Remembering Srimirambika

Today, the 21^st February 2014, is the 136th Birthday anniversary of The Mother — Srimirambika, the spiritual collaborator of of Sri Aurobindo. 

The Mother has advised us: "Keep yourself always open towards me". And that is the Way, the Sadhana, the highest and surest range of human sadhana, the Way towards the New Creation on earth, towards the Integral Transformation, towards the supramental becoming. When we keep ourselves open to Her, the Supramental Light tries to touch us, limited by our limitations. If we are sufficiently conscious to open to It, to receive It, we will be really successful take our Next Step towards the New World.  

Remembering The Mother, as much as possible, is the Way. We should try to have a contact and communion with Her, as sincerely and perfectly as possible. Let us always continue our surrender to Her, to Her Work, to Her Cause, the Manifestation of the Supramental Consciousness, the New Creation of the Supramental World.

Meditation is helpful. In meditation, one may sit quietly at a place for some time. However, that is insufficient. One should develop quietude in the Mind, trying to stop the ever-busy movements of the Mind, its ideas, opinions, habits and constructions, and also the recurrence of the impressions of the vital being its activities, sensations, desires, cravings, greed, lust,  jealousy, pride, envy, hostility, selfishness and egoistic trends. Also one lust,  endeavourto conquer the darkness of the physical nature, the doubt, disbelief, stupidity and obscurity of the physical nature. 

Aspiration is the Way — aspiration for the Light, for the Truth, for the Higher Consciousness. One should try to replace the lower nature by the Higher Nature. And the best way is to remember The Mother.

When for some time everyday one meditates and calls The Mother, aspires for the Higher Consciousness for some days, there is Descent of  Peace, Bliss and Light, and there is elevation of Consciousness. The Consciousness widens and the barriers and limitations break down and collapse.  

M P Pandit says: “…it is not enough that one sits with closed eyes once the higher and deeper Consciousness. It is necessary to be vigilant and keep oneself in the current of the Force, without MEANDERING of the MIND.” 

If one sits for a while in a silent and quiet way and then gets up and forgets it and mixes up oneself in the half-conscious whirlpools of life, that is not meditation. It brings failure to the sitting in quietude for some time. 

Meditation can be done and has also to be done, as far as possible, during our Works also. 

Remember The Mother, commune with Her, refer everything to Her, concentrate on Her, surrender everything to Her. That is the best Way we can express our Love for Her. 

On Her Birthday, let us take one step further towards The New World, — let us start remembering Her ever.

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Sri Aurobindo, an Incarnation of the Supreme Divine Consciousness, referring to The Mother, said that ' the One whom we adore as The Mother is the Divine Cinscious Force that dominates all existence…' He has said further: “The Mother is the consciousness and force of the Supreme and far above all she creates.” 

Sri Aurobindo has also said on The Mother:

"Her embodiment is a chance for the earth-consciousness to receive the Supramental into it and to undergo first the transformation necessary for that to be possible."

Thus, She is unalterably important for the entire humanity and for the earth. "She is the golden bridge ...," in the language of Sri Aurobindo. She is the Force to enable Man and the earth to leap beyond and pass over the gulf of difference between Mind and the Supramind, between Darkness and Light, between Ignorance and Wisdom, between Falsehood and Truth.

She is the golden bridge, the wonderful fire.
The luminous heart of the Unknown is she,
A power of silence in the depths of God;
She is the Force, the inevitable Word,.....
To heal with her feet the aching throb of life
And break the seals on the dim soul of man
And kindle her fire in the closed heart of things.
[Savitri : Sri Aurobindo]

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The Mother Herself said :

Throughout all this life, knowingly or unknowingly, I have been what the Lord wanted me to be, I have done what the Lord wanted me to do, I have done what the Lord wanted me to do. That alone matters.

She has further said :

Since, the beginning of the earth, wherever and whenever there was the possibility of manifesting a ray of Consciousness, I was there.

She has also shown us the Way, the most sublime Way of the Child in us, in all of us:

You have to aspire, you have to reject; but the best is if you can keep me in your heart, if you love me, then you will have to do nothing. I shall do all for you.

That is the best Way.

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The Mother told us about Sri Aurobindo : 

Sri Aurobindo came on earth from the Supreme to announce the manifestation of a new race and a new world, the Supramental.

She also said about Sri Aurobindo :

Man is the creation of yesterday. Sri Aurobindo came to announce the creation of tomorrow : the coming of the supramental being.

