Ans. The Mother says: “The purpose of earthly life is progress. If you stop progressing you will die. Every moment that you spend without progressing is one step closer to your grave.”

Human beings are intermediary stage between Animal and Superman. We are still having all the animal qualities within us, and fraction of divine qualities within us. Our aim should be to transform ourselves from man to Divine through the intermediary stage of Supermind. We are all potentially Divine. The Mother also says

Here, each one represents an impossibility to be solved; but as for Thy divine Grace all is possible, will not Thy Work be, in the detail as in the whole, the accomplishment of all these impossibilities transformed into divine Realisations.

We are all growing souls, having timeless journey of our creation, having got a chance to perfect ourselves and work for the Divine Mission on Earth. All our progress has to be measured not by our outer achievements, outer success, or outer recognitions and awards, but by our inward progress, inward journey towards Eternal, and inward closeness and bonding with the Sweet Mother. The only reward or compensation for our spiritual progress is the Joy of the Divine Mother. Human beings may justify smaller achievements even in spiritual field as some kind of progress, but we need to ask by our work or action, if The Mother will be happy or joyful for all our action. She knows in and out of all centres of our being. We must ask ourselves if our relationship with the Mother is a transactional or experiential. Is it cost-benefit relationship or an unconditional relationship?

Progress will be real when we have not forgot even for a moment, that sweet Smile of the Mother, in all our actions. We might grow old with each passing year, but The Mother says our real age is the number of moments we are connected to the Divine or we are aware of the Divine within.

The Mother: It is not the number of years you have lived that makes you old. You become old when you stop progressing.

Never forget the goal. Never stop aspiring. Never halt in your progress, and you are sure to succeed.

A year spent uselessly is a year during which no progress has been accomplished, no growth in consciousness has been achieved, no further step has been taken towards perfection.

The following list shows the difference between our real progress and unreal progress:

Questions to be asked to oneself to know if we make or have made any real progress in life in our long associations with the Divine Mother for many births?

1. Am I becoming more conscious every moment of my life, in this timeless journey of my soul?

2. Am I growing inwardly in my relationship with the Mother?

3. Am I able to control our desires which are unending and infinite?

4. Am I able to control/reject at least one defects such as my anger, arrogance, hatred, jealousy etc.?

5. Am I able to transform my hatred towards love, my jealousy towards acceptance, my anger towards Samata and all undivine qualities towards Divine?

6. Am I still completely driven and building my empire by my little self, the little ego?

7. Am I able to harmonise my different parts around the Divine Centre?

8. Am I reacting and responding to any situation or person from the deepest point of Psychic?

9. Am I still trying to correct others, lecture others, change others, transform others, without changing iota of myself? Am I still seeking perfection in others and waiting for others to change first instead of perfecting myself and changing myself?

10. Am I still trying to look at the defects of others, sin of others and becoming delighted? Or started trying to reject my own list of defects and treating others as my own mirrors?

11. Am I constantly aware of my source, my origin, my psychic presence, the descent of the Supramental Force, and Peace?

12. Am I keeping myself aware that I am nothing, no big shot, but a dust in the Divine creation?

13. Am I keeping myself aware that I am still alive because of Divine Grace only?

14. Am I having any sense of gratitude to the Creator, for sending me to the Earth?

15. Is my surface nature still captured by my ego and desire, forgetting the sight of Eternal Will?

16. Is my inner being getting awakened with the Divine Light, Divine Force, Divine Peace, Divine Knowledge?

17. Am I still pulled from all directions forgetting my evolutionary goal of Supermind?

18. Am I giving more attention to the rewards, recognitions, prestige, acknowledgements from human beings rather than Divine Mother?

19. Am I courageous enough to handle any situation, to work for the Divine Mother?

20. Is my surface nature just clinged to this Yoga because of some fear or getting some benefit?

21. Is Divine Mother concretely established in all parts of my being?

22. Can I call myself an Ideal Child, Ideal Instrument before the Divine Mother?

23. Am I becoming conscious dynamically at every moment, at every situation, with every people and things?

24. Am I still considering each situation as some accident or a part of Great Divine Plan and great Play of Chance?

25. Have I started leading a life and sense of expansion, wideness, vastness, of consciousness in place of narrowness or prejudiced thoughts?

26. Am I leading a life of complete surrender to the Divine Mother?

27. Am I able to clearly demarcate the movement of ego and desire within from a psychic poise?

28. Have I been able to accept every path, every person, and every being as the Divine’s creation for a specific purpose?

