June 25, 1966
This morning towards five, you came and told me lots of things. Oh, really!
Were you sleeping?
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Yes, certainly.
I was awake, taking my walk – my japa-walk. You came and spoke to me, you even asked me (laughing), “Did you see Sri Aurobindo this night?” So I told you all kinds of things, but I also told you, “No, I won’t have anything left to tell you this morning!” And here I am, telling you everything. Nothing sensational last night. It was a night of great rest. So that’s what I can tell you, that’s all. But it was amusing, and I said, “Oh, you are so conscious you come and talk to me!” But then you weren’t conscious! Which means that this [Satprem's outer being] isn’t conscious, but the other was: you came and talked to me.
I’m not conscious at all.
That’s strange.
Sometimes, depending on the activities one has had, the kind of life one has lived, there are intermediary parts (Mother draws a narrow strip) that remain undeveloped, so they act as a sort of padding: the consciousness doesn’t go through. I also had one like that; but as soon as I met Théon, he told me. He told me, “Your … (Mother tries to remember) nervous subdegree” (I think), “between the vital and the physical, isn’t developed.” There’s a padding, the consciousness doesn’t go through. So for six or ten months I worked carefully to develop it – no result. Then I left (perhaps I’ve already told you the story), I left for the countryside. One day, I stretched out on the grass, and all of a sudden, prrt! it came from everywhere, the consciousness had awakened. And indeed the way was blocked: there were lots of things that I never received because of that. But it’s a long work.
What could I do for that?
At that time I could have answered you in detail; now I don’t exactly remember. But the best thing is, when you go to bed, a slight concentration with the will to remain conscious. Just that. A sort of aspiration to remain conscious.
Yet I never go to sleep just anyhow, I always go to sleep after a meditation.
Yes, that’s why you come to me and I see you and all that. But
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then that is missing: a small connection.
At that time, when I was deep in occultism, I could have told you in detail, now I don’t remember. But I know (that’s one thing I still know): an aspiration. An aspiration for the thing … You know, when you want to wake up at a precise time and you say to yourself, “I want to wake up at such and such a time,” it works very well; well, it’s the same principle. Instead of asking for a precise time, you ask to remember, to remain conscious – to remember what has happened. It can act. And also, as I have always said, not to wake up abruptly, that is, not to leap from one’s bed, to stay quite still for a while. It happens to me even now: if I wake up and get up abruptly, it’s after a time, when I enter my concentration again, that the memory comes back.
These two things are enough, they should do.
***
(Soon afterwards, regarding a European disciple who asks to help the Ashram’s “cottage industry.” This fragment of conversation, though rather prosaic, was preserved, as it is quite illustrative.)
This cottage industry produces things that aren’t very pretty…. So she would like to know if you want her to go and work there or to do something on her own. I feel she has a capacity for handicraft that could be used.
Pavitra read me her letter. I spontaneously answered him, “Oh, this woman is too perfect for me.” You know, “I can do this, I can do that, I do this so well, I do that so perfectly….” There were pages of it, mon petit! So in the end I said, “She is too perfect for me.”
She is probably skillful.
Yes, and this cottage industry has lots of resources that aren’t put to full use….
I have never got involved in it – it’s been functioning for a long time and they’ve been producing their hideous things for a long time….
Yes.
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And I have never said anything because … we don’t speak the same language. But perhaps G. [the head of the cottage industry] would be glad to have her?
But that needs your approval. How should she go and see G.? She would need a note from you or…
Oh, no! I can’t say anything. G. must be the one to ask. She should express to G. her wish to help, and he should spontaneously accept; otherwise it won’t work, mon petit! I’ll receive a polite letter for an answer.
That’s strange!
No, no, that’s how it is, humanity is like that.
If she goes there, if she shows interest and a great goodwill, then it may work. Naturally, if G. asks if I agree, I’ll certainly tell him – but he must be the one to ask! (Mother laughs)
She could bring some fresh air there….
There was some repair work to be done in their house – she showed the workers how they should do it! – The workers preferred to go and work elsewhere.
They all have that, all of them: the arrogance of the European, oh! … Because the European is indeed used to dealing with Matter, so he has a certain authority over Matter. That’s true. For instance they are much more orderly (I am talking in a general way, there are exceptions everywhere), they have a certain mastery over Matter that doesn’t exist here, and because of that they feel so superior that it’s disgusting.
I find this in all those who come and I must admit I get … I let them flounder about for some years, until they suddenly realize that with all their superiority they are inferior. Then – then we can start getting along with each other!
You understand?
That’s true.
***
Then Mother takes up
the translation of “Savitri”
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It’s always the sound that guides me….
Do you know that Sunil has done some music for Savitri, and he is going to play it for me in early July. I don’t think he wants to have an audience, it’s quite private, because it must be played only in 1968 – in February ’68 – and he will show me just a small piece to see if it’s all right. But I thought you would be interested. I’ll leave my windows wide open.
I like what he does very much.
Oh, not just once but very often, while listening to his music, a door is immediately opened onto the region of universal harmony, where you hear the origin of sounds, and with an extraordinary emotion and intensity, something that pulls you out of yourself (gesture of abrupt wrenching). It’s the first time I’ve had this while listening to music – I myself have it when I am all alone. But I never had it while listening to music, it’s always something much closer to the earth. Here, it’s something very high, but very universal, and with a tremendous power: a creative power. Well, his music opens the door.
Now, some people have heard his music, and in Russia, France and the U.S.A. as well, they have asked for permission to copy it and spread it around. And the strange thing is that those people don’t know one another, but they have all had the same impression: tomorrow’s music. So to those who have asked I’ve answered, “Have some patience, in two years we’ll give you a musical monument.” It’s much better to begin with a major work, because it immediately gives the position, otherwise you might think it’s passing little inspirations – not that: something that strikes you on the head and makes you bow before it.
I read out the lines (in English, naturally), and with that he does the music. And the words are probably mixed in with the music, as he always does. But then, my reading is simply the clearest possible pronunciation, with the full understanding of what’s being said, and WITHOUT A SINGLE INTONATION. I think I have succeeded, because at a week’s interval (I don’t read every day), the timbre of the voice is always the same.
But all the music I used to adore seems pallid to me.
Doesn’t it! It sounds dull.
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Yes, it seems shallow.
Superficial, very shallow. All those things I found admirable in the past, that’s finished.
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