She is here. It is God's Plan. We did not know each other on the physical plane, but we have known each other for centuries. I am aware of it and now she is becoming aware of the fact, because I am making her feel and realise our previous connection. This connection was that we were fully acquainted in India, that we knew each other, that she aspired for the spiritual heights and that I assisted her spiritually. It is only on the strength of our previous connection that we could become spiritually so close.
On the physical plane, I think we have not known each other even for a year. Even this was through correspondence. It is not even a year. I stay in New York and through circumstances, which came from the Supreme's Will, we met.
Alo's sister, Marcia (Gariyasi), had met Sudha in the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec. She told Sudha about Alo who was in India at the time. Sudha asked Gariyasi to inform her whenever Alo returned to Canada. Gariyasi informed Alo in Pondicherry, also.
When we returned to the West, and had begun publishing our AUM magazine, Alo wrote to Sudha, enclosing the third issue of the magazine, the orange-coloured issue. Sudha wrote to Alo, saying that she was profoundly moved by Sri Chinmoy's writings and asking for a year's subscription. She got the magazine; she concentrated on me and I concentrated on her.
After one or two telephone conversations, Sudha invited me to come to Puerto Rico and address a number of very serious seekers who had been involved in the spiritual life for many, many years. Most of them were Sudha's friends and fellow-seekers.
Sudha: And you are here, divine Gurudev. It is God's sublime Grace to us.He says that (as you know) God is in the Church, but also He is in your heart. But the God who is in your heart is more compassionate and more divine than the God who is in the Church. Your heart's God is all the time for you; He is absolutely pure, and He is absolutely for you, whereas the God in the Church, receiving different vibrations from many, many people and some undivine priests — the atmosphere may not be so good.
But you must continue going to the Church. However, please pay more attention to the church inside your heart. This heart contains your religion fully and, at the same time, divinely. Unfortunately, in some of the Churches, it is full of dogmatism. But your heart is full of love, full of purity for God. By God's Blessings, you will get infinitely more when you go to your own inner church. This church is religion in its purest form. Since you have been brought up as a Christian, you must go to the Church, but you must pay more attention to your own heart-church.
Now, secondly, your husband definitely says that if you do not like the particular priest at all, then you do not have to make any confession to him. If you feel that you have made a mistake or have done something wrong, he wants you to stand in front of his picture and touch your heart and speak out to him. Touch your heart with your right palm, and immediately he will get your confession and he will unite his soul with yours. He will pray to God to give you more Light and Illumination. You will definitely go to God, but your husband does not want you to make any confession to the priest that you dislike so much.
Then your husband wants you, for one hour a day, one precious hour to start with, to do some work for the world, some work that pleases you most. Now this work you will do under no compulsion, but out of free choice. You will select some work, and you will do it for one hour a day. Your soul wants it, needs it.
Your soul is extremely beautiful. Your soul embodies God the Beauty and God the Splendour, plus the purest consciousness of the fairy. You belonged to a royal family in your past life, closely associated with the reigning monarch. Your family was like that of the Barons. You were adored and even worshipped for your divine qualities. You were very tall and very strong, with a beautiful stature and long hair.
In the next life, you will be greater. I know that your present life will be changing very soon. The darkness that is going to attack you will be thrown away by your inner light and life. You need not fear for anything because I shall be there to help you. No matter where you are, Auntie, in Spain or in Puerto Rico, I can help you.
If you want to send a message to your husband, I can do it. Your husband repeatedly tells me that he cares much more for your heart's religion than anything else. Again he is giving me this message, "PLEASE DO ONLY WHAT YOUR HEART SAYS AND NOT WHAT OTHERS SAY." Your heart will never fail you, but some of the religions have been corrupted by uncomely human thoughts, feelings, ideas and prejudices. However the aspiring heart can never be contaminated. It is so pure.Then from now on, think of God more than you think of religion. God is in every religion. He is in all religions. If you go to God, you fulfil all religions. I know God. I feel God. I speak to God. So I have fulfilled all religions. If you want to perfectly fulfil all the religions of the world, then try to go to God. The religions are life-rivers flowing towards the Ocean.
In one's heart is the Garden. In the Garden is a mango tree. You have come into the Garden, but you have not taken permission from the Owner, so you cannot touch the mangoes. However, if you make friends with the Owner, He tells you to take as many fruits as you wish. Similarly in our life there are many fruits: Peace, Light, Power and so forth. They are hanging on a tree. If we go to the Person who owns the tree, we get all the fruits. Otherwise, we will see all the fruits, but will get nothing. If you pray to God, you will get everything. If you try to please your friends, relatives, priests and religion, and forget to please God, you will not get anything. You will waste your own time by pleasing human beings. But when God is pleased, you will be truly fulfilled. If you leave God aside, you will never be able to please any person in this world. But if you give yourself to God, He will be so pleased with you that by pleasing Him, you will, at the same time, please everybody else.Now the person who feels that he is about to be destroyed does not have that capacity. He feels utterly helpless. He feels that he is going to be destroyed in no time. So we cannot expect anything from him. He who is going to be destroyed cannot save his own life; it is somebody else who has to come and save him. The one who is under the water is going to be drowned, so what can he do? He has to raise his hand so that another person can lift him up.
Now, in Whom does the person who feels himself about to be destroyed emotionally have all faith? In the One who is going to help him, inwardly, silently, spiritually. He has to feel that his outer life, which is on the brink of extinction, has to be surrendered either to God directly or to a spiritual person who is able to act as an instrument of God the Absolute Supreme. This spiritual person will infuse the sufferer's entire being not only with Divine Peace but also with the Divine Power, Divine Light and Divine Happiness. So the sufferer must go directly to the Absolute Supreme or to the one who represents Him.The AUM Centres are having special meetings today, celebrating Guru's fourth anniversary in the West and the initiation of his divine, spiritual work, assisted and shared by Sri Alo. Their work is to inspire humanity, especially the spiritual seekers and aspirants, teaching them how to know themselves, how to give purpose to life, how to attain the peace and wisdom which will carry the souls to the Feet of the Supreme.
I am sure that the greatest concern of each one of us here and of all their spiritual children all over the world is how to please them. Nothing I can think of would make them happier than the authentic dedication of all our actions to the Supreme, our authentic surrendering to the Supreme in them. Though these might sound not very difficult at the moment, it is not so easy in practice. But this is our challenge. Let us try it once and many more times until it becomes spontaneous and natural. Then we will not be far away from our Goal, our Self-Realisation. [Thunderous applause from the audience.]All of you can help mentally, while some can help physically. There are various ways to help or, you could say, to cooperate with Dacosta in running the Machine. The Machine is the Machine of the Supreme. This Machine will run with the inner help of each disciple here, and I wish each disciple to feel the necessity, the responsibility, of working on the Machine regularly to bring about its success.
This Offset Machine is our first adventure, our first divine adventure, to spread the message of the Supreme here in Puerto Rico. I am extremely proud that we have been able to buy this Offset Machine in this AUM Centre. We shall print my writings here in Puerto Rico instead of having them printed commercially in Brooklyn, New York.
This AUM Centre will give you my soul's message and, at the same time, the soul's message of each disciple here. It will also give us the message of humanity and even the message of the Heart of the Supreme.
So Alo will send Sudha the manuscripts of my spiritual talks, and I wish all of you to bring outside orders for this Machine and cooperate with Dacosta in this way. And those of you who are truly my disciples should feel my true joy, my true pride, in all that you do for the Printing Machine.
We shall be playing on this Printing Machine, as human instruments, the Message of the Supreme and the message of humanity.
MPR 9. 5 August 1968, Aum Centre. San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
My dearest disciples, my most humble request to you is to look at my picture, the latest picture which I call my "Transcendental Picture", the picture that houses my Transcendental Consciousness. Whether you can meditate or not is one thing, but to enter into my Consciousness is another. If you can enter into my Consciousness, I can assure you that you will get infinitely more than you expect from your own meditation.
If you can do both, if you can meditate well every day and, at the same time, enter into my Consciousness, naturally you will get infinite Joy, Achievement and Fulfilment.
Geography divides New York from Puerto Rico, but your Guru's and Alo's hearts' love and hearts' concern for the disciples have no geographical boundary. Most of you have felt it. I am sure that each day is a golden opportunity for the disciples to grow into their Guru's heart and for the Guru to grow inside the disciple's heart, each fulfilling the other in their one common mission. That mission is to fulfil the Divine, the Supreme, here on earth.
I am satisfied with your aspiration, concentration and meditation, collectively, but this satisfaction is not enough. Something more I need from you. I need the total dedication of your body, vital, mind, heart and soul. When we have made a total consecration of our body, vital, mind, heart and soul to fulfil the Supreme, it will become something more than my personal satisfaction: it will be the real glorification of the individual soul, the collective soul, the universal soul. It will also be the true glorification of our Inner Pilot, the Supreme.
To the closest and dearest disciples, I am glad to tell you from the very depth of my heart how your sincerity is ever pressing against my heart's door. Lovingly and gratefully, my heart's door will open in no time to welcome you, to place you on the golden throne of my spiritual heart, which is as wide as the universe. Please try, and I assure you that you will succeed and therefore I shall succeed.
MPR 10. 11 September 1968, Aum Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
Sri Chinmoy: I also would like to say a few words about Sudha. It is extremely difficult and, at the same time, extremely easy to tell all of you present here how close Sudha is to our hearts, Alo's and mine. We always refer to her as our physical daughter and mother. We always feel that we are on her strong shoulders. We are very heavy, but she does not mind.
When the question of concern comes, geographical boundaries immediately vanish. Her illness compelled us to fly immediately to this Centre. This is our concern for her. This is our soul's concern and heart's concern.
With the greatest joy and pride, we see her with us here today. We have prayed that she would not fall sick so often and that she should not become a victim to illness so often. If she does, I will be sad and miserable. I will be cross with her.
Alo Devi: Devaji, this is the first time she has been seriously sick.
Sri Chinmoy: Yet a very serious illness threatened her. When Alo heard her voice on the phone, Alo could not recognise Sudha's voice and thought it was someone else's voice.
I wish all of you to see in Sudha what Alo and I see in her: affection, love, sacrifice, total dedication to us both, and to the Supreme. I wish you all to be one with her, as she is one (or has to be one) with each of you. In all her sacrifices, love, devoted service to the Centre, to her spiritual parents and to the Supreme, I wish her to be one with all of you. Together we must grow.
All our disciples, the moment they have accepted the spiritual life, this path, have to go beyond, beyond, beyond the human, so-called necessities of personal, emotional desires or needs. They have to enter into the field of aspiration, the field of oneness.
I will get the deepest joy, and I can be the happiest man on earth, if the disciples have the capacity to make both of us the happiest beings on earth. If the disciples have this capacity, a sea of gratitude-tears will overflow from my heart.
My disciples here in Puerto Rico are truly strong. If they want to, they can make me the happiest man on earth. Again, if they want to, they can make me the worst possible street-beggar on earth. It is up to them to make me what they want. I will always remain faithful to the disciples, dedicated to them, no matter what they do with my life and Alo's life. But if they want to get real joy, real satisfaction, real achievement and real fulfilment, then I say they should please the Supreme in me. This way, they will also please the Supreme in themselves and in all their spiritual brothers and sisters. Then the Supreme will say that this Puerto Rican family of His is matchless and not only has His deepest Pride, but also will remain unparalleled and unique in the history of the inner world, as well as in the history of the outer world.
MPR 10. 13 October 1968. Aum Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
I am most grateful to each of you because last time, when we went to India for our visit and we were in great difficulty financially, we received some money from you. The disciples in New York became extremely generous when they found out about our difficulty. They gave us the necessary money. Then finally I received your money. I am most grateful to each of you. I thought of writing to each of you personally to thank you, but it was simply impossible.
From 8:30 in the morning until late in the evening, up to 11:30 pm sometimes, my friends, admirers, well-wishers, etc., came to see me and took away all my time. Then I had to concentrate at night on each of you, my disciples. Of course, I have an inner contact with those of you who have made a special inner contact with my soul and heart.
