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Prologue

A new creation from the old shall rise,A Knowledge inarticulate find speech,

Beauty suppressed burst into paradise bloom,Pleasure and pain dive into absolute bliss.

A tongueless oracle shall speak at last,The Superconscient conscious grow on earth,The Eternal’s wonders join the dance of Time.1

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Scene 1

The Old and the NewThe battle within

I have to live a life of convictionOnly then can my spine be straight

I live a life ordinary and hide it with high talkI know I’m not ordinary, but ordinary is my walk

I have to give up this façade of yogaAnd do what I think is right

There’s always a self-judgment, a moralizing lightI have to rise above it, develop spiritual sight

I am pained by lack of purpose, lack of passion in my lifeI am hurt by aspiration which fails due to divide

There’s a need to be better, to reach out to the worldBut mundaneness takes over and nothing gets done

I just want to be ordinary, I know I will not be happy when all façades are goneBut at least it will be the naked truth and then the yearning will arise

A New Creation from the Old shall Risea creative dialogue

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The pain of ordinariness will push me once againTo reach for the source within and rejuvenate its strength

My sweet MotherI am thy child for eternity

This I surely knowBut why is this ordinary

So strong in its holdI offer thee my tamas

My opposition to lightI ask thee to step in

And help me to fight

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Scene 2

A search for the NewAn exploration

Chorus: I seek for something that is not A new experience, beyond thought

Voice 1: How can I define the New? For me, it is something like being in nothingness, a kind of a void, in touch with the deepest core. When I am in the midst of tumult, nothing impacts my being and that void.

Voice 2: I experience it as a very tiny moment of quiet joy and celebration that I can actually feel in my body and with it the experience of resistance from the old that immediately comes up.

Voice 3: Everything I am not and I have to become – that is the New for me. A sense of vastness, very plastic, very flexible, a smiling vastness that can comprehend and carry everything and moving constantly forward.

Chorus: A lightness of being Intuitive, synthetic Find the flow of my being Moving forward Moving forward

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Voice 4: The New expresses itself not only within, but without too… to be able to unconditionally exist at peace. To be able to explore and connect with people not limited by thoughts and words the way we express ourselves now… something which goes beyond that.

Voice 5: To go beyond… yes, but manifested in matter. That is important.

Voice 6: I see the New as an inclusivity of vision… to be able to hold more perspectives, mystery and paradox… to hold complexity, and along with it a focused and yielding will and a deep inner silence and quietude.

Chorus: Being centred, being quiet Listening, open, ready Trusting, not wanting Accepting, not judging

Voice 7: For me the New is the society’s new desire, collectively and individually, to become curious of the universe within… as a community, as a society… together.

There is beauty of thought, of emotions… an inner harmony that holds us all together; a unity and a deep-rootedness… holding us from very deep down.

Chorus: A grand orchestra of spiritual powers, A diapason of soul-interchange Harmonised a Oneness deep, immeasurable.2

Voice 8: Letting go of the old… through Surrender to the force that is seeking to manifest in me and around me. Through maintaining a spontaneous Faith that whatever is necessary for this manifestation will be made available as long as we can keep in touch with this strong aspiration. And through letting go of all past formations, ideas and preferences and simultaneously to expand one’s being. The new consciousness would require a vastness and dynamism which I don’t think we are currently capable of.

Voice 9: I would not let go of anything. I would take and re-engage with that old and deconstruct it and find in it something which is new for the future.

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Chorus: A new creation from the old shall rise From the old shall rise Shall rise

Voice 10: The consciousness of the New – it is when I experience a consciousness governed by the psychic being, a consciousness that loves and seeks the Divine, a Surrender so complete, an Aspiration so intense that the whole being is consumed in the yearning, a Passion for the preparation of the new creation, a Confidence which says, ‘I am ready for the divine vision and the action on earth.’

Chorus: O Lord, I pray to Thee, guide my footsteps, enlighten my mind, that at every moment and in all things I may do exactly what Thou wantest me to do.3

*

Scene 3

Transmuted by the White Spiritual RayNew Structures for Learning, Life, Architecture, Governance & Society

Entrepreneur: What do we see around ourselves? Where do we begin?

