> But prior to that he had his work to do; he had to do “dredging, dredging, dredging the mire of the subconscious”. The Agenda page of January 22, 1961 provides some intuition into the nature of this "mud". The subconscient is ruled by beings of the lower vital who preserve all our subconscious mechanisms and habits. It is these beings who resist the descent of Supramental Light into the physical plane because it would bring about their destruction - their life depends on their hold on Matter.

Yes, I am disrupting their work - I know perfectly well that I am disrupting their domination of the world! All these vital beings have taken possession of the whole of Matter (Mother touches her body) - life and action - and have made it their domain, this is evident. But they are beings of the lower vital, for they seemed artificial - they didn't express any higher form, but an entire range of artificial mechanisms, artificial will, artificial organization, all deriving from their own imagination and not at all from a higher inspiration. [[These seem to be the forces ruling the subconscious mechanisms or reactions of the body: all the automatism produced by evolution and atavism - what might be termed evolutionary habits. This is the 'descending path,' which started forty years earlier, as Mother said (or the 'physical plunge' referred to by Sri Aurobindo), leading to the pure cellular consciousness. Evidently all the vital forces who have taken the habit of ruling the earth (last night it had the proportions of the earth, it wasn't universal) are the very ones who refuse to listen; they don't at all like what I am doing.

The Mother also explains in the same entry that since their consciousness was no longer individualized but universalized, everything took longer.

You see, personal surrender and devotion is an excellent solution for the individual, but it doesn't work for the collectivity. ..... Later, on the 27th, Mother remarked: 'I was reading about this very thing yesterday in The Secret of the Veda, in the first hymn translated by Sri Aurobindo (the reference is to the colloquy between Indra and Agastya, Rig Veda 1.170 - cf. The Secret of the Veda, Cent. Ed., X.241 ft.), and it helped me put my finger on the problem. In this hymn there is a dispute between Indra and the Rishi because the Rishi wants to progress too quickly without first passing through Indra [the god of the Mind], and Indra stops him; finally they reach an agreement. Sri Aurobindo's commentary is quite interesting: when one has the INDIVIDUAL power to go directly, but neglects the steps which are still necessary for the whole, for the universal movement, then one is stopped short. That is absolutely my experience.