And for this coming of the supramental being, Sri Aurobindo says that Man has to ascend from Mind to various higher levels of Mind, and then to the Supermind. Man has to go through the ways of Transformation. And when the human aspiration rises to a height, then only Supermind can be approached.

The Mother Mira was the Person who caused the Descent of the Supramental Principle on earth on the 29th February 1956. The purpose of this Supramental Descent was to make possible the ascending journey of Man to Supermanhood.

The Mother has stated:

FIRST SUPRAMENTAL MANIFESTATION

(During the common meditation on Wednesday

The 29th February 1956)

This evening the Divine Presence, concrete and material, was there present amongst you. I had the form of a living gold, bigger than the universe, and I was facing a huge and massive golden door, which separated the world from the Divine. As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that ‘the time has come', and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces. Then the supramental Light and Force and Consciousness rushed down upon earth in an uninterrupted flow.

This is the Aim and purpose of the coming of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother on earth : the Manifestation of the Supramental Consciousness and Force on earth, so that Man can progressively change himself into the Superman, the Supramental Being. By the half-conscious and diminished principle of Mind, Man can rise from the animalhood to a great extent, but cannot become the Supramental Being, cannot put an end to his miseries and sufferings, to darkness, ignorance, inconscience, incapacities and death in his existence.

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The Mother has said:

We can, simply by a sincere aspiration, open a sealed door in us and find…that Something which will change the whole meaning of life, answer all our questions, solve all our problems and lead us to the perfection we aspire for without knowing it, to that Reality which alone can satisfy and give us lasting joy, balance, strength. All this you have heard many times. You have heard it - oh, there are even ~ here who are so used to it that for them that seems to be the same as drinking a glass of water or opening a window to let in the sunlight ....

We have tried a little, but now we are going to try seriously! The starting-point: to want it, truly to want it, to need it. The next step: to think, above all, of that. A day comes very quickly when one is unable to think of anything else. That is the only thing that counts. And then … you formulate your aspiration, you let the true prayer spring up from your heart, the prayer that expresses the sincerity of the need. And then ... well, you will see what happens. [Spiritual Significance of Flowers]

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Sri Aurobindo said about Man in His poem Evolution :

O thou who climbest from dull stone

Face now the miracled summits still unwon.

The first half of Evolution is before us, the human beings — step by step, we have grown from Matter, described by Sri Aurobindo as “dull stone” — we have become the humans through the prolonged and difficult course of Evolution — from the stone to the human. That is the story of the coming of Man, amidst the stone and the plants and the animals.  

Now, there are the new summits, still unconquered, before us — the summits of consciousness and existence : we should have to conquer the new summits beyond the human existence and consciousness, beyond our limitations, beyond our present imperfections and incapacities, beyond our ignorance and darkness, and we should also have the capacities to transform ourselves for the New Creation, for the Advent of the Superman, the Supramental Being.

That is the Truth, as The Mother says. We have to achieve it or we have to lose the struggle of existence, being doomed to the Abyss. Let us remember what The Mother has said:

Men, countries, continents,
The choice is imperative — Truth or Abyss.

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In spite of all the imperfections, ignorance and darkness in Man, in spite of all the pull and push of the animal nature in him, since the beginning of his existence, he has an opening for the Supreme, for the Divine. Since the beginning, he has ever tried to have contact with the Higher Consciousness and Force, however crude and incomplete his attempts might have been. This trend in him might have given rise to many superstitions, but it has also given rise to the great religions, leading some humans to live nobler and higher lives.

However, The Mother has said that the Age of Religions is over.

In the religions, the incomplete and imperfect mind attempted to conveniently mix up the mental ignorance and darkness with the highest contact and the highest sentiments, emotions, ideas and thoughts within us. Men have been seeking to go to heaven, or to go for Niravana or Moksha, making the human existence, as it were, a meaningless, purposeless, aimless play of the Supreme.

In the name of the religions, now the humanity has been divided. Hatred, cruelty and division are now in force in place of Love and humanism and oneness. The Divine is far away, and the Divine Life has been distant and impossible.

Therefore, we shall have to go beyond Mind to find the true meaning and use and purpose of the human life and existence and also of the Mind itself.

Let us recall what The Mother has said: “The Age of religion is over.” Keeping aside the religious conflicts and debates, we shall have to go beyond the mental limitations and ascend the higher ranges of Consciousness. 