When we arrived in India, my sisters and brothers were overwhelmed with joy when they saw me, when they saw us. At the same time, the parting scene was unbearable. My sisters, especially, cried bitterly, as if I were already dead. I told my eldest sister, Arpita, "When I actually die, there will be no tears since you've used them all up here. There will be nothing left in your eyes. So you'd better stop crying now since you will have to cry again when I die." Then my sister Lily tried her best to control her tears, but finally she again burst out crying. This is Indian family life!
We shall come in May, both Alo and I together, for our regular visit. At that time we shall show our slides of India, the Himalayas, the spiritual pilgrimage places and other spots. Yesterday we showed those slides at our Centre in New York. The New York disciples liked them immensely. Here I am sure you will also enjoy them. We will also speak elaborately about India, our Mother India, Bharat Mata.
I come here with my heart's deepest love, joy and concern for each of you. You who have already come close to my heart and soul feel me at every moment of your existence, no matter where I am, whether I am in India, or in the West Indies, or in some other corner of the globe. I assure you, the closest and dearest ones, who have made themselves close to my heart, are bound to feel me, no matter where I am or what I do on the outer level. Here, on Thursdays and Sundays, when you actually start your meditation, no matter where I am, whether I am in a car, or in the street, or in a restaurant, as soon as the first disciple arrives here in this Puerto Rican Centre, there will be a tremendous knock at my heart's door. At that moment, I start my very special meditation on each one of you. That is what Alo and I have been doing.
I get great joy when I see our family of faces here. But when I see those who once upon a time used to come here regularly and now, unfortunately, are irregular, I feel very sad. I wish to tell you that in everything in life, there should be some regularity. I have not previously emphasised regularity, but you know very well that when you go to work regularly or you study at school regularly, you get good results. If you don't go to work regularly, the boss will fire you. If you don't study regularly, you will fail in your school examinations. Here our boss is the Supreme and no human being. But because He has asked me to take care of you, He has every right to command me to tell you what He feels to be best for you.
In New York, I have been extremely strict with my disciples. Here I am not. In New York, nobody can come to the meditations without my previous knowledge. If anybody wants to come, he has to send me his photograph. I concentrate on the picture and I inform Dulal, the President of the Centre, whether that person can be allowed to come or not. Then, if I do allow that person to come, the first thing I request is regularity in addition to aspiration. I tell them, "Aspiration is the fee." There is no monetary fee. Here in Puerto Rico, in New York and in other places, by the Grace of the Supreme, Alo and I have managed financially so that we are not starving. The disciples' contributions are taking care of us.
But if you want to be my disciples, you have to be regular. Here, aspiration you have; on the strength of your aspiration, you have pleased me. Regularity, however, is another matter. I am asking you and telling you that you can come to the Centre but you have to be regular. You have to pay attention to regularity. When someone comes regularly, faithfully and devotedly every Sunday and Thursday for four months, then I give that person an interview that lasts for forty-five minutes. Before that, I do not give interviews to newcomers. They have to complete at least four months in the AUM Centre.
Already four or five persons have been asked by me not to come to the Centre because of their irregularity. Yesterday I asked another lady not to come to the Centre. She then created such a scene, such a pathetic scene. But I cannot go against the Law of the Supreme. During our absence, while we were in India, not even once did she get the inspiration to come to the Centre. So I have asked her not to come any more.
In May, when we come back to Puerto Rico, we have to make the same kind of decision here. The time has come to be precise and strict. Those who really care for the Supreme have to be regular. At home they eat regularly; here they must feed their soul regularly. They feed the body at home; here is the place to feed the soul.
I beg to be excused. I come here not to scold you but to love you, to be one with each of you in your aspiration. All of you have sincere, true love for God, but that love has to be dynamic. It must be dynamic love, not inactive love.
In New York, since I have become strict, the result is most satisfactory. During our absence, only one particular lady did not come. Otherwise forty-eight or forty-nine members come regularly, without fail, on Sundays and Thursdays.
Here in Puerto Rico, I do expect you to come at least once a week. If you want Sunday or if you want Thursday, you are welcome to choose either day. But if you can come on both days, Thursday and Sunday, I will be so happy, delighted and grateful.
I do not know if you understand (or do not want to understand) that I have consciously taken responsibility for each of you who have sincerely, consciously and soulfully accepted me. You gave me your promise but, unfortunately, some of you have eaten up your promise. And I gave the same promise to the Supreme inside you, that I would guide your aspiration, the inner aspiration in you. So please give me the opportunity to fulfil the Supreme's Will inside you.
There can be no greater joy than regularity. Aspiration you have, but that is not enough. Along with aspiration, if you have regularity, then only will you achieve the Highest. When you are irregular, when you don't come to the Centre regularly during our absence, whom do you insult? Not the physical body, not the mind, not the soul in me, but the Supreme inside you, because the Supreme inside you has awakened and inspired you to lead an inner life. There are millions and billions of persons in life who are not awake, but you have awakened.
When you have awakened, the next step is to dive and to fly. Dive into the Deepest; fly towards the Highest. Run also to the Farthest. In New York, six or seven persons have already changed their jobs since they could not come on Thursdays for our meditation. I had told them that I would be extremely happy if they could attend on both days, Thursdays and Sundays. In case they could not come on Thursdays, they should come on Sundays without fail. But they wanted to become excellent disciples and, more than that, they wanted to feed their souls, their inner beings. So they left their old jobs. Now they have taken new jobs with lower pay. This is their real sacrifice, this is their true aspiration. Again I wish to say that this sacrifice is no sacrifice in comparison to one's highest realisation. If you get twenty or thirty or forty dollars less per month, so what? Whom are you getting in place of money? The Supreme. You are getting God, the living God who is infinite Light, Peace and Bliss.
Our Centre, this Centre in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is the Mother Centre of all our Centres. Here the AUM Centre was established long before any other of our Centres. Here, when you sing The Invocation, the Absolute Supreme dances with deepest Joy. I have told my American disciples that here in Puerto Rico you sing "The Invocation" in Spanish far better than they do in English. This was not the case even a year ago. But you have improved remarkably. A few months ago in New York I had to scold the disciples. I said, "My Puerto Rican disciples sing infinitely better than you people sing." When my Narayan (Raphael Elvira) plays The Invocation and you people sing, you just bring down Heaven on earth.
So at the end of my scolding to the New York disciples, I got a reward. An elderly lady, a very close disciple of mine who is very motherly to me, came over and said, "Guru, I know you must have a fever, and that must be why you are scolding us — because we also sing well. You say they sing better than we do." I replied, "No, I don't have a fever. I am telling the truth." Then she placed her hand on my forehead and said, "Well, your body is not overheated, but I feel that you must be unwell and that is why you are scolding us so unexpectedly." I answered, "Although I feel satisfied with the New York voices and the New York aspiration, I can only say that my Puerto Rican disciples really create Heaven on earth when they sing my Invocation to the Supreme. That is really what happens in Puerto Rico."
A few days ago, a young disciple of mine named Maureen Nestor, who is just eighteen years old and recently joined the Centre in New York, sang our Invocation. First Dulal taught her, then Alo taught her. Of all our disciples in New York, Puerto Rico, Kingston, Jamaica, or Miami, Florida — she happens to be the best singer of our Invocation to the Supreme. The other day — it was a Sunday afternoon, at our regular meditation — she sang it. You cannot imagine how soulfully, sweetly and divinely this young, delicate girl sang that song. I wish all of you could sing, individually, "The Invocation" as soulfully as Maureen sang it. Next time, we shall bring a tape of her singing and you will hear it for yourself.
Now, dearest Puerto Ricans, I wish to speak to you on a totally different subject. I feel that each one of you here has the capacity to inspire at least two other persons who are not disciples — persons in your vicinity or at work — and bring them here. But again, I do not want to increase our numbers only for the purpose of adding to our disciples. I am not like other Yogis. If I had wanted, I could have increased our numbers by thousands, especially in America. I have rejected drug addicts, hippies, people with perverted, emotional problems. These people are not welcome.
However there are sincere seekers who need a place to feed their inner beings, their souls. All of you have found that place. You will do the best service to the Supreme in yourself if you bring those seekers here, if you inspire them and bring them to the Centre. But mind you, only those are welcome who want to be awakened, want to be inspired and want inner Light.
So when we come back in May, I wish to see how many of you have sincerely tried to bring new, aspiring people. "New" or "more" does not mean all and sundry. It does not mean useless, unaspiring people. No. But there are many sincere and genuine seekers on earth crying for the inner life. The difficulty is that we do not know how to approach them, how to inspire them.
The time has come for each of you to inspire them. If I have the capacity to inspire you, you also have the capacity to inspire someone else. We are always satisfied with our individual success, our individual progress, but that is a wrong attitude. An individual — who is he or she, after all? He is the one who represents the universe. So an individual becomes perfect only when he sees the entire universe as his very own. His salvation is the quickest when he cries for the salvation of the entire universe, the whole of mankind.
Dearest spiritual children, please try to feel my heart's deepest love and purest concern for each of you. I come here with my heart's abundant love and my soul's deepest blessings. Each time I come here, I get profound joy and, at the same time, I get a few minor shocks. I wish to tell you that even though I receive unexpected shocks from you, you can rest assured that my love for you, my concern for you and my blessings for you will remain for Eternity.
There is a higher Truth, there is a higher Life, and we must, each one of us, attain to the spiritual perfection where this high, higher, highest Truth abides. Your imperfection is my imperfection. Your incapacity is my incapacity. This I say not out of sheer emotion but on the strength of my total oneness with you. I have become totally one with you in my heart. I am trying to give my realisation to each of you. Those who are crying for realisation are really climbing the ladder of the highest consciousness in me. They are getting an inner realisation in and through me. The road is arduous, but that does not mean that you will not reach the Goal. No, the Goal is destined; the Goal is ready; the Boatman is ready. You have to come and take your respective seats in the Boat and then see the capacity of the Boatman, whether he is capable of taking you to the Golden Shore of the Beyond. I pray to you: give me the opportunity and give me a trial. I wish to tell you that I shall not fail you. The only things I need from you are aspiration and regularity. The rest will be done by me.
If you have anything to ask, please do so. For your ultimate realisation, I feel that if I am strict with you, I am doing a good service to the Supreme in you. In New York, I have done it and it has been most successful. In Jamaica, West Indies, I am happy to tell you that not even one person has been irregular. There our number is twenty-three... I think it is twenty-four now. If you go through their attendance list, you will see how devotedly they have come to the Centre without me being there. I have come to Puerto Rico, I think, about twelve times, and there I have gone only twice — to Kingston, Jamaica. Of course, their Centre was established only last year but they are doing well, and I am going there on the 28th of March to see them. No demand in Jamaica: it is all love and concern and dedication that we get from them.
Here also in Puerto Rico we get love, dedication and devotion in infinite measure from some of you, but not from all of you. So you have to forgive me. Those who feel that they don't have to offer anything to the Supreme within themselves are really lucky! Please do not take this as a personal insult or as a scolding. I have come here neither to scold you nor to insult you. I have come here to love you and become one with you in your sufferings and also in your aspiration. After six months, I don't know what is going to happen here. If I have to become strict as I am in New York, I am sure that the situation here will become deplorable from the ordinary point of view, but not from the spiritual point of view. From the spiritual point of view, those who stick to the Centre in spite of the strict rules will be the real pillars of the Centre. Those who cannot do it will unfortunately create sorrow in their own lives.
A disciple of mine named Andrew Lepak has the spiritual name of Ribhu, which means "The son of Brahma, the Creator." He wrote me a letter in India and said, "Guru, I am now feeling you much more than when I stood in front of you. But please come back to us. If you want to stay in India, do stay for another month. You only have to write, telling me how much money you need. I will send you the money immediately. Stay there for another month but not more than a month. You have to come back again. I am feeling you more than I did when you were here, but you have to come back and not forget me."
So my inner being, my spirit, is all the time with you, with all my dearest disciples, no matter where I am. This feat I can do; your Guru is, after all, a realised soul. In this world, there are very few realised souls, especially in today's world. This I wish to tell you. Many people claim to have God-realisation, but God alone knows what calibre it represents. But a real spiritual Master, a true realised soul, is very, very rare on earth.