Old structures that we have been conditioned into are crumbling. Individual aspect of the person is becoming important. At the same time the collective aspect of coming together needs to be put together. The challenge of the new world is how to harmonise the individual and collective development.

Educator: Everyone has different capacities, treasures, baggage, backgrounds. What is important is to be able to see the best, the strengths in the people and put that person to use with that strength in mind. It creates an inclusiveness and ownership, and it is real (not false praise, etc.). When we put people in positions they are not suited to, it is not good for anyone.

Leader: The societal structure could be based on a hierarchy of consciousness – not a hierarchy of power or dominance, but a hierarchy of consciousness. This hierarchy of consciousness is extremely central to the New because it allows the new force to manifest.

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The new element in this would be if we could find a way that our decisions are based on receiving inspiration, and aspiration – not just a horizontal process but a vertical process – if that could be included in this new structure.

Entrepreneur: If the world around us is to change, then we as humans need to change. We need to seek the new consciousness. When we approach things from a purely mental perspective then we get glimpses of Truth but we never get to see the complete Truth. And, to be able to get to the real Truth of things we need to approach it with another paradigm. Some of us have started this shift but in a limited individual way. How to work together in a group and devise methodologies that would help take this out into the larger world – I think, that should the challenge before us. And, it does not need to be a purely spiritual or theistic basis – I think we will need new ways of approaching everything, from economics to justice to business to management to may be even medicine… everything.

Philosopher: We are here thinking of developing independent thinking individuals. The existing system doesn’t think like this. Actually it is dangerous to develop someone who can think. An individual like this would not sell himself to the system that wants to put him in a particular position and substitute his other possibilities of development by money – thinking that that would develop him – but that does not develop him.

We are trying to look at the holistic development of an individual with the perspective of activating or educating rather all his capacities/ faculties so that he would be able to move in any direction and discover the Truth for himself. We are not teaching him the Truth, we are trying to educate in him the capacity to discover the truth. This is the crucial difference that is most important to build into all structures – education, management, governance, law.

Chorus: As when the mantra sinks in Yoga’s ear, Its message enters stirring the blind brain, And keeps in the dim ignorant cells its sound; The hearer understands a form of words And, musing on the index thought it holds, He strives to read it with the labouring mind, But finds bright hints, not the embodied truth: Then, falling silent in himself to know

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He meets the deeper listening of his soul: The Word repeats itself in rhythmic strains: Thought, vision, feeling, sense, the body’s self Are seized unutterably and he endures An ecstasy and an immortal change; He feels a Wideness and becomes a Power, All knowledge rushes on him like a sea: Transmuted by the white spiritual ray He walks in naked heavens of joy and calm, Sees the God-face and hears transcendent speech…4

(A deep silence follows.)

Educator: Silence is the best teacher for the awakening of the soul and for learning. When there is silence, when one listens to each other in silence, one hears more than just the words… when one speaks from silence, one speaks from more than just the mind. Therefore the sounds of silence are something that the environment should consciously inculcate, embrace and consciously imbibe… and then from the silence, the word… the word that creates.

Artist: I seek an environment that allows me to inwardise. Whose journey is this? This is not the journey of my mind, it is not the journey of my emotional being, it is not the journey of my physical being, it is a journey of my Soul – which has responded to the call of the Divine. And for that I need the world to be that place where the soul needs to grow. And that perspective should always be alive – that it is for the soul. So an environment that allows you to inwardise and a complete clarity that the soul is being prepared to respond to the call of the new creation – nothing else, nothing less, nothing more.

Healer: We need to create an environment that addresses every part of the being – that addresses the centre, the psychic being, that allows the psychic being to come forward, that addresses the mind, educates the mind, educates the vital, educates the body and puts it under that guidance.

Engineer: Can we create a material reality that almost imposes all these qualities – irrespective of the receptivity of the person? The Matter we create has to be so plastic that it can almost mould itself to the Consciousness that has to manifest there, and the Consciousness in turn gets influenced by the material form.

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Builder: The first challenge is the Intention i.e. the Consciousness has to be at that level that it can impact Matter. The second challenge is that when Matter is in place, for it to remain plastic or continue to imbue all with that consciousness – that consciousness has to be maintained so that it remains so.

