The Mother
French-born spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo, co-founder of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, founder (in 1968) of Auroville — the international experimental township in Tamil Nadu intended as a living laboratory for human unity — and the woman known throughout the Aurobindo lineage simply as The Mother. Born Mirra Alfassa in 1878 in Paris to Sephardic Jewish parents from Egypt and Turkey, she pursued painting, music, and esoteric studies (including a deep relationship with the Theonic and Cosmic teachings of Max Théon), met Sri Aurobindo in Pondicherry in 1914, and from 1920 collaborated with him in the development of Integral Yoga and the supramental work. After Aurobindo's withdrawal in 1926 she became the Ashram's primary teacher and organizer; after his passing in 1950 she carried the work forward for another twenty-three years until her own death in 1973. The vast Mother's Agenda — thirteen volumes of conversations with her disciple Satprem covering 1951-1973 — preserves the most detailed first-person record of late twentieth-century yogic experience available in any tradition.
117
quotes in library
Quotes by The Mother
117 quotes“Spend the day in remembering the Divine.”
dayWords of the Mother
“At work. At meals. At rest. With others.”
dailyWords of the Mother
“This is the practice that transforms ordinary life into yoga.”
practiceWords of the Mother
“Sri Aurobindo and I came to bring the supramental down to earth.”
supramentalMother's Agenda
“Whether the world recognizes the work or not is a small matter.”
recognitionMother's Agenda
“The work is being done.”
workMother's Agenda
“And those who can collaborate are welcome.”
collaborationMother's Agenda
“It is a great privilege.”
privilegeMother's Agenda
“Be patient with the body.”
patienceMother's Agenda
“It is the slowest part of the being to transform.”
bodyMother's Agenda
“For without bodily transformation, all spiritual gains are partial.”
bodyMother's Agenda
“Yoga of the body is the unfinished work of all the great traditions.”
bodyMother's Agenda
“This is the work integral yoga undertakes.”
integral-yogaMother's Agenda
“Cells have memory. Cells have consciousness.”
cellsMother's Agenda
“To work with the cellular consciousness is to do yoga at the deepest physical level.”
cellsMother's Agenda
“This is what makes integral yoga unique.”
integral-yogaMother's Agenda
“It does not stop at the mind. It does not stop at the soul. It works on the body itself.”
integral-yogaMother's Agenda
“Death itself can become a doorway, not a wall.”
deathMother's Agenda
“In the end, integral yoga aims at a transformed body.”
integral-yogaMother's Agenda
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