Individual and Collective Work

May 16, 1914

I was interrupted yesterday just when I was trying to formulate the experience I had. And now everything seems changed. That precise knowledge, that clear-sightedness has given place to a great love for Thee, O Lord, which has seized my whole being from the outer organism to the deepest consciousness, and all lies prostrate at Thy feet in an ardent aspiration for a definitive identification with Thee, an absorption in Thee. I implored Thee with all the energy I could summon. And once again, just when it seemed to me that my consciousness was going to disappear in Thine, just when all my being was nothing but a pure crystal reflecting Thy Presence, someone came and interrupted my concentration.
Such is, indeed, the symbol of the existence Thou givest me as my share, in which outer usefulness, the work for all, holds a much greater place even than the supreme realisation. All the circumstances of my life seem always to tell me on Thy behalf: “It is not through supreme concentration that thou wilt realise oneness, it is by spreading out in all.” May Thy will be done, O Lord.

Now I understand clearly that union with Thee is not an aim to be pursued, so far as this present individuality is concerned; it is an accomplished fact since a long time. And that is why Thou seemest to tell me always: “Do not delight in the ecstatic contemplation of this union; accomplish the mission I have entrusted to thee upon earth.”

And the individual work to be carried on simultaneously with the collective work is to become aware and take possession of all the activities and parts of the being, the definitive establishment of consciousness in the highest point, making possible both the prescribed action and the constant communion with Thee. The joys of perfect union cannot come until what has to be done is done.

First, union must be preached to all, afterwards work; but for those who have realised the union, every moment of their life must be an integral expression of Thy will through them.

[Prayers and Meditations of the Mother]