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We need to ascend the higher ranges of Mind —the Higher Mind, the Illumined Mind, the Intuitive Mind , the Overmind — to ascend the heights of  the Gnosis, the Supramental Consciousness. And before all these Ascents, we should discover and know the Divine Child in us, the Psychic Being.

That is the Work before us, the humans. That is the Truth. The Spirit, involved in the Stone, has become Man, and shall now evolve further and manifest as the Supramental Being.

The Mother has prayed before the Supreme, for all the humanity :

Lord, we are upon earth to accomplish Thy work of transformation. It is our sole will, our sole preoccupation. Grant that it may be also our sole occupation and that all our actions may help us towards this single goal.

Evolution is the Work of the Supreme, the Divine. The Supreme, the Sat-chit-ananda, the Existence Consciousness Bliss, has emerged as the Stone, the principle of Matter. That is Involution. And from that stage, the return journey of the Supreme has begun — from Matter to the Supreme Consciousness again. Man has come into existence, in course of the Evolutionary return journey of the Supreme Consciousness. That is the Play, the Work of the Supreme. However, in Evolution, the One willed to become the Many and has become so. t may be said that he thought : “Ekoham, bahu syama.” [ I am alone, and shall become many.]  Existence-Consciousness became many, countless many, and each of the many is a Soul, or the Atman in Sanskrit, which is a part and portion of the Supreme Consciousness, the Divine — a part who is one with the Whole, who can be the Whole also, who can unite with the Whole.

Sri Aurobindo has used the word ‘the psychic being’ in expressing the active aspect of the ‘soul’ in Man. The psychic being is evolved only in the human being, as it has to participate and lead in the next evolution beyond Mind. Sri Aurobindo says :

The soul … … is something that comes down into birth and passes through death – although it does not itself die, for it is immortal – from one state to another, from the earth plane to other planes and back again to the earth-existence. It goes on with this progression from life to life through an evolution which leads it up to the human state and evolves through it all a being of itself which we call the psychic being that supports the evolution and develops a physical, a vital, a mental human consciousness as its instruments of world-experience and of a disguised, imperfect, but growing self-expression. All this it does from behind a veil showing something of its divine self only in so far as the imperfection of the instrumental being will allow it. But a time comes when it is able to prepare to come out from behind the veil, to take command and turn all the instrumental nature towards a divine fulfilment. This is the beginning of the true spiritual life. The soul is able now to make itself ready for a higher evolution of manifested consciousness than the mental human. [Letters on Yoga — Sri Aurobindo]

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Sri Aurobindo has expressed in a poem how the Ascent, the Next Evolution, will lead Man to the Supramental Transformation.

Earth was a cradle for the arriving god

And man but a half-dark half-luminous sign

Of the transition of the veiled Divine

From Matter’s sleep and the tormented load

Of ignorant life and death to the Spirit’s light.

Mind liberated swam Light's ocean vast,

And life escaped from its grey tortured line;

I saw Matter illumining its parent Night.

[Evolution : Sri Aurobindo]  

The Supramental Consciousness is the arriving God, the Divine, and the human being is the sign, the evolved reality, that is the instrument of the Divine. In Man, there is only a partial Light. He is not fully illumined. The arriving God, which is the veiled Divine, is there to bring a Transition from the Matter in sleep to the Light of the Spirit. When Mind will then be liberated — it will then swim the vast ocean of The Spirit, the Divine Consciousness. Life will also be freed from all the torture it has been tolerating all along. And even Matter will illumine its darkness. “Even the body shall remember God.”

This is the message of Hope for Man.

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In interpreting the message “Truth or Abyss,” The Mother further said :.

The message is only for those who are still asleep and quite satisfied with their   sleep.

The majority of the mankind is still asleep, asleep in darkness and ignorance with satisfaction. Man is still imprisoned with the ignorant senses and the blind and limited thoughts and ideas, with no aspiration or hope, no light or vision, no seeking, satisfied with the animal  indulgences and the limited ego, with death and darkness and division.

We shall have to aspire and endeavor and prepare ourselves for the Ascent.We should no more remain satisfied with our present state of being immersed in gross indulgence and inner blindness and blocked consciousness, of being involved with hatred and jealousy and greed and violence, of being conquered by darkness and ignorance and death. This is the Truth for us.

Let us accept the Truth and thereby open the gates of great possibilities. The Mother says : This wonderful world of delight waiting at our gates for our call, to come down upon earth…  

We must accept this Truth. Or else, the Abyss is sure.  To stop remaining the gross animal man, immersed in darkness and falsehood and hatred and violence, this Truth is the desireable way. Our Aspiration should be for the Ascent. Let us remember The Mother and march towards the Goal : the Ascent, the Supramental Becoming.

