Chapter 28The Mother, the Divine and the Lower Nature · The Mother and the Lower Prakriti

Essentially everybody is the Self — but take care to avoid the idea that you are the Lord — for that may raise up the ego.

8 October 1934

* After getting your letter [above], I was frightened, thinking that all my experiences about the Self were untrue and were misleading influences. Then I thought I would not aspire for the higher opening any more; what is necessary for me now is the growth of the psychic. So I began to concentrate on the heart and have been trying to depend on the psychic strength.

You must not try to stop any opening. My remarks were only meant to keep you on your guard against certain errors that sadhaks often make when the cosmic consciousness opens. If there is the psychic opening with its surrender and the higher opening with its wideness and self-realisation, the two together, there is little danger of any such error.

11 October 1934

* You have told me to keep on my guard against errors. What is your opinion of my recent higher experiences? I used to feel a Consciousness, a vast Wideness which has become each individual. This Consciousness contains all and is in all. I used to feel that each is a part of me since I am that vast Consciousness. I felt that whatever I was doing, I was doing for myself, which is above. Will you tell me what all this means and why you warned me to take care? Was there a chance of making an error?

The experiences were all right — but they give only one side of the Divine Truth, that which one attains through the higher mind — the other side is what one attains through the heart. Above the higher mind these two truths become one. If one realises the silent Atman above, there is no danger, but there is also no transformation, only Moksha, Nirvana. If one realises the cosmic self, dynamic and active, then one realises all as the Self, all as myself, that self as the Divine, etc. This is all true; but the danger is of the ego catching hold of the “my” in that conception of all as “myself”. For this “myself” is not my personal self but everybody’s self as well as mine. The way to get rid of any such danger is to remember that this Divine is also the Mother, that the personal “I” is a child of the Mother with whom I am one, yet different, her child, servant, instrument. I have said that you should not stop realising the Self or the cosmic consciousness, but should at the same time remember that all this is the Mother.

13 October 1934 What is remarkable today is that the consciousness is turning more and more towards oneness with the Mother’s Self in the silent peace. I write “Self” simply out of my perception, so I would like to be a little clear about it.

You are seeking for Self-realisation — but what is that Self if not the Mother’s self? There is no other.

29 September 1934

* As the soul is in direct connection with the Divine, is not our Self also in direct connection with it? Why then does one not feel intimacy with the Mother while realising the Self as one does during the soul-realisation?

The Self has two aspects, passive and active. In the first it is pure silence, wideness, calm, the inactive Brahman — in the second it is the Cosmic Spirit, universal not individual. One can feel in it union or oneness with the Mother. Intimacy is a feeling of the individual, therefore of the psychic being.

12 October 1934 In the Chandi it is said that the Devi is in everyone in the form of consciousness. This is the Bhagavat Chetana in all beings. In the true state, in the psychic and the Jivatman, it is united, a divine portion. In the fallen state, it is the ego. Is this correct?

I don’t understand exactly. Chitshakti or Bhagavat Chetana is a spark of it. Ego is a perverted reflection of the psychic or the Jivatman. If that is what you mean, it is correct.

* Sometimes I feel as if I am a portion of the Mother come down into the manifestation for her work. As a result, I have to pass through various human births and experience pain, separation, suffering, falsehood and ignorance.

It is true of every soul on earth that it is a portion of the Divine Mother passing through the experiences of the Ignorance in order to arrive at the truth of its being and be the instrument of a Divine Manifestation and work here.

15 February 1937 Is it possible for the Mother or anyone living above the Overmind or even in the silence to take any interest in the world, since the world would be felt from there as a mere speck?

It all depends upon what basis one lives in the silence or above. A speck can be of as much interest to the Divine Consciousness as an infinity.

8 August 1934 The higher Prakriti is the true nature of the Divine, so it can show Light and Ananda to people who are trying to reach the highest Truth; it is a help to sadhaks. But the lower Prakriti is impure and blind and can only show a limited Truth and a brief Ananda.

Everything comes from the Divine; but the lower Prakriti is the power of the Ignorance — it is not therefore a power of Truth, not for the Power of the Ignorance, but for the Power that has