Chapter 30Helpers on the Way · Following a Hostile Influence

the two forces?

There is one force only, the Mother’s force — or, if you like to put it like that, the Mother is Sri Aurobindo’s Force.

*

Somebody told me: “When I came here, Sri Aurobindo never used to teach us anything about the Yoga. He told us to follow our own knowledge.” Is this so?

I am not aware of that. But now also the Mother does not teach, she asks all to open and receive. But she does not tell them and I don’t think I told people to follow their own “knowledge”.

26 April 1933 It is quite sure that we are with you day and night; even if you do not yet see the Mother in your dreams or feel her presence, you should think of her as there and supporting you and that will surely help you.

If there is a natural movement of your mind to identify Shiva in the way you speak of and it jumps to myself and the Mother, why not let it take the jump? Perhaps it is not a jump but a natural transition, and reconciliation and not a conflict. Certainly, your pranams are always accepted by us and always will be.

* Our presence, force, peace, love are always with you. That is a thing you must realise and learn to keep the consciousness of it. If you do that, all the rest is of minor importance (your difficulties, the old nature etc.) and will be set right in due time.

While aspiring towards the Mother and repeating her name, your name comes in as well. Strange!

You must always aspire towards the Mother, because hers is the force which can alone give you the true realisation of the Divine. If your mind wants to do otherwise, you must control it. Any separation made by it between the Mother and myself (like substituting my name for hers) must be discouraged — because when that happens, errors may creep into the inner experience.

*

When I aspire to feel Mother with me and call “Mother, Mother”, something in me calls “Lord, Lord” and I feel him near me! What is this you are doing, Lord?

Probably I come to work in you so that it may become easier for you to feel the Mother with you always.

There are no conditions for receiving the influence of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother2 except faith, an entire sincerity in following the spiritual path and a will and capacity to open oneself to the influence; but this capacity usually comes as the result of sincerity and faith.

It is quite possible to follow the Yoga while remaining outside the Asram. There are many both in Northern and Southern India who do it.

You can submit your doubts for elucidation to Sri Auro-bindo, if brief answers are sufficient, as he has little time. If longer and more detailed answers are necessary, it could only be done through one of his disciples.

28 October 1934

* We are doubtful about the advisability of your coming here the next winter. Your illness and the fact that you suffer from the heat stand in the way, for in Southern India the heat is extreme. The sudden change of climate and ways of life may be hard to 2 Written by Sri Aurobindo to his secretary, who replied to the correspondent. — Ed.

bear. Moreover there will not be truly competent medical aid and advice available here as it would be in America. Finally, you do not know perhaps that I am living for the present in an entire retirement, not seeing or speaking with anyone, even the disciples in the Asram, only coming out to give a silent blessing or frequent access to those who are here. You would therefore probably be disappointed if you came here with the idea of a personal contact with us to help you in your spiritual endeavour. The personal touch is there but it is more of an inward closeness with only a few points of physical contact to support it. But this inner contact, inner help can very well be received at a distance. We have not any disciples in America, though several Americans have come recently here and became interested in the Yoga. But we have disciples in France and some of these have been able already to establish an inner closeness with us and to become aware of our nearness and help in their spiritual endeavour and experience. We would advise you therefore to try this way where you are rather than face the difficulty and inconveniences of a journey and stay here which, if necessary, could be undertaken with more advantage after you have gone some way on the path rather than at present.

9 September 1936 If you want the plain and simple truth, the plain truth is this that you have entered into a complete falsehood and have put yourself into the hands of a hostile Influence that lives by confusion and ignorance. You began by setting your own imperfect thinking power against a superior Truth and Knowledge. And by false and fantastic reasonings you have so clouded your mind that it has become entirely muddled and confused and incapable of understanding the plainest distinctions or discriminating between falsehood and Truth. This is evident in all you are saying and doing; it is not Truth and religion, but the false and inadequate ideas of your own confused and weakened mind that you are trying to force upon others.

The letter you wrote to me shows a surprising inability to understand the plainest distinctions and the simplest truths. The one who was an instrument for giving birth to the physical body of X was no doubt in her lifetime his material mother. But the relation which exists between the Mother here and X (and between the Mother and all who accept her), is a psychic and spiritual motherhood. It is a far greater relation than that of the physical mother to her child; it gives all that human motherhood can give, but in a much higher way, and it contains in itself infinitely more. It can therefore, because it is greater and more complete, take altogether the room of the physical relation and replace it both in the inward and the outward life. There is nothing here that can confuse anyone who has common sense and a straightforward intelligence. The physical fact cannot in the least stand in the way of the greater psychic and spiritual truth or prevent it from being true. X is perfectly right when he says that this is his true mother; for she has given him a new birth in an inner life and is creating him anew for a diviner existence.

The idea of spiritual Motherhood is not an invention of this Asram; it is an eternal truth which has been recognised for ages past both in Europe and in Asia. The distinction I have drawn between the physical relation and the psychic and spiritual relation is also not a new invention; it is an idea known and understood everywhere and found to be perfectly plain and simple by all. It is the present confused state of your own mind which prevents you from understanding what men have found natural and intelligible everywhere.

As for X and Y, you have no claim over them and no right to control their thoughts and actions. X is of an age to choose and decide; he can think and act for himself and has no need of you to think and act for him. You are not his guardian nor Y’s; you are not even the head of the family. On what ground do you claim to decide where he shall go or where he shall stay? Your pretension to have the responsibility for him or her before God is an arrogant and grotesque absurdity. Each one is responsible for himself before God unless he freely chooses to place the responsibility upon another in whom he trusts. No one has the