AUM — Vol.II-2, No.12, 27 December 1975

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> I am the way, the God-Soul.

— from The Absolute by Sri Chinmoy

New Year's message

New Year's message¹

The animal in us will unimaginably be destroyed. The human in us will unreservedly be frustrated. The divine in us will supremely be satisfied.

The animal in us is self-doubt. The human in us is self-indulgence. The divine in us is self-offering.

Commentary and questions on the New Year's message

Commentary

It is a mistake to feel that each year has the same potentiality or opportunity. No, each year has a special message. Each day comes from God, although each day need not be God’s choice Hour for realisation, perfection and satisfaction. But if we divinely use our sincere capacity, then this year will be the year of real satisfaction. If we don’t do that, then this year will undoubtedly prove to be the year of destruction.

Last year was the year of success and progress. We made considerable progress in our inner and outer lives. At the same time, the undivine forces also made considerable progress. If we properly cherish our sincere inner cry, this will be the year of inevitable satisfaction. If not, it will be the year of real destruction, disaster. If the divine forces within us win, then our self-doubt and self-indulgence will be destroyed, which means transformed. Self-indulgence and self-doubt will not be there. Alertness and self-offering will replace them. But the divine forces will win only if we consciously and constantly side with the divine forces. Otherwise, there is every possibility that the undivine forces will destroy us. This does not mean that we will die this year, but our inner life may die. Then we will feel that we are dead souls.

Question: Does this New Year's message apply to the world at large, or primarily to your disciples?

But in some of the disciples all the success and progress was made by the undivine forces in them. These disciples are also part and parcel of my inner life. Good and bad forces assail us. The bad ones we have to transform into good and the good into better. This year also, either the divine forces will win most powerfully — they should win, must win 100 per cent — or the undivine forces will destroy our life of aspiration.

Question: Usually I think of self-doubt as the human quality and self-indulgence as the animal quality in us.

The animal in us is doubt because it is ready to devour us, the reality in us, at every moment. It is hiding inside the mind like a hungry wolf, and as soon as it sees something good, it tries to devour it. Anything that is good in us can be devoured by doubt. The human in us is indulgent because it has not received abundant light. The divine light has not yet illumined the human in us fully. When it is indulgent, the after-effect of this pleasure-indulgence is immediate retribution. When the human in us goes to the wrong extreme, it suffers immediately. There is something called divine nectar, which is ecstatic delight or bliss, and when the human in us goes in the right direction, which means with the divine, then it will have all ecstasy and delight.

Question: When I see myself cherishing indulgence and I start doubting my sincerity, what should I do?

Question: What are the forms of self-indulgence that we must transform?

Lecture to ministers of the Unitarian Universalist Church²

I come from India. My teaching is founded upon one Sanskrit word, ‘Yoga’. The significance of this word is ‘spiritual oneness’. This oneness cannot be established by talks. You and I have given hundreds of talks. This oneness is established only by self-giving. Self-giving is truth-becoming and God-becoming. Yoga is oneness with the highest Truth, which is totally free from religious, political, racial or geographical boundaries. This Truth is also the goal of the Unitarian Church. If your goal and my goal are identical, then I am perfectly safe in the heart of my spiritual brothers and you are also safe in the very depth of my heart.

Now I wish to share with you some of the things which I teach to my students. You may call them my disciples, my followers, but I wish to say that to me they are like members of my family. We form a small group and we belong to one boat, the boat that is carrying us to the Golden Shore of the Beyond. This Beyond can be a vague term or this Beyond can be a living reality. We need only to realise that there is a goal. Before we reach that particular goal we call it the world of the Beyond. Once we reach that goal we feel that it is nothing but a new starting point. Each day in the inner world we try to reach our goal. Sooner or later we do reach it. When we reach our goal we feel that that very goal is nothing but a starting point for a higher goal.

We feel that God the ultimate Truth is also in the process of eternal Self-transcendence. He is infinite, He is eternal, He is immortal we all know, although we often try to bind Him. But He does not want to be bound and He does not want to bind us. The higher, the deeper we go, the more we feel that God Himself is always transcending His own Reality and that we who are His conscious, chosen instruments are also doing the same. Each day we aim at a new goal and each day, consciously or unconsciously, we arrive at a new goal. Each day we look forward to something new, something more fulfilling, more satisfying.