29. Am I ready to accept my mistakes, my sins, before the Divine Mother instead of shifting the blame to others, blaming others for my faults?

30. Am I keeping/allowing anything else, or anyone else in between in my relationship with the Divine?

31. Have I succeeded in mastering and leading all my parts through the power of Psychic Being?

32. Am I able to lead a life of Delight of the Supreme every moment, by keeping my aspiration intact?

33. Am I able to purify my thoughts, my speech, my emotions, my actions, and think, speak and act from the point of psychic always?

34. Am I becoming aware of the great Divine Work that Mother expects from me at this hour of God? Am I at least leading a life according to one Single word, one Single Quote, of the Mother?

35. Am I still wasting my precious time by gossiping about others precarious situations, or falls or bad situations, instead of living in a state of universal love and peace and harmony?

36. Am I able to discover/segregate/differentiate all my elements of inner life and outer life expressions clearly or am I still having some doubts or am I still confused?

37. Am I living with a sense of love and oneness with the entire universe unconditionally, without any baggage or prejudice or preconceived notions?

38. Am I able to clearly define my boundaries where I can work consciously for the Divine Mission?

39. Am I still hating others, blaming others, keeping my lower vital engaged in undivine works?

40. Am I be able to practise stillness, calm, peace, silence, within in front of an extremely negative people or situation?

41. Am I leading a life where I can improve myself every moment, constantly acting from the Psychic Centre, not from the Egoistic and Desireful Surface Centres?

42. Am I leading a life of sincerity and patience, where I will not be in a hurry to see the results of my transformation as well as not to get idle or lethargic or inert doing nothing, thinking that this work is of many births?

43. Am I be able to align with the universe which is an endless masquerade and becoming conscious of Her Mighty plan and play of forces?

44. Am I able to nurse my psychic in the power of the Infinite Divine Silence?

45. Am I still playing hide and seek with the Divine through my ego and desire and keeping myself open in front of the Mother with my psychic?

46. Am I able to retain the Divine Light, Divine Force, Divine Knowledge, Divine Grace for a longer period of time instead of falling back into the vicious circle of ego and desires?

47. Am I becoming aware of each Eternal instant as the cause of great Divine Plan?

48. Am I becoming aware of the forces of ignorance, inconscient, sub-conscient, death, suffering and falsehood which are blockers in my Sadhana?

49. Am I becoming conscious of my each fall as part of evolutionary journey from animal level to human level and not living in a guilty consciousness?

50. Am I showing my infinite gratitude to each and all and the Divine who helped overcome my one defect or limitation or deformation?

51. Am I clear now that if I keep the Divine in my heart I will be safest in Her lap? Am I faithful to the Divine Grace at every moment and at every situation?

The Mother on Progress:

Progress is the sign of the divine influence in creation.

From the moment you are satisfied and aspire no longer, you begin to die. Life is movement, life is effort; it is marching forward, climbing towards future revelations and realisations. Nothing is more dangerous than wanting to rest.

One has always something to learn and a progress to make, and in each circumstance, we can find the occasion of learning the lesson and making the progress.

Progress: to be ready, at every minute, to give up all one is and all one has in order to advance on the way.

Do not think of what you have been, think only of what you want to be and you are sure to progress.

Do not look behind, look always in front, at what you want to do — and you are sure of progressing.

Let us keep flaming in our heart the fire of progress.

What cannot be done today will surely be done later on. No effort for progress has ever been made in vain.

Stagnation means decomposition.

No enterprise can flourish unless it is progressive.

Go always forward towards a growing perfection.

No institution can live unless it is progressive.

Whatever is new will always meet an opposition from conservative people. If we yield to this opposition, the world will never advance one step.

The world progresses so rapidly that we must be ready at any moment to overpass what we know in order to know better.

In the constant march forward of the universe, whatever has been accomplished is nothing but the first step towards a greater realisation.

Each year that passes should be — and is necessarily — a new conquest.

Everybody and everything can always progress and I am always working in view of a possible improvement, knowing that the greatest difficulty brings always the greatest victory and I trust that you are with me for that.

2. Ways of Making Integral Progress in Sadhana

2. How can we work towards making integral progress in our Sadhana? What should we do make our progress?

1. Progress only through Individual Self-Perfection

The Mother: True progressive evolution, an evolution which can lead man to his rightful happiness, does not lie in any external means, material improvement or social change. Only a deep and inner process of individual self-perfection can make for real progress and completely transform the present state of things, and change suffering and misery into a serene and lasting contentment.

