Table of Contents
Part One: Spiritual and philosophical articles
- Man and God
- Within us is our goal
- Our peace is within
- Who is fit for Yoga?
- The strength of surrender
- Meditation: Individual and collective
- Has your soul a special mission?
- How far are we from realisation?
- The role of purity in the spiritual life
- Two secrets: Reincarnation and evolution
- What is the aim of life?
- What is spirituality?
- What is Yoga?
- Bhakti Yoga
- Karma Yoga
- Jnana Yoga
- What is God's plan?
Part Two: Section 1. Questions and answers on the inner life
- How can one reconcile America's inner decay and crassness with her evolving spiritual awareness?
- Do you not feel that national boundaries, economic disparity and religious dogma divide human beings into different camps, creating unspiritual environments and making peace, for an individual as well as for a nation, a distant star?
- I would frankly like to know what India's spirituality has ever done for her. How is it that in spite of her yogis and saints, she is still a poor and backward country?
- Could you please tell me why people in India worship so many gods and goddesses and not one?
- The caste system is absolutely bad. Why do you have it? Can you say even one word in favour of it?
- If an Indian living here marries an American girl, will his parents accept them when they go to India?
- Is it true that some people in India can walk on fire? Doesn't it scare you or astonish you?
- In India, the wives surrender to their husbands. Why do they not care for their own individuality?
- You have explained to us what the supreme surrender is. Now I would like to know from you what the supreme sacrifice is.
- If man, when dissatisfied with the world, escapes the world and seeks out higher planes of existence, how will humanity ever be able to establish peace and happiness on earth?
- My wife, who is otherwise the most reasonable of beings, insists that all religious beliefs are delusions brought about by existential anxiety. Most people find the thought unbearable that there is no meaning in life except for the biological and rational fact of life itself. But this, she feels, should satisfy anybody. The fact of death, she believes, is to be similarly faced as a biological reality. It is an old theory, which I realise can neither be proved or disproved at an intellectual level.
- I believe that love is always the same, whether human or divine. Is this true?
- You have been speaking of faith. Could you make it a bit easier for me to understand this concept?
- How may we strengthen our inner faith in God when we are beset with discouragements in our daily life?
- I have studied a good many scriptures. I also indulge in preaching about spirituality, religion, the inner life and so forth. But personally, I feel a barren desert within me. I get no satisfaction at all from what I am doing. I feel I am wasting my own precious time and that of others. Could you possibly enlighten me regarding this?
- Would you kindly advise me as to whether I should leave my wife and child in order to enter deeper into the spiritual life?
- Are spiritual experiences absolutely necessary to realise God?
- Why do you believe in rebirth? I know pretty well that I shall go to God when I die. And that's all.
- Do you believe that in each incarnation the individual improves himself?
- Does the law of karma apply to everybody?
- To pray to God or to work as God wants us to work: which is the better of the two?
- You said there are different ways of approaching God: action, devotion and knowledge. If one person possesses all these qualities, will it help his progress?
- Will you please tell me something about meditation?
- In order to come into closer contact with one's Self, to know the mysteries of one's inner Self, what is the correct procedure? I believe that meditation is where answers will be given about one's inner Self. Is this correct?
- Are there any set procedures one must follow in order to meditate correctly?
- But very often I may not recognise my inner Self. I do not know whether the voice I hear is the inner voice or the outer voice, and this is extremely confusing.
- What is the difference between the voice of Silence and the voice of Yoga? Or isn't there any difference?
- When I try to meditate, I get a feeling of oceans and water before my mind's eye. This creates fear in me, and I cannot meditate very well. How can I meditate without getting this feeling of oceans and water?
- Sir, when did you come upon the thought that there is an inner Self within yourself? And after you discovered that you had an inner Self, how did you make a connection with other people who were not aware that they had an inner Self?
- There are seven planes of consciousness in the spiritual development. How can I determine which plane I belong to?
- You are always using the word "consciousness". What exactly does it mean?
