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If you would know what is the Divine Grace, it is necessary first to realise that it is something which contradicts the law of the world, for it is outside its normal rule and not of its nature. There is here something which does not seem to govern at all the cosmic action, but only to intervene, and yet it is always there; an element without which this universe would be either a tremendous machine or a fortuitously and yet inexorably ordered chance…
...there is probably something else beyond the intellect which alone can give him[man] the Light—something beyond his mind and greater than himself—a Grace that intervenes, the law of a supernormal Light and Will, a help, an opening from above. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p2,p3</ref>
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…but this divine grace, if we may so call it, is not simply a mysterious flow or touch coming from above, but the all-pervading act of a divine presence which we come to know within as the power of the highest Self and Master of our being entering into the soul and so possessing it that we not only feel it close to us and pressing upon our mortal nature, but live in its law, know that law, possess it as the whole power of our spiritualised nature. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/24/the-integral-perfection#p12</ref>
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I have said also that the Grace can at any moment act suddenly, but over that one has no control, because it comes by an incalculable Will which sees things that the mind cannot see. It is precisely the reason why one should never despair,—that and also because no sincere aspiration to the Divine can fail in the end.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p22</ref>
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A state of Grace is prepared in the individual often behind thick veils by means not calculable by the mind and when the state of Grace comes then the Grace itself acts. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p4</ref>
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It [Divine Grace] is an action from above or from within independent of mental causes which decides its own movement. We can call it the Divine Grace; we can call it the Self within choosing its own hour and way to manifest to the mental instrument on the surface; we can call it the flowering of the inner being or inner nature into self-realisation and self-knowledge. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p6</ref>
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The Divine Grace is something not calculable, not bound by anything the intellect can fix as a condition—though ordinarily some call, aspiration, intensity of the psychic being can awaken it, yet it acts sometimes without any apparent cause even of that kind. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p9</ref>
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The Divine Grace cannot be explained through words and mental formulas. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace#p19</ref>
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…no matter how great your faith and trust in the divine Grace, no matter how great your capacity to see it at work in all circumstances, at every moment, at every point in life, you will never succeed in understanding the marvellous immensity of Its Action, and the precision, the exactitude with which this Action is accomplished; you will never be able to grasp to what extent the Grace does everything, is behind everything, organises everything, conducts everything, so that the march forward to the divine realisation may be as swift, as complete, as total and harmonious as possible, considering the circumstances of the world. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/1-august-1956#p49</ref>
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Grace is not an invention, it is a fact of spiritual experience. Many who would be considered as mere nothings by the wise and strong have attained by Grace; illiterate, without mental power or training, without "strength" of character or will, they have yet aspired and suddenly or rapidly grown into spiritual realisation, because they had faith or because they were sincere… Strength, if it is spiritual, is a power for spiritual realisation; a greater power is sincerity; the greatest power of all is Grace. I have said times without number that if a man is sincere, he will go through in spite of long delay and overwhelming difficulties. I have repeatedly spoken of the Divine Grace. I have referred any number of times to the line of the Gita:
In the whole manifestation there is an infinite Grace constantly at work to bring the world out of the misery, the obscurity and the stupidity in which it lies. From all time this Grace has been at work, unremitting in its effort, and how many thousands of years were necessary for this world to awaken to the need for something greater, more true, more beautiful. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/29-october-1958#p11</ref>
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I should like to say something about the Divine Grace—for you seem to think it should be something like a Divine Reason acting upon lines not very different from those of human intelligence. But it is not that. Also it is not a universal Divine Compassion either, acting impartially on all who approach it and acceding to all prayers. It does not select the righteous and reject the sinner. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p4</ref>
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''Q.Sri Aurobindo speaks of the influence of the Divine Compassion and the Divine Grace. But what is the difference between the two?''
There are these three powers: (1) The Cosmic Law, of Karma or what else; (2) the Divine Compassion acting on as many as it can reach through the nets of the Law and giving them their chance; (3) the Divine Grace which acts more incalculably but also more irresistibly than the others. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/sabcl/23/basic-requisites-of-the-path-v#p112</ref>
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The Divine Grace is there, ready to act at every moment, but it manifests as one grows out of the Law of the Ignorance into the Law of Light and it is meant, not as an arbitrary caprice, however miraculous often its intervention, but as a help in that growth and a Light that leads and eventually delivers. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/philosophical-thought-and-yoga#p11</ref>
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It is a power that is superior to any rule, even to the Cosmic Law—for all spiritual seers have distinguished between the Law and Grace. Yet it is not indiscriminate—only it has a discrimination of its own which sees things and persons and the right times and seasons with another vision than that of the Mind or any other normal Power. A state of Grace is prepared in the individual often behind thick veils by means not calculable by the mind and when the state of Grace comes then the Grace itself acts. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p4</ref>
Of course in many cases there is a true experience first, a touch of the Grace, but it is not something that lasts and is always there, but rather something that touches and withdraws and waits for the nature to get ready. But this is not so in every case, not even in many cases, I believe. One has to begin with the soul's inherent longing, then the struggle with the nature to get the temple ready, then the unveiling of the Image, the permanent Presence in the sanctuary. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/bhakti-yoga-and-vaishnavism#p14</ref>
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And, moreover, there are days when one is in contact with the divine Consciousness which is at work, with the Grace, and then everything is tinged, coloured with this Presence, and things which usually seem to you dull and uninteresting become charming, pleasant, attractive, instructive—everything lives and vibrates, and is full of promise and force. So, when one opens to that, one feels stronger, freer, happier, full of energy, and ''everything'' has a meaning. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/26-september-1956#p14</ref>
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But it's so lovely when this Harmony comes. You know, puttering about, arranging papers, setting a drawer in order.... It all sings, it's lovely, so joyous and luminous... so delightful! And all, all, all.... All material things, all activities, eating, dressing, everything becomes delightful when this harmony is there, delightful. Everything works out smoothly, it's so harmonious, there's no friction. You see... you see a joyous, luminous Grace manifesting in all things, ALL things, even those we normally regard as utterly unimportant...