We have to create something that despite everything draws the best in each one of us, yet it will also have to be maintained such that it remains at a high level and is not lowered.

Green worker: Allow the spaces to tell you where an activity should take place. Keep the vastness also. Experience nature, experience seasons, and each season lets you do something different, the usage of the space changes. Spaces should do that to you. But there should also be a centre which allows the disparate far-flung corners to be pulled together. You live in the space as it is being developed and feel what the space should be like.

Architect: It is not an easy formula to follow for designers. The clarity of purpose – what each space should house – has to work hand in hand with design, then designing or plasticity would make sense. Otherwise it would be very abstract.

Healer: The intention is a very important part of the environment. To have an intention would be that I have a goal, I have an aspiration. And focusing attention… if attention is not there, the intention gets dissipated.

Architect: We should have basic principles in hand and not try and design everything today. If we have principles which come from our past and can take us way ahead into the future, it would be a great approach and give it an organic growth by itself.

Homemaker: Any process of growth, any progress has to have a clear direction, and it should also be anchored somewhere to the roots. I feel that we must go back to the roots and also find a new direction.

Architect: We tend to think that physical structures, buildings are forever. The way the world is changing, you should consider a certain degree of impermanence. You can have a certain balance. There are certain things that are immutable in every space. The anchor point (centre) becomes the peg that is not shaken. There is nothing exclusive about it. The minute you become exclusive, everything starts falling out.

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Chorus: There Matter is the Spirit’s firm density… All that now passes lived immortal there In the proud beauty and fine harmony Of Matter plastic to spiritual light.5

(The words reverberate for a long time.)

Builder: Plasticity of Matter is not only a question of design, and also what materials are used. It is also a question of human consciousness, how it is built, with what attitude, what is invoked. Design is important, but the best of designs can get spoilt or potential not fully explored if the consciousness in execution is not there. So, the challenge is also that – how am I manifesting or dealing with matter.

Engineer: You all know the law of ‘Ohm’ – I = V/R where current is equal to voltage divided by resistance. I have changed this into the law of ‘Aum’ which is P = V/HR. P is for performance or outcome or delivery, equals the Vision divided by HR or Human Resistance.

If there is a good vision, why can’t that vision be realized in a fraction of a second? It is because of HR. So, the society has to deal with reducing HR (human resistance) in the acceleration of the evolution. If Sri Aurobindo’s yoga is summarized as acceleration of evolution towards transformation of matter, then we are standing in the way. It has to happen with us, but we have to be transformed also. If the society or a group or an organization has a good V then the outcome – whatever the society/group/organization would be delivering – is very much a function of how we reduce HR. It is one more dimension to the story. That requires a very personalized approach because in each H there is a very different R (physical, mental…)!

Artist: If the context is Transformation, I can only see it in the context of the whole. If there is a polarity between the outside and the inside and the inside space would be the heart, the core that would need to be the focus – then, to have the vision, the inspiration very clear, and sharing it would be important – within the outside context. If the society takes in the whole context, it would fulfill its function of transformation. Only then can one be truly porous, otherwise one dissolves in the chaos. How to preserve the vision of it? That would be an interesting process.

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Educator: How about having a different way of living? Like, to live in soul families… How do we create this environment where people feel that it is their life… they are fully engaged with their arms and hands – the physical, mental, vital, psychic?

I see it more and more… when we are attuned, we can hear each other without anyone having to speak, we can hear each other’s thoughts, we can feel each other’s inner sense… and that’s when you really begin to learn… and when you develop these higher faculties, then you have these new ways of communing.

Chorus: Love was a close and thrilled identity In the throbbing heart of all that luminous life. A universal vision that unites, A sympathy of nerve replying to nerve, Hearing that listens to thought’s inner sound And follows the rhythmic meanings of the heart, A touch that needs not hands to feel, to clasp, Were there the native means of consciousness And heightened the intimacy of soul with soul.6

(The words create an atmosphere of calm ingathering.)

Entrepreneur: I think what is also important is the shift of the perceiving faculty from the mind to the psychic. We have to realize the mind is not an individuality, it is only a faculty of the psychic. To facilitate this shift of perception of how we perceive through the mind and how we perceive through the psychic… I think only when we shift to the psychic can we realize that the mind too is just a faculty. The Truth is absolute; when perceived by the mind, it is partial.