- Do we have control of our consciousness?
- How do I work on my consciousness?
- What is the meaning of AUM?
- Is it better to meditate on AUM or on God?
- Is God a mental being?
- How can one move ultimately towards success, believing that "As thy feet bend, so bends the path"? Is that really possible?
- About the vision and its fulfilment, how do you know that you are having the right "vision"?
- Guru Chinmoy, you were speaking about the vision without the mind. Is this what is known as intuition? Or is intuition something else?
- Is the mind itself a kind of machine connecting the higher and the lower?
- In the old books they talk about Nama-Rupa, Name and Form. Words are Nama-Rupa right? Ideas are Nama-Rupa. Now this is not really God. These are human concoctions. The meaning is a manufactured thing. There is no reality in the word itself, true?
- Sri Chinmoy, in the Hindu tradition one speaks of how Atman equals Brahman — the individual soul equals the Universal Soul. Jesus Christ once said, "I and my Father are one." These two statements, coming from two different spiritual backgrounds — are they, in the spiritual light, one and the same?
- Would you care to elaborate on the statement, "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you"?
- What exactly is the ego?
- How was the ego born? How did it come into being?
- How do we weaken the ego and ultimately subdue it?
Part Two: Section 2. Questions asked by children
- Gurudev, I want to ask you something. If I break an egg, can God put it together again?
- Can you do it?
- Can I do it?
- Is it true that anybody can become a yogi if he really tries?
- What does God look like?
- How come you can see God and I can't?
Part Two: Section 3. Questions and answers on the soul
- Is the soul always with the person during his lifetime, or can it leave him temporarily, even making its home elsewhere?
- During sleep, does the person's soul make journeys?
- Can a person's body and consciousness so change during his lifetime that he becomes fit for a finer soul to enter him?
- Does a change, such as purification, during the lifetime, change the soul?
- When we think another's thoughts, we let ourselves tune in to his "psychic" agitations. However, if we tune in to one whom we believe to be grounded in the Source of his being, his soul, would this be a valid practice, at least until our own spiritual unfolding developed?
- How does one know if his soul is happy?
- Does the soul cry when it is unhappy?
- Are there two sets of instructions within the person, one from his deepest nature — which includes and unfolds all in goodness and compassion — and the other, which is clever about "me" and "mine"?
- Can the soul be equally represented in dreams by an old woman, wrinkled and wise, as well as by a young baby babbling a new language?
- Is the soul both male and female?
- Is it the soul that makes the decision in selecting a new body in each incarnation?
- Is it the soul that must surrender to the Cosmic Self?
- Does the soul get new instruction in its development, or does it merely uncover what it has always known?
- Does the soul experience loneliness? If so, how does this differ from our superficial need to have the company of others, regardless of whether we like them or not, simply because we want someone to talk to?
- Does the soul make demands on a person so that he has to change his ways?
- How different is this from the demands the ego makes?
- When the vital or mental tries to satisfy itself without the soul's approval, what happens to the soul?
- Do things or places have a soul? For example, does a chair have a soul, does a city have a soul?
- Does the earth have a soul?
- Can the gross ever give the subtle anything? That is, can the soul become stronger by the right use of the body such as exercise, right food, and so on?
- Can the soul select what the individual is to experience in the manifested world?
- Approximately where in the physical body does one feel a sense of soul?
- If the body or personality is the newcomer and the soul is the real landlord, or lord, then how is it that the newcomer, which is always seeking satisfaction, can so suffocate the soul that its inspiration cannot be heard?
- When someone is described as having a young soul or an old soul, what does this mean?
- Do things move faster with a young soul because there is less overlay from previous incarnations?
- What is the difference between "strength of soul" and "strength of character?"
- Could the soul that inhabits a human body have inhabited an animal body or a plant in previous times?
- Do souls differ in their characteristics?
- What is the connection of the soul to past and future karma?
- Where does the soul rest when it first leaves the body? Does it carry over its bodily or earthly limitations?