But it's so lovely when this Harmony comes. You know, puttering about, arranging papers, setting a drawer in order.... It all sings, it's lovely, so joyous and luminous... so delightful! And all, all, all.... All material things, all activities, eating, dressing, everything becomes delightful when this harmony is there, delightful. Everything works out smoothly, it's so harmonious, there's no friction. You see... you see a joyous, luminous Grace manifesting in all things, ALL things, even those we normally regard as utterly unimportant...
It makes you sense so clearly that things in themselves don't count. What we call 'things in themselves' are of no true importance! What really counts is the relationship of consciousness to these things. And there's a formidable power in this, since in one instance you touch something and drop or mishandle it, while in the other it's so lovely, it works so smoothly. Even the most difficult movements are made without difficulty. It's an unheard-of power! We don't give it importance because it has no grandiose effects, it's not spectacular. Yes, there are indeed states of grace when one is in the presence of a great difficulty and suddenly has all the power needed to face it—yes, but that's something else. I am speaking of a power active in ordinary life. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/agenda/02/july-18-1961#p63,p6</ref>
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As soon as you are in contact with It, there is not a second in time, not a point in space, which does not show you ''dazzlingly'' this perpetual work of the Grace, this constant intervention of the Grace...
If one were in union with this Grace, if one saw It everywhere, one would begin living a life of exultation, of all-power, of infinite happiness.
<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/1-august-1956#p50,p51</ref>
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The best meditations are those that one has all of a sudden, because they take possession of you as an imperative necessity. You have no choice but to concentrate, to meditate, to look beyond the appearances. And it is not necessarily in the solitude of the forest that it seizes you, it happens when something in you is ready, when the time has come, when the true need is there, when the Grace is with you. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/miscellany#p20</ref>
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If one can see it, feel it, experience its action, so to say, be conscious of its presence and movement, then one has the joy of the movement, the progress, the realisation; but this does not mean that if one doesn't feel this joy, the action of the Grace is not there, the realisation not there. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/10-october-1956#p18</ref>
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For, as to this "Grace" [first experience of the Self], we describe it in that way because we feel in the infinite Spirit or Self of existence a Presence or a Being, a Consciousness that determines—that is what we speak of as the Divine,—not a separate Person, but the one Being of whom our individual self is a portion or a vessel. But it is not necessary for everybody to regard it in that way. Supposing it is the impersonal Self of all only, yet the Upanishad says of the Self and its realisation, "This understanding is not to be gained by reasoning nor by tapasya nor by much learning, but whom this Self chooses, to him it reveals its own body." Well, that is the same thing as what we call the Divine Grace,—it is an action from above or from within independent of mental causes which decides its own movement. We can call it the Divine Grace; we can call it the Self within choosing its own hour and way to manifest to the mental instrument on the surface; we can call it the flowering of the inner being or inner nature into self realisation and self-knowledge. As something in us approaches it or as it presents itself to us, so the mind sees it. But in reality, it is the same thing and the same process of the being in the Nature. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/35/first-experience-of-the-self#p1</ref>
It is only the Divine's Grace that can give peace, happiness, power, light, knowledge, beatitude and love in their essence and their truth. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace#p21</ref>
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The complete consecration is undoubtedly not an easy matter, and it might take an almost indefinitely long time if you had to do it all by yourself, by your own independent effort. But when the Divine's Grace is with you it is not exactly like that. With a little push from the Divine now and then, a little push in this direction and in that, the work becomes comparatively quite easy. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/03/surrender-self-offering-and-consecration#p1</ref>
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The boon that we have asked from the Supreme is the greatest that the earth can ask from the Highest, the change that is most difficult to realise, the most exacting in its conditions. It is nothing less than the descent of the supreme Truth and Power into Matter, the supramental established in the material plane and consciousness and the material world and an integral transformation down to the very principle of Matter. Only a supreme Grace can effect this miracle. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/12/integral-yoga#p97</ref>
The boon that we have asked from the Supreme is the greatest that the earth can ask from the Highest, the change that is most difficult to realise, the most exacting in its conditions. It is nothing less than the descent of the supreme Truth and Power into Matter, the supramental established in the material plane and consciousness and the material world and an integral transformation down to the very principle of Matter. Only a supreme Grace can effect this miracle. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/12/integral-yoga#p97</ref>
==Grace Saves==
The Divine Grace is with us and never leaves us even when the appearances are dark. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p19</ref>
