels of consciousness, from the most material Nature to the Supreme. The point is to illustrate the symbol of Infinity, the figure 8, which Mother explained in the conversation of May 11: the infinite play of the Supreme reaching down to Nature and Nature rising toward the Supreme. Mother speaks in English in the presence of a disciple, who is a painter, so that he may convey her explanations to H., the disciple who is preparing illustrations for “Savitri.”)
Of course, all these things are lights, so you can’t reproduce them. But still, it must be a violet that is not dull and not dark (Mother starts from the most material Nature). What she has put is too red, but if it’s too blue, it won’t be good either – you understand the difficulty? Then after violet there is blue, which must be truly blue, not too light, but it must be a bright blue. Not too light
Page 143
because there are three consecutive blues: there is the blue of the Mind, and then comes the Higher Mind, which is paler, and then the Illumined Mind, which is the color of the flag [Mother's flag], a silver blue, but naturally paler than that. And after this comes yellow, a yellow that is the yellow of the Intuitive Mind; it must not be golden, it must be the color of cadmium. Then after this yellow, which is pale, we have the Overmind with all the colors – they must all be bright colors, not dark: blue, red, green, violet, purple, yellow, all of them, all the colors. And after that, we then have all the golds of the Supermind, with its three layers. And then, after that, there is one layer of golden white – it is white, but a golden white. After this golden white, there is silver white – silver white: how can I explain that? (H. has sent me some ridiculous pictures of a sun shining on water – it has nothing to do with that.) If you put silver, silver gray (Mother shows a silver box nearby shining brilliantly in the sun), silver gray together with white … that is, it is white, but if you put the four whites together you see the difference. There is a white white, then there is a white with a touch of pink, then a silvery white and a golden white. It makes four worlds.
I have explained this [to H.] as I am explaining it to you, but H. has not seen it so she can’t understand. I want to show her on paper. It is twelve different things [or twelve worlds], one after another. [[Mother seems to have forgotten the red of the vital, which comes between material Nature's violet and the Mind's blue. Thus we have twelve worlds: violet, red, blue (the Mind's three blues), yellow, then the Overmind's prismatic colors, which makes five lower worlds, then finally the three golds of the Supermind and the four whites of the supreme creative Joy or Ananda. ]]
***
(Then Satprem reads out an aphorism:)
93 – Pain is the touch of our Mother teaching us to bear and grow in rapture. She has three stages of her schooling, endurance first, next equality of soul, last ecstasy.
… I am still in a period of conflict.
There are all the time periods of conflict between outside ideas and the inner experience.
Page 144
The problem is this: you can take the attitude of endurance and endure everything, to the point where you are able to turn pain into ecstasy, as he says – it’s an experiment that can always be made, at any given moment. But materialist-minded people will tell you, “That’s all very well, but you’re ruining your body.” And that’s where … (laughing) we would have to carry out all kinds of experiments, as they do with guinea pigs, to find out whether ecstasy has the power to restore order in the body.
You suffer from, say, a physical trouble, purely physical (morally speaking, it goes without saying, the thing is quite clear; I mean something purely material). Something is disorganized in the working or the structure of the organs. The result is pain. At first you endure, then out of endurance comes perfect equality, and out of perfect equality comes ecstasy – it’s perfectly possible; it’s not only possible, it has been proved. But the experiment should be carried through TO THE END to know whether ecstasy has the power to restore the body’s order, or whether it ends in dissolution: you are in ecstasy and die in ecstasy. That is, you leave your body while in ecstasy. Is that so?… It’s not only possible, it’s perfectly obvious. But that’s not what we want! We want to restore order, to eliminate disorder IN MATTER – does ecstasy have the power to restore order in the physical working and triumph over the forces of dissolution?
The only way to find out is to make the experiment!
But there is always something which says that the risk is great for … We are too – still too cautious. Or is it a lack of faith? But it’s a lack of knowledge more than a lack of faith, because if we say, “Whatever happens is the Lord’s Will, and if the experiment dissolves the body, well, it only shows He willed it,” then there is no need to worry. And it’s true, you live in this idea, you feel this way, you sense this way; but there is something on the outside or from the outside that says, “That’s all very well, but is this need or inclination to experiment legitimate? Couldn’t the same knowledge be obtained without running so great a risk? …”
That’s the kind of problem you have to face.
So personally, my attitude (all this has nothing to do with the Bulletin, by the way), my attitude is to watch it all: this opinion, that opinion, this attitude, that attitude, and I stay like this (gesture of a Witness completely outside and passive). I refrain from deciding or acting, I become exclusively a witness – a non-interfering witness. I say to the Lord, "It’s for You to decide; it isn’t my business, You will decide. Whatever happens is Your
Page 145
concern." So far, this has always resulted in an intervention that restored order, but … but with no positive proof that the order was restored in this way or that, because of this or that. There is no certainty.[[ Mother means that there is no proof that the order was restored because of the Lord's intervention rather than by some other, "natural" mechanism. ]]
In this field, we know nothing. Oh, as soon as we get into the field … even the field of sensation, the vital, all problems are solved. Nothing could be easier, there’s nothing to discuss; in the field of feelings, the work was done long ago. That’s not what I mean: I mean when we get to the bottom of the problem. There, everything, everything is in a sort of incomprehension, of total ignorance, along with all the ideas that result from the intellectual and scientific development and are so sure of themselves, so full of impregnable certainty! The certainty of the material experience, of the thing you touch.
