WRITINGS BY THE MOTHER
© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

Material consciousness

7 October 1964

... The big difficulty in Matter is that the material consciousness (that is to say, the mind in Matter) has been formed under the pressure of difficulties--difficulties, obstacles, sufferings, struggles. It has been, so to say, "worked out" by these things and that has left upon it a stamp, almost of pessimism, defeatism, which is certainly the greatest obstacle.

It is of this that I am conscious in my own work. The most material consciousness, the most material mind is accustomed to act, to make an effort, to advance through whippings; otherwise, it is tamas. And then, so far as it imagines, it imagines always difficulty, always the obstacle or always the opposition, and that slows down the movement terribly. Very concrete, very tangible and often repeated experiences are needed to convince it that behind all its difficulties there is a Grace, behind all its failures there is the Victory, behind all its pains, its sufferings, its contradictions, there is Ananda. Of all efforts it is this one which has to be repeated most often; all the while you are obliged to stop or to remove, to convert a pessimism, a doubt or an imagination altogether defeatist.

I am speaking exclusively of the material consciousness.

Naturally, when something comes down from above, that makes, well... a crash, like that (Mother makes a gesture of flattening), then all is silent, all stops and waits. But... I understand well why the Truth, the Truth-Consciousness does not express itself more constantly, because the difference between its Power and the power of Matter is so great that the power of Matter is, as it were, annulled--but then that does not mean transformation, that means crushing. That is what they used to do in ancient times--they crushed all this material consciousness under the weight of a Power against which nothing can struggle, which nothing can oppose. And then one had the impression: "There you are! It has been done." But it has not been done, not at all!---for the rest, down below, remained as before, without changing.

Now it is being given the full possibility to change; well, for that you must allow it full play and not interpose a Power that crushes it--this I understand very well. But this consciousness has the obstinacy of the imbecile. How many times during a suffering, for example, when a suffering is there, acute, and one has the impression that it is going to become unbearable, there is the little inner movement (within the cells) of Call--the cells send their S.O.S.--everything stops, the suffering disappears, and often (now more and more) it is replaced by a feeling of blissful well-being; but the very first reaction of this imbecile material consciousness is: "Ah! We shall see how long that is going to last", and naturally, by this movement it demolishes everything--one must begin all over again.

I believe that for the effect to be lasting--not a miraculous effect that comes, dazzles and goes away--it must really be the effect of a transformation. One must be very, very patient--we have to deal with a consciousness very slow, very heavy, very obstinate, which is not able to advance rapidly, which clings to what it has, to what has appeared to it as truth; even if it is quite a tiny truth, it clings to that and does not want to move. Then to cure that, one must have very much patience--much patience.

The whole thing is to hold on, to endure, to endure.

Sri Aurobindo has said this many times in many forms: Endure and you'll conquer... bear--bear and you'll vanquish.

Triumph comes to the most enduring.

Collected Works of The Mother, First Edition, Volume 11, pp. 2-3