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At each moment of our life, in all circumstances the Grace is there helping us to surmount all difficulties. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p23</ref>
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In failure as well as in success, the Divine's Grace is always there. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p25</ref>
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Man is a mass of imperfections—it is only by the divine Grace that he reaches the Divine. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/religion-and-yoga#p6</ref>
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The Divine Will works in all things—it may work out anything whatever. The Divine Grace comes in to help and save. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p1</ref>
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The difference between knowledge and ignorance is a grace of the Spirit; the breath of divine Power blows where it lists and fills today one and tomorrow another with the word or the puissance. If the potter shapes one pot more perfectly than another, the merit lies not in the vessel but the maker. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-master-of-the-work#p12</ref>
The difference between knowledge and ignorance is a grace of the Spirit; the breath of divine Power blows where it lists and fills today one and tomorrow another with the word or the puissance. If the potter shapes one pot more perfectly than another, the merit lies not in the vessel but the maker. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/23/the-master-of-the-work#p12</ref>
==Grace and Justice==
An act carried out has always a consequence and this consequence brings along another and so on. And this is absolutely ineluctable. That is universal justice. You have a bad thought, it has a result. And that result has yet another. And you cannot escape it except through the intervention of Grace. Grace is exactly something which has the power of changing all that. But only the Grace can change it. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/18-november-1953#p23</ref>
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If you make a mistake without knowing that it is a mistake, that does not protect you, you are punished. Well, in Nature it is the same thing. If you take poison without knowing that it is poison, it will poison you all the same. Do you understand?... Unless the Grace intervenes. And as the Grace is omnipotent, it can change everything. That is what I have explained. But without the Grace there is no hope. For precisely it is ignorance that's the constant factor of mankind. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/18-november-1953#p23</ref>
If you make a mistake without knowing that it is a mistake, that does not protect you, you are punished. Well, in Nature it is the same thing. If you take poison without knowing that it is poison, it will poison you all the same. Do you understand?... Unless the Grace intervenes. And as the Grace is omnipotent, it can change everything. That is what I have explained. But without the Grace there is no hope. For precisely it is ignorance that's the constant factor of mankind. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/18-november-1953#p23</ref>
==Grace and Karma==
Destiny in the rigid sense applies only to the outer being so long as it lives in the Ignorance. What we call destiny is only in fact the result of the present condition of the being and the nature and energies it has accumulated in the past acting on each other and determining the present attempts and their future results. But as soon as one enters the path of spiritual life, this old predetermined destiny begins to recede. There comes in a new factor, the Divine Grace, the help of a higher Divine Force other than the force of Karma which can lift the sadhak beyond the present possibilities of his nature. One's spiritual destiny is then the divine election which ensures the future. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/fate-free-will-and-prediction#p2</ref>
<center>~</center>When one does not repeat one's past mistakes, the divine power, the power of the divine Grace, abolishes their consequences—their karma—in the being. But as long as mistakes are repeated nothing can be abolished, because one re-creates them at every minute. When a person has made a serious error, say, a serious mistake (it can be serious or not, but we are concerned primarily with the serious ones), such mistakes have their consequences in life, a karma which has to be exhausted. The divine Grace, if you call upon it, has the power to abolish that karma, to cut short the consequences—but the Grace can only do this when you, within yourself, don't begin all over again, when the mistake committed is not renewed. The past can be completely purified and abolished, on condition that one does not keep making it into a perpetual present. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/agenda/02/june-2-1961#p2</ref><center>~</center>
...the Divine Grace completely contradicts Karma; you know, It makes it melt away like butter that's put in the sun…
...if you have an aspiration that's sincere enough or a prayer that's intense enough, you can bring down in you Something that will change everything, everything—truly it changes everything. An example may be given that is extremely limited, very small, but which makes you understand things very well: a stone falls quite mechanically; say, a tile falls; if it gets loose, it will fall, won't it? But if there comes, for example, a vital or mental determinism from someone who passes by and does not want it to fall and puts his hand out, it will fall on his hand, but it will not fall on the ground. So he has changed the destiny of this stone or tile. It is another determinism that has come in, and instead of the stone falling on the head of someone, it falls upon the hand and it will not kill anybody. This is an intervention from another plane, from a conscious will that enters into the more or less unconscious mechanism.