To use that without being governed by it, to base yourself on that without being influenced by it, is very difficult.
Maybe someone much more intelligent, much smarter than me would find the work easier; but he would probably have more difficulties inside – no such difficulties here! But outside … For example, the chemical discovery of the structure of Matter would seem to be sufficient to serve as a base for true knowledge to act on Matter. [[Let us recall that it was in 1952 that the biochemist Stanley Miller discovered the structure of the DNA molecule. ]] And maybe those scientists, those who have discovered and experimented with the structure of Matter, would have no difficulty…. But the field of the greatest difficulty is the medical field, the therapeutic field: their science is still ABSOLUTELY contrary to the true knowledge. And when it comes to the body’s equilibrium … They know anatomy, they even know a little (not very, very much) a little about the body’s chemistry, they know all kinds of things that the common man doesn’t, on the strength of which they make dogmatic assertions and send you packing like an ignorant fool. All this business about the body’s workings – how much do they know? Naturally, when you ask them, “But why is it like that?” they reply, “Oh, why? I have no idea.”
And their way of telling you, “That’s how things are and they cannot be otherwise”! But if you tell them, “Your experience is ultimately based on statistics, but your statistics are useless, they cover such a limited field of experience that they are worthless – there is also all that you don’t know,” then they feel sorry for you.
Page 146
They are still in infancy, with the kind of dogmatic certainties characteristic of infancy.
On the other hand, the others, those who know the inside of things, don’t have the experience – no one has transformed his body so far! No one can tell you, “Well, it’s done this way and it happened that way; this is what I did and that’s what happened” – no one. That’s why it is so difficult.
Very difficult.
And also, oh, there are all those great waves of thought, of convictions (Mother draws great cosmic waves coming from the outside to assail her), that whole habit of Matter of decomposing and recomposing itself, being unbuilt and rebuilt…. It comes again and again, very regularly, like waves beating against a dike.
Very difficult.
(silence)
Probably it’s necessary because at times, when everything is in utter confusion, at times I ask for an Assurance – and I see very well, very well that if my body’s cells, the body consciousness were told, “You are immortal; all those difficulties are experiences; the pain you feel has no importance; this apparent decomposition has no importance; all those things are necessary experiences, and you will go on to the end of the experience, that is, to transformation,” if it were told that, obviously it would be mere child’s play, just enduring the difficulties – that’s nothing. So I wonder…. But never have I been told that, never, never have I been given the Assurance – now and then the body is in a sort of STATE, a state of immortality, but it isn’t constant, it’s dependent on other things; so the minute it’s “dependent,” it is no longer a supreme Assurance. There is at the same time a sort of discernment: very likely there would be a general slackening of the cells’ effort if they were told, “Never mind, none of this is important, because you will last till the work is done.” Maybe they would flag. The concentration of will in the battle would disappear. Which means one of the necessary conditions would be missing.
Then again something else comes and says, “Oh, you always have very favorable explanations to comfort yourself! …” You see, I am like a spectator (Mother does the same gesture of great cosmic waves assailing her) at a sort of contest of all the different reactions. (I put it into words to make myself understood, but there are no words – only SENSATIONS; the verbal translation is just for explaining, but they are like sensations, or rather states of consciousness. They
Page 147
are all states of consciousness.) And they all run into each other … (gesture of waves).
Ah, none of this is for the Bulletin!
***
(Just before leaving, Satprem rests his forehead on Mother’s feet. The previous time, when Satprem had made the same gesture, Mother, who was standing then, had lost her balance and almost fallen.)
You saw last time how I lost my balance. When you touched my foot, there came down a … not a column, it was a tornado! Of a light so white, so white! Not transparent – sparkling white, white like milk. But such a powerful mass! It came so violently that I lost my balance. That’s all, I only lost my balance. And it remained there, it was there – you saw how I stood a moment without raising my head, it was because I was looking at it. It was … it was MUCH MORE SOLID THAN MATTER. Something very peculiar, it was solid! More solid, MORE MATERIAL THAN MATTER. And a power, a weight, a density – extraordinary! Like a great column, and everything became pure white. Absolutely white. Nothing but white, everywhere. It stayed on a few seconds. And the power of it threw me off balance.
I was in no condition to tell you all this at the time!
Didn’t you feel anything?
Oh, yes, I felt the Force!
Oh, it was … (laughing) it was compelling enough!
(silence)
I don’t recall ever having felt the Force in such a way. It’s something (how can I put it? …) more material than Matter. That’s it. It didn’t come as a descent of light, no: it was like a mass – an AVALANCHE.
White! White, white, sparkling, dazzling. You couldn’t look at it. That’s why I looked down, I couldn’t look at it.
And there was nothing but that – there was no more you or my feet or my body or anything, nothing but that.
Page 148
(silence)
At night, sometimes I wake up (not “wake up,” rather I come to), I come to enveloped in something like that, very, very, very dense – dense. Which has weight. Perhaps a chemist could explain that! I see it as a new thing.
Page 149