Consequently, the best example is one that shows the first stage of individual self-perfection which makes possible all the rest, the first victory to be won over the egoistic personality: disinterestedness.

At a time when all rush upon money as the means to satisfy their innumerable cravings, one who remains indifferent to wealth and acts, not for the sake of gain, but solely to follow a disinterested ideal, is probably setting the example which is most useful at present.

The Mother: Let us progress ourselves, it is the best way of making others progress.

2. By Making each part of our being more and more conscious

Q. O Mother, I feel too far away from You. I appeal to You: give me the strength to overcome the adverse powers and to conquer my lower nature and all that is tormenting me.

The Mother: I don’t think there is anything for you to worry about. You are no further from me than you were before. It is still the same parts of your being that refuse to participate in the divine life; previously you were not aware of them, but now, on the contrary, you are becoming more and more conscious of them, and consciousness is a real progress — it is the way towards mastery.

3. By Practising Inner Silence Every Moment

Less Exchange of Words, More Practice of Silence

The Mother: Silence: the ideal condition for progress.

The Mother: It is only in silence that a true progress can be made; it is only in silence that one can rectify a wrong movement; it is only in silence that one can be of help to somebody else.

If you have found out a truth, or rectified a mistake in yourself, or made a progress, to speak or to write about it to anybody else than the Guru is to lose at once the truth or the progress.

In the perfect silence of the contemplation all widens to infinity, and in the perfect peace of that silence the Divine appears in the resplendent glory of His light.

4. By Not Allowing Anyone Between Ourselves and the Divine’s Force

Q. Let nothing and nobody come between you and the Mother’s force…” Who is this person?

The Mother: This person? Anybody at all. Anybody at all who… There are all kinds of ways of letting someone come between you and the divine force. First of all it is to attach a very great importance to your relation with someone. It is to listen to the advice given to you by someone who is not qualified. It is to want to please anybody at all, for any reason whatever. People do that constantly, don’t they?

Probably what is written here was to someone who had heard certain things and was attaching much importance to these things — advices or remarks or opinions — who was attaching importance to these things. So Sri Aurobindo told him: Let nobody come between you and the Divine.

Whoever it might be, parents, friends, no matter who, it is not any special person… It may even be for each one a special person…

6. By Keeping a Will and Thirst for Progress

The Mother: It is especially the will for progress and self-purification that lights the fire. The will for progress. When those who have a strong will turn it towards spiritual progress and purification, they automatically light the fire within themselves.

The thirst for progress, the thirst to know, the thirst to transform yourself, and above all the thirst for Love and Truth — if you keep that, you go faster. Truly a thirst, a need, you know, a need. All the rest has no importance, what you need is that.

No more bonds — free, free, free, free! Always ready to change every- thing, except one thing: to aspire. That thirst. The “Something” we need, the Perfection we need, the Light we need, the Love we need, the Truth we need, the supreme Perfection we need — and that’s all. The formulas — the fewer the formulas, the better. A need, a need, a need . . . which only the Thing can satisfy, nothing else, no half measure. Only That. And then, move on, move on! Your path will be your path, it doesn’t matter; any path, any path whatever.

Tiredness shows lack of will for progress. When you feel tired or fatigued that is lack of will for progress. Fire is always burning in you.

7. By Coming Closer to the Divine Inwardly

The Mother: No institution can live unless it is progressive.

The true progress is to come always closer to the Divine.

What is created by spiritual progress is an inner closeness and intimacy in the inner being, the sense of the Mother’s love and presence etc

8. By Effectively Using Each Moment for the Divine

The Mother: This time it is a year of true progress which has brought you nearer to the goal and much closer to me. With my love and blessings.

Each year that passes must be marked by a new progress towards perfection.

9. By Progressing at all levels including at the Subconscient level

The Mother: Mon cher enfant, This is a very good sign that you are beginning to feel the effect of the Force in the subconscient; it indicates a true progress. My love and my blessings are watching over you.

10. By Becoming Constantly Vigilant

The Mother: Vigilance: indispensable for all true progress.
In each human being there is a beast crouching ready to manifest at the slightest unwatchfulness.

Each time that we have made a decisive step in our spiritual progress, the invisible enemies of the Divine always try to have their revenge and when they cannot injure the soul they strike the body, but all their efforts are in vain and will finally be defeated, for the Divine Grace is with us.