We call our path the path of love, devotion and surrender. Basically it is a path of the heart, and from my own inner knowledge, inner aspiration, I feel that yours is also absolutely the same. What we want is universal oneness, founded upon love and peace. We are doing the same thing; we are in the same boat. We have adopted different names and different forms, but in reality we have the same spirit, same goal, same soul, same awakening.

I came to the West by following an express command from my Inner Pilot. Each time I see an individual I try to see my Inner Pilot inside that individual. And each time I get an opportunity to be of service to an individual I feel that my life on earth is blessed with some purpose, some significance, some reality. So I have not come here just to give a talk. I have come to make you feel that I am of you and I am for you in the Heart of the Absolute Supreme. We are like a rose or a lotus growing inside the Heart of the Eternal Reality. Each individual is a petal, and the flower is blossoming petal by petal. We are getting ready to be placed at the Feet of the Absolute Supreme, for He needs us as we need Him.

It is our misconception that tells us that God does not need us but we need Him, like beggars. No, we need Him, but He needs us more. How can we say that He needs us more than we need Him when we are so weak, so helpless, so meaningless, so insignificant? How is it possible for us to say that He needs us more than we need Him? It is precisely because He knows what we are. We are exact prototypes of His all-embracing, all-fulfilling Reality, although we do not know it. We are helpless and hopeless because we are earth-bound; we treasure and cherish doubt, consciously or unconsciously, and then we forget our reality, our divinity, our immortality. But He knows that we are of Him and for Him; therefore, He constantly reminds us of what we are and teaches us how we can feel in the inmost recesses of our hearts that we are of Him and for Him. The philosophy that we are studying and the school that we belong to teach us one truth: it is by self-giving that we eventually grow into the very image of God.

There is a message unparalleled in Indian history. This message tells us that today we are crying to realise God, tomorrow we shall realise God, and the day after tomorrow we shall do something more: we shall become consciously aware of the truth that we are not only of God and for God but we are God Himself in the process of realisation and manifestation. This God you can call anything you want to: infinite Light, infinite Energy, infinite Bliss, infinite Peace, Infinity’s self-expanding, self-transcending Reality. This is what we all are in our highest.

Again I wish to say that what you are doing and what I am doing is the same. The truth that we embody we are consciously, soulfully, devotedly and unconditionally trying to place before mankind. We are human beings. Some of us are awakened, fully awakened, while others are in the process of awakening and still others are still asleep. We are trying to knock at the door of those who are awakening or still asleep. We believe in God’s Hour. God’s Hour has struck for us to knock at the heart’s door of the seekers who can run with us fast, faster, fastest toward the goal. And that goal is universal love, oneness in realisation, oneness in revelation, oneness in manifestation.

Questions and answers

Question: I think that some of us might be interested to know what your view is of the thinking of Dr. Radhakrishnan, who was probably the best known philosopher of Hinduism in the rest of the world. When he died, you remember, there was almost a page devoted to him in _The New York Times_. Has his thinking made an impact on your religious philosophy?

As far as I know, Dr. Radhakrishnan was a philosopher, a thinker. Now, Indian philosophy is founded upon Indian religion, and Indian religion, which we call Dharma, is founded upon Yoga. But Yoga is something that one has to practise. It is not theoretical. It is more than practical; it is a living reality. At every moment we have to live it and practise it in order to grow into the very image of that reality.

Dr. Radhakrishnan knew about reality only in its theoretical aspect. In his practical life, unfortunately, he did not practise it. Anybody can speak on philosophy, on truth, even on the ultimate Truth, but if that particular person does not live those truths, then we feel that there is a yawning gulf between the reality that he understands or believes in and the reality that he embodies. In the case of Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda, Sri Aurobindo, Ramana Maharshi and others, they not only knew the reality, but they grew into the reality itself. For them it was a living reality. You could not separate that reality from the man. But in Dr. Radhakrishnan’s case, he was the man and reality was somewhere else.

Question: Your practice of Yoga seems to be distinct in some way from the practices of other teachers. When someone comes to you to be a disciple, on what basis do you accept them? What do they have to do in terms of Yoga? In what way is your path distinct from the paths of others?

The heart means oneness. As soon as I see you, if I feel oneness with you, then you are meant for me, and I am meant for you. But if I try to analyse and scrutinise you and want to know how much wisdom you have or how much capacity you have, then at every moment I will be subject to suspicion, doubt and various wrong forces. So when I look at a seeker, the first thing I see is whether the seeker is really in the heart and for the heart. I go deep within for guidance from my Inner Pilot to see if that particular seeker is ready to follow the path of love, devotion and surrender. The seekers whom I am unable to accept may be sincere, absolutely sincere, but they have to know that they can make faster progress if they follow another path or another Master.