Educator: The first and foremost focus should be to liberate the mind from what is not new… I am not talking about rejecting the past… liberating the mind from what rules it, determines it… in that process allow the mind to receive the new.

Corporate worker: Constantly breaking conditioning that we may develop (which is a natural human process), constantly being aware of conditionings and then moving past them.

Philosopher: How to develop our faculties? It is more interesting for me because I am too long in this philosophical framework and not much has happened – so I am looking for more concrete answers. Not only to be influenced by some mystic presence – which must be there,

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without which nothing can proceed… but, something more from our side. What shall we do as educators? Shall we just wait for it? Will that do everything for us? Most probably not. Something is expected from us also. So, what shall we do?

Educator: Actually our current education system does not address the inner needs at all – so people don’t have an exposure to it… it is not there in the curriculum. It is assumed that people are not interested or they are as yet at a level of consciousness where it cannot be done. But, I think something has grown in the wider consciousness. People are open to it, provided we also become more open in our own minds that this can be done.

For me the question of a new curriculum begins with a new kind of facilitator – that is the key. Also, it is not just the mental ideal of a curriculum, one must also be living that curriculum – it should be living within you – it should be something that resonates with your soul – you live it day-in and day-out and then you embody it. Outer spaces we can create, we can create structures, but if the facilitator is not there, the leader is not there – then outer spaces remain dead because there is no-one to help in intensification of consciousness, of quietening and stilling of the mind, of inviting new faculties to be invoked and expressed. The facilitator is the key. The ‘newness’ will come from my consciousness. It is the whole question of the Yogic consciousness that develops within and then expresses itself.

It should be growth of consciousness that manifests in action/in life, which can be perceived and also evaluated. It should not be just a feel-good factor – it should actually create a change.

Entrepreneur: If you take work as offering or service, and the value of that is much higher than the money in exchange… once this kind of higher aspect of service, offering comes and this new currency develops of servitude, then a new organizational structure comes out that is invisible. That’s going to be the future structure – where the leader is invisible, where everyone is a leader.

Aligning people to do whatever they believe in. If they believe strongly, just align them. When they start believing strongly, then the leader is pushed out, not needed.

Lawyer: One more point regarding the people who come together – governance or administration or education – have to be people who can work together, who have a higher aspiration, who are

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open to learning. These are the attributes of the people who will govern, who will lead – aspiration, motivation higher than themselves, they should be learners.

Social venture From what everyone has said, it is coming out to: TransparentCapitalist: ownership, aligning with your higher self, having a macro

and micro ability to hold, having the ability and service as in karmayoga – attributes of a leadership of a hierarchy, not a flat structure.

Educator: The leader might have very strong values, but other individuals might bring in a lack of values into the structure or society.

Lawyer: For a leader to be a leader he has to be living those values so that it permeates to the entire group – in that lies the success or the failure of a leader. That leader can be an individual or a group.

Administrator: Fluidity. The governance has to be very non-biased, as much objectivity as possible. Sometimes you believe that if you let go, the cause will suffer. Another principle I lay a lot of emphasis on is the means, not just the end. You can’t take short cuts, then in the long run the larger good, the society will suffer.

Therapist: The aim of the governing body should be to uphold the higher consciousness.

Educator: How does one create a learning environment of Love? How about the discords? How about our own shadows and dealing with those? How does the environment help us to deal with the shadows – with our ego, with pride, with arrogance, with jealousy, with envy? How does one deal with that? These are important questions even if we don’t find the answers.

Artist: The key is the psychic being – to have the psychic being as our centre and always connect back to it.

Corporate worker: To take that forward I would say it would be constant awareness of what I am doing, all my actions, all my thought processes along the way so that I am aware of what I am feeling. Of course, these feelings are there, they are human, they are a part of us. First of all to accept that without denial that I am feeling this negative feeling. There has to be space for that as well.

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Educator: What about those who have not as yet decided to do Yoga?

