Master: What is it?
Girish: I want love of God for the sake of love.
Master: That kind of love is possible only for the Isvarakotis. Ordinary men cannot achieve it.
I asked the Holy Mother, "What does the Master mean by that?"
Mother: The Isvarakotis have all their desires fulfilled in God (purna-kama). Therefore they have no worldly desires. Love for the sake of divine love is not possible so long as a man has any desire.
Disciple: Mother, do your own brothers belong to the same level as these Isvarakotis?
I thought that as they were her brothers, they must have the same spiritual capacities as the monastic disciples of Sri Ramakrishna. At this the Mother simply looked scornfully, as if she were going to say, "What a comparison! What can one achieve by simply being my brother! To be the intimate disciple of the Master is quite a different thing!"
One morning the Holy Mother was assisting in husking paddy. It was almost her daily job. I asked her, "Mother, why should you work so hard?" "My child," said she in reply, "I have done much more than is necessary to make my life a model."
One night, all were asleep in the house of the Holy Mother when the husband of Nalini, a niece of the Holy Mother, arrived unexpectedly with a bullock cart to take Nalini to his house. Nalini had returned from her husband's place and did not want to go back. Hearing of her husband's intention, Nalini shut the door of her room and threatened suicide if her husband forced her to go back with him. The Holy Mother, however, assured her that she would not have to go back with her husband and she opened the room. There was confusion in the family for the whole night and the Holy Mother sat through the night on the porch of Nalini's room. She put out the lamp at dawn and repeated to herself, "Ganga, Gita, Gayatri, Bhagavata, Bhakta, Bhagavan, Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Ramakrishna!"
One day the Holy Mother sent me with an old servant of the family to Pagli's (the mad sister-in-law's) father to persuade him either to come to Jayrambati or to return the ornaments he had taken from his daughter. After a great deal of persuasion, he accompanied us but did not bring the ornaments with him. The Mother