<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/3-june-1953#p24,p25</ref><center>~</center>Imagine the world as a single whole and, in a certain sense, finite, limited but containing potentially innumerable possibilities of which the combinations are so numerous that they are equivalent to an infinite (you must be careful with words, however; I am very much cramped by words, they do not express exactly what I mean). So, the universe is objectified by the Divine Consciousness, by the Supreme, according to certain determined laws of which we shall speak later. The universe is a single whole, in the sense that it is the Divine—it does not contain the whole of the Divine, but it is as though the Divine deployed Himself so as to objectify Himself; that is the ''raison d'être''of the manifestation of the universe. It is as if the divine Consciousness wandered into all divine possibilities following a path it had chosen. Imagine then a multitude of possibles of which all the possible combinations are equivalent to an infinite. The divine Consciousness is essentially free—It wanders therein and objectifies Itself. The path traversed is free in the midst of an infinite multiplicity which is at the same time pre-existent and absolutely undetermined according to the action of the free divine Will. It may be conceived that this Will, being free, is able to change the course of the deployment, change the path and, although everything is pre-existent and consequently inevitable, the road, the path is free and absolutely unexpected. These changes of the route, if one may say so, can therefore change the relations between things and circumstances, and consequently the determinism is changed. This change of the circuit is called "the effect of the Grace"; well, through the aid of the Grace, if the Grace decides it, things can change, the course can be different. Things can change their places and instead of following a certain circuit follow another. A circumstance which, according to a particular determinism, should occur at a certain place ahead, for instance, would instead occur behind, and so on. The relations between things consequently change. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/1-march-1951#p4</ref>
Imagine the world as a single whole and, in a certain sense, finite, limited but containing potentially innumerable possibilities of which the combinations are so numerous that they are equivalent to an infinite (you must be careful with words, however; I am very much cramped by words, they do not express exactly what I mean). So, the universe is objectified by the Divine Consciousness, by the Supreme, according to certain determined laws of which we shall speak later. The universe is a single whole, in the sense that it is the Divine—it does not contain the whole of the Divine, but it is as though the Divine deployed Himself so as to objectify Himself; that is the ''raison d'être''of the manifestation of the universe. It is as if the divine Consciousness wandered into all divine possibilities following a path it had chosen. Imagine then a multitude of possibles of which all the possible combinations are equivalent to an infinite. The divine Consciousness is essentially free—It wanders therein and objectifies Itself. The path traversed is free in the midst of an infinite multiplicity which is at the same time pre-existent and absolutely undetermined according to the action of the free divine Will. It may be conceived that this Will, being free, is able to change the course of the deployment, change the path and, although everything is pre-existent and consequently inevitable, the road, the path is free and absolutely unexpected. These changes of the route, if one may say so, can therefore change the relations between things and circumstances, and consequently the determinism is changed. This change of the circuit is called "the effect of the Grace"; well, through the aid of the Grace, if the Grace decides it, things can change, the course can be different. Things can change their places and instead of following a certain circuit follow another. A circumstance which, according to a particular determinism, should occur at a certain place ahead, for instance, would instead occur behind, and so on. The relations between things consequently change. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/1-march-1951#p4</ref>
==Grace and Love==
A total surrender, an exclusive self-opening to the divine influence, a constant and integral choice of the Truth and rejection of the falsehood, these are the only conditions made. But these must be fulfilled entirely, without reserve, without any evasion or pretence, simply and sincerely down to the most physical consciousness and its workings. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/12/integral-yoga#p96,p97</ref>
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Say―"I have received his Grace: I must be worthy of it", and then all will be well. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace#p27</ref>
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Let us offer our will to the Divine Grace; it is the Grace that accomplishes all. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p50</ref>
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The Grace is always there, eternally present and active, but Sri Aurobindo says that it is extremely difficult for us to be in a condition to receive it, keep it and make use of what it gives us. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/16/17-october-1960-1#p3</ref>
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In the final analysis everything really depends on the Divine Grace and we should look at the future with confidence and serenity, progressing at the same time as quickly as we can. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p43</ref>
It is not indispensable that the Grace should work in a way that the human mind can understand, it generally doesn't: it works in its own "mysterious" way. At first usually it works behind the veil, preparing things, not manifesting. Afterwards it may manifest, but the sadhak does not understand very well what is happening. Finally, when he is capable of it, he both feels and understands or at least begins to do so. Some feel and understand from the first or very early; but that is not the ordinary case. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p8</ref>
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People are not aware of the workings of Grace except when there has been some danger, that is, when there has been the beginning of an accident or the accident has taken place and they have escaped it. Then they become aware. But never are they aware that if, for instance, a journey or anything whatever, passes without any accident, it is an infinitely higher Grace. That is, the harmony is established in such a way that nothing can happen. But that seems to them quite natural. When people are ill and get well quickly, they are full of gratitude; but never do they think of being grateful when they are well; and yet that is a much greater miracle! <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/23-december-1953#p52</ref>
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When you are in a particular set of circumstances and certain events take place, these events often oppose your desire or what seems best to you, and often you happen to regret this and say to yourself, "Ah! how good it would have been if it were otherwise, if it had been like this or like that", for little things and big things.... Then years pass by, events are unfolded; you progress, become more conscious, understand better, and when you look back, you notice―first with astonishment, then later with a smile―that those very circumstances which seemed to you quite disastrous or unfavourable, were exactly the best thing that could have happened to you to make you progress as you should have. And if you are the least bit wise you tell yourself, "Truly, the divine Grace is infinite."
