The Mother’s Force Is the Primary Aid in Overcoming the Force of Desire

There is a dual significance to the term ‘the Mother’s Force’. First, this is the Divine Shakti, which manifests the universal creation, and which acts to bring forth the sequential expression of the consciousness involved in Matter. At the same time, there is the specific reference to the Mother of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, who so embodied and focused this divine Force that those who came into her presence or aura of influence were profoundly impacted by that Force.

In his book, The Mother, Sri Aurobindo states: “The supramental change is a thing decreed and inevitable in the evolution of the earth-consciousness; for its upward ascent is not ended and mind is not its last summit. But that the change may arrive, take form and endure, there is needed the call from below with a will to recognise and not deny the Light when it comes, and there is needed the sanction of the Supreme from above. The power that mediates between the sanction and the call is the presence and power of the Divine Mother. The Mother’s power and not any human endeavour and tapasya can alone rend the lid and tear the covering and shape the vessel and bring down into this world of obscurity and falsehood and death and suffering Truth and Light and Life divine and the immortal’s Ananda.”

As the seeker learns to tune his attention and open up his receptivity to the higher forces, he gains direct contact with, and benefit from, those forces operative there. This attention may be based on coming into contact inwardly with the psychic being, or through concentration that opens the higher chakras to direct influence of the spiritual energy; or, through a receptive contact with the Guru, or some individual who embodies that force to such a degree that a link is created and an opening established.

Large numbers of devotees around the world have had the experience, and reported it, that focusing on a photograph of the Mother could put them into a state of deep meditation. Receiving the Mother’s blessings could induce a state of distance from the awareness of the physical body and the demands of the vital being.

If one is struggling with the force of desire, and relying on one’s own ability to overcome that force through will-power, discipline or some form of control, there is a constant battle and an oscillation between the desire and the overcoming of that desire. Many have found, however, that putting oneself into direct and receptive contact with the Mother’s Force took one totally outside the vital desire and its influence, making this a direct and powerful method of educating the vital nature and moving beyond the promptings of the universal vital force that provokes the desire within the being.

Sri Aurobindo writes: “Desire takes a long time to get rid of entirely. But, if you can once get it out of the nature and realise it as a force coming from outside and putting its claws into the vital and physical, it will be easier to get rid of the invader. You are too accustomed to feel it as part of yourself or planted in you — that makes it more difficult for you to deal with its movements and dismiss its ancient control over you.”

“You should not rely on anything else alone, however helpful it may seem, but chiefly, primarily, fundamentally on the Mother’s Force. The Sun and the Light may be a help, and will be if it is the true Light and the true Sun, but cannot take the place of the Mother’s Force.”

Sri Aurobindo, Bases of Yoga, Chapter 4, Desire — Food — Sex, pp. 63-64