All sadhus and spiritual teachers proclaim that they are realised souls. Well, they have every right to tell people this; they also have every right to deceive people. But I wish to tell my disciples that if they have felt in me what I truly represent and what I stand for, they will be under no illusion. For inside me, the Supreme is living vividly, to guide each one of you. He has given me more capacity than I need to guide you.
In years to come, as Alo has prophesied here quite a few times, we will be known all over the world. It is not that our ego will push us forward, but it will be the dedicated service to the Supreme which will take us to many, many parts of the world. It is not ego that is pushing me or my disciples, but it is the selfless service with which the Supreme has entrusted us, that will compel us to work for the Supreme and serve Him all over the world. All of you have the same opportunity to dive into the sea of aspiration and dedicated service.
MPR 15. 17 March 1969, Aum Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
We shall be leaving tomorrow. Our physical will leave, but not the spiritual in us. The spiritual presence we shall leave behind. We are carrying with us your aspiration, your dedication and your concern.
The difference between an ordinary, unaspiring person and an aspiring person is vast. The deeper you go, the clearer it will be for you to realise how close you are to the Inner Pilot. During your meditation, you are feeding the inner Child. During your aspiration you are also feeding the inner Child. During your dedication-service you are likewise feeding the inner Child. Meditation, aspiration and dedication must go together. Most of you do not need to be told this, for you have realised it and are actually revealing it. It is now a truth in your inner lives.
At times, unfortunately, I scold you people. I scold you, if you can call it scolding at all, just because I feel that you, our disciples, are totally one with us. On the strength of our oneness I feel that my scolding is not scolding; it is only the recognition of our true oneness. In our oneness, if there is any limitation, imperfection or unwillingness, even unconsciously, then we must open to the Light. I feel that at every moment I have to make you aware of your highest Goal. So actually, my scolding is my loving concern for you, to make you aware, constantly, of your highest Goal.
This Centre happens to be the Mother of all AUM Centres. We are most proud when we announce this fact, that the Centre in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is the Mother Centre of all the AUM Centres that now exist and that are going to exist. The responsibility of this Centre is enormous. Here in this Centre, our spiritual mission, the Mission of the Supreme, started. Here we have to establish ourselves adequately, fully, divinely and supremely.
Each disciple, as I said a few minutes ago, has to please both Alo and me. At the same time, we feel that each disciple can offer his inner as well as his outer help a little more, if he or she really wants to. This is no complaint. This is no scolding. Only we feel that each disciple has the capacity to offer a little more of his dedicated service. Dedicated service can be of various types, as you all know. Right now the particular kind of dedicated service that we need most is to bring to the Centre more sincere and aspiring souls. If each disciple of ours consciously and gladly takes up the challenge, this divine challenge of bringing a new, sincere, aspiring person to the Centre, one who is really crying for a better life, a higher life, a more luminous life, then I shall be most soulfully happy and grateful to you.
We don't want to increase the numbers in the Centre just for the sake of numbers. That is contrary to our Goal. But we do feel that there are many aspiring souls around you who are crying for Joy, Peace and Light, and since you have the capacity, I want you to exercise that capacity.
This does not mean that you should go into the street, beating a drum and saying, "Oh, our Centre is a wonderful place! Come, come, everyone!" That will not solve any problem. It will also not help the persons you are trying to bring. But if you go deep, deep within yourselves, you are bound to see in your vicinity, in your area, people who are really crying for spiritual Light. The Supreme wants us to spread His Message, the Message of Light.
Each disciple has the right to spread the Message of the Supreme according to his own capacity, according to his understanding, his receptivity and his willingness to serve the Supreme.
It seems that, very often, the one thing that bothers the new seekers is the fee, the contribution of $5.00 per month. As you know, we need contributions for the rent and maintenance of the Centre. I feel that this $5.00 is not too much. However, I wish to tell you that the newcomers who would like to come here are under no obligation to be members of the Centre all at once. They may come to the Centre for days and months, even for years, and they are under no obligation to be members of the Centre. Just because they have aspiration and they want to lead a better life, a spiritual life, we welcome them. Later if they feel that they want to become part and parcel of the Centre, they are most welcome at that time to be members. But there should be no pushing and no influencing, on our part, to make more members.
We need and we want aspirants, and the Supreme feels that His Message of Light has to be spread all over. So I wish to make it very clear to each disciple, when he approaches a true, sincere seeker, that he should not tell his friend about any fee, donation, contribution, etc. His part will be only to inspire a newcomer. That newcomer will get Peace, Light and Blessings if he offers his own aspiration; his own aspiration will be his real fee. Those who have already become members, real members of our spiritual family, and are contributing this small amount lovingly, cheerfully, regularly, faithfully and devotedly are our true joy and our true pride. You people know the responsibility you have to our inner family and that gives us abundant joy. I have gone through our books, and as far as monthly contributions are concerned, practically everyone has been faithful and devoted. Again I wish to say that if amongst those who are contributing regularly, there are people who cannot contribute on a particular month, they should not feel miserable. If circumstances do not permit you to offer your contribution on a particular month, please do not feel embarrassed. What I need from you is your attendance, your regularity. That will satisfy me. In your regularity, we shall see your true aspiration. Money comes and money goes, but if once our aspiration deserts us, then we are totally lost. So we must be, all the time, conscious of our aspiration. Those who have already accepted this Centre as their very own must feel our deepest joy and our blessingful gratitude in their hearts. It is you who are supporting the Centre. It is you who feel the necessity to grow into a spiritual family together. We are extremely pleased with what you have been doing for us, dearest disciples. We feel only that you have the capacity to do a little more. Both Alo and I are positive that by the time we come back, either at the end of October or the beginning of November, we shall see some very remarkable progress and success that you will achieve for the Centre and for the Supreme.
When we speak about this Centre in New York, we speak with our highest pride and our mightiest joy. Each disciple must feel that the AUM Centre in Puerto Rico is his Centre, is her Centre. It is his spiritual family; it is her spiritual family. Each one should feel equally important in fulfilling the mission.
This time both Alo and I have observed something with the deepest joy: that all of you, without exception, have most divinely collaborated with Sudha in the undertaking of the Centre activities. This is something that gives us enormous joy and pride because it means that you know how to work together, how to work with your Centre President. Each person has to feel that this Centre is his spiritual, living breath. This place is the living, inner breath of the aspirant. Those who have launched into this path can rest assured that the Golden Beyond can never remain a far cry. Their Goal is destined. They are most fortunate precisely because they have been chosen by the Highest, by the Supreme. The Supreme is utilising them and the Supreme will fulfil Himself in and through each selected child of His.
In the Name of the Supreme, both Alo and I bless you. In the Name of the Supreme, we offer our deepest, blessingful gratitude and soulful concern to each of you present here.
[Sri Chinmoy chants A-U-M.]
Alo Devi: Guru is very close to our inner consciousness. When he gives the disciples work to do, he knows how they carry it out, even though he is not here physically. On the strength of his inner identification with each one of us, Guru feels and sees and understands inwardly how we are doing. So he wants each disciple to know that his or her work is appreciated and understood. It is not only in Sudha's absence but all the time, even when she is here, that Guru sees inwardly what each person is doing.
Sri Chinmoy: Each disciple is indispensable. I wish to say that each disciple should feel that he is indispensable, and at the same time — it is a paradox — nobody is indispensable.
When humility and devotion come to the fore, I wish to say that each disciple is more than indispensable. But when our human pride, arrogance and ignorance come in, nobody is indispensable.
So I wish all of you to feel our immediate appreciation and our very soul. Whenever you do anything for us, when you even bring a flower, I may not be physically here, but while you are bringing the flower, immediately my soul appreciates and blesses you. I may not be physically here, but spiritually I am here, and immediately my soul's deepest gratitude goes towards the person who is offering his selfless service to us. Outwardly you do not have to convince me of what you are doing or what you are bringing, because my inner recognition is operating. My inner recognition is immediate and my inner appreciation is also immediate.
I wish to make you feel that my soul is overjoyed and full of gratitude the moment you do something. So outwardly it is not necessary to convince me, because my soul gets the immediate message and sends you my Blessings.
Outer activities must be done always with love, devotion, surrender and the feeling of oneness. When one speaks out, that person has to feel that he is also listening to himself in the heart of somebody else. If I feel that I am saying something and you people are all ignorant — if I have that idea — then I am defeating my own purpose. When I give a talk, I feel that I am listening to you inside your own hearts. It is I who am learning something again in a better way.
So whenever you do anything, please feel three essential things: it is you who are acting; it is you who are seeing the results of the act; it is you who become the result of the act. So please try to be the doer and the action and the soulful and devoted result.
And as Alo said, even if you think one divine thought (let us say about God), my soul immediately records it. I have never told you, but I have thousands of pages written in my heart about each disciple. Early in the morning, every day, my inner being gives me the report of every disciple. It is not necessary to tell you outwardly. My business is to take you towards God and not to show you how much I know about you. My work is to make you feel that I really love you, really want you and really need each one of you.
The other day Frank (Nadeshwar) asked me something that touched me so deeply. He said, "How can we love you the way you love us?" When he was saying this, my whole heart was shedding tears of gratitude. This should be the attitude of each disciple, what Frank asked about. Whoever accepts me as his Guru should feel that I love him much more than he loves himself and more than he loves me.
A few weeks ago in New York, a disciple of mine told me, "The moment I think of you, I feel that you have been thinking of me all that time. But when I don't think of you, what will happen?"
I replied, "When you don't think of me, at that time, also have the feeling that I do think of you. The moment you think of me, feel that I think of you all the time. But if you don't think of me, nevertheless have the feeling that I am constantly thinking of you, because although you can live without thinking of me, I cannot live without thinking of you."
So what Frank said deeply touched my heart. I am constantly like a beggar, loving, loving you. Each of you is a most precious jewel, and that is why I love you. To be frank with you, I adore all your divine qualities. At the same time, when I see undivine qualities, my heart bleeds because sooner or later I have to be identified with those undivine qualities; I have to be in them, within them, in order to transform them into divine qualities. Let us, therefore, try to cooperate, the disciple and the Guru. Let us try to be good partners, divine partners.
When I place my hands on your head, I bless both the physical and the spiritual; that is to say, the soul inside the body. The soul came into this world in earthly form. On a particular day, it took the earthly form which is the body. That is the most important day in your life because the soul came into the world to fulfil a particular mission.
And you know that the main thing in life is to start the journey. If you don't start anything, how can you ever succeed in anything? The soul started its journey on a particular day here on earth, and in your case, I was trying to enter into the particular day when your journey started. I wanted to see how much promise, how much capacity and how much ability the soul had when it came into the world. Then I wanted to know about the hour of birth. In the West, when they note the hour of birth, they often make mistakes. In India, in the villages, the hour of birth is noted very specifically. Here in the West, I find that the hour given is actually the wrong hour, with differences of quite a few minutes. For example, Alo was born in the Western Hospital in Toronto on 18 August 1927. They told Alo's mother that she was born at 5:00 pm, "just in time for supper." But I see clearly that she was born at exactly 6:09 pm. That is a big difference.
In your case, it became a little more complicated because even your day of birth, your birthday, is wrong! You were born actually one day earlier than they say. But there is no harm; one day earlier or one day later — only it is difficult for the astrologers to cast your horoscope. But I am not going to cast your horoscope. I am only trying to keep track of the actual start of your soul's journey, because my purpose is to take you to your Goal.
Always try to observe all of your birthdays — not necessarily in offering cakes, not in preparing Indian meals, but in trying, on that special day, to think of God as much as you can and to think of me also as much as you can.
That is the best thing to do because, on that day, the soul has to renew its mission again, and each individual has to begin a new life, a new goal.
Each birthday is most important for the individual seeker. In the life of the seeker, the birthday is the most important day. But you should also know that in the case of a spiritual person, the spiritual birthday can be observed at every moment, because at every moment he will want to make an improvement in his life, he will want to reach something deeper, higher and more valuable. An ordinary person recognises his birthday only once a year, but a spiritual person is very wise. He says, "No, at each moment we are taking a new life, a new incarnation."
If you pray to God devotedly and meditate on God soulfully and regularly, your meditation will bring down into your day-to-day existence, into your thoughts and into your actions, the Wisdom and Knowledge of God. When you use that Knowledge in the form of speech and in the form of action, you will enter into others' consciousness. They will understand you, and you will understand them. At the present time, since you are only at the beginning of the spiritual path, people are misunderstanding you and you are not understanding them.