Healer: I also think it is necessary first to acknowledge this and then, even if they have not decided to do yoga, take a distance, and say, this is only a part of me, there is another part of me. If they do not know that this other part exists, then there is trouble. But the acknowledgement of the shadow gives the opportunity to step out of the shadow, and then you can invoke. Even with people who do not do yoga, you can say that just bring it out, bring it to the light, offer it to the light – whatever light may mean for them. This acknowledgement that well that’s in me, but I am not that, that can be changed, it can be offered.

Educator: Sometimes, it takes a long time for some people to come out, they need their time. And the environment therefore needs to be such that it can take that shadow for some time, before the person is ready to let go of it, and ready to want to move forward. Sometimes people want to stay where they are for some time, sometimes they have to leave and go out and come back, sometimes they are able to deal with it. It’s very mixed, you have every possibility that exists. How do we, therefore, have a learning environment that nurtures Love? Spontaneity does it but it has to be more conscious than just that.

Healer: And sincerity and trust on both parts? On the part of the ones who come in, who really want to work on themselves, and the ones who are there, who really want to work on themselves. And trust on each other, trust in the process, trust in this journey, to bring this out – I think this can foster Love.

Artist: Every culture, every society, every organization has different facets of consciousness. The people in the hierarchy are going to be the holders of that part of the consciousness, protectors of that part of the consciousness that needs to manifest.

Entrepreneur: Whatever structure you decide on has to be flexible enough – that is the primary concern. We are presently working on this from our present level of consciousness, and I am hoping that it will evolve. And as it will evolve, the structure should be flexible enough not to disrupt or obstruct in moving forward. There should be flexibility in the structure, for instance, the molecular structure.

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Artist: What will differentiate is a certain kind of preparedness of consciousness – for e.g. a person governing money or a person governing operations, there has to be an inner understanding of the real force of money, an inner understanding of what karmayoga is. If the highest person knows the truth behind, then that person will be the guardian of that truth, the guardian of that consciousness that needs to flow in this new structure. It is the truth behind that is important.

The first physical act would be inwardisation that the structure needs to provide through physical spaces or through the atmosphere, through the process of beautifying, where the inner being is allowed… the people are allowed to get into the truth of their being, allow that atmosphere.

The psychic being is the one that knows the truth of the being. We have to allow that atmosphere for that identification with things and knowledge. If we can gather or start with things around to have that freedom and play, that will give the new element.

Chorus: In these new worlds projected he became A portion of the universal gaze, A station of the all-inhabiting light, A ripple on a single sea of peace. His mind answered to countless communing minds, His words were syllables of the cosmos’ speech, His life a field of the vast cosmic stir. He felt the footsteps of a million wills Moving in unison to a single goal. A stream ever new-born that never dies, Caught in its thousandfold current’s ravishing flow, With eddies of immortal sweetness thrilled, He bore coiling through his members as they passed Calm movements of interminable delight, The bliss of a myriad myriads who are one.7

(The words ‘myriad myriads who are one’ reverberate in the silence.)

Leader: The element of Love in governance, and especially in the core, I would like to call it the nucleus of love – we need to bring in those qualities in the way we govern, the structure needs to embody love. That’s so new, because that creates an element of nurturing, of embracing of the earth, of being, which is completely absent, and that’s why we are so one-brained, one-sided in everything we do.

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I want it to just put it clearly. I want to express it as an element in governance. I want to put it in a way that it is absolutely in contradiction to everything that governance is all about. Governance is normally about domination, and power and direction. But actually it is all about creating an atmosphere, or an inner… you don’t even have to express it. It is Consciousness of Love in Governance.

Entrepreneur: And if all action also comes from a space of love…

Leader: Yes, then it can be very powerful. It is something we have to aspire for, it is not something we always have, yet we all have it in us. Consciousness of Love and not consciousness of power and domination. It just changes the whole vibration.

Philosopher: Nurturing of the psychic qualities will be the governing principle. There is a psychic presence in all Nature… faculties are everywhere, and consciousness pervades everything. And in that sense if you look at the faculties of consciousness, you will see that they have to be ignited, they have to be nurtured by the psychic presence growing within them. These are given in Mother’s terms as verities of consciousness – sincerity, humility – that is properly psychic which is going through the faculties. That’s why faculties can be more sincere.

