Letters 1935

Could you kindly say something in general about the psychic and spiritual experience and the descent from above?

You have to learn by experience. Mental information (badly understood, as it always is without experience) might rather hamper than help. In fact there is no fixed mental knowledge for these things, which vary infinitely....

Would you kindly define the nature of Ananda?

Ananda is a thing to be felt — it cannot be defined except negatively that it is not mere joy, but something much more deep and essential.

Even the higher or deeper experiences do not seem to be of much value if one cannot love the Mother with the true heart.

It is a mistake to think like that. The experiences prepare the different parts of the being for loving in the right way, so that it is not the soul alone that loves. So long as they are open to ignorance and ego they cannot receive and hold the love rightly.

There is a psychic sorrow which usually comes when the soul feels how strong is the resistance in the vital and how much the Forces in it rage against the Mother, or when some similar feeling is in or behind the consciousness.

After death when the soul returns for a new birth, who moulds the mind, vital and physical?

It is done by Nature under the influence of the soul. In a certain sense it may be said that the soul does it, because what it sees as needed is drawn in as material and shaped.

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.

I would like to know what that sweet flow is and from where it comes into my mouth.

It is a form of the flow of Ananda from above — when it takes a quite physical form the Yogins call it Amrita.

A subtle sound like a peal of bells is heard constantly and loudly. What does it denote?

That is considered to be a sound closely connected with the sadhana.

Why are so many flowers being seen these days?

It is usually when the psychic is active that this seeing of flowers becomes abundant.

What has the inner being to do with Yoga or spiritual life?

It is the outer being that has nothing to do with Yoga or spiritual life unless the inner awakens it.

The peace and silence is there all the time during meditation. But what is its value unless it becomes dynamic?

It has a great value — because if there is not that peace and silence the true strength cannot come down in such a way as to settle.

Could I have an interview with the Mother? I want to discuss [my difficulties] and get at least a verbal solution.

This method of asking questions and getting solutions in an interview is one of which the Mother does not approve. She finds it useless....

"... the Divine does the sadhana first for the world and then gives what is brought down to others. There can be no sadhana without realisations and experiences. Both myself and the Mother have done sadhana. The Prayers and Meditations are a record of Mother’s experiences."

Does such a [golden] path truly exist somewhere or is it only a visionary idea?

There is such a sunlit or golden path, but it is difficult for man with the pull of his lower nature to follow it.

Difficult no doubt it is, but is it really impossible for the human being to tread the sunlit path?

It is not impossible. But only one or two have been able to do it — which proves that it is not easy.

The struggle between the higher and the lower forces goes on within in the same way. What to do then?

Nothing can be done except to keep yourself detached, unless you can recover the use of the knowledge and the will or else bring down the Mother’s Force.

I pray to the Mother to see the plight of her child .... and know how the vital has filled it with agony and pain.

.... There must be no tamasic (inert, passive) surrender to the Mother.... Surrender must be luminous, active, a willed offering to the Mother and reception of her Force and support to its workings, at the same time a strong vigilant will to reject all that is not hers. Too many sadhaks cry before the attacks of their lower nature “I am helpless, I cannot react..."

But what can one do when the difficulty seems overwhelmingly great?

If you cannot do anything else, you must at least remain detached — there is always a part of the being that can remain detached and go on persisting in calling down the Force from above.