At the end of our journey, my Inner Pilot will not ask me how many millions of seekers I have brought to Him. He will ask me whether or not I have brought the seekers that He wanted me to bring to Him. The number is not important. If I try to take someone who is not meant for our boat, then He will be displeased with me.

If a seeker wants to follow the path of the heart, then there is every possibility that the seeker will fit in with our path, which is divine love, divine devotion and divine surrender. Human love we know is a fast train. It is an express train whose destination is frustration. Frustration is immediately followed by destruction. But divine love is a local train. Slowly and steadily it reaches its destination, which is illumination.

Human devotion is just another name for attachment. We are usually not conscious of it, but eventually there comes a time when we see that it is nothing but attachment, unconscious attachment. Divine devotion is our oneness-cry to the reality, our feeling that there is a purpose for our lives, and our need to establish our deepest oneness with that purpose.

Human surrender is the surrender of a slave to the master. It is forced, fearful and resentful surrender, not spontaneous, loving and devoted. We surrender to our boss because we feel that if we don’t, he will dispense with our services. This is forced surrender. But divine surrender is totally different. Here the finite becomes fully aware of its infinite Source. When a drop enters into the ocean, it becomes the ocean itself. The tiny drop surrenders its limited existence and what does it get in return? It gets the message of vastness, Infinity. This surrender is spontaneous, natural and cheerful. It is divine surrender, surrender to our own highest reality, of which we are right now not conscious.

Question: If you were to accept a seeker who was meant for you, would he be practising or following certain specific exercises?

The exercises do help to some extent. If you are wanting in physical fitness, then you will not be able to meditate well. But we should not give too much importance to physical fitness. The boxers, the wrestlers, the athletes of the world are physically extremely fit. But in terms of peace of mind, those who meditate will be much better off than they are.

Physical postures and exercises are like the kindergarten class. You can easily skip it and go directly to primary school. Concentration, meditation and contemplation are the higher courses. One can easily start with concentration. Concentration paves the way for meditation, and meditation paves the way for contemplation.

When we concentrate on a particular subject or object, we focus all our attention on it. We try to place in front of us the tiniest possible object or the tiniest possible thought; then we concentrate, we penetrate. The minutest thing that we can possibly imagine will give us the best result from concentration. If we keep a flower in front of us to concentrate on, we try to enter into the fragrance of the flower, into the essence of the flower.

When we meditate, we do just the opposite of concentration. At that time we enter into something vast. When we meditate, we try to feel inside us the vast sky, the vast ocean or the infinite universe. We try to expand our consciousness as far as possible.

When we contemplate, at that time we become consciously one with reality. In contemplation the divine lover and the Supreme Beloved become one. When you contemplate on something, you feel that very thing as your own reality. You become the object of your contemplation. The lover and the Beloved become one. This moment you see God as somebody else or somewhere else. But when you approach Him through contemplation, you see that He is also approaching you. Now you are seeking for reality, thinking that reality is something other than yourself. When you contemplate, you will see that what you considered reality is running after you, because you are the reality itself.

Question: I was going to ask what part Hatha Yoga had in your discipline, but you have already answered my question.

Question: You mentioned two paths, the mind and the heart. I was wondering if they were mutually exclusive or is there a combination possible?

I have come here as a seeker. If you remain in the realm of the doubting mind, at this moment you may think of me as a good person, but before I leave this place you may think of me as a bad person. A few minutes later you will ask yourself whether you were right in assessing me as a good person or a bad person. Then you will start doubting yourself. The moment you doubt yourself you are totally lost. By thinking that I am a bad person or a good person you don’t lose anything. But the moment you start doubting your own assessments you are totally lost.

If you follow the path of the heart, your inner feeling will tell you whether I am a good person or a bad person, and that feeling will last inside your heart for days, for weeks, for months. It is a question of identification. Once you identify with me, my entire reality is yours.

I wish to say that the body, vital, mind and heart all belong to one family, the family of the soul. The body, instead of remaining lethargic, must become dynamic. The vital, instead of remaining aggressive, must become expansive. The aggressive vital wants the entire world to remain at its feet. Like Napoleon and Julius Caesar, it wants to conquer the whole world. But that vital we don’t need. We want the vital that will expand like a bird that spreads its wings.

Question: I find that search and doubt are part of the same thing, that part of searching is doubting. I'm not sure of your meaning of doubt.

