Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

3. The Mother and the Practice of the Integral Yoga

Fragment ID: 19623

At 4.30 in the afternoon, while serving vegetables in the Dining Room, I suddenly fell into a very unhappy condition. My consciousness entered into a world of obscurity and uneasiness and wild vital forces. Innumerable hostile suggestions pierced my helpless consciousness. Then the form of X appeared and he threatened me, saying that my fate would be the same as his – I would have to leave the Asram. Later, while in this condition I passed by Y’s room and felt that the Mahakali forces of the Mother were around me; I also felt that her very name would create fear in the hostile forces. As I thought of her with feeling, suddenly all was clear.

It is the Force that attacks everyone in the Asram who can at all be attacked in this way – the X form is merely an appearance which it took for the sake of having a more concrete effect. It is a vital violence which suggests always a catastrophic breaking of the personal sadhana or of my work. Such a Force is naturally met by the power of Mahakali. You felt it while passing Y’s room because it is always there with Y, and it is by that that he meets the suggestions of this Force when it comes. The Mother’s name called with faith is usually enough to meet it. It disappeared at once because it is a Falsehood which cannot stand once the light of the Truth touches it. It prevailed with X because he welcomed its suggestions of pride, revolt, hostility to the Mother, even clung to them – otherwise it would have had no chance.

2 October 1933