Always there are revolts, insults, all those things. So the question is: Is there any place for “self-respect”, for amour-propre in the sadhana? The straight answer is: “No”. Yet, in the present state, there cannot be the effort without the ego-sense. Ego is the helper. However, things have to be understood; even the physical must understand them. It has to be a sort of offering of the being, which gives itself in order to learn. The Mother was speaking of the cells. She even said that it is very interesting, that it is the experience of the body. “It is very interesting, because the ego has become for me a kind of impersonal entity, while for everybody else it is the acute sense of his personality!” Impersonality of ego—how wonderful! What must happen is, one must learn how to be the perfect unity. And one must always laugh, always. “The Lord laughs, and He laughs, and His laugh is so nice, so nice, so full of love. It is a laugh that envelops you with an extraordinary sweetness.”  Indeed, it is the Anandamaya Purusha, the Being of Bliss who is radiating his rapturous sweetness everywhere—deep and calm in its power of creation-expression-manifestation.

11 January 1967

A question was put to me yesterday; I was asked if insult, the feeling of being insulted, and what is called in English “self-respect” (something corresponding a little to amour-propre in French) had any place in the sadhana. Of course, there is no place for it, it is well understood! But I have seen the movement, it was very clear, I have seen that without ego, when the ego is not there, there cannot be this sort of ruffle in the being. Because I went back far into the past to a time when I still used to feel it (many years ago), but now, it is no longer something foreign even, it is something impossible. The whole being, and even (it is strange), even the physical constitution does not understand what that means. It is the same thing when there is materially a shock; it is no longer felt as one feels an injury, it is no longer felt like that. Most often there is nothing at all, it passes absolutely unperceived in the whole; but when something is felt, it is only the impression—a very, very gentle, very intimate impression of a help seeking to make itself felt, a lesson that is to be learnt. But not as one does in the mental way in which there is always a stiffening; it is not that, it is immediately a sort of offering of the being, which gives itself in order to learn. I am speaking of the cells. It is very interesting. Evidently if you mentalise, you must say that it is the feeling or consciousness of the divine Presence in all things and that the mode—the mode of contact—derives from the state in which you are.

Yes, that is the experience of the body.

And in individuals, when there is any knock or shock, always the only perception is a clear vision of the ego—the ego manifesting itself. They say, “It is the other.” I would not say, “Oh! That one was angry” or “Oh! This one...”, no, it is his ego; not even his ego: the ego, the ego principle—the ego principle which still intervenes. It is very interesting, because the ego has become for me a kind of impersonal entity, while for everybody else it is the acute sense of his personality! Instead of that, it is a kind of way of being, which is in greater or lesser quantity here or there or there, giving each one the illusion of personality. It is very interesting. ...

I have noticed that if I resist, it becomes bad. If I have the feeling of fluidity, there are no more knocks. ... If you stiffen and things resist, you get a knock. It is like men who know how to fall: they fall, they break nothing; whereas men who do not know how to fall, just a little fall and they break something. It is the same thing. One must learn how to be... the perfect unity. To correct, to straighten, is still resistance. ...

One must always laugh, always. The Lord laughs, and He laughs, and His laugh is so nice, so nice, so full of love. It is a laugh that envelops you with an extraordinary sweetness. This too men have deformed—they have deformed everything (Mother laughs).