Message of the Day (Tamas Nature of Children) - May 25, 2012

Sri Annai and Sri Aravindar, AuroMere Meditation Center Question: Why do some children take interest in things only when there is some excitement? Mother's Answer: They are tamasic. It is due to the large proportion of tamas in their nature. The more tamasic one is, the more does one need something violent and exciting circumstances. When the physical is tamasic, unless one eats spices and highly flavoured food, one does not feel nourished. And yet these are poisons. They act exactly like poison on the nerves. They do not nourish.But it is because people are tamasic, because their body’s consciousness is not sufficiently developed. Well, mentally it is the same thing, vitally the same thing. If they are tamasic, they always need new excitements, dramas, murders, suicides, etc. to feel anything at all, otherwise.... And there is nothing, nothing that makes one more wicked and cruel than tamas. For it is this need of excitement which shakes you up a little, makes you come out of yourself. And one must also learn, there, to distinguish between those who are exclusively tamasic and those who are mixed, and thosewho are struggling within themselves with their different parts. One can, one must know in what proportion their nature is constituted, so as to be able to insist at need on one thing or another. Some people constantly need a whipping from life in order to move, otherwise they would spend their time sleeping. Others, on the contrary, need soothing things, silence, a retreat in the country-side—all things that do a lot of good but which must disappear as soon as one needs to make an effort for progress or to realise something or struggle against a defect, conquer an obstacle.... It is complicated, don’t you think so? The proportion is very important, this proportion of the three “gunas” (you know the three gunas?)1 the proportion of the three gunas in the nature. And one must know the exact proportion in oneself and how to use one guna to fight the other, and so on. But there is a moment when one should attain a certain equilibrium, and then be capable of establishing it in oneself a little steadily and facing life without having to fall into holes or struggle against terrible things. From that moment on everything goes well.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 The three principles of Indian psychology: tamas, rajas and sattwa.  Tamas is the principle of inertia and obscurity;  rajas the principle of passion, desire and dynamism;  sattwa the principle of light and equilibrium. -Questions and Answers 1929 – 1931 - Collected Works of  The Mother

Thanks,

AuroMere Meditation Center (Sri Mother & Sri Aurobindo Center)

(ஸ்ரீ அன்னை அரவிந்தர் தியான மையம்)

Pallikaranai, Chennai.

TN, India.