We want only inner Light. We want those who are the possessors of the inner Light; not the outer friends, not even the husband, the wife or the children. No, they do not possess that inner Light. He who possesses the inner Light and lives in this inner Light is in a position to bring down Peace for the seekers. He can also bring down Peace for the man who is suffering, the man who is disturbed or the man who is about to be destroyed.
Now, supposing that one does not have that kind of faith in the spiritual life or the inner life, or even the spiritual individual: then what are we going to do? The case may seem hopeless at that time, but it is not absolutely hopeless because that person has a soul. Each person has a soul. His mind may refuse to accept the truth that you want to offer. It is his mind and not his soul that refuses. However, that person's own soul will always try to awaken the person, the sufferer, so that he can get additional help from the spiritual person. A real spiritual person has the capacity to establish his oneness with the soul of that individual.
How does he do this? What he does is that he sends his own soul to the sufferer. The two souls become one and then they both enter into the physical mind of the sufferer. Then the two souls go into the person's vital and then into the physical. The soul that is already in the sufferer is not powerful enough to illumine the person, but if it has the help of someone else's mighty soul, and that person is a real spiritual man who invokes the Supreme to help the soul of the sufferer, we then have one soul, two souls and now three souls coming to fight against the ignorance of this sufferer, or the hostile forces that have attacked the person. These are the means that can be utilised in order to help a person who is suffering and even one who is on the verge of destruction.
MPR 16. 9 June 1969, Aum Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
It is not that I'm telling you this like a jealous person who does not want you to read others' writings. No, I am telling you this for your own good. Reading others' books may confuse your mind. Fortunately, I have covered, for my disciples, all the aspects of the inner life and the spiritual life, in my writings. For my dedicated disciples, I have written amply. If you study my writings every day, you will get a deeper truth each time you read them.
Take one article or even one single paragraph. Read it today. Tomorrow, if you read the same paragraph, it will bring you a different and higher Truth, a higher Light.
When I tell my disciples not to enter into others' spiritual writings, not to read them, it is because reading others' books may confuse their minds. Our people in New York read thousands of books; they read everything that falls into their hands. Then who is the loser? I am not the loser. My mind is not going to be affected if you read these books.
Unfortunately, books that have been written by people who are millions of miles from God-realisation are numerous. You read them and then you suffer. So I say that if you are going to read books, then read about the Christ, read books about Ramakrishna, Lord Krishna, Ramana Maharshi and Lord Buddha. But the so-called "masters," who are growing in the West like mushrooms, will only confuse your inner life and your spiritual life.
Meditation is your reading; meditation is your realisation. If you care to read my writings and then you meditate on even one line of my writings, you will satisfy me. And if you want to totally satisfy me, then you have to meditate daily without fail.
My spiritual presence, my inner presence can be felt by you in your heart every day. But I tell all of you to come here to the Centre because this is the spiritual home of the whole spiritual family. It is the divine house for the disciples of the Supreme. That is why I tell my disciples to come here. Here they will definitely feel the Presence of the Divine.
To come back to your question, Venu, if you read spiritual books about spiritual giants like the Christ, Lord Buddha, Rama, Krishna, Sri Chaitanya, Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Aurobindo and Ramana Maharshi, this will help you. But again I wish to say that if you read books by others who only express their own opinions about these spiritual Masters, you will be making a serious mistake. There are so many self-styled teachers who will only confuse you if you read their books.
Now I wish to tell you clearly and bluntly that if you accept me as your spiritual Teacher, you have to accept my teachings. My teachings (and my writings) can never be separated from my living truth, my living light and my living being.
If disciples do not have the time or the necessity to read my writings, no harm, but meditation you have to practise. Meditation is the common link, the golden thread between you and me. If you want to be inside me, or if you want me to be inside you, what is required is meditation. If you meditate, all your problems and all my problems will be solved.
In the beginning, one may read good spiritual books to learn how to meditate. After you have learned how to meditate, if you do not care to, you don't need to read any more books because it is meditation that brings God-realisation — not books. If you meditate, you acquire divine wisdom; if you study others' ideas, you are only borrowing from them.Now, there are other people who only want God's Will to be fulfilled. First they enter into their own inner consciousness or into their highest meditation to get the answer from God. If the answer is "Yes" (that God wants a particular person to be cured), then immediately they will use their own power to help that sick person.
Now, you asked something else in your question: "Does it not interfere with the law of karma?" Every sickness is a kind of imperfection. Sickness is always preceded by some imperfection either in our inner life or in our outer existence. It usually does not come into existence for any other reason. It is due to some inner disharmony from which it is manifested. Now when somebody is sick, it means he has done something wrong. That is why he is suffering. One can say that this is the law of karma operating. In either his past incarnation or in this incarnation, he has done something wrong and that is why he is suffering.
Possibly he has not taken proper care of his health. If one neglects one's own body, this is also a kind of inner crime, an injustice to the body. The body is a temple. Here in the body, God exists. So in neglecting the body, we are doing something wrong, and the penalty for this is sickness.
Here I want to say one thing. Why does God's Grace intervene sometimes? We feel that if someone has done something wrong, he has to accept the suffering. But no: although God is Justice, He is also Compassion. If we take Him only as Justice, naturally we shall have to go through all kinds of suffering as human beings. But if we take God as Compassion, if we approach Him through His compassionate Aspect, then God Himself can nullify His law of karma.
Again, it may happen that because of their tremendous love and compassion for their disciples, some spiritual Masters have taken upon themselves the diseases and sufferings of their disciples. Here the Master nullifies the law of his disciples' karma. Needless to say, the spiritual Masters do this only after taking permission from God. Then God Himself nullifies His own cosmic Law.
So a spiritual person, when he heals a sick person, enters into the compassionate Aspect of the Divine, of the Supreme, and then he effects his cure. God has infinite Aspects. Here His compassionate Aspect overrules His Aspect of Justice. If a spiritual person identifies himself with God's infinite Compassion, he can cure someone and, at the same time, he is not violating God's karmic Law.
So the first thing is to realise God's Consciousness. The next thing is to identify oneself with God's compassionate Aspect. When one does that, one does not violate the cosmic Law at all, because one is fulfilling God in a spiritual way, in God's own Way. He is actuating God's Compassion.The other way is Neti, neti — "Not this, not that." This approach is used quite often in India. "This" is not the imperfect world we see, but the perfect world that we are in. We are not imperfect, we are not undivine, we are not ill. We are something else. We are perfect and whole. So, in India also, they are dealing with the perfect aspect of the Creation, of the Universe, of the Cosmos.
If one uses a mantra or the repetition of a sacred syllable, if one constantly says that he is not the body; he is the soul ("I am the soul, I am the soul, I am the soul"), then definitely the qualities of the soul will come to the fore. The individual is constantly saying, "I am not the body," so his own consciousness will be in his soul. His soul's qualities will come forward.
Similarly, if someone says he is not a sinner, he will stop being one. But if he says, "I am a sinner, I am a sinner," he will be a sinner all his life. Again, if someone says he is not sick, then he may stop being sick. How? What is the opposite of sickness? He is invoking the perfection of the body. He says, I am not sick, I am all right." So the more he can convince his conscious mind that he is not sick, the more he gets sound health and a sound body.
This is the result of a positive action. If he can dwell on the positive aspect, then the negative aspect which has created the problem will disappear. Even an ordinary person, when he is suffering from a headache, can say, "I don't have a headache, I don't have a headache." He may stop suffering from a headache or he may reduce the pain.
Now, unfortunately an ordinary person may not be successful in doing this. Even though he says, "I don't have a headache," the headache may not leave him. Who can actually do this successfully? A real spiritual person who has been meditating for many years and knows what will-power is. I am not speaking about ordinary will-power. We use that term very often, but we do not actually know what true will-power is. A person who can utilise spiritual will-power, one who can exercise will-power can consciously convince the mind that he is not sick. But an ordinary person cannot do that. An ordinary person can repeat, "I am not sick, I am not sick," but who is it that is saying this? It is the body. Therefore he may not get the satisfactory result.
A real aspirant who has been meditating for many years knows that he is not the body, so when he says, "I am not sick," he also says, "I am not the body." He knows that he is not the body, but the soul. If he has been in the spiritual life for many years, and he knows what deeper meditation is, and if he has developed spiritual will-power, which, like a muscle, is developed by continuous exercise, he can get results from the constant utterance, "No, I am not the body. I am not sick."
To come back to your question, Abhaya, about a month ago, on our return to New York from Puerto Rico, one of our psychotherapist-disciples brought to us two of his patients. He had given them this kind of positive thinking: "You are not sick; you have no anxiety, etc." For a month or so, he had given them all kinds of positive suggestions to follow. He thought that by applying his own will-power, he could make them feel that they did not have any inner problems, any inner anxieties. Unfortunately, it did not work, for the reasons which I have just given to you. One has to be very experienced in meditation and one has to have considerable spiritual growth to do this type of thing.By constant aspiration, we can surrender to the Will of God, saying, "O Lord, give us no other will. We don't want any other Will. We want only Your Will to be our will."
The other day at my talk at the University of Puerto Rico, towards the end (I think it was my last paragraph), I said that some people cry because they have not made any plans to make their lives successful and fruitful. They are unhappy that they have no plans. Then there are other people who cry because their plans have come to a very lame end; their lives are not at all fulfilled, in spite of enthusiastic plans. But I cry to God not to have any plans at all, so that I can be at His Feet all the time.
If you have a plan, then you are using your mind. Your plan will have reasoning and logic. You will weigh the pros and cons and come to a conclusion. From the spiritual point of view, that is not the right method. The right method is to get the spontaneous feeling directly from the heart, as to what to do. If it comes from the heart, you will not be making any mistakes. It comes on the spur of the moment. You get the intuition from the third eye or an intuitive feeling from the heart, and you solve the problems very directly. But if it comes from the top of the head, from the intellect, ninety-nine per cent of the time, you will make the wrong decision.
Now that you have me as your Guru, I wish to say that if you want to surrender to God's Will, you should make no plans, make no decision about the future. But that does not mean that you will be lazy or stupid, or that one day you will be totally realised only because you have got me for a teacher. No, you have to make a personal effort. But this effort is not like pushing and fighting. It is the effort of aspiration. Your aspiration will climb up like a mounting flame and, at the same time, feel that I am bringing down the infinite Grace from the Supreme for you. So you go up, and I come down. You go up to catch me, and I come down to bless you.
So, Chaitanya, to come back to your question, it is not through reason that we can surrender to God's Will. It is through aspiration and through the constant feeling that we should have nothing in our consciousness but the fulfilment of God's Will. Then automatically we shall surrender. Now we are crying for surrender, but the moment we feel that God's Will alone will protect us, save us and liberate us, that He is our Protector, our Saviour and our Liberator, then our surrender will be spontaneous and unconditional.Those who arranged television interviews and radio programmes; those who have driven us to so many appointments in the city, and others who have taken us around for sightseeing and leisure; and those who have selflessly brought flowers for the shrine, candles and incense; those who have cooked and baked most delicious refreshments for every meeting — you are seated in the shrine of our thankful souls.
Without ego and without demand, you have served the Supreme in us. We know how much time, effort and physical energy have gone into your service. You have asked for nothing except to labour soulfully for your Guru and Alo. We have been wanting to tell you how much your pure and beautiful self-giving has touched us. Self-offering is one of the true qualities of the Puerto Rican soul and you have manifested it most divinely.
I have not yet mentioned Sudha, who has worked the hardest of all, as she always does. She is our President, and all the responsibility falls upon her. We make all demands on her personally and, unfortunately, we berate her for all the group's shortcomings and all the Centre's mistakes, although it is often not her own fault. Sudha bears everything with a rock-like endurance and a true humility. The Master and I want to thank her again, as we have done so many times in the past three years, for all that she does and all that she has borne in running this Centre.