Question: I think one of the reasons I experience this doubt, as well as other people, is because there are so many bad teachers in the world.

Question: I'm not sure how truthful it is to say that we are all doing the same thing, we all have the same goals. I'm not sure I am. When Billy Graham says that to me I resent it. When Moon from Korea says that, I resent it. I don't know that we are in the same boat that you are. I think many of us have this dichotomy between personal religion and social religion. We understand that in some societies and some religions and some periods of history there has been some emphasis on social religion hurting the individual. But as Unitarian Universalists, many of us feel that at least historically there is a social dimension in our faith, a very strong social dimension. And I don't feel it or see it coming from your religion. You're saying we'll convert the individual and there will be a better United Nations, a better America, a better India. I think we say that we convert the individual, but also we must convert groups of individuals; we must change institutions and change society. And I don't perceive that you are in the boat about personal religion and social religion.

Question: I think people would say that the way in which you choose to discover yourself is not good for people because it tends to turn them inward, so their attention is more exclusively on themselves rather than on making the kinds of changes that have a significant impact on large numbers of people. And by concentrating on one's own fulfilment and self-discovery a lot of other things that are of greater need to the world are neglected, in a sense.

Real spirituality does not mean entering into the Himalayan caves and remaining closeted. Far from it! Ours is the path of acceptance. The spiritual path that we are following demands the acceptance of the outer world. But we are not satisfied with our own lives or the lives of others right now. We want to change the face of the world for the better. If I have no capacity, then how can I be of service to you? And to develop capacity I have to dive deep within and establish a free access to the highest Source so that I can become a perfect instrument of that Source to be of service to earth in the best possible way.

Question: Once they have looked within, then what do your people do socially for the world?

Question: Is there another kind of Yoga that is specifically for service?

Question: Is there any difference between prayer and meditation?

Poems from _The prayer of the sky_

We are happy

You are happy

Your desire-life

He is happy

His aspiration-life

I am happy

My surrender-life

I depend on God

I depend on you;

I depend on him;

I depend on myself;

I depend on God;

Transformed

Immortalised.

Inside their hearts

For the sake of vision-soul,

Of Heaven.

For the sake of creation-role,

Of earth.

For the sake of perfection-goal,

Of the eternal Pilot.

The prayer of the sky

The prayer of the sky

Of vastness-light.

The prayer of the moon

Of beauty’s right.

The prayer of the sun

Of duty’s delight.

The prayer of God

Of Compassion’s might.

New Age Community

The NEW AGE COMMUNITY staff visited the Vancouver International airport recently to greet Sri Chinmoy as he departed the Vancouver Area after a brief visit to Victoria.

Interview - The jewel of humility³

Sri Chinmoy: My work is love and my work is service. I try to love mankind and I try to serve mankind according to the limited capacity that God has granted me. Only to love Him in aspiring mankind and to serve him in the service of mankind. This is my only work.

NAC: What shape does your activity take in that service?

Sri Chinmoy: We have about fifty centres all over the world and I visit all the centres and they keep inner contact with me. I have written over 250 books and my students follow my writings. I go to the United Nations twice a week where we hold meditations for the delegates and the members and the staff. We try to serve mankind in the Committee of Nations according to our inner capacity which I call my devoted soulful service. This is what I do. Everywhere I try to serve and whenever I get an opportunity to serve I feel my life on earth is worth living.

NAC: Do you relate to the politicians at the United Nations?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes and No. Not in their political capacity, but when they come to me as seekers. I myself, being a seeker, can talk to them on a spiritual level but not on a political level. Politics is not my forte, whereas I know a little bit of spirituality. So when the politicians come to me as seekers, I try to offer light to them.

NAC: Are there many politicians seeking actively?

Sri Chinmoy: That is a difficult question to answer. There are some politicians who do not want to disclose their names, but they do take my help, secretly. They don’t want to be exposed, they don’t want to attach themselves to the so-called religious or spiritual life, but they do come, and again when we have soulful meetings, they come and join us in the capacity of seekers and not in the capacity of politicians.

NAC: It is a very fine work. Do you have a space set up for you to do your work?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes.

NAC: Is it an official capacity that you have there?

Sri Chinmoy: Previously, I have been the spiritual director of the meditation group — it is official. It is an official group at the United Nations and also recently I have gotten the honour of being an honorary delegate. They call it NGO — Non-Governmental Office.

NAC: From the point of view of a lot of people, the world is a very cruel and negative place and their consciousness is not in a position to absorb the negativity. What can you say, or what service can we perform (we in the largest sense of the word), to help with that situation?