When you are in a particular set of circumstances and certain events take place, these events often oppose your desire or what seems best to you, and often you happen to regret this and say to yourself, "Ah! how good it would have been if it were otherwise, if it had been like this or like that", for little things and big things.... Then years pass by, events are unfolded; you progress, become more conscious, understand better, and when you look back, you notice―first with astonishment, then later with a smile―that those very circumstances which seemed to you quite disastrous or unfavourable, were exactly the best thing that could have happened to you to make you progress as you should have. And if you are the least bit wise you tell yourself, "Truly, the divine Grace is infinite."
So, when this sort of thing has happened to you a number of times, you begin to understand that in spite of the blindness of man and deceptive appearances, the Grace is at work everywhere, so that at every moment it is the best possible thing that happens in the state the world is in at that moment. It is because our vision is limited or even because we are blinded by our own preferences that we cannot discern that things are like this.
 
But when one begins to see it, one enters upon a state of wonder which nothing can describe. For behind the appearances one perceives this Grace―infinite, wonderful, all-powerful―which knows all, organises all, arranges all, and leads us, whether we like it or not, whether we know it or not, towards the supreme goal, that is, union with the Divine, the awareness of the Godhead and union with Him.
Then one lives in the Action and Presence of the Grace a life full of joy, of wonder, with the feeling of a marvellous strength, and at the same time with a trust so calm, so complete, that
nothing can shake it any longer.
And when Then one is lives in this state the Action and Presence of perfect receptivity and perfect adherencethe Grace a life full of joy, one diminishes to that extent the resistance of the world to the divine Action; consequentlywonder, this is the best collaboration one can bring to with the Action feeling of a marvellous strength, and at the Divine. One understands what He wants<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/8-august-1956#p42same time with a trust so calm,p43so complete,p44,p45,p46</ref>that nothing can shake it any longer.
And when one is in this state of perfect receptivity and perfect adherence, one diminishes to that extent the resistance of the world to the divine Action; consequently, this is the best collaboration one can bring to the Action of the Divine. One understands what He wants. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/8-august-1956#p42,p43,p44,p45,p46</ref>
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People believe that the Grace means making everything smooth for all your life. It is not true.
 
The Grace works for the realisation of your aspiration and everything is arranged to gain the most prompt, the quickest realisation. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace-and-difficulties#p20-p21</ref>
==By Invoking==
''Q. Does the intervention of the Grace come through a call?''
''A:'' When one calls? I think so. Anyway, not exclusively and solely. But certainly, yes, if one has faith in the Grace and an aspiration and if one does what a little child would when it runs to its mother and says: "Mamma, give me this", if one calls with that simplicity, if one turns to the Grace and says "Give me this", I believe it listens. Unless one asks for something that is not good for one, then it does not listen. If one asks from it something that does harm or is not favourable, it does not listen. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/18-november-1953#p38-p39</ref>
We must learn to rely only on the Divine Grace and to call for its help in all circumstances; then it will work out constant miracles. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p53</ref>
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The Grace is always with you; concentrate in your heart with a silent mind and you are sure also to receive the guidance and the help you aspire for. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p6</ref>
<center>~</center>
''Q. But, Mother, when one prays sincerely for the intervention of the Grace, doesn't one expect a particular result?''
''But, Mother, when one prays sincerely for the intervention of the Grace, doesnA:'t one expect a particular result?'' Excuse me, that depends on the tenor of the prayer. If one simply invokes the Grace or the Divine, and puts oneself in His hands, one does not expect a particular result. To expect a particular result one must formulate one's prayer, must ask for something. If you have only a great aspiration for the divine Grace and evoke it, implore it, without asking it for anything precise, it is the Grace which will choose what it will do for you, not you. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/8-august-1956#p26,p27</ref>
==By Aspiration==
No one is fit—for all human beings are full of faults and incapacities—even the greatest sadhaks are not free. It is a question only of aspiration, of believing in the divine Grace and letting the Divine work in you, not making a refusal. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-call-and-the-capacity#p26</ref>
 <center>~</center>
However a man may stumble, the Divine Grace will be there so long as he aspires for it and in the end lead him through. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/dealing-with-depression-and-despondency#p55</ref>
 <center>~</center>
The Grace is equally for all. But each one receives it according to his sincerity. It does not depend on outward circumstances but on a sincere aspiration and openness. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace#p29</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is not that [yoga relying on tapasya], but the soul's demand for a higher Truth or a higher life that is indispensable. Where that is, the Divine Grace whether believed in or not, will intervene. If you believe, that hastens and facilitates things; if you cannot yet believe, still the soul's aspiration will justify itself with whatever difficulty and struggle. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/bhakti-yoga-and-vaishnavism#p22</ref>
And then, if you become aware that it is only the Grace which can do that, that the situation in which you find yourself, from there the Grace alone can pull you out, can give you the solution and the strength to come out of it, then, quite naturally an intense aspiration awakes in you, a consciousness which is translated into an opening. If you call, aspire, and if you hope to get an answer, you will quite naturally open yourself to the Grace. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/15-september-1954#p32</ref>
<center>~</center>