At the beginning, she obtained the premises here; she paid the entire rent from her own money, she furnished the entire Centre, including three sets of private quarters for Guru, myself and herself. She set up the Library and later the Printing Room. She bought all the flowers, incense and refreshments for each meeting twice a week. In the outer world, Sudha created the AUM Centre in Puerto Rico and, in the inner world, she was the very life breath and direct instrument of Gurudev's divine consciousness.
The disciples here used to tell us that when they opened their eyes during meditation here, and looked at Sudha's face, they saw Guru's face instead of hers. This is the outer proof of her inner oneness with us.
As Gurudev said in his farewell talk in June, the Puerto Rican Centre is the Mother of all our Centres. It is not only because this Centre was established first, but because the aspiration here is most intense and the spirituality is very deep and full of consciousness. This comes from the culture of Puerto Rico and the spiritual nature of the Puerto Rican soul.
It is natural that we should look to this Centre to give a kind of divine example to all our other Centres. Our New York Centre is our geographical headquarters because we live there, but our Puerto Rican Centre is truly our spiritual headquarters because our souls have found their true home within you, all our closest and dearest disciples.
Now we want to start growing, not only inwardly, but also outwardly. You know that the Supreme has ordained that Guru should become world-famous. This is so that Guru's consciousness, which represents the Consciousness of the Supreme, can inundate the world. Those of you who can help us fulfil that mission, to spread Guru's Light all over the world, will have our most powerful blessings. We want Sri Chinmoy to enter into the world arena, not for name and fame, but because it is God's Will; it is God's way of offering a new, illumining spirituality to the entire world.
So if any of you here in Puerto Rico can help him to become known in other countries or in cities in this part of the world, we would be most grateful to you. You will be participating in a very important plan, a Divine Plan conceived by the Lord Supreme Himself.
Guru and I want to offer very special gratitude to three of our young disciples: Bandhana (Lily Casanova), Hladini (Katherine Wood Marina), and Chaitanya (Juan Marina). It is they who have learned to run our precious printing press here which publishes Guru's spiritual writings. Without these three divine soldiers of the Supreme, we would have no publications. They have worked like slaves in this terrible heat to put out our two recent AUM magazines. They work for hours at a time, standing on their feet, running back and forth, doing all the manual jobs that are required to maintain the printing machine. These three divine servitors have never made one word of complaint and have offered only love, joy and consecrated, meticulous service.
Guru and I have seen and observed all this, but we have never thanked them adequately. We want them to know that their self-effacing work, their divine effort, and their souls' sweetest contribution to our special mission here in Puerto Rico have evoked our deepest gratitude. Our hearts and souls are yours, dearest Bandana, Hladini and Chaitanya. We bless you in our deepest love.
MPR 21. 10 September 1969, Aum Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico.↩
When the inner commitment has been made by the soul and by the Master, then, at that time, the Master takes full responsibility for the individual soul. But when one is in the Centre on a trial basis, the Master is not fully responsible, and he cannot make a commitment at that time.
If the Master makes any commitment prematurely, he will be misunderstood. The seeker may find some "motive" behind the acceptance. He may say, "I come from a very rich family," or "I am a great singer. The Master needs me." This type of wrong idea may be harboured in the mind of the seeker. So the Master gives full authority to the seeker to make the decision.
Once the seeker makes the decision and once the Master approves of it, he accepts the seeker. When there is mutual acceptance, then, at that time, the Master is bound to be responsible for the seeker, inwardly and outwardly. He will inspire that disciple inwardly and he can also, if the seeker wants it, give him specific instructions outwardly.When you proceed through desire, there is no end to it. Today your desire is fulfilled and tomorrow you become victim to another desire. First you get a little fame; then you get more fame. Today's desire is increased tomorrow in infinite measure. There is no end to it. Today you are fulfilled, but tomorrow again you will be possessed by another desire.
In the case of aspiration, it is not like that. Here your nature, your very existence, wants to remain in the Infinitude. If one remains in the highest Light, the all-fulfilling Light, then it is for the Light to decide whether it wants to give a specific experience to the seeker by giving him name and fame and so forth. But if the individual seeker himself wants to have both, desire and aspiration, worldly name and fame plus true aspiration for the Highest, then he will stay neither on the spiritual path nor in the ordinary material world because he will constantly be pulled by these two contradictory forces. One force will immediately say that the other is useless. Desire will say, "Aspiration is useless. You will only be building castles in the air." Aspiration will say, "Desire is stupidity, an endless round of stupidity." It is like the camel in the desert. The camel eats thorny bushes and its mouth bleeds badly. But again and again, it goes back and eats the thorns.
So these two are contradictory forces: desire leads you to frustration and aspiration leads you to satisfaction. But there is another subtle point that we should speak about. This is the material world, the physical world. We cannot reject the material world.
Why? Because our spiritual world is inside the physical world. So when it is a matter of the inner world and the outer world, we have to understand that the realisation of the inner world has to be expressed in the outer world. We cannot separate the inner world from the outer world. That is our view, our philosophy. That is our path. Other paths are different. If we leave the outer world and stay in the Himalayan caves, we are not going to realise the Absolute Truth here on earth.
If we say, "Human beings are very bad; let me have an escape," we are separating the inner world from the outer world. Our philosophy is that the outer world has to be a manifestation or an expression of the inner world. In order to manifest the Truth, one first has to have the Truth, and for that, what is necessary is aspiration.
As I said at the beginning, if we try to unite desire and aspiration, we will be ruined. Since they are like the North and South Poles, neither aspiration nor desire will care for us or fulfil us because these two cannot go together. But once, on the strength of aspiration, realisation has been achieved, then you can enter into the field of manifestation. It may even be thrust upon you. No one will blame you at that time for entering into the outer world because it will be a higher Power which will bring the so-called "outer achievement" into you. That higher Power cares only for your own realisation, for your oneness with the highest Absolute. The Power will be in you and for you. That is what God wants from you. That is what God needs from you.
So for a seeker, if he is a true seeker, he has to go through aspiration and not desire. If right now one has aspiration and desire, then should that person leave the spiritual path? No. He has to go through it. He has to see the percentages. If he has 50 per cent aspiration and 50 per cent desire, then what should he do? He should not renounce the ordinary human life, but he should pay more attention to the path of aspiration. Gradually, gradually, the percentage of desire will decrease. Then a day will come when he will really see that it is aspiration that is fulfilling him, giving him whatever joy he experiences. He will see that aspiration will fulfil him forever. At that time, automatically the desire-life will drop off and the life of aspiration will carry him to the end of the road, the real Goal.We have three bodies: one is physical; another, inside the physical, is the subtle body; the third one is called the causal body, where the truth exists in seed form. The physical body is called the Sthula Sharira (which means the "Gross Body"); the subtle body is called the Sukshma Sharira (which means the "Subtle Physical" or "Ethereal Body"); and the Causal Body" is called the Karana Sharira (or the "body where action starts").
So we have the physical and we have to go beyond it; then we have to go beyond the subtle; then we have to go to the causal body. When we have the proper illumination, we can transcend all the limitations around us. We can transcend these planes of consciousness inside us, around us, before us and behind us. Then we can have the highest Oneness with the Absolute. At that time, we care nothing for the Sthula Sharira, the Sukshma Sharira or the Karana Sharira, because we have gone far beyond them to the One Absolute Source.
This Absolute Oneness, this Highest Absolute, is something which technology and science do not, unfortunately, aim at. Here is the problem. If you want to see the existence of God in science, I wish to say that you are absolutely right in your wish. Within science, God does exist; within everything He exists. In science you can have great, greater, greatest success, but that success will be within the boundaries of science; that is to say, your success will be circumscribed by the scientific method. Your success will not lead you to God-realisation.
A Self-realised person will never stand against the achievements of science or technology. At the same time, Self-realisation knows that nothing can stand in its way.
There is no harm if you are interested in technology or science. But you have to know what you are aiming at. If you are aiming at the Absolute, at the Transcendental Truth, you won't get it through science. You have to go deep within yourself and make your self-discovery. When you have discovered yourself, you will have discovered the Highest Truth and that Truth is God.
There is no barrier between a seeker and a technologist, but one has to know what one is aspiring for. A true spiritual aspirant will naturally follow his own spiritual path. At the end of the path, he will reach his Goal. But the Goal will always differ from that of the scientist, because each of them has different motives. They have two different ways of realising or fulfilling themselves. Naturally one who wants to realise the Highest, the Absolute, the Transcendental Truth, will eventually achieve this. Naturally he is the better of the two. In his inner world, there is no hankering. Once he has identified and realised his conscious oneness with the Highest Truth, with God, he has nothing else to cry for. He has everything and he is everything.
In the case of technology, one may be thoroughly conversant with it and also get intense gratification from one's success, but there will always be an inner sense of insufficiency, of wanting something more, something greater. That "something more" will not come to the technologist. It can offer only more technology or more science. It cannot offer anything beyond. Only God-realisation can offer everything, within and beyond, because it is a realisation of total oneness. In realisation, you don't feel that you have lost anything or gained anything. You are one with everything. You become everything.
In the outer world, in the outer process, you get something, you achieve something or you profit by something. But in God-realisation, you become precisely what you want to be.When a spiritual Teacher sees jealousy in his disciples, in the aspirants, immediately he gets a tremendous blow. Why? Because he feels, first of all, that each individual aspirant or seeker is his own, not in the way of ordinary possession, but in the way of union, oneness. So when he sees jealousy in a disciple, immediately he sees a spot, like a grease spot, inside himself, because he had promised that particular disciple, "You are mine, and I am yours, so whatever you have is, of course, yours, but whatever I have is now also yours. All the divine qualities; all the spiritual qualities that I dare to claim as my very own are now also yours. Similarly, both your good and bad qualities are now mine, on the strength of our indivisible oneness. How can I dare to separate myself from my disciple's weakness?" Jealousy is a form of weakness.
Now, you were speaking about the aspiring disciples, but I wish to say that when a disciple does something great and I appreciate it, when someone has done something very nice and I appreciate it very deeply, at that time, a third person has to identify himself immediately with the consciousness of the person who offered me something nice or good or helpful. At the same time, the third person who is about to become a victim of jealousy has to enter immediately into my consciousness and become one with me. The person who is giving me something and to whom I am showing concern and paying attention will enter into me with his achievement, and I will enter into him with my recognition and appreciation of his merit. But the observer who is becoming jealous has to enter into the person who is offering me his achievement and feel that it is he or she who has achieved that thing. That third person, when he enters into me, will see that it is he or she who is appreciating the thing that I have received. So your identification with the aspirant who is giving me the thing, and your identification with me, myself, who is appreciating the thing, will totally annihilate jealousy. Then jealousy cannot exist.
Jealousy exists just because we feel that the Master is only for him or only for her. But when I give you the assurance that you and I are one, you should feel, "The Master and I are absolutely one." Each disciple, each true disciple of mine, each individual can unfalteringly claim that he or she and I are absolutely merged in oneness. I give you that assurance. But until the disciple feels that he and I are one, immediately jealousy will come in. Why? Because when an individual feels that we are not one, then naturally, as a third person, he cannot be one either with me or with the second person.
So to conquer jealousy, the easiest way is to feel that the Guru has a body and that body is composed of the disciples' aspiration. My body has hands, legs, a nose, eyes and everything. I am telling you this not just to answer Alo's question, but I am telling you how we can conquer jealousy. So the individuals here are my closest disciples. Each individual should feel that he or she belongs to me and is a limb of my body. My right hand cannot be jealous of my nose — far from it — although we may say, "Yes, but with my nose I cannot write, and with my right hand I can write." But when we go deep within, we see that it is simply impossible for our hand to be jealous of our nose or our nose to be jealous of our hand, because we see that our nose is fulfilling its own purpose by breathing in and out, and the hand is fulfilling its own purpose by writing.
So in this spiritual world, jealousy can be conquered only by becoming one with the Guru outwardly and inwardly. When we inwardly and outwardly become one with the Guru, then we feel that other disciples are not 'others,' but that they represent our own 'I'-ness. This 'I'-ness is not the 'I'-ness of ego, but the 'I'-ness of oneness. This oneness feels, "I am in this particular disciple, and I am in that particular disciple as well."
