Editor’s note: We present a few passages from the Mother where she speaks of Equality as the most essential condition for Supramental realisation on the earth. Her words on the significance of equality as a quality to be cultivated for living in Auroville are worth deep reflection.
Signs that one is in contact with the Supermind
There’s an American living in Madras, a rather important man, it seems, and an intimate friend of Kennedy, the new President. He has read and reread all of Sri Aurobindo’s books and is extremely interested. He wrote to Kennedy that he would like him to come here so he can bring him to the Ashram.
This man has posed a very interesting question, drawing an analogy…. Deep in a forest, a deer goes to quench its thirst; no one is aware of it, yet someone who has made a special study of deer hunting would know by the tracks that the deer had passed by—not only what particular type of deer, but its age, size, sex, etc. Similarly, there must be people with a spiritual knowledge analogous to that of hunters, who can detect, perceive, that a person is in touch with the Supermind, while ordinary people know nothing about it and wouldn’t notice.
So he asks, ‘I would like to know by what signs such a person can be recognized?’
It is a very intelligent question.
I replied very briefly in English. I haven’t brought my answer with me, but I can tell you right away that there are two signs—two certain, infallible signs. I know them through personal experience, for they are two things that can ONLY come with the supramental consciousness; without it, one cannot possess them—no yogic effort, no discipline, no tapasya can give them to you, while they come almost automatically with the supramental consciousness.
The first sign is perfect equality as Sri Aurobindo has described it (you must know it, there’s a whole chapter on equality, samatā, in The Synthesis of Yoga)—exactly as he described it with such wonderful precision!
But this equality (which is not ‘equanimity’) is a particular STATE where one relates to all things, outer and inner, and to each individual thing, in the same way. That is truly perfect equality: vibrations from things, from people, from contacts have no power to alter that state.
In my reply I mentioned this first, though I didn’t give him all these explanations. I put it in a few words as a kind of test of his intelligence, and in a somewhat cryptic form to see if he would understand.
The second sign is a sense of ABSOLUTENESS in knowledge.
As I have already told you, I had this with my experience of January 24. This state CANNOT be obtained through any region of the mind, even the most illumined and exalted. It’s … not a ‘certainty,’ it’s (Mother lowers both hands like an irresistible block descending), a kind of absoluteness, without even any possibility of hesitation (there’s no question of doubt), or anything like that. Without (how to say it ?)….
All mental knowledge, even the highest, is a ‘conclusive’ knowledge, as it were: it comes as a conclusion of something else—an intuition, for instance (an intuition gives you a particular knowledge, and this knowledge is like the conclusion of the intuition). Even revelations are conclusions. They’re all conclusions—the word ‘conclusion’ comes to me, but I don’t know how to express it.
This isn’t the case, however, with the supramental experience—a kind of absolute. The feeling it gives is altogether unique—far beyond certainty, it is … (Mother again makes the same irresistible gesture) it is a FACT, things are FACTS. It is very, very difficult to explain.
But with that … one naturally has a complete power—the two things always go together. (In my reply to this man I didn’t speak of ‘power’ because the power is almost a consequence and I didn’t want to speak of consequences.) But the fact remains: a kind of absoluteness in knowledge springing from identity—one is the thing one knows and experiences: one is it. One knows it because one is it.
When these two signs are present (both are necessary, one is incomplete without the other), when a person possesses both, then you can be sure he has been in contact with the Supermind.
So people who speak about receiving the Light… well, (laughing) it’s a lot of hot air! But when both signs are present, you can be sure of your perception.
(silence)
It is quite evident that with these two things, you truly… it’s what Sri Aurobindo says: you step into another world, you leave this entire hemisphere behind and enter another one. That’s the feeling.
The day it’s established, it will be good.
The Mother, Mother’s Agenda — 1961: February 25, 1961
Everything becomes the Supreme in a perfect equality
One could say that the constant state that is needed for the Supermind to be able to express itself through a terrestrial consciousness is the perfect equality that comes from spiritual identification with the Supreme. Everything becomes the Supreme in a perfect equality.
And it is automatic—not the equality achieved by the conscious will, by intellectual effort or an understanding prior to the state; it is not that. It must be spontaneous and automatic; one should no longer respond to everything that comes from outside as if one were responding to something coming from outside.
This kind of reflection and response should be replaced by a state of constant perception—which I cannot call identical because each thing necessarily calls for a special response—but free from any rebound, if one may say so. It is the difference that exists between something coming from outside, that strikes you and that you respond to, and something which is circulating and which quite naturally brings with it the vibrations needed for the general action.
I do not know whether I am making myself clearly understood…. It is the difference between a vibratory movement circulating in a unitary field of action and a movement coming from something outside, striking from outside and obtaining a response—that is the usual state of human consciousness.
On the other hand, when the consciousness is identified with the Supreme, the movements are internal, so to say, in the sense that nothing comes from outside; there are only things that circulate and naturally bring about certain vibrations in the course of their circulation, by similarity and necessity—or that change the vibrations in the medium of circulation.
It is something very familiar to me, because it is my constant state at present—I never have the impression of things coming from outside and striking, but of inner, multiple and sometimes contradictory movements, and of a constant circulation bringing about the inner changes needed for the movement.
That is the indispensable basis.
Auroville, Equality and Supramental Realisation
Auroville is meant to hasten the advent of the supramental Reality upon earth.
The help of all those who find the world is not as it ought to be is welcome.
Each one must know if he wants to associate with an old world ready for death, or to work for a new and better world preparing to be born.
~ Message for UNESCO, Feb 1, 1972, CWM, Vol. 13, p. 215
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Every good Aurovilian should strive to free himself from all desires, all preferences and all repulsions.
Equality in the face of all circumstances is the chief aim to be attained in order to live in Auroville.
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Quarrels are altogether contrary to the spirit of Auroville.
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Earth needs a place where men can live away from all national rivalries, social conventions, self-contradictory moralities and contending religions; a place where human beings, freed from all slavery to the past, can devote themselves wholly to the discovery and practice of the Divine Consciousness that is seeking to manifest.
Auroville wants to be this place and offers itself to all who aspire to live the Truth of tomorrow.
~ September 20, 1969, CWM, Vol. 13, p. 202
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Q: How can you believe that in Auroville there will be no more suffering so long as the people who come to live there are men from the same world, born with the same weaknesses and faults?
The Mother: I have never thought that there would no more be suffering in Auroville, because men, as they are, love suffering and call it to them even while they curse it.
But we shall try to teach them to truly love peace and to try to practise equality.
~ November 9, 1969, CWM, Vol. 13, p. 203
~ Design: Beloo Mehra