Do not allow these [of unfitness] ideas to gain on you or even to occupy your mind. It is not by their merit or their effort or the capacity they show that men advance in the spiritual path, but by their opening to the divine help and grace. For that you must have the confidence that whatever your own weakness, the grace will not fail you. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/imperfections-and-periods-of-arrest#p27</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is quite true that it [a great wave (or sea) of calm and the constant consciousness of a vast and luminous Reality] is a grace sent and the only return needed for such a grace is acceptance, gratitude and to allow the Power that has touched the consciousness to develop what has to be developed in the being—by keeping oneself open to it. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/experiences-of-the-self-the-one-and-the-infinite#p10</ref>
<center>~</center>
To practise Yoga implies the will to overcome all attachments and turn to the Divine alone. The principal thing in the Yoga is to trust in the Divine Grace at every step, to direct the thought continually to the Divine and to offer oneself till the being opens and the Mother's force can be felt working in the Adhara. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/32/the-mothers-grace#p9</ref>
The Grace is always there ready to act but you must let it work and not resist its action. The one condition required is faith. <ref>https://incanateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p8</ref>
<center>~</center>
"At the very moment when everything seems to go from bad to worse, it is then that we must make a supreme act of faith and know that the Grace will never fail us." <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/comments-on-new-year-messages#p9</ref>
<center>~</center>
The Grace will never fail us―such is the faith we must keep constantly in our heart. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p15</ref>
<center>~</center>
...even if one has no knowledge at all but has trust in the divine Grace, if one has the faith that there is something in the world like the divine Grace, and that this something can answer a prayer, an aspiration, an invocation, then, after making one's mental formation, if one offers it to the Grace and puts one's trust in it, asks it to intervene and has the faith that it will intervene, then indeed one has a chance of success. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/8-august-1956#p24</ref>
<center>~</center>
Put your trust in the grace of the One and Divine which has already touched you and opened its door and rely on it for all that is to come.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/30/the-value-of-experiences#p7</ref>
<center>~</center>
Faith is certainly a gift given to us by the Divine Grace. It is like a door suddenly opening upon an eternal truth, through which we can see it, almost touch it.
As in everything else in the ascent of humanity, there is the necessity—especially at the beginning—of personal effort. It is possible that in some exceptional circumstances, for reasons which completely elude our intelligence, faith may come almost accidentally, quite unexpectedly, almost without ever having been solicited, but most frequently it is an answer to a yearning, a need, an aspiration, something in the being that is seeking and longing, even though not in a very conscious and systematic way. But in any case, when faith has been granted, when one has had this sudden inner illumination, in order to preserve it constantly in the active consciousness individual effort is altogether indispensable. One must ''hold on'' to one's faith, ''will'' one's faith; one must seek it, cultivate it, protect it. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/9-july-1958#p4,p5</ref>
<center>~</center>
If one has within him faith in the divine grace, that the divine grace is watching over him, and that no matter what happens the divine grace is there, watching over him, one may keep this faith all one's life and always; and with this one can pass through all dangers, face all difficulties, and nothing stirs, for you have the faith and the divine grace is with you. It is an infinitely stronger, more conscious, more lasting force which does not depend upon the conditions of your physical build, does not depend upon anything except the divine grace alone, and hence it leans on the Truth and nothing can shake it. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/7-october-1953#p26</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is when all seems lost that all can be saved. When you have lost confidence in your personal power, then you should have faith in the Divine Grace. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p38</ref>
<center>~</center>What is necessary is not to listen to what resists, not to believe what contradicts—to have trust, a real trust, a confidence which makes you give yourself fully without calculating, without bargaining. Trust! The trust that says, "Do this, do this for me, I leave it to You."<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/12-november-1958#p17</ref><center>~</center>
Have an absolute trust in the Grace, set aside your little personality and allow the Grace to act; it will make you do what is needed and everything will be all right. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/trust-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p27</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is in proportion to our trust in the Divine that the Divine Grace can act for us and help. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/trust-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p4</ref>
<center>~</center>
The Grace and the help are always there for all who aspire for them and their power is limitless when received with faith and confidence. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p7</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is only by remaining perfectly peaceful and calm with an unshakable confidence and faith in the Divine Grace that you will allow circumstances to be as good as they can be. ''The very best happens always'' to those who have put their entire trust in the Divine and in the Divine alone. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace-and-difficulties#p1</ref>
<center>~</center>
For the Grace to have a perfect and total result of its action, the faith must be ''total and perfect.'' <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p10</ref>
The true spiritual or psychic vision is this, "Whatever I may be, my soul is a child of the Divine and must reach the Divine sooner or later. I am imperfect but seek after the perfection of the Divine in me and that not I but the Divine Grace will bring about; if I keep to that, the Divine Grace itself will do all." The "I" has to take its proper place here as a small portion and instrument of the Divine, something that is nothing without the Divine but with the Grace can be everything that the Divine wishes it to be. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/dealing-with-hostile-attacks#p55</ref>
<center>~</center>
