Transformation is IN THE WORK ITSELF

Individual and Collective

Here's the Mother revealing to Satprem that “the individual work of the body's transformation” is concurrent with and complementary to the work for the collective:

"But in your case… it’s your mission, you understand. I don’t know how to explain. I always, always see you in direct and constant contact with… with this Consciousness expressing itself; so when it reaches the mental level, you’re as if… arranging pawns on a chessboard. I’ve looked very, very often: it’s indispensable, it’s an indispensable work, and extremely useful. Naturally, my body, too, might say, “If instead of seeing all these people I were all the time like this (gesture huddled in the Lord), working to hasten the transformation, it would be very pleasant!” For you too, it’s like that, but we’re here to do something. That’s it. And it’s a certainty, a certainty because several times when things became critical, I have told the Lord, “There, it’s for You to decide—whether to stay on or to go… and rest blissfully.” And the answer has ALWAYS, always been the same: 

There’s work to be done.

We are here because we were sent to do the work, and as long as work is necessary, we must do it. When it’s time for the work to stop, we will be free to go… and rest blissfully.

It’s IN THE WORK ITSELF—I see that—it’s in the work itself that the other work, the individual work of the body’s transformation, is done; if we were concentrated on this [the body], we would probably upset many things. It’s better to… It’s by doing the work as we should that the body is put in the condition necessary for it to benefit from the…

As for me, my impression was that mental activity acted as a “buffer,” if you like, and prevented …

No, no! No. This mental activity is what the Supreme Lord is expecting of you. That’s it. That’s it. So then, instead of being an obstacle, it’s THROUGH this activity that the work on the body is getting done. You understand, the only truly individual work is the work of the body; well, for you, it is done through your work, just as for me it’s done through my work. The whole thing is simply to be like that, aware that it’s not a hindrance—this work is what is expected of this body, that’s all."

https://incarnateword.in/agenda/10/november-29-1969 (in full)

Thus soon after in 1970 the Mother's Specific Guidelines for anyone aspiring To Be a True Aurovilian:

1. The first necessity is the inner discovery in order to know what one truly is behind social, moral, cultural, racial and hereditary appearances.  At the centre there is a being free, vast and knowing, who awaits our discovery and who ought to become the active centre of our being and our life in Auroville.
   
   
2. The fulfilment of one’s desires bars the way to the inner discovery which can only be achieved in the peace and transparency of perfect disinterestedness. One lives in Auroville in order to be free from moral and social conventions; but this freedom must not be a new slavery to the ego, to its desires and ambitions.
   
   
3. The Aurovilian should lose the sense of personal possession. For our passage in the material world, what is indispensable to our life and to our action is put at our disposal according to the place we must occupy. The more we are consciously in contact with our inner being, the more are the exact means given to us.
   
   
4. Work, even manual work, is something indispensable for the inner discovery. If one does not work, if one does not put his consciousness into matter, the latter will never develop.  To let the consciousness organise a bit of matter by means of one’s body is very good. To establish order around oneself helps to bring order within oneself. One should organise one’s life not according to outer and artificial rules, but according to an organised inner consciousness, for if one lets life go on without subjecting it to the control of the higher consciousness, it becomes fickle and inexpressive. It is to waste one’s time in the sense that matter remains without any conscious utilisation.
   
   
5. The whole earth must prepare itself for the advent of the new species, and Auroville wants to work consciously to hasten this advent. 
   
   
6. Little by little it will be revealed to us what this new species must be, and meanwhile, the best course is to consecrate oneself entirely to the Divine.

https://auroville.org/page/core-documents (integral and inseparable)

And of course all the rest of the Aims and Principles for the invited participants in Her Auroville, such as the following:

https://incarnateword.in/cwm/13/aims-and-principles

The Great Cosmic Play of Dark and Light continues, concentrated here in Her Auroville.

Towards the Life Divine.