Sri Chinmoy: I fully agree with you. What we should do is to cultivate more soulful patience. Patience is the length of time. Right now the world is far from perfection. It is almost half animal world that we are living in. We quarrel, we fight, these are the tendencies of animal life. But again there is an inner cry in us to do something, to become something, to go into something that will give us abiding satisfaction. This inner cry is something that wants to transcend what we have now and what we are now. But, perfection does not come into existence overnight. It takes time.

So, what you need, what I need, what others need, is one thing — soulful patience. And we have to know that patience is not something weak, something that we are forced to surrender to the hard reality of life, No, it is inner wisdom. Our inner wisdom needs patience, length of time. The seed — as soon as we see a seed, we expect the seed to grow into a plant and become a tree — a huge banyan tree. But if you know that the seed takes time to germinate and gradually to become a plant, and a tree; if we see the vision of our patience, then one day we will see that Truth will grow into reality, will manifest reality. So what the entire world needs is soulful patience. Let the Truth grow in its own way.

NAC: When one is engaged in a way of life which is not satisfactory to the person and one feels the first tug to become seeking, (I am asking this question because a great many people who will be listening to this radio program and reading this interview will be in that position), one has the impulse to do something. The philosophy and the ideals and so on make some sense but we here in the West have the impulse to do something to make it happen. Is there anything practical, direct, that you can suggest for someone to do?

Sri Chinmoy: Now here I wish to say the best policy is to become something, then do something. First become — then give what you have. This is a Golden Rule. But again, if we have an inner pilot, suppose we have a master who is representing the inner pilot for us. In offering you are becoming. Self-giving is God becoming. Now, self-giving can be at any place at any standard of one’s whole life. You become the fruit, then you offer yourself for everybody to eat you as the most delicious fruit. You grow into the fruit yourself, you give. If that is the Will of God.

But we have to know whether we have free access to the inner pilot or not. If the inner pilot tells us ‘do this’ and in the process of doing, you are becoming. This is one theory. The other theory is that when you become something then you give. If you are not something what are you going to give. This is the general rule.

There is a special rule that when one is being guided by a higher force, and the higher force says ‘I need you as my instrument, or I have accepted you as my instrument, you please me’. As in the Gita, Krishna said in the last moment to Arjuna, ‘Surrender to me, I will do everything for you really and truly, I will do everything.’ But if Arjuna had to wait to become something then he would have had to offer to the world, and that would have been also one process. But Krishna did not want this. Shri Krishna said that he had only to become an instrument. If that is the case, then one has to listen to the dictates of one’s master who is representing God for him. This is free access to the inner pilot. Inner pilot is saying, ‘do this’, in the process of doing you become what I wanted you to become.

NAC: Most of our minds are so confused and our bodies so tense that We can't listen to the inner self, or even if we can there are so many conflicting voices that we don’t know which one is true. How can we cut through all that?

Sri Chinmoy: It is a most interesting question. Mind here creates tremendous problem for us. But only if you want to hear accurately the message, the voice of the inner pilot. Then you have to know one thing — as soon as we get the message we will see that this message is giving us inner joy, inner satisfaction. Then you see that as soon as you carry out the message, the message will bear fruit and this fruit will come in the form of success or failure. Mind will accept it as a success or as failure. But if you can take the result with the same cheerfulness if it is success, or failure, with the same amount of inner strength, inner courage, equanimity, then the message is coming from the soul, otherwise we will be extolled to the skies as soon as something heavy comes in the form of success and we will be doomed to disappointment if failure appears. So only from the result will you know whether we have gotten the real message. If it comes directly from the deep inmost reaches of our heart, from our soul, then the result will not be important; only the most important thing is our way of executing that message. And the result will come to us only in the form of success or failure. But if you can offer both success and failure as an experience which is building us to grow into the supreme reality, if you have that kind of feeling or conception for the message, that is coming forward, then you are getting the message from within, from the inner pilot.

NAC: Are you optimistic about the future of humanity?

Sri Chinmoy: 100% optimistic. Because I love God. God, I know will not allow us to ruin His creation. We are His creations, nobody likes to destroy his own creations. We are God’s children. We may do everything wrong, but out of his infinite bounty, he will give us eternal time to turn over a new leaf.

NAC: Do people look to you and bow to you as master?