Then again, to come back to jealousy, I should tell you that there are various ways in which I appreciate the disciples' service to me, to the Divine, to the Supreme. One way is that I look at, I bless or I appreciate the disciple in the outer world. The other way is that I appreciate someone with my soul's recognition. Immediately, the very moment that someone is thinking of me or someone is doing something for me, my soul, which is all knowledge, all wisdom, will appreciate that person even though my physical mouth is not saying anything and my physical body is not doing anything. The inner world is very vast and, in that inner world, I do appreciate each of you. Every disciple of mine, the moment they think of me or the moment they think of the Supreme, I appreciate them deeply. They need not bring something material to me in the outer world, or tell or show me the good things they have done. No, at each second I appreciate the seeker deeply, from the very depths of my heart, whenever he thinks of me or cares for me. People in the outer world need recognition — yes. But even that recognition is not enough for them because recognition is often misunderstood by the human mind. The human mind will never accept others as one with itself. But the human heart — I mean the aspiring heart — will always accept, not only others, but the entire universe, as one with itself.
So I wish to say that the easiest way to conquer our outer jealousy is to enter into the Master as often as possible and remain in the Master's consciousness. At that time, you become the Master himself.
I am not at all jealous of any of my disciples. The moment any of you will go beyond me in anything, I will be the happiest person. In Sanskrit, it is written that everywhere one desires to win victory, but not in the case of one's children or one's disciples. Unfortunately, in America I have seen parents fighting with their children over this; the parents would not allow the children to go beyond the parents' capacities. In the West (I should not say only in America), the mother is jealous of the daughter, the father is jealous of the son. This kind of thing I have often noticed in the West. In India, we have millions of faults, but we do not have that particular one.
Similarly, in the case of a spiritual father — and I happen to be your spiritual father — my existence, my very existence depends on your acceptance, on your aspiration and on your oneness with me. But the moment you identify yourselves with me, with my consciousness, you will represent me in your existence, both your outer existence and your inner existence. I cannot be afraid of, or jealous of anybody because I feel that your achievement is my achievement. If the disciple does something great, immediately I feel it to be my achievement, for I can never separate myself from my disciples.
However, the disciples either consciously or unconsciously or cleverly or wisely separate themselves. At that time, the wall of separation creates jealousy. But I say, "No, enter into me, remain in me, then become me, possess me and finally represent me. The moment you represent me, where is jealousy? Jealousy is nowhere."
So to come back to your question, I wish to say to all disciples: "Stay inside me. Then you will see that you are proud of someone because you feel that you have done it on the strength of your oneness with me. I cannot become jealous because I do not think I am fooling myself when I think that your possession is my possession. Therefore I take all credit in your great achievement, precisely because I have already become totally one with you.An analogous situation was when Krishna and Arjuna were drinking milk provided by a very loving devotee of Krishna's. She was a very poor, old widow, and owned nothing but one cow, from which she earned her livelihood. While Krishna and Arjuna were drinking their milk, Krishna said, "May this cow die now!" Arjuna was shocked. He said, "Krishna, why do you want the cow to die? The cow is all she has."
Krishna replied, "At present, her whole life is the cow and the milk, the milk and the cow. If the cow dies, she will have nothing whatever, and then she will come to me fully. Then I will receive her and spiritually give her everything."A 'Jignashu' is a seeker who needs truth, perfection and divine fulfilment. This fulfilment is the development of your soul in the sea of infinite Wisdom. You can swim in the sea of infinite Light, Life and Bliss.
Please repeat your soul's name a hundred times before you go to bed, and you will be able to realise infinite Wisdom, Peace, Light and Bliss at God's choice Hour.In each action, your soul wants to express its inner joy. Your soul never suffers frustration or limitation. It is the Light of Delight that your soul sees around and above. It is this spiritual Joy that guides you in the path of the Supreme.
Please repeat your soul's name a hundred times, and you will become one with your soul's Bliss at God's own Hour.In accepting the spiritual path, your soul wants your physical mind to love not only those who cry for God, but also those who need God. They will receive, in the love from your soul, the conscious awareness of peace. To them, also, your soul tries to offer love. Your soul, in doing so, gradually grows into infinite Delight.
God is all Love. Your soul knows it, and your soul is offering that message to you, to your physical mind, so that the mind can feel the living presence of God's Love. God wants to expand His Love through you to fulfil His Dream in humanity.Your soul wants you to realise that it is through purity alone that God can be seen and felt and finally realised. It is through the purity of your soul, it is through the purification of your outer nature, that you will realise God's Will in your life. It is the song of purity that your soul sings constantly in the inner life and in the outer life. Purity is the song of Immortality.
Your soul wants to reveal itself through purity, and purity alone, here on earth. Please repeat your soul's name a hundred times.Yesterday I spent an hour with you, Udayan, and I told you the full meaning of your spiritual name. Your soul knows it very thoroughly, completely and divinely. I bless you with my eternal love and my implicit will for your inner flowering.
U-D-A-Y-A-N. Supreme, Supreme, Supreme.To outsiders, what we do here may seem absurd, but it is not my body that is represented in this picture. The picture represents my highest Consciousness in which I am totally identified with the Supreme. It represents the highest Consciousness of the Supreme capable of being manifested, in accordance with my receptivity.
This picture is worthy of much more adoration and devotion than anybody is capable of offering. The disciples should not feel embarrassed and, to my joy, most of you do not, when meditating on this picture.
I am most proud of my disciples' aspiration and their belief in me. My body will die; all of us here will die, but this picture of my highest Transcendental Consciousness represents the Supreme Himself, and it will live forever. It will exist for Eternity. Similarly, Sri Ramakrishna's photograph, taken late in his life, was such that he said it would conquer the heart of the West, and it did.
I wish my disciples to have one regular-size photo and one wallet-size. In times of joy or sorrow, offer your joy or sorrow to the Supreme in this Transcendental photo. The photo will give you all the Blessings and Joy and Peace that you aspire for.
When the disciples revere this picture, especially on Wednesdays, in our physical absence, we occultly and spiritually bless each one of the disciples as they do this.
I have made a promise to each and every disciple of mine that I will take them to the Golden Shore if and when the disciples give me the opportunity. It is then up to me to show them that I keep my promise.
The disciples' aspiration and devotion give me the deepest joy. Sri Chaitanya, in his highest Consciousness, identified himself with Lord Krishna. He would ask his mother to touch his feet on the strength of his oneness with Sri Krishna's Consciousness. Similarly, I ask for reverence to my Transcendental photograph on the strength of its oneness with the highest Consciousness of the Supreme.
MPR 34. Summarised by Agni (Jose Luis Casanova) at Sri Chinmoy's request, on the basis of Agni's longhand notes, taken when his tape recorder failed. AUM Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico. January 1970.↩
An English couple made the arrangements for our trip. They had become our disciples seven or eight months ago. They became New York disciples. This couple met with all the expenses. Mahalakshmi and Mahavishnu are their names. Mahalakshmi and Mahvishnu did everything for us. Mahalakshmi worked so hard. Even twenty disciples, twenty dedicated disciples put together, would not have been able to accomplish what she did. So selflessly, devotedly and with a real surrendered attitude, she did everything. Her husband did the same. Unfortunately he had to play in his band. Quite a few times he had to miss our functions. He is a well-known guitarist. In American newspapers so many articles have come out about him. John McLaughlin is his name. Today he was interviewed by The New York Times. He is either the number one or number two guitarist in the world. He is really a superb player.
Now I shall tell you the stories, the experiences, that we had during our one-month trip to Europe. Mahalakshmi and Mahavishnu arranged everything financially and in every way they met with all our needs and expectations.
Now, unfortunately, I will not be able to tell you in any systematic way about the lectures I gave, but as far as my memory allows, I will try to be faithful to the basic order of our main activities.
The first talk I gave was in the University of Kent in Canterbury. There an amusing thing happened. The Cathedral of Canterbury is of world renown. Here in this most beautiful, solemn Cathedral, an amusing incident took place. Mahalakshmi and Alo were sitting on a bench, and they started to meditate. Mahavishnu and I were moving around in the Cathedral, looking at everything. I was wearing a tall, Russian fur hat which Alo had bought me in New York. It had velvet ear-flaps. I was very fond of that hat. Then all of a sudden, Alo came to me and said, “Devaji, I am really worried. We are in a Christian church and, in the West, gentlemen always remove their hats to show respect. They never keep their hats on inside a building, especially a church. Even in our Canadian schools, the little boys had to take off their caps whenever they entered the school building. People are looking at you and Mahavishnu, and I am afraid that they will think that you, as an Indian, are showing disrespect or indifference to the sacred atmosphere of Christ’s presence here. Could you take your hat off? Remember the trouble that we had recently in Puerto Rico, when you entered a famous church wearing shorts?”
I said to Alo, “Christ is the Universal Brother. Christ is also the Lord; it is absolutely true. He loves me and I love Him, and that is more than enough. I am sure He will not mind if I do not take my hat off.”
So I insisted on leaving my hat on in that most powerful, most solemn, most inspiring Cathedral.
Then we went to the talk I was supposed to give. Even three minutes before the actual hour, nobody had arrived; nobody turned up. But one minute before eight o’clock, fifty or sixty people came in, all at once.
After the talk they asked me quite a few sincere questions. One question was, “Is death the end?” There were many other sincere questions. At the end of the meeting, a young man came to me with a short note and a greeting card with two beautiful birds on it. He said to me, “This bird signifies earth, and that bird signifies Heaven. I was so deeply moved by your talk that I wish to say that you have the same God-Realisation that I have. Your Realisation and my Realisation are of the same type. We both know that there is no such thing as death. So I am presenting you with Heaven and earth in the form of these two birds, one earth, the other, Heaven.”
So his Realisation and mine were of the same calibre. I was so happy that I had at least equalled his Realisation.
The following day I gave a talk at Nottingham University. There, in that University, we met Mahalakshmi’s parents. They were very wise, very cultured and very highly developed souls. I told Mahalakshmi later on that her father, who is now a judge, is destined to be the Prime Minister of England in his next incarnation. Her father will not believe it because he is now only a magistrate. For a magistrate to think of being Prime Minister is impossible. I told her that in his next incarnation, God wants him to be a Prime Minister.
Now, back to Nottingham University. As soon as we entered the hall, we saw that more than three hundred people were present. All the chairs were occupied, and fourteen people were sitting on the floor. I took my place on the platform and, standing there, I gave a very serious talk. This will eventually be printed. During the question-and-answer period, the first question I got was from an Indian. Often when an Indian asks a question, it is not a question; it is a lecture in itself and the start of a controversy. Some of my Indian brothers do not want to know anything because they know everything already. Here I wish to go off the track and tell you that when I gave a talk at Cornell University about a year ago, an Indian stood up. Many professors and students had been so devotedly asking questions. This Indian stood up and said, “Why do you talk about God? Who is not God? You are God. I am God. Everybody is God. So why do you talk about God here?”
So I answered him, “This University has invited me to give a talk, and I am speaking on God, on Truth and on Light. If you have realised God, then who has asked you to come here to listen to me? You stay with your God-Realisation. These people in the audience perhaps have not yet realised God; that is why they are listening to me. So you can leave this place and give us a little peace.” He kept quiet.
After the meeting was over, he came up to me and fell flat at my feet, prostrating in the Indian fashion, with his head on the floor at my feet. He said, “Everybody was admiring you, adoring you, but nobody was paying any attention to me. So I thought that if I asked an embarrassing question, everybody would pay attention to me. That is why I asked you my question. Please forgive me. Forgive me!”
So here in Nottingham University also, I was getting that kind of question. The first question was no question at all. The Indian man just wanted to show off his wisdom, but I didn’t say anything about it and just answered his question very soulfully.
There were many questions. Many sincere questions they asked; very nice questions. But towards the end, this Indian started arguing. He said, “How is it you are talking about meditation? We are married people, and you know that married people cannot meditate. It is so difficult, and your philosophy is so difficult.” He started again arguing with me. But with utmost kindness and affection I answered his objections — for about ten minutes.
The final question of the evening was again not really a question. Another Indian stood up and said, “What have you to offer? Why have you come here? You Indians, all you Yogis come here to the West only to exploit us.” At this very time, so many people had been showing me sincere admiration. So one or two students of philosophy who had introduced me to the audience stood up and asked the audience to offer their appreciation of me. To my surprise this meant that they immediately started clapping for my talk. They applauded very enthusiastically and sincerely. Oh yes, the philosophy student had said, “I am sure you have all enjoyed the talk. So now let us offer our appreciation to the speaker.” In the thundering applause, the poor Indian was drowned.
