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4
Introduction
In this document I have extracted from my journals on Sri Ganesh from
2004 onwards the slokas, poems and notations that are directly relevant to,
or inspired by, Sri Ganesh’s presence and reality.
This is so that one may read and absorb and open to the experiences and
perceptions therein without being encumbered by any personal or mundane
extraneous elements.
*
From the very beginning of my active service to Sri Ganesh in Auroville, I
have chosen to turn to the aspect of the Supreme the figure of Lord Ganesha
stands for and represents; and with the growing sense of its import and
significance I have come to cherish the qualities and blessings that it
embodies.
This was not an easy process as, in Auroville and essentially in Sri
Aurobindo’s Yoga, we are to grow out of all religious habit and formation and
strive to open to the direct spiritual Consciousness-Force that alone can
eventually transform our human nature into its true and manifest divinity
upon earth.
*
I was born an atheist as were both my parents.
This atheism was not a posturing, but the sensible admission of ignorance as
to any irrefutable answer to the big questions posed by existence.
However for both of my parents it was tacitly understood and taken for
granted that there is a certain code of conduct to which each person must
refer one’s actions and that, so long as this was respected, each one was
entirely free to find one’s own way.
Thus when in my teens I began to feel the restlessness of the seeker, I was
not encumbered by traditional beliefs or any religious observance, although
the sense of inner guilt is so ingrained in the sub-consciousness of any
western culture that, having grown up in such a milieu – in France in my
case -, one cannot pretend to be without baggage.
My initial journey eventually delivered me at Her Feet – in Pondicherry,
1969: I had reached home again.
*