Question: Would you call the ability to communicate directly with one's own Master without the use of the spoken word a form of psychic power?

Sri Chinmoy: Psychic power is not required to contact one’s own Master. It is done through devotion, through implicit faith. Where is the Master? You are here in Puerto Rico and your Master perhaps is in New York, you say. But no! He is deep inside your heart, deep in the inmost recesses of your heart. If you want to contact your Master at any time, just enter into and plumb the depths of your heart, and you will find him there.

Psychic power is not required, but only devotion and faith. When you have devotion, the Master, or the person whom you are praying to is at your beck and call. Sri Krishna, India’s foremost spiritual Master, said: “It is easy for God to give Power, Light, Bliss and all other divine qualities to a disciple. But if He gives devotion to the disciple, which is also a divine blessing, then He is caught. The moment the disciple gets devotion, the disciple can rest assured that his Master has become his perfect slave. A true devotee is very, very rare in this world. But a man of knowledge and wisdom, a man of light or a man of peace can very often be found.

Lord Krishna had a very intimate disciple named Vidhura, who was very, very poor. It happened that one day Lord Krishna visited Vidhura’s house. Vidhura could not give him rice or a proper meal, so he served Sri Krishna a very simple meal on plantain leaves. Sri Krishna’s heart swam in a sea of ecstasy and delight. What did he do? First he ate the meal, then he ate the whole plantain leaf. Vidhura asked, “Master, what are you doing? You are eating the plantain leaf. This is not food!” Sri Krishna said: “O Vidhura! How can I separate your food from the plantain leaf? How can I separate your devotion from your existence? In your meal I see devotion, in your body I see devotion, in your heart I see devotion, in your plantain I see devotion. Whatever I see with you, around you and in you is all devotion. I can no more separate the meal from the leaf than I can separate your soul from your body.” So this is what happens when one has true devotion for God, for the Supreme. One gets the Supreme by his side all the time.

Now I wish to say something about faith. I am sure that all of you have heard about the Ganges, India’s most sanctified river. It is said that whoever takes a dip in the Ganges will be freed from all sins. Throughout the year you can commit all kinds of sins, and then if you just enter into the river, all these sins will disappear. This is our Indian belief. How stupid we are only God knows. Once Parvati, the consort of Lord Shiva, asked Lord Shiva: “Is it true that if once a man takes a dip in the Ganges all his sins will vanish in the twinkling of an eye? Do people have such faith?” He said to his consort: “Well, the best thing is for me to demonstrate it. Look, both of us will take human form and sit on the bank of the Ganges. I will be a very old man and you will be an old woman. You will be holding a baby in your lap and I will take away the life from the baby. Then immediately you start shedding bitter tears and crying that we have lost our only child. Many will come to console you and you will tell them: ‘If my son is blessed by a person who feels that he has no sin, he will come back to life.’

So they took human form and sat on the banks of the Ganges. Hundreds had come to swim and bathe in the river. Parvati said: “All of you here know that the moment you enter into the Ganges, all your sins will no longer exist. So go and have a dip and then bless my child, and he will come back to life.” Hundreds of persons passed by, but nobody wanted to do it. They were ready to swim, they were ready to take a dip or bathe in the Ganges for hours, but they knew that it would have no effect on the child. They would touch the child, but he would not come back to life. This went on for hours. Finally the bystanders saw a middle-aged man approach the lady who had lost her only child. This man had just come out from a bar. He smelled very unpleasant and, according to Indian standards, was what you would call ‘characterless.’ The man came to her and asked, “Why are you crying?” She said, “I am crying because nobody is coming to bless my child, although everybody here knows that the moment they bathe in the Ganges all their sins will leave and they will be able to bring my child back to life.”

“You are crying for that? I have faith. Let me go.” So he jumped into the Ganges, and in a couple of minutes he came back and touched the child. Immediately the child returned to life. Then Lord Shiva said: “See! Out of thousands only one person had faith in the Ganges!” And with this Lord Shiva, Parvati and the child disappeared.

Whenever we do anything we say that we have faith. but we are only fooling ourselves. This man never cared for the spiritual life or anything, but he knew that the Ganges actually came from the Himalayas. All India’s spiritual Masters have great admiration for the Himalayas, and most of the Indian Vedic Seers meditated in the caves of the Himalayas. This man had boundless faith in the Ganges. Most of us would have gone to the Ganges but would not have dared to touch the child, because nobody wants to be a laughing stock. When it comes to the practical life, most of us will fail. And almost all of us who might have come and touched the child would have seen that we were not successful, because we lacked true faith in the Ganges. But that particular man did have faith in the Ganges. If we have true faith in God, we need not meditate twenty-four hours a day; just a few minutes will serve the purpose. If we have that soulful faith in God, then God takes care of us.