When everything was over, we went downstairs for refreshments. The Indian man who said that married people cannot meditate, that my philosophy was so difficult and all that, came down with two of his children. One was five and the other was two years old. With folded hands, he said, “Swamiji, forgive me, forgive me. I saw tremendous power inside you while you were talking. I thought that if I asked you some spiritual question, you would be able to answer it easily. I thought if I asked something that was not spiritual, something ordinary, it would be difficult for you to answer. That is why I asked you that kind of question. My question wasn’t spiritual, but you answered it so well.
“Now, this is my humble prayer: my son here, who is five years old, has for the last six months been having attacks of nightmares every night. We have been to so many doctors and other people. Every night he is attacked by nightmares and he suffers. He cries out and he calls us, my wife and me. We are very worried about him. He is very much afraid of the night. He can’t sleep properly and, even during the day, he is apprehensive because he remembers the night. We have been to so many places, to so many doctors. We have even been to two or three spiritual Masters. Nobody has been able to cure him. But the power that I saw in you while you were giving the talk is immeasurable. I want you to forgive me and cure my son.” His wife, who had come in with him, also folded her hands and repeated, “I want you to forgive us and cure our son.”
So I blessed the child, and I asked the mother to do a certain number of things; also to meditate in a special way. And I told them that in fifteen days his nightmares would be cured, because I had cured this kind of nightmare before. I had always been successful. I actually felt that it would not take a full fifteen days, but I wanted to be on the safe side.
Such is life. At the time of need, I was “Swamiji”, and I was called on to cure his son. This is human life.
From England, we went to Paris, France. There I gave two talks, one at the School of Fine Arts, and the other at the American Academy.
Now I have to tell you a few things about our experience upon reaching the airport in Paris. I was supposed to give my first talk at six o’clock in the evening, and we reached the airport, Alo and I, at four o’clock. We were totally on our own because Mahavishnu and Mahalakshmi had to remain in England to prepare for other engagements of ours, and were due in Paris two or three days later. Now here at the airport, an unfortunate thing happened.
I had been told by the Indian Consulate in New York that I did not need a visa for France since I was “half-American”, the holder of a Green Card, designating me as a permanent resident of the United States. When we boarded the plane in New York, nobody asked me for a visa. But when we arrived at the airport in Paris, they would not let me in. They said that since I had no visa, I would have to go back to England. At six o’clock was my talk, and at four o’clock they were telling me that I had to return to England, get a French visa and then only could I come back to Paris. Now what could I do?
Now it always happens that when there is a West Indian from Jamaica, he shows special concern for me. Wherever I go, I see that if there is a Jamaican, that Jamaican tries to help me. Now this particular Jamaican overheard our conversation and, saying that he would try to help me, took me to a particular place and said to the Customs Officer, “Can’t you keep your eyes closed?” It turned out that the Jamaican himself was also a Customs Officer.
He said that if I had to go back to England, I needed an English visa, but if I went from France to some other place, they wouldn’t mind because my destination was not France. But no other destination was in my ticket. If my ticket had mentioned Italy, they could have said, “Let them have the trouble and problem in Italy.” The Customs Officer said, “Here we cannot do that. Italy is not mentioned in the ticket.” The Jamaican replied, “You just keep your eyes closed and write down that he is going to Italy.” The Customs Officer said, “No. I have to keep my eyes open.” But to help me, he went to the Station Police Officer who is the final head and can allow a person to pass through at his own discretion. The Police Officer said, “No, no, I cannot do it.”
Two other Officers spoke to the Police Officer on my behalf, saying, “You have allowed others through in similar cases. How is it that in this case you don’t want to?” The Police Officer replied, “I have allowed people, yes, but they have touched my feet and cried.” I said to myself, “I cannot touch your feet and cry.”
Now, at this time, Alo, who had easily passed through Customs, felt that I was in trouble and, with great difficulty, got permission to come back out of the Customs area to where I was standing with these people. She was shocked and outraged at the whole situation. She also could not, from within her soul, cry and touch his feet. Touching someone’s feet in India is something very holy and sacred. The soul really does not allow you to do it for this type of thing. She spoke in French to the Officials, saying that the whole problem lay in the failure of the New York authorities to give me the correct advice. She told them that in view of this, we being innocent foreigners, and I being a saintly “man of God”, could they please overlook the mistake and let us through. Alo, as a Canadian, would vouch for my financial well-being and my definite departure from France. I added, “It is only a matter of two days.”
They were very sympathetic to Alo’s soulful plea. But they said, “We are helpless. We ourselves can do nothing. We are really only clerks. We have no authority to make this kind of decision. What can we do?” Then one of the clerks said, “Let us phone the Indian Consulate.” His friend disagreed, saying, “No, as he has a Green Card, let us call the American Consulate and see if they can help.” So they phoned up and an American official said, “Since he is not a full American citizen, we cannot help him out.”
Then they reverted to the first plan and phoned the Indian Consulate. There a South Indian official said that it was a very sad situation and that he would try to help me. This official went to his superior officer, who said, “If the Americans cannot help, we can try the French Government.”
The French government official, when contacted, said, “Non, non, non! C’est impossible!” The South Indian explained, “He has come to Paris only to give two talks on Indian philosophy, and then he will leave France. He has an American Green Card.” The French official replied that he did not believe what Indians say. He said, “Indians do not return to their country; they remain in France. They do not go back, and they become a real problem for us.” He added, “He is already in America and that is no problem for us, but the French Government cannot allow him to remain in France.”
Now the South Indian spoke to his own Consul, who said, “The only thing we can do is to refer this whole matter to the Indian Embassy in Washington, DC.” If they make a request to the French Government, the French will listen to them because if the French authorities, in their turn, make any request of the Indian Embassy, the Indians would simply say, “No.” For example, when French lecturers go to India without visas, they run into this same problem. Each country does the other a favour.
So the Indian Consul in Paris made a long-distance call to the Indian Embassy in Washington, DC. Fortunately the phone there was answered by a very high-ranking Indian official working directly under the Indian Ambassador to the United States. As soon as he heard the name, Chinmoy Kumar Ghose, he said, “One Ghose is in trouble; another Ghose has to save him.” Can you believe it? This man’s name was also Ghose! He said immediately, “Don’t worry. Tell Mr Ghose that I am taking care of him.” He phoned the Customs people at the Paris Airport and said, “I want to talk to the Police Officer who is creating this problem for Mr Ghose.”
The Police Officer came to the phone and the Indian official said, “I am calling from Washington, DC. I am the Ambassador’s aide. Let Mr Ghose in immediately; otherwise I shall make a complaint to the French authorities. At six o’clock he has to give a talk, and it is nearing five o’clock now.”
The French Police Officer came running to me, “Mr Ghose, you are going to give a talk, and your tie is not on properly.” How could this be? He started to fix my tie. Half an hour before, he was making me feel that I should touch his feet and cry; now he started fixing my tie! So you can imagine what I was going through.
Well, we got to the talk at six-thirty. It was all God’s Grace. I must say that there were a few people there who were sincerely interested in the spiritual life... others, no. Four or five were smoking, asking questions while smoking. They felt that this was normal behaviour. Many speakers in France encourage an informal atmosphere in their audience, and the people in the audience, on their part, indicate their seriousness by smoking with deep, contemplative puffs of smoke. They were asking questions on Kundalini Yoga, how to raise their Kundalini. I answered, “Yes, your Kundalini has already risen... perhaps from your lower vital.”
The following day we went to give my talk at the American Academy. We were alone, Alo and I. There were no French disciples at that time. The Academy was located in a very obscure Quarter of Paris, on a street called “Rue Bergères”. We had to take a taxi, but the driver did not really know that street at all. Alo had said, “Rue Bergères, Monsieur, s’il vous plait.” Then she said, “Académie Américaine.” That was all the information we had. He couldn’t find it. It was getting late, and just as the day before, we started to get worried about the audience who would be waiting for their speaker. I said to Alo, “This adventure is just going to turn out to be another useless wild-goose chase. What a mistake we’ve made by even planning this.” We were driving round and round, getting nowhere!
The driver felt that it was his fault for not being familiar with that Quarter. He was desperately trying to find Rue Bergères. Finally he turned around and said to Alo, “Follies Bergères, Mademoiselle?” (referring to the famous dancing troupe). Alo answered, smiling, “Non, Monsieur, Rue Bergères; follies spirituelles!” He replied, “Ah, oui.” We all laughed.
Well, he finally found it. We paid him, gave him a big tip and went in. I was deeply impressed to see in the hall a picture of President Abraham Lincoln because there, right beside Lincoln, to my amazement was a poster with my aphorism, “When the power of love replaces the love of power, man will have a new name: God.” In most of the universities in which I have given a talk, I have seen this poster. But this one was three times as big as the others; it was right beside Abraham Lincoln and, to our astonishment, it said, “Our Guru, our Guru.” Some students had already accepted me before even seeing me. We were very touched and realised that it had not been a mistake to come here.
In that Academy, there were two or three students who evidently had Draft problems. When Alo was taking their photos, they covered their faces. They had come to hear a spiritual talk, and they were hiding. They were in Paris to avoid the Draft. It was a real experience for us, quite shocking.
We realised something in France that we had seen also in Pondicherry, a former French colony. Educated French people do not like to use the English language, even when they speak it well. Most of them don’t want to learn English in the first place, but even if they know it, they refuse to use it, almost on principle. A hundred years ago, French was the international language for cultured people, more so than English. If you were truly educated, you spoke French. So now the French people, remembering this in their cultural memory, refuse to give way to another international language.
Now, my reason for mentioning this is that very few people in Paris understood us. So for this talk at the American Academy, even though we knew there would be many Americans present, we had hired an interpreter. He worked at the American Embassy in Paris. He was a Frenchman with an excellent knowledge of English. He was about forty-two years old.
Alo said of him later, “It was the most impressive translation I have ever heard in my life, and we have Agni José Luis Casanova, in Puerto Rico, who translates flawlessly, correctly and rapidly from Guru’s English into beautiful, accurate Spanish. I don’t know Spanish, but others have told us this countless times and we see and feel it intuitively. But I did study French for eight years — five years in High School and three years in University — and this interpreter I found to be absolutely awe-inspiring. My hair was standing on end.
“Devaji had told the interpreter that he would stop every few sentences to allow him to translate that portion into French. But as usual, Gurudev got carried away with his inner spiritual momentum. When he recalled that he was supposed to have stopped, sometimes ten or fifteen minutes had elapsed, full of complicated points, allusions, metaphors, etc. So many words, sentences, etc. But this man was truly incredible. He had listened carefully, and he reproduced every single point of Guru’s into absolutely flawless and beautiful French. He could have left out material, but he never did. He translated every single sentence of Guru’s. The thing that impressed me most was his capacity to understand and translate spiritual phrases and concepts which Guru uses in his own unique way. I was sure that this would cause difficulty for the interpreter. His normal work, after all, was translating for the American Embassy: things pertaining to law and to everyday life... perhaps many specialised phrases connected with immigration and so on. But here he was, translating the most subtle, spiritual ideas with a finesse and inner comprehension that really flabbergasted me. (Agni was a disciple, after all, and he understood Guru’s philosophy. Guru had also, on innumerable occasions, defined his spiritual terms for us all.) But this French interpreter had only spoken to us for three minutes before the talk, and yet his translation was spiritually flawless, as though he had been a close disciple for years.
“This French interpreter was not only extremely intelligent, with a phenomenal memory, but his inner being was very luminous and full of depth. I felt that no one but myself (and Devaji, of course) realised what an outstanding job he had done.
“When the talk was over, I spoke to him in English, as I was ashamed of my very poor conversational French. He was very gracious, but didn’t feel that his skill was anything out of the ordinary. He also didn’t realise that he was spiritually very promising, a very mature soul. He took it as all-in-a-day’s-work, even though that one hour’s translation must have been very tiring.