How many blows are needed in life for one to know to the very depths that one is ''nothing'', that one can do ''nothing'' that one ''does not exist'', that one is ''nothing'', that there is no entity without the divine Consciousness and the Grace. From the moment one knows it, it is over; all the difficulties have gone. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/15-september-1954#p37</ref>
<center>~</center>
It's narrowness of consciousness, it's division. When you let things work on their own, there's... there's EVERYWHERE a Consciousness and a Grace that do EVERYTHING so that EVERYTHING may go smoothly, and that imbecility is what constantly upsets everything—oddly enough! Self-centered imbecility, that's right: what Sri Aurobindo called "the old man." <ref>https://incarnateword.in/agenda/10/november-19-1969#p98</ref>
<center>~</center>
The psychic does not demand or desire; it aspires; it does not make conditions for its surrender or withdraw if its aspiration is not immediately satisfied—for the psychic has complete trust in the Divine or in the guru and can wait for the right time or the hour of the divine grace.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/desire#p40</ref>
 
==By Not Insisting on the Grace==
After all, one has not a ''right'' to call on the Divine to manifest himself; it can come only as a response to a spiritual or psychic state of consciousness or to a long course of sadhana rightly done; or, if it comes before that or without any apparent reason, it is a grace; but one cannot demand or compel grace; grace is something spontaneous which wells out from the Divine Consciousness as a free flower of its being. The bhakta looks for it, but he is ready to wait in perfect reliance, even if need be all his life, knowing that it will come, never varying in his love and surrender because it does not come now or soon. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/bhakti-yoga-and-vaishnavism#p24</ref>
<center>~</center>
Your thesis was, "Once I want God, God must manifest to me, come to me, at least give glimpses of himself to me, the real solid concrete experiences, not mere vague things which I can't understand or value. God's Grace must answer my call for it, whether I yet deserve it or not—or else there is no Grace." God's Grace may indeed do that in certain cases, but where does the "must" come in? If God must do it, it is no longer God's Grace, but God's duty or an obligation or a contract or a treaty. The Divine looks into the heart and removes the veil at the moment which he knows to be the right moment to do it. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/bhakti-yoga-and-vaishnavism#p12</ref>
<center>~</center>
Grace may sometimes bring undeserved or apparently undeserved fruits, but one can't demand Grace as a right and privilege—for then it would not be Grace. As you have seen one can't claim that one has only to shout and the answer must come. Besides I have always seen that there has been really a long unobserved preparation before the Grace intervenes and, also, after it has intervened one has still to put in a good deal of work to keep and develop what one has got—as it is in all other things—until there is the complete siddhi. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p18</ref>
 <center>~</center>
"But whatever you ask for or whatever your effort, you must feel, even while trying your best, using knowledge or putting forth power that the result depends upon the Divine Grace." <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/04/5-april-1951#p12</ref>
Gratitude: it is you who open all the closed doors and let the Grace which saves penetrate deeply. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/gratitude#p1</ref>
<center>~</center>
Gratitude A loving recognition of the Grace received from the Divine. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/gratitude#p2-p3</ref>
<center>~</center>
...to be grateful, never to forget this wonderful Grace of the Supreme who leads each one to his divine goal by the shortest ways, in spite of himself, his ignorance and misunderstanding, in spite of the ego, its protests and its revolts. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/agenda/05/july-15-1964#p1</ref>
<center>~</center>
The best possible way is to allow the Divine Grace to work in you, never to oppose it, never to be ungrateful and turn against it—but to follow it always to the goal of Light and Peace and unity and Ananda. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p24</ref>
<center>~</center>
And later—you must pay great attention to this (''Mother puts her finger on her lips'')—the Grace will answer you, the Grace will pull you out of the trouble, the Grace will give you the solution to your problem or will help you to get out of your difficulty. But once you are free from trouble and have come out of your difficulty, don't forget that it is the Grace which pulled you out, and don't think it is yourself. For this, indeed, is the important point. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/06/15-september-1954#p33</ref>
<center>~</center>
One must have a great purity and a great intensity in one’s self-giving, and that absolute trust in the supreme wisdom of the divine Grace, that It knows better than we do what is good for
us, and all that. Then if one offers one’s aspiration to It, truly gives it with enough intensity, the results are marvellous. But one must know how to see them, for when things are realised most
people find it absolutely natural, they don’t even see why and how it has happened, and they tell themselves, “Yes, naturally it had to be like that.” So they lose the joy of... the joy of gratitude,
because, in the last analysis, if one can be filled with gratitude and thanksgiving for the divine Grace, it puts the finishing touch, and at each step one comes to see that things are exactly what they had to be and the best that could be. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/13-july-1955#p44</ref>
<center>~</center>
All discoveries are always graces—wonderful graces. When you discover that you can't do anything, when you discover that you are a fool, when you discover that you have no capacity, when you discover that you are so petty and mean and stupid, well... "Oh, Lord, I thank You so much, how good You are to show me all this!" And then, it's over. Because the minute you discover it, you say, "Now this is up to You. You will do what has to be done for all this to change." And the best part of it is that it does change! It does change. When you do like this (''gesture of offering to the Heights''), sincerely: "Oh, take it, take it, take it, rid me of it, let me be... only You"... It's wonderful. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/agenda/07/january-31-1966#p48-p49</ref>
<center>~</center>
Right use of the granted Grace: no deformation, no diminution, no exaggeration―a clear sincerity. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/the-divine-grace#p30</ref>
<center>~</center>
''Q. What is the way to accept the Grace with gratitude?''