11. By Making All Progress by Sadhana in This Body

Q. Sweet Mother, I did not understand “Sadhana has to be done in the body.”

The Mother: The body? This is the continuation of something. It is said that some people are disgusted with life and want to leave it in the hope that another time it will be better. So it is said: It is useless to run away from your body, it won’t be easier without the body. On the contrary it will be much more difficult. And the body is made for doing yoga. We are upon earth; the period one passes on earth is that in which one can make progress. One does not progress outside terrestrial life. The earthly, material life is essentially the life of progress, it is here that one makes progress. Outside the earthly life one takes rest or is unconscious or one may have periods of assimilation, periods of rest, periods of unconsciousness. But as for the periods of progress, they are on the earth and in the body. So, when you take a body it is to make progress, and when you leave it the period of progress is over.

And true progress is sadhana; that is, it is the most conscious and swiftest progress. Otherwise one makes progress with the rhythm of Nature, which means that it can take centuries and centuries and centuries and millenniums to make the slightest bit of progress. But true progress is that made by sadhana. In yoga one can do in a very short time what takes otherwise an interminable time. But it is always in the body and always upon earth that it is done, not elsewhere. That is why when one is in a body one must take advantage of it and not waste one’s time, not say, “A little later, a little later.” It is much better to do it immediately. All the years you pass without making any progress are wasted years which you are sure to regret afterwards.

12. By Not Trying to Perfecting Others, but Perfecting Oneself

The Mother: Surely a big stride will have been taken when man will naturally turn to perfect himself instead of waiting to find perfection in others…. This reversal is the very basis of all true progress. The first human instinct: “It is the fault of circumstances, the fault of people, the fault… this one is like this, that one is like that, the other one…” And this goes on indefinitely. The first step, the very first step is to say: “If I were as I ought to be or if this body were as it ought to be, all would be perfectly all right for it.” If in order to progress, you were to wait for others to progress, you would have to wait indefinitely. That is the very first thing that is to be circulated everywhere. Never put the blame on others or on circumstances, because whatever the circumstances, even those that appear the worst, if you keep the true attitude and have the true consciousness, they will have no importance at all for your inner progress, no importance — I say this and I include even death.

Indeed, that seems to be the first lesson to learn.

Sri Aurobindo had written (I translate freely) that the notion of sin has been introduced to hasten progress, and immediately (Mother laughs) man saw sin in all others — he never saw it in himself! Sri Aurobindo’s sentence is charming, but I do not remember it.

The Mother: All service done sincerely to the Divine is sadhana. To become aware of one’s deficiencies is a sign of great progress and the door open on the road to success in sadhana. So rejoice and keep confident- all is well.

13. By Working in a Right Attitude

The Mother: Progress is going on at a giant’s pace — that shakes the house a little, but it goes on at a giant’s pace. And for some, like X for example, it is very conscious. She had an accident in the knee long ago and this leg is a little weaker than the other one — there was a possibility of an upsetting. She noticed that so long as she had the correct attitude she felt nothing, there was nothing, it seemed to have gone altogether. As soon as she fell back into the ordinary consciousness, the illness returned…. And she has had innumerable experiences. I found it very interesting. Others also.

And it is truly interesting. It is truly interesting because it has a clarity altogether limpid and obvious, because it is solely a state of consciousness. When one has the consciousness (that is to say, as the consciousness grows more and more true — not something that is arrested, but a consciousness that is ascending), when you are within that, everything is all right; as soon as you fall back into the old consciousness, either unprogressive or progressing slowly and imperceptibly, then the disorder returns. And that is as though a lesson given in an altogether clear and obvious way.

It is truly interesting. And the body goes on learning. It learns very quickly.

14. By Giving up All Personal Seeking and Demands

The Mother: Give up all personal seeking for comfort, satisfaction, enjoyment or happiness. Be only a burning fire for progress, take whatever comes to you as an aid to your progress and immediately make whatever progress is required.

15. By Surrendering to the Mother Unconditionally

The Mother: Plenty of people progress rapidly without understanding what the Force is doing — they simply observe and describe and say “I leave all to the Mother.” Eventually the knowledge and understanding come.

The Mother: Let us offer our work to the Divine; this is the sure means of progressing.

16. By Becoming Aware of Our Wrong Movement

The Mother: The first condition of inner progress is to recognise that whatever is or has been a wrong movement in any part of the nature, wrong idea, wrong feeling, wrong speech, wrong action, — -and by wrong is meant what departs from the truth, from the higher consciousness and higher self, from the way of the Divine. Once recognised, it is admitted, or glossed over or defended, — -and it is offered to the Divine for the Light and Grace to descend and substitute for it the right movement of the true Consciousness.