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Sri Aurobindo has said of The Mother: 

The One whom we adore as the Mother is the divine Conscious Force that dominates all existence, one and yet many-sided that to follow her movement is impossible even for the quickest mind and for the freest and most vast intelligence. 

[The Mother : Sri Aurobindo] 

The Supreme Consciousness, Parama, and The Supreme Conscious Force, Parashakti, both came to this our Earth, as human beings, so that we, the human beings, can yearn and long and hope for becoming divine beings, the supramental beings, in due course of Time. 

Turagāngsu sahasrabhāsurasya

Pravibhāgam kurutām dvidheha koā

Avibhaktamapi sthitam dwirupam

Jagate tat paramam parah pareti. [Kapali Shastriar]  

[Here, who indeed can divide into two the One That is gloriously dazzling with His thousand steed of rays? That Supreme is indeed indivisible, but He has appeared in two forms for this Universe, as Para and Parā.]  

And They said that the Time has already come. They arrived at a juncture of the Evolutionary process on earth, at a time when Nature — the Supernature — felt the need of going beyond the human race.

Man, owing to his limitations, imperfections, failures and shortcomings, needs be surpassed. He has to surpass himself towards a higher and diviner becoming. Man has the seeking, the Aspiration, the Hope and the possibilities to become a higher and diviner being — though he has all the limits and imperfections in him. Ignorance and Darkness are there in him. Most often he acts for divisions and darkness and ignorant movements and forces! But still, he has the Hope, the possibilities.  

Sri Aurobindo has said that Man is a transitional being — he is a being who is a temporary and a transitional appearance on the Way of the coming Supramental Race — a race which will not be based on death, division, darkness and Ignorance like Man.

And the New Race will come through the human beings — through their transformation, of course, if they are ready.

 We shall have to follow and accept Truth, the truth of the Supramental becoming. And we shall have to transform ourselves towards the Supramental becoming. Or else, the Supernature will surpass us, by ignoring us!

Let us remember The Mother on Her birthday anniversary today.

As we know, the 21st day of February 2010 is the 132nd birthday anniversary of The Mother, Mira Alfassa, the spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo. 

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The Ultimate Reality is the Infinite and One Existence-Consciousness-Bliss. He is the Supreme Divine, the One, Indivisible, Infinite and Pure, who has three aspects, the Transcendental, the Universal and the Individual. In the Transcendental mode, He is the Source of — and also above — all manifestation, all the Universes, all the worlds. As the Supreme, He is the eternal consciousness, above all Time and Space. The Supreme Divine is the Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, as it is already told. He is. He is Existence, eternal existence, and can even become Non-Existence, beyond the apprehension of any manifested existence. In the Universal mode, he is one with the Universes, though He is above them and is their Creator.

As the Supreme, who is both Impersonal and Personal, He is the Source of all that is, of the this Universe, or rather the Universes. He has no form, no shape, and simultaneously, He is the Source and Creator of all forms and shapes. He has become all this Universe, or rather all these universes. He is the Manifestation and the One who manifests. It is His Will that manifests and is manifested. The entire Manifestation is He, and it is His Leela, Play. He is both beyond it, and within it, and in each atom, in each living being. And He is also the Individual, Personal God. All the Avatars are but His Individual Manifestations.  

The Supreme is with His Creative Force, the Mahashakti, whom we call the Divine Mother. They are One and Indivisible, and yet They are Two in Manifestation and even above Manifestation.

The Mother also has the three aspects, just as the Supreme: transcendental, universal and the individual.  

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Vasudhām yadi sā jadatvagarte

vinimagnām na vishankate sma gantum

nanu soūpah

svayamambāmanugachchhati svayambhūh.

[Kapali Shastriar]

 

[If She, The Mother, had no hesitation to go the Earth, plunged in the depth of  Inconscience, He too, the self-born Supreme himself certainly comes with The Mother.]  

Both of Them have come to save this Earth of ours that is plunged in Ignorance, Inconscience and darkness. Their aim is to heighten and transform the earthly existence towards Light and Joy and the Divine Life.  

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It is a matter of a great faith and understanding that The Mother even conquered Death and walked in to a New Supramental Body along with Her subtle body on the 17^th day of November 1973. She left Her physical body and walked and entered into the then newly formed Supramental Body. The World knew and told that She has passed away.

It is said that The Mother withdrew Herself on the 17^th day of November in 1973. However, we will see that in reality, in the highest meaning and sense of the term 'reality', The Mother continues eternally — in a new body.

The Mother revealed Her Agenda and Her Work before Satprem and Sujata, and they were told by Her of Her programme of creation and preparation of the New Body as a very important step in the Supramental Manifestation.

 

K D Sethna has said in this matter:

We are aware that the Supramental Body was already with Her, waiting to fuse with the human form She had worn for our sake. We are aware also that the lengthy struggle she recently went through was only the Yogic endeavour of the human form to open completely to the Supramental Body. Perhaps this form did enough and its exalted agony was needed no more to enable the Supramental Body to manifest. Perhaps that Body having assimilated the achievement of the other and thereby gained sufficient density for its subtle-physical substance, can now materialize itself on its own in a not too distant future.

 

What M P Pandit said is highly relevant :

A new body was under formation, the supramental body, in which She was to take Her embodiment as the end-result of the transformation of this body. The body was being prepared. She gave in "Notes on the Way" descriptions of this body, described how it looked. And about a year ago, She told someone, "I am trying to fuse this material body into that body but I have not been able to get the clue." She said, "Nobody on earth has tried this, the secret is not given to me. On that point, She said, there was no help from above. She was searching.

 

Thereafter ……… one day it flashed to me that as soon as that luminous body was ready, the Mother would just walk into it without dying, "without dying" means not necessarily keeping the body, but without the gap in consciousness; keeping up the continuity of the personality, She would just cross in to that luminous body. It just flashed, and the way it came I thought it was more than just an idea: I noted it down in my diary. I looked up it the other day, it was dated the 24^th of July 1973. I did not think it wise to speak of it to people except in my closest circle, which I did… …

 

Then on the morning of 17^th November at about nine o'clock, a particular friend of mine — he has a certain grounding in occult experience, occult knowledge, and normally when we meet we exchange notes — told me, "I have seen the Mother's body of light." I got interested. "The new body is full of light but it is not dense enough to function in earth conditions. It is there, and as I was looking at it I got the feeling that the Mother would enter this body the moment it became dense enough to stand and function in the earth atmosphere, seen or unseen. But there is no question of revival of the material body." And he added, "Those who are capable of seeing the Mother's halo, aura, they will be able to see that luminous body." It confirmed what I had perceived some four month's earlier; I told him as much.

 

That evening at 7-25 p.m., as you all know, the Mother withdrew from her body. They say the cause was heart failure, but let me tell you the heart failure was not the cause, the heart failure was the result of her withdrawal. She had decided, the moment things were ready she walked into that body.

 

She has not passed away, She has just changed her body. Not changed in the manner of the Gita — soul changing bodies — consciously ; keeping the full personality she has gone into that body. And, as it was revealed to me.…, she will function in that body, work through those instruments who are open to her, expedite the remaining work — the working out of the consequences — but her activity will not be confined to the Ashram or to Auroville; for her the whole world is her Ashram. As I was led to put it on radio the next day, "The sea of Love that is the Mother swells into an ocean": not a perception, not an idea, not an image, but an experience. [Underlines are mine.]

 

A divine possibility had to change its course due to the lack of preparation and consequent non-co-operation on the part of Man. The negative force and will prevailed for the time being and the Destiny of Mankind and the Evolution had to have a different Course. When the Old Form could not walk into the Supramental Body, a New Course was taken by the divine possibility — The Mother entered into the New Body.

 

The Mother, in Her subtle body, walked into the New Body. That was the triumph of which the mankind did not know. She is continuing Her work of the Supramental Manifestation and Transformation through those instruments who are open to Her, throughout the world and Her activity or Her Presence will not  be bound by any spatial limitation. Her work is now for the entire world and for the entire humanity and is to be carried out throughout the world.

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The Mother has shown us the Way, the most sublime Way of the Child in us, in all of us:

You have to aspire, you have to reject; but the best is if you can keep me in your heart, if you love me, then you will have to do nothing. I shall do all for you.  

That is the best Way.  

And let us remember always what She has told us to march ahead towards the Goal, towards The New World:

Let us advance always, without stopping, towards an always more complete manifestation, an always more complete and higher consciousness.  

Let us always remember Her ! 

Om namo namah Srimirāmbikayāi.

Barindranath Chaki

21-2-2014