Chapter 4November 23, 1963

they combined with each other. And then: Why? Why should one choose this? (A child's question, which one asks immediately.) And immediately, the answer: "But the more" (let's say "central" to be clearer) "the more central the origin and the more pure in its essence, the greater the 'ignoble complexity below,' as we could call it. Because the lower down you go, the more it takes an essential light to change things."

Once you've been told this very nicely, you're satisfied, you stop worrying – it's all right, you take things as they are: "That's how things are, it's my work and I do it; I ask only one thing, it is to do my work, all the rest doesn't matter."

There, mon petit.

Oh, you've made me chatter away!

Kennedy has been assassinated, that means the possibility of war.

He was one of the instruments for the establishment of peace – it's a setback for the entire political history of the earth.

But probably, it means basically that things weren't ready: some parts would have been overlooked. But I had been told this a few weeks ago, last month, while I was conducting a general survey. I heard someone who said ("someone" is a manner of speaking, I know who it is): Kennedy won't be able to do it. I thought the instrument was too small, I didn't think of this.

And then five of our air force chiefs have been killed in a helicopter crash – helicopters never crash, and they were the best possible pilots. It's an act of sabotage – the Communists are doing a lot of sabotage. So that makes two accidents in a row.

But these accidents always occur at the time of Kali, in November – October and November.

February, too?

Revolutions, big strikes, dangerous INNER events are always just before February 21. And the catastrophes of this kind in November – always.

Sri Aurobindo too used to say that the most difficult period in the year was November to February.

(silence)

As for the accident here [the five army chiefs], those killed were first-rate pilots. There is every indication that it's an act of sabotage. It's the same thing again.

The Communists here sabotage everywhere (they sabotage the mail too, that's a nuisance), they sabotage a lot, sabotage everywhere.

Anyway, there we are, we have only to wait, endure, and broaden more and more.

(silence)

Kennedy won't be able to do it.... According to the American constitution, the vice-president automatically becomes president, the next minute; and this vice-president symbolized the opposition to Kennedy. And within his own party, among the Democrats, there was already a division.

Well. So, what have you brought me?

Nothing, Mother, except Agenda conversations.

That will soon sound repetitious – things are moving fast.

(silence)

You were better yesterday, weren't you?

Yes, better.

I even felt something lifted: I pressed and pressed hard, and whoops! it lifted.

But I feel quite a dark shadow following me.

Still?

Not like in the past.

No. You know, what lends force to the opposition is superstitious ignorance – superstitious in the sense of a sort of faith or at least of belief in Destiny, in Fate. It's ingrained, as if woven into the human substance. They have the same superstition, the same superstitious belief in what is favorable to them as in what is unfavorable; in the divine Power as in the adverse power – it's the SAME attitude. And that's why the divine Power doesn't have its full force, and also precisely why the adverse force has so much power over them, because it's absolutely a movement of Falsehood, of Ignorance – of total Ignorance.

Recently, I was following the thing down to the smallest detail, in everybody's mentality. Even in those who have read Sri Aurobindo, who have studied Sri Aurobindo, who have understood, who have come into contact with that region of light, it's still there – it's still there. It's very... yes, it's very tightly woven into the most outward and material part of the consciousness. It's a kind of submissiveness, which may be quite rebellious, but which gives a sense, as you said, of something hanging over your submission, the surrender consists in accepting – blindly – all that happens. One's nature revolts, but revolts against an Absolute against which it is helpless. And all of that is Ignorance. Not one of all those movements is true – from the most intense revolt to the blindest submission, it's all false, not one true movement.

I don't know if it's in Sri Aurobindo's writings (I don't remember), but I hear very strongly (not for me, for mankind):

AWAKE AND WILL Naturally men take "will" for their own whims, which have nothing to do with a will – they're all impulses.

"To will" means "to will with the supreme Will." And it's as if it were the key that opens the door to the future:

AWAKE AND WILL But beware of willing the wrong way because that's no longer a will, it's a whim – don't confuse the two. Will with the supreme Will.

We shouldn't hunch our shoulders – it makes us grumble terribly within ourselves and it's useless. Oh, (Mother holds up her head) that feeling of the head rising above all that, of emerging above...

But we're so totally enslaved to very small things – the very small things of the body: its needs (or supposed needs). I see all the entreaties that come from everywhere, and it all revolves around the same thing (even those who think they've understood that the consciousness must be general – not collective, but terrestrial – they're slaves to the reactions of their body), it all revolves around two things: sleep-food-sleep-food-sleep... (Mother draws a circle). Even with those who profess that they have "no interest" in those things, they still have the power to cause reactions in their consciousness: a sleepless night or poor digestion, or an upset digestive system – there you are. It has the power to weigh down on their faith and to take away its capacity of action. It's a kind of attachment – an involuntary and mechanical attachment – to that need for sleep and that need for food. And I don't mean people who love to eat or lazy people who like to sleep – I don't even mean that, which is all the way down, that's not it: I mean those who aren't interested in food and would really like to replace sleep with something else, something more interesting, even those – all, all, all of them.

And even this body, which has been worked on and kneaded for years... It's in the subconscient of the body. And so that was the answer, it was said to the body:

AWAKE AND WILL

(silence)

And as usual, it was full of humor. Something said: "You grumble all the time, you moan all the time,