Sri Chinmoy: They look to me and bow to the Supreme in me, I always tell them. Our Master is only the One God and the Master is inside me and inside you. When they bow to me I know who is getting it, it is the Supreme in me, and when I bow to you, I know who is getting it, the Supreme in you. Not to me, not to the body, not to Sri Chinmoy, but to the inner pilot of Sri Chinmoy, they bow, and I bow to the inner pilot of their own existence.

NAC: What shall we do with these characters who go around calling themselves ‘perfect masters’. How shall we talk to them?

Sri Chinmoy: I am the last person to say anything. I am not the right person to pronounce any judgement. Everybody knows what is good for them. I know what is good for myself, they know what is good for themselves. They are doing the right thing according to their inner light. We are trying to do the best thing according to our receptivity. We are all responsible for our own rooms. They are responsible for their rooms; I am responsible for my room; you are responsible for your room. You can come and see what I have in my room. I have no right to say what they have in their rooms.

NAC: How old are you, Sri Chinmoy?

Sri Chinmoy: I am just 44.

NAC: You appear in the Vancouver Airport as an ordinary middle-aged businessman in you summer suit. Why is that? Why are you not clad in your Indian robes and all that?

Sri Chinmoy: In my case I know who I am — a seeker. When I am holding a meeting, it is easier for the seekers to identify themselves with me when I wear Indian robes. If I am in need of a policeman, if I see a policeman wearing his uniform, then immediately I go to him, because he is the right person. So when I am holding meditations, I am the right person to be of dedicated service to offer spiritual light. But like a policeman, he doesn’t work 24 hours in that capacity. Inwardly he knows he is a policeman, I know I am a spiritual seeker, so here I don’t have to act as a spiritual teacher, spiritual Master. Whereas when I hold meetings at the United Nations, there I have to wear it because there I represent what I inwardly am.

NAC: I don't know if it's possible, but do you feel any sort of urge to create a song right now?

Sri Chinmoy: I can sing you a significant song, a song which has stood first out of hundreds of songs. “Oh my boatman, do carry me to the golden shores of the beyond.”

[Sri Chinmoy sings a beautiful song in Indian style and dialect]

I am extremely grateful to you for having given me the opportunity to be of service to the aspiring mankind through your own most exemplary practise, spiritual discipline.

NAC: Thank you. God Bless you.

Jharna-Kala news

Question: Up to now, it has been a marathon — a lot of paintings in a short span of time. Will you arrive at a point where you will slow down and do only one or two large, detailed paintings?

I am a consciously devoted machine or instrument. He who utilises me is far beyond speed. In Puerto Rico, when I did 181 paintings in one hour and fourteen minutes, I was constantly talking on the phone and to the people around me, but I did not lose my highest consciousness or my speed. Sometimes I feel sorry for my hand because it has to go so fast.

Question: Many painters paint objects, like birds and flowers, but most of your paintings seem to be abstract.

Question: In essence you are really painting what you see?

Question: Some people feel that your type of art expresses realities that have never been seen by the world before.

Question: By revealing these scenes to the ordinary world, have you incurred any anger from the cosmic gods?

Question: Are there any other human artists who have consciously or unconsciously tried to express these other planes?

In school I studied art for only two or three years, and art was not part of our family. In our family we never cared for painting, only poetry; that is why I write poetry easily. If one member of my family had been a great artist, painting would have been easier for me.

Question: Once when you were showing us some paintings I had the feeling that each picture had a soul.

Question: Would an artist have a better understanding of your paintings than an ordinary person?

Question: Is it true to say the human mind as we know it was surpassed? Was it your highest aspect that saw the things that you have painted and you only used the human mind to capture them on paper?

Question: Given what you just told us, do you think in ten or fifteen years people will accept this as a different form of art?

Question: Most of your paintings have been small. Will you do larger ones?

Question: Why can't the small ones be enlarged?

Question: You have worked in many media since you started painting. Which is your favourite?

Question: What is the particular quality of acrylic that you like?

Question: Are the colours that you see inwardly much more brilliant than what you paint?

Question: Sometimes some of the great artists and poets of the past have done works that seem to have been divinely inspired, but their lives did not seem to be spiritual. How is it that one's life can be undivine and his work divine?

The Supreme is not bound by anything. We think that if a person has a bad character, the Supreme should look down on him. But the Supreme sees Himself in all His creation. Who is having the experience in and through the person? The Supreme. The Supreme’s unconditional Compassion does not depend on what a person does in the outer life. Although a person may not be saintly, as long as he is sorry for his weaknesses, at that time the Supreme’s Compassion knows no bounds.