Chapter 2March 9, 1968

The result is certain, with the least amount of damage. But that least amount is still quite considerable.

And for the human consciousness, it takes long. But as you remarked just before, it’s pretty. It feels like something going like this (gesture like a tide spreading out), very slowly for the human consciousness, certainly, but quite implacable towards resistances, and so sov-er-eign-ly sure of its victory.... That’s pretty. And with the least amount of damage, undeniably. Not to mention that what looks like "damage" may only be, seen in the whole, a means of higher realization.

(Regarding an old Playground Talk of May 27, 1953, in which Mother says in particular, "When the consciousness behind is developed, when you have the power to concentrate it, whatever you do that

consciousness will act.")

That was this morning’s very experience.

The experience was like this: the important thing is to keep the consciousness of the Presence, which means that the Presence must be concrete; then, in everything you do, everything you say – whatever you may do, whatever you may say – it’s this Presence that expresses itself. And this morning’s experience was to find the difference between the direct expression and the more or less veiled expression; and the difference of quality in the expression depended on the mental judgment, that is, the mind in everyone judges that difference, but that’s only an individual question; from a general point of view, the things that seem to us the least transparent or expressive are sometimes the best expressions.

It’s hard to explain. There was the perception of what the mental consciousness ADDS to the action of the supreme Consciousness, and that addition, or judgment, was still something quite relative – relative to time, to the occasion, the person; it’s not an absolute: in one case, a particular clothing will be a perfect expression, and in another case, the same clothing won’t be.... It was a long experience of the relativity of the mental world with regard to the supreme Consciousness expressing itself.

It came in the wake of a sentence someone had written (I forget who, some writer or another), which said (I am adapting it), "When one sees how humorous the creation is, one is certain that the Creator must be smiling...." With that sentence, I saw how relative the clothing is in the human consciousness – there is no absolute, no absolute expression, the expression is always relative, and the impression it leaves is relative to the individual perceiving it.

I am trying to express it, but it was a concrete experience: the relativity of the mental clothing on the action of the higher Consciousness.