Page 14 - All India Magazine Feb-2025

Growth of the Flame

Living divinely
That's another thing I have noticed: even in my childhood I
was already conscious of what Sri Aurobindo calls "living divinely,"
that is, outside the sense of Good and Evil.
This was counterbalanced by a terrible censor which never left
me. It took Sri Aurobindo to clear it from my path. But I didn't have
the sense of sin, of Good and Evil, sin and virtue — definitely not!
My consciousness was centered around right action and wrong ac-
tion —"this should have been done, that shouldn't have"— with no
question of Good or Evil, from the standpoint of work, of action
alone. My consciousness has always been centered on action. It
was a vision, a perception of the line to be followed — or the many
lines to be followed — for the action to be accomplished. And any
deviation from what to me was the luminous line, the straight line
(not geometrically straight: the luminous line, the line expressing
the divine Will), the slightest deviation from that, and... oh, it was
the only thing that tormented me.
And the torment didn't come from me, it came from that
character hooked on to my consciousness and constantly whip-
ping me, hounding me, ill-treating me — what people call their
"conscience," which has nothing whatsoever to do with con-
sciousness! It's an adverse being, and whatever it can change, it
changes for the worse; whatever is susceptible to being changed
into something anti divine, it changes. And it is constantly repeat-
ing the same thing: "This is wrong, that is wrong, this is wrong...."
But this was the only thing; there was never, never the idea
of being either virtuous or sinful — never. It was a matter of doing
the right thing or not doing the right thing. That's all. No sense of
being virtuous or sinful, none at all! I never, ever had that sense.
The Mother: Conversation with a Disciple, January 9, 1962

14 All India Magazine, February 2025