"On Prayer"
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Q: About collective prayers and bhajan, especially in the center:
A: Mother generally discouraged collective bhajan. For the simple reason that it tends to bring forward the vital excitement and devotionalism much more than the psychic consciousness. So, while she discouraged it, she gave this reason and she preferred that, generally, people concentrate together collectively quietly, rather than with collective chanting. But a collective dimension is important. It is just [that] a form has to be such that it allows the psychic vibration to come forward and doesn't allow to be clouded by the vital energy.
Regarding the second question on mantras and the choice of mantras:
As a rule in this yoga, Sri Aurobindo says, the mantra is a name of Sri Aurobindo or the Mother. But if a mantra arises spontaneously from our heart, or if we feel spontaneous affinity with a specific traditional mantra, we may use it as needed to the extent we feel it helps. At the end of the day, it is not the mantra we use but the benefit you get from it. Sometimes in life a mantra comes for duration, and then, we seem to feel its benefit and [the] mantra then can be discarded also, even Sri Aurobindo or the Mother. But whether they [the mantras] come there with an intention, with an aspiration, or with an intention to connect to the Divine Presence. Even if they come with that, without a specific link with the Mother or Sri Aurobindo, the benefit will be felt. That's why, what I said right at the beginning, it is not the form, but the relationship with the Presence which is more important. And, if they come in [with] that intention it is fine.
Q: . . .
A: Mother blesses when two people, in conflict or in conflict of interest, pray to the Mother. Mother gave one interesting comment about going to court. If people go to court, she says: "Be very careful, because if you pray for help then the Divine Grace will help the part, [the side], which represents the truth most. This is the big problem, because each side feels its own side of the truth. But there is a complexity in life which goes beyond what we can individually see. And the Grace sees that larger picture. In addition, the Grace is not always going to sit in judgment – 'he is more right, he is more wrong'. Otherwise, it wouldn't be Grace. As Sri Aurobindo says; "It is not a machinery." Machinery will function based on a set of rules. A grace bypasses all rules. And it may descend on a criminal for no other reason than that fact is Grace. A mother's love is not bound by which child is more worthy or less worthy. It flows with its own inner logic. Someone complained to Mother once about some functioning in Ashram and said: "But this is not justice." Mother said: "If it was justice that was operating here, none of you would deserve to be here. It is because Grace operates here that you are all being given a chance." So, in such matters, we cannot apply the human standards or the human logic. The Grace may favour the criminal once, may favour the police once, and it will have its own inexorable divine logic.
Someone had a question? Have the question then….
A: When the Mother links us to herself and becomes the bridge to the Supreme for us, she is the point which is closest to our consciousness. And therefore the Darshan becomes an occasion by which we can most easily connect to the Highest and the transcendent power of the Divine. The preparation for that is to link ourselves most completely and most intensely to the Mother herself. As she observes, prayer can be in different parts of our being. More often than not it is one part, generally the emotion, which we open to her most completely and the rest stays subdued and quiet; while that is the good state, it is not the best state. The best is when we can open each one of our parts – the mind, the emotion, even the body, to her Presence. How does one do that? The special gift that the human consciousness has is this power of self- awareness. When you become aware of something within yourself, the awareness itself allows you a grip on that part. And allows you by willing to change it, or turn or modify it. So, first become aware of yourself in all the parts. Become aware of your own mind and its processes, of your heart and its emotions, of your body itself and its nerves and its impulses. And with that awareness identified, open that part by a movement of will to the Mother's Presence. So, opening the mind gradually to her, opening the emotions to her, opening the body and its sensations to her and infuse in all these parts, in this receptive stage, something of the psychic aspiration to whatever extent one can feel it. Fortunately for us, as the pressure of the Darshan Presence builds up, in the days before the Darshan while circumstances around may become more difficult on one level within us, also it becomes easier to open and to aspire. So, whatever glow of the psychic aspiration you feel within, bring that forward, intensify it, remain in a gathered condition, avoid dispersal of energy either through the mind or emotion or physical activities. Spend some fixed time during the day in which you are in direct communion with the Mother, either through reading or by sitting near [the] Samadhi or the Meditation Hall. Intensify that communion, as if nothing else matters in life. All other things have to be discarded in that moment, nothing matters. The world itself may go to blazes it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is this identification with the Mother's consciousness. With that kind of exclusive intensity, one turns and opens to her. And then the rest she leads us thereafter. We can end with a brief concentration and in a collective aspiration, a collective prayer.
The end