17. By Staying Away from Calculating Through Mind your Progress

The Mother: From the spiritual point of view it is not good always to be wanting to know whether what one is doing is good, whether one has made any progress, what point one has reached, etc., etc. It is yet another opportunity to satisfy one’s “ego” by drawing attention to it.

Sri Aurobindo: Your Only reward: A constant progression in Divine consciousness, calm, and strength and bliss.

The Mother: How can you hope to make any spiritual progress so long as you remain shut up in such a bargaining and calculating spirit?

18. By Breaking All Mental Forms

The Mother: If you want to progress mentally, you must break all your mental forms, all your mental constructions to be able to make new ones.

19. By Treating Everyone and Each Circumstance As Your Mirror

The Mother: All those around me, all the circumstances of my life, all the people near me, are a mirror held up to me by the Divine Consciousness to show me the progress I must make. Everything that shocks me in others means a work I have to do in myself.

20. By Becoming Aware of Our Mistakes

The Mother: If the central will is sincere, each recognition of a mistake can become a stepping-stone to a truer movement and a higher progress.

21. By Removing Pride from our Work and Mind

The Mother: A great obstacle to progress.

22. By Merging into the Divine Gaze

The Mother: Do not worry. Do not be concerned about your own self, your progress and realisation, nor about others. I am here, look at me, gaze into me, enter into me wholly, merge into my being, lose yourself into my love, with your love. You will see all problems solved, everything done. Forget everything, forget the world. Remember me alone, be one with me, with my love.

22. By Realising Two Movements of Progress

The Mother: It is the necessity of a certain perfection in the environment that compels human beings to progress; it is the inadequacy of this progress, whatever it may be, that drives the divine being to intensify his endeavour for progress in his body. Thus the two movements of progress are simultaneous and complete each other.

23. By Having Minimum of Rules and Maximum of Freedom

The Mother:

A minimum of rules.

A maximum of freedom.

All possibilities must have equal scope for manifestation, then humanity will progress more rapidly.

24. By Using the Day and Nights Consciously

The Mother: It is another school for another purpose, but it is a school. If one wants to make the maximum progress possible, one must know how to use one’s nights as one uses one’s days; only, usually, people don’t at all know what to do, and they try to remain awake and all that they create is a physical and vital imbalance — and sometimes a mental one also — as a result.

25. Have Right Associations which Elevates Your Consciousness

The Mother: Here is on of Ramakrishna’s sayings:

“The company of saints and sages is one of the chief agents of spiritual progress.”

26. By Steady and Cheerful Equanimity

The Mother: Do not cherish suffering and suffering will leave you altogether. Suffering is far from being indispensable to progress. The greatest progress is made through a steady and cheerful equanimity.

27. By Passing through various Tests

The Mother: Each time a progress is to be made, there is a test to pass.

The integral yoga is made up of an uninterrupted series of tests that you must pass through without any advance notice, thereby forcing you to be always vigilant and attentive.

These three categories of tests faced by Integral Yoga Sadhaks:

1. those conducted by the forces of Nature,

2. those conducted by the spiritual and divine forces, and

3. those conducted by the hostile forces. (Most deceptive)

The qualities more particularly required to pass these tests:

ü for the Tests of physical Nature are: Endurance and Plasticity, Cheerfulness and Fearlessness.

ü For the spiritual tests: Aspiration, Confidence, Idealism, Enthusiasm and Generosity in Self-giving.

ü For the tests stemming from the hostile forces: Vigilance, Sincerity and Humility.

28. By Complete Realisation

The Mother: I use transformation in a special sense, a change of consciousness radical and complete and of a certain specific kind which is so conceived as to bring about a strong and assured step forward in the spiritual evolution of the being of a greater and higher kind and of a larger sweep and completeness than what took place when a mentalised being first appeared in a vital and material animal world.

If anything short of that takes place or at least if a real beginning is not made on that basis, a fundamental progress towards this fulfillment, then my object is not accomplished. A partial realisation, something mixed and inconclusive, does not meet the demand I make on life and yoga.

29. By Writing To The Mother About Your Inner Aspiration

You should write daily a prayer, expressing your aspiration, or your gratitude, or your adoration, the progress you want to make. It does not need to be long, only a few lines; and it will help you to understand yourself. You will write as if you were speaking to him and to me directly and thus you will create an intimacy with him and myself…It would be good if daily you could devote some time to prayer, worship and meditation in whatever place you find it easier.

Progress

1. What is the Kind of Progress we should make?