Green worker: Those who have this consciousness, would also be able to perceive points of resistance to the coming down of this consciousness, and be able to quietly work on them; to know and to be aware of these points of resistance and to work on it is very important.

Leader: I think what you are talking about is the faculty of discrimination of the shadow and the light – just to be able to see that these are the shadows and they need to be brought to the light or the light needs to flood them. To acknowledge the shadow, to perceive it, and to engage with it.

Educator: These are elements that should exist in the governing structure. It is not saying that every individual needs to completely embody perfectly all of these things. But when they all work together, these elements would emerge.

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Entrepreneur: For the governing body... if we were to offer service as an offering… every work is done as a service. Not just without any expectation (disinterested service), but service as an offering (to the Divine)...

Leader: What kind of structure would embody Love, Flexibility, Receptivity, Disinterested Service, Fearlessness, Gratitude, Openness to the Divine… what kind of structure could embody these elements? What kind of structures in life, in nature embody these elements?

Chorus: The Banyan Tree symbolizes the New… Heaven and Earth equal and one Immortality, Self-renewing Eternal consciousness Rootedness, Continuity and change Divine protection and grace Expansive, Circle of Life, Evolving Embracing oneness and multiplicity, stability and movement Umbrella of protection Unity in strength

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Epilogue

There is a deeper seeing from withinAnd, when we have left these small purlieus of mind,

A greater vision meets us on the heightsIn the luminous wideness of the spirit’s gaze.

At last there wakes in us a witness SoulThat looks at truths unseen and scans the Unknown;

Then all assumes a new and marvellous face:The world quivers with a God-light at its core,

In Time’s deep heart high purposes move and live,Life’s borders crumble and join infinity.

This broad, confused, yet rigid scheme becomesA magnificent imbroglio of the Gods,

A game, a work ambiguously divine. …Amid the figures of the Ignorance,

In the symbol pictures drawn by word and thought,It seeks the truth to which all figures point;

It looks for the source of Light with vision’s lamp;It works to find the Doer of all works,

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The unfelt Self within who is the guide,The unknown Self above who is the goal.

All is not here a blinded Nature’s task:A Word, a Wisdom watches us from on high,

A Witness sanctioning her will and works,An Eye unseen in the unseeing vast;

There is an Influence from a Light above,There are thoughts remote and sealed eternities;

A mystic motive drives the stars and suns.In this passage from a deaf unknowing Force

To struggling consciousness and transient breathA mighty Supernature waits on Time.

The world is other than we now think and see,Our lives a deeper mystery than we have dreamed;

Our minds are starters in the race to God,Our souls deputed selves of the Supreme.

A new creation from the old shall rise,A Knowledge inarticulate find speech,

Beauty suppressed burst into paradise bloom,Pleasure and pain dive into absolute bliss.

A tongueless oracle shall speak at last,The Superconscient conscious grow on earth,The Eternal’s wonders join the dance of Time.

*

- original text: Several*

Concept: Ameeta Mehra, Script: Anuradha

* The script is based on verbatim reports of the 3-day charrette (29-31 March, 2013) held at The Gnostic Centre, to focus on Academy of the Future (an upcoming project of the Centre). The participants (whose words and ideas form the material for this script) were: Aditya Ahluwalia, Aloka Mariona Marti Gich, Ameeta Mehra, Amit Gujral, Anu Chabra, Anuradha, Aurelio, Chali Grinnell, Harpreet Kaur Jass, Hemant Lamba, Jean-Yves, Jyoti Saikia, Kakoli Banerji, Karan Gupta, Manisha Verma, Matthew Rich, Mayank Mishra, Monica Gupta, Natasha Nair, Nitika Gujral, Partho, Pradeep Sachdeva, Rahul Sen, Rajalakshmi Malhotra, Ritika Goyal, Sanjay Prakash, Shashi Bala, Shibani Dara, Suhasini Aiyer, Sumita Ghose, Sunaina Singh, Swetha R Prakash, Toine van Megen, Ulrike Strassmann, and Vladimir Yatsenko.

3 The Mother: CWM vol.15 (16 January 1962). All other Sri Aurobindo: Savitri; Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust.