February 22, 1964The Mother
Agenda
Volume 5
February 22, 1964
(The day after Mother's eighty-sixth birthday. Mother first reads the translation of the message she gave on the 21st:)
It was translated in an interesting way.... I read it, then I concentrated (A. was sitting here, not moving or saying anything), so first I said a word or two to him to “establish the atmosphere.” Then I remained quiet, and it simply came – it isn't exactly a translation:
Sa volonté solitaire affronta la loi du monde.
Pour arrêter la roue fatale, cette Splendeur se leva...
Her single will opposed the cosmic rule.
To stay the wheels of Doom this greatness rose.
(Savitri, I.II.19)
*
* *
I had a strange night last night.
The whole day yesterday, I had an impression – not a vague impression: a very precise sensation – of the Pressure of something that was trying to manifest. But it was so material that it was almost like a physical pressure. And then a kind of Force that not only resisted, but revolted, trying to make a muddle of everything – to create unpleasant circumstances, trouble people, all sorts of perfectly unpleasant little nothings. I was watching all that.
And in the evening the resistance and revolt took a concrete form, as it were. Then, in response, there was in all the cells of the body a call, a desperate call for the Truth, as if all the cells were crying out, “Ah, no! We've had enough of this Falsehood, enough, enough, enough! – the Truth, the Truth, the Truth....” It put my body in a very deep trance. And it had the impression of a very, very intense struggle.
I was looking, and everywhere there were... as if the world were made of huge engines with enormous pistons that were falling – you know, like in engine rooms: they were rising and falling, rising and falling.... It was like that everywhere. And it was pounding Matter – it was frightful. To such a degree that the body felt pounded.
It was a compression – a mechanical compression – and at the same time (both things at the same time), such an intensity of aspiration! There is in these cells an extraordinary intensity: “The Truth, the Truth, the Truth...”1 Then, in the middle of all this, I went into a state of very deep trance, a sort of samadhi, from which I emerged five hours later – it lasted from 10 at night to 3 in the morning – five hours later, beatific, and conscious that I had been conscious all the time, but of something inexpressible. And what a light! A light, a light... a fantastic light.
But this morning, the body is a bit... (what's the word?) giddy.
Dizzy?
Not exactly dizzy... the sensation of a sort of lack of consistency. Yes, like when one is giddy – a giddiness, rather. Because it was such a pounding!
Mother, some fifteen days ago, I dreamed that very thing. There was a sort of enormous “drill” boring into Matter; then you came, and you were very interested, as if you participated actively in it. An enormous black drill, like the ones they use to drill wells, boring into a sort of Matter with a color like yellow clay. It struck me very much. About ten or fifteen days ago.... A tremendous power.
Yes, yesterday I had the feeling that I was brought into contact with something that's going on ALL THE TIME.
Then that's it.
Like this, a pounding: you know, those machines that rise and fall and rise and fall.... And there were scores and scores and scores of them... it was endless.
But then (laughing), this poor body was lying underneath! I even heard (although I was in trance), I heard my body letting out little cries, “Ah! ah!...” Just a little “ah”!
So that's how I am this morning, a little giddy.
These are powerful methods!
(silence)
I have never seen such an intensity in the cells, in the consciousness of the cells... you know, an almost desperate intensity: “We've had enough, enough of this Falsehood! – the Truth, the Truth, the Truth....” And then that Light... bah-bah!... They were conscious of the light. Conscious of a dazzling light.
Look, it's the kind of giddiness one has when one has drunk a bit too much – that's it, the giddiness caused by alcohol.
But I didn't have the sense of a definitive thing: I had the sense of a beginning! It's only a beginning!
Which means that the gap between what they are used to receiving through infiltration and a radical descent is a tremendous one.
Several times in his letters, Sri Aurobindo wrote that if the higher Light were to descend abruptly, or if divine Love were to descend abruptly, without preparation... the matter would be shattered. It appears to be quite true!
(silence)
Even now (Mother touches her hands and fingers), one feels... not the pounding, but the aspiration in all the cells....
(Mother goes into contemplation)
Yes, that's what it is, a sort of inebriation.
Somewhere in “Savitri,” Sri Aurobindo says, “This wine of lightning in the cells....”2
Oh! Do you know where it is?...
(Satprem looks for the passage in vain)
1 A few days later, Mother had a very bloodshot eye.
2 And came back quivering with a nameless Force Drunk with a wine of lightning in their cells. (IV.IV 383)