The closer you come to the Divine, the more you live under a shower of overwhelming evidence of His immeasurable Grace. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/faith-in-the-divine-grace-and-help#p27</ref>
<center>~</center>
Psychic life in the universe is a work of the divine Grace. Psychic growth is a work of the divine Grace and the ultimate power of the psychic being over the physical-being will also be a result of the divine Grace. And the mind, if it wants to be at all useful, has only to remain very quiet, as quiet as it can, because if it meddles in it, it is sure to spoil everything. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/07/9-february-1955#p22</ref>
<center>~</center>
The divine Consciousness works always, everywhere and in the same way. The divine Grace is active everywhere, and in all circumstances in the same way. And so on. But according to your personal attitude, you create within yourself the conditions for receiving what is done or not receiving it. And trust—indeed, trust in the Truth, trust in the Grace, trust in the divine Knowledge—this puts you in that state of receptivity in which you can receive these things. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/25-november-1953#p6</ref>
The divine Consciousness works always, everywhere and in the same way. The divine Grace is active everywhere, and in all circumstances in the same way. And so on. But according to your personal attitude, you create within yourself the conditions for receiving what is done or not receiving it. And trust—indeed, trust in the Truth, trust in the Grace, trust in the divine Knowledge—this puts you in that state of receptivity in which you can receive these things. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/05/25-november-1953#p6</ref>
==By Reliance on the Divine Grace==
There is nobody who can go on in his own strength or by right of his fitness to the goal of the sadhana. It is only by the Divine Grace and reliance on the Divine Grace that it can be done. It is in a strength greater than your own that you must put your first and last reliance. If your faith falters you have to call on that to sustain you; if your force is insufficient against the ill-will and opposition that surround you, open yourself to receive that force in its place.
<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-call-and-the-capacity#p29</ref>
 <center>~</center>
To be absolutely sincere, straightforward, open, is not an easy achievement for human nature. It is only by spiritual endeavour that one can realise it—and to do it needs a severity of introspective self-vision, an unsparing scrutiny of self-observation of which many sadhaks or Yogins even are not capable and it is only by an illumining Grace that reveals the sadhak to himself and transforms what is deficient in him that it can be done. And even then only if he himself consents and lends himself wholly to the divine working. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/sincerity#p10</ref>
<center>~</center>
It is in action, in effort, in the march forward that repose must be found, the true repose of complete trust in the divine Grace, of the absence of desires, of victory over egoism. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/20-march-1957#p11</ref>
<center>~</center>
And once you have seen this, you feel you are never equal to it, for you should never forget it, never have any fears, any anguish, any regrets, any recoils... or even suffering. If one were in union with this Grace, if one saw It everywhere, one would begin living a life of exultation, of all-power, of infinite happiness. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/1-august-1956#p51</ref>
 <center>~</center>
One cannot be perfect in discrimination at once or in rejection either. The one indispensable thing is to go on trying sincerely till there comes the full success. So long as there is complete sincerity, the Divine Grace will be there and assist at every moment on the way. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/sincerity#p20</ref>
<center>~</center>
Everything should be for the sake of the Divine, this [aspiration for the Divine's Presence] also. As for leaving the result to the Divine, it depends on what you mean by the phrase. If it implies dependence on the Divine Grace and equanimity and patience in the persistent aspiration, then it is all right. But it must not be extended to cover slackness and indifference in the aspiration and endeavour. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/the-divine-grace-and-guidance#p13</ref>
<center>~</center>
I ask you to have faith in the Divine, in the Divine Grace, in the truth of the sadhana, in the eventual triumph of the spirit over its mental and vital and physical difficulties, in the Path and the Guru, in the existence of things...<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/faith#p52</ref>
<center>~</center>
No sadhak can reach the supermind by his own efforts and the effort to do it by personal tapasya has been the source of many mishaps. One has to go quietly stage by stage until the being is ready and even then it is only the Grace that can bring the real supramental change. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-supramental-transformation#p15</ref>
No sadhak can reach the supermind by his own efforts and the effort to do it by personal tapasya has been the source of many mishaps. One has to go quietly stage by stage until the being is ready and even then it is only the Grace that can bring the real supramental change. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/28/the-supramental-transformation#p15</ref>
==By Progress==