“Well, we paid him more than the Embassy’s normal hourly rate for an interpreter, which was already very high, and, of course, we were more than satisfied. Yet I kept feeling that here was the waste of a promising soul. Aspiration had not yet awakened in him. He spoke of spiritual states with the familiarity of a high, advanced soul, and yet his inner consciousness in this life had not yet awakened.”
This ends Alo’s account of our talk at the American Academy in Paris.
The following day we went to the outskirts of Paris to see the Palais de Versailles of Louis XIV. Their achievements, their grandeur, their pomp, their opulence! Glory is not the word! Perhaps in our time only a multi-millionaire could have this kind of splendour. In each room the decorations themselves, apart from the furniture, must have cost thousands or millions of dollars. Sometimes three enormous rooms were joined to make a salon that was so gorgeous, one did not know where to look first. We saw magnificent portraits in every room of people like Napoleon and all the royalty and aristocracy of France. It was overwhelming!
The French Revolution... why did it take place? Here you can understand how some human beings can exploit the sincere but weak ones. This revolution, the French Revolution, took place to save poor mankind from tyrants. The aristocracy became supremely powerful at the expense of the sweat and blood of the poor, sincere people. Their downfall took place in due course.
Are you enjoying these anecdotes, my Puerto Rican children? Again I am saying that they are for the disciples, for the spiritual family. We have many visitors here. Perhaps some will scorn me or blame me. I have repeatedly said that those who are not my disciples are under no obligation to accept my views. Even the disciples are under no obligation to listen to this kind of talk. If they object to it or disagree with it, they can say so or, if they want to leave, I shall have no objection.
Now, to come back to England. At our next university, it was raining heavily as I was due to give my talk. We had to walk through bitter, biting cold to get there. We encountered so much difficulty as it was so dark and the cold rain prevented us from finding the way. It was so hard to find the hall where the talk was scheduled. Such hard work simply to get into the university that night!
There were about sixty hippies there. The lecture was about to start, but they would not stop talking. The man who introduced me told them that it was high time for them to show a little respect to the speaker. Then they kept quiet. Most of the boys were sitting with their partners, their girlfriends. Three or four asked me spiritual questions, but those questions had a mockery behind them. So I became very strict and showed my spiritual pride and dignity as I answered their questions. They were humbled by my spiritual power.
Then again, as I always have wonderful experiences with my Indian brothers, an Indian student asked the last question. He was asking me a serious question about Liberation and Realisation. While he was asking the question, his girlfriend was caressing him, much to his enjoyment. I really became so mad that I gave him a very drastic answer. When I become furious, at that time I use my spiritual power. Then the girl stopped.
Another fellow was asking me a question, and I could see that he was thinking only about his girlfriend. The question was only lip-deep. So again I became mad: “You people should have some courtesy. Some of you are, to my extreme sorrow, still in the animal world. It is impossible for me to throw light into the animal consciousness. Only into the aspiring human heart can I offer a little light. So I have to leave.” I walked out.
The man who introduced me was miserable and very sorry about the students’ behaviour. I said, “It is not your fault. It was my Indian brother who inspired and instigated them to adopt that attitude. So often it is an Indian brother.” That was our unfortunate experience at that particular university.
Our evening didn’t end there. We were supposed to meet Mahalakshmi and Mahavishnu on a particular platform of the railway station in London. Alas, they were not there. Our bad luck never ended. We were on one platform, and they were waiting for us on another! So we did not meet. We arrived back at the house in Kensington at one o’clock in the morning, and there they were, waiting for us. The house belonged to a European Countess who had kindly accommodated all four of us there. It was a bad night all around, a comedy of errors and hostile forces.
By the way, we used to go to an Indian restaurant every day. In America, it is very expensive to eat in Indian restaurants. In England, it is not expensive. So we have eaten in seventeen or eighteen Indian restaurants in England.
Early each morning we had to leave Kensington; at noon we had to take a plane, then a train, then a taxi. We were absolutely gypsies, moving all the time from here to there, with no rest. Only at night did we come back to London and only to sleep in the Countess’ beautiful house. We hardly saw the house, and we rarely saw her, a frail, elderly little lady.
Moving from here to there, to this city and that university, whenever we got hungry, we would take our food at some Indian restaurant in whatever town we found ourselves.
So you see, in one university I had practically the worst experience of my mission. In the question period, I was miserable. But at Oxford University I was so highly honoured. It is the first university where I have been garlanded. I have given talks in seventy or eighty universities in the West, but in Oxford the president of one of the Societies came up and garlanded me with utmost humility.
While garlanding me he said, “A candle is introducing the sun. The sun needs no introduction, but the candle gets the greatest joy, delight and pride when it gets the opportunity to introduce the sun. I am the candle and he is the sun. Sri Chinmoy does not need any introduction, but some of my colleagues have asked me to make this introduction, and I am very proud that I am in a position to introduce such a great figure.”
Then he added something: “We have heard and read so much about Indian philosophy. We’ve also read the writings of many spiritual Masters. Professors use famous quotes from the Upanishads and other Indian scriptures. Indian philosophy is complicated and, when spiritual Masters speak on it, they make it more complicated. They say they are trying to explain in a simple manner what Indian spirituality stands for but, while trying to make it easy, they are actually making it more complicated. But today I see our speaker here, I see Swamiji Chinmoy Ghose, and I know that he will not fail us. He will make Indian philosophy really simple. This is not just my expectation; I am sure he will do it.”
So now that the speaker had expressed his confidence in me, I tried my best to make my talk as simple as possible. Everything I made extremely simple. In fact, I did not use any “shlokas” (Sanskrit verses) or quote from the Upanishads or the Vedas. They were tremendously pleased. My simple talk was considered a great success.
In another university we had another stroke of bad luck. There is always one student who causes anguish to his lecturers and professors. He started to say that Indians are beggars and rogues; they also don’t have any manners. “In India,” he went on, “people are dying of hunger, and yet Indians come here and speak about spirituality. Go home,” he said, “and give your spirituality to your own starving people.”
Now, I wanted to answer this English boy’s statement but, when I stood up, he would not allow me. I said, “You have asked me a question, and now I want to answer you.” But he only started talking and arguing. He would not listen to me. It turned out that this student was not allowed to enter into classes because of his misbehaviour. It was a sad story. His sister was in love with an Indian fellow who was sitting beside her. Everybody was shouting at him, “Sit down, sit down!” The president of the club, the man who had introduced me, stood up, but he could not control the situation. The English boy just continued, referring to me, “He has not answered this question.” “I am more than ready to answer this question,” I said to the president, “but he is asking dozens of questions, and these are not questions; they are only insults.” I said to the English boy, “I am ready to answer your question, but it has to be a real question and not just berating words.” But he continued haranguing for another three or four minutes, and the president simply called an end to the meeting.
The English boy had the audacity to come up to me afterwards, and he said, “You know, you have deceived me.” I asked, “How? Why?” He said, “I thought that by insulting you, you would give me some of your power. But you are a clever fellow; you did not give me any power. Kindly tell me whether you are going to give another talk. If so, this time I will keep silent, and I will receive everything from you. But you have deceived me. You have deceived me. Forgive me.”
Meanwhile Alo, who still remembered her Hindi from India, kept saying to me in Hindi, in a quiet voice, “Devaji, the boy is insane. He is quite deranged emotionally. Please let us get away from him. Let’s get out of here. He may get worse.” She felt that we were banging our heads against a brick wall, that he might get violent.
But before we left, I said to the boy, “God is the only one who can forgive you. I came all the way from New York to this university, and look what you have done. You have created such a problem for the sincere seekers. You have ruined the question period. Whether you receive power or don’t receive power, do not create this kind of problem ever again.” Then we departed.
The president had been so sincere, so attentive and so devoted, and yet what an experience we had there! He could not deal with this trouble-maker.
At London University, I had to revise my opinion about my Indian brothers. An Indian, a professor of mathematics, was in the audience. He came from Bengal, a very respectful man. He was asking me questions full of love and respect.
Three questions he asked with the utmost respect. He came from a prominent family. He had read the Gita and all the Indian scriptures. (Other Indians, in spite of being very familiar with the Gita and with Indian spiritual ideas, would ask me all kinds of very silly questions.) His questions were so nice, so deep and sincere, so aspiring.
Now, when the meeting was over, I got a very nice surprise. A young man, accompanied by a few others, came up to me. He said they all would like to have a Centre in England. He said, “When you were giving your talk, suddenly I saw light all around you, and then wherever I turned my head, no matter which side I looked at, I saw only your face, on the walls, ceiling, everywhere. We would like to be your disciples. We want to have a Centre here.”
So we agreed. We were very happy. Nine or ten persons came to the meditation the first time. It was held in the apartment of the young man. Then the following week about fifteen or sixteen came. Before we left England, it became about twenty-two. They were very dedicated and very serious. I gave two talks to them before I left.
One young girl in the group was studying law. She comes from New Zealand and, when she completes her studies, she will return to New Zealand. Her name is Carol, and she will run the Centre. She will open up a Centre in New Zealand when she returns and has already invited us to go there. She is very close and very sincere.
With this England Centre, I am so pleased. So many letters I have received from them since returning home to New York. They call their Centre “Little Chinmoy”!
They have sent Christmas and New Year’s greeting cards which say “From Little Chinmoy.” First we have the Chinmoy Family magazine, and now we have the “Little Chinmoy Centre”. They have given it that name. They are doing extremely well there. Carol is very wise and very dedicated. She is having inner experiences almost every day in the inner world.
Then... to Oxford and Cambridge Universities... so well known. Mahalakshmi and Mahavishnu were there with us. In many universities, Alo and I were alone with the organizers.
At Oxford, I had a sad experience due to my own stupidity, although Alo blames herself. It was extremely cold, and it was raining. Inside the college where I was due to speak, they ushered me into an ante-room containing a large, comforting fireplace. I was standing with my back towards this old-fashioned fireplace, trying to get warm and dry. I was wearing my grey overcoat and my silk Indian dhoti and kurta. I had planned to take off my overcoat only at the time of the talk, and now I was trying to dry off and warm myself up. It was so cold in that room that I was practically standing against the fireplace. I stood there for about fifteen minutes while the steam escaped from my wet coat.
All of a sudden there was the smell of something burning. My coat had caught fire and my silk robes were also about to catch fire. I jumped. I said, “Alo, I have caught fire!” At that very instant, she had jumped, and said, “Deva! You’re on fire!” She immediately pulled the coat off. It was smelling terribly, smelling like anything. Five minutes later I had to give my talk. It was a talk on “The Higher Worlds”.
I was standing on the platform, and I was giving my talk, and I was smelling like anything. For ten or fifteen minutes there was an unbearable smell of burning, acrid cloth. It was a foul, unbearable odour. I was giving my talk, and there was this smell of burning cloth. What a situation! But fortunately, by God’s Grace, my Indian robes did not catch fire. (Alo said her inner being was constantly telling her to ask me to move away from the fireplace at least two or three feet, but she was tired and didn’t do it. She was very familiar with British fireplaces from her year at the University of London in 1955.)
Although I was smelling like anything, we had a wonderful question-and-answer period. The questions were very sincere. They asked about Hinduism and many other things. There were no problems: no smoking, no foul behaviour or anything like that. When the meeting was over in Oxford, several people made written comments quite voluntarily. Some young girls, university students, said, “We envy his peace. During the time he talked and while answering questions, he was inundated with peace. The whole room was inundated with peace and we sensed this.”
Other students said, “Other swamis who have talked about spiritual matters have been very difficult to understand. But here Sri Chinmoy has made it very easy for us. It seems to us that he has expressed everything as in a parable. Although we are all university students, and we thought he would give us mental nourishment, he has given us our hearts’ nourishment and our souls’ nourishment.”
So this was Oxford.
Now for Cambridge. At Cambridge University, six or seven professors came. They taught subjects like Indian archaeology, Southeast Asian art, Japanese language, Indonesian music, etc. They asked me many significant questions.
One student who was studying international law was so moved; he thought that spirituality was not meant for him because he would have to be dishonest, to some extent, when he entered into his career. He would be a lawyer, and he knew that lawyers, at times, resort to lies. After the talk, he said to me, “If I follow your spiritual path, I will be able to be a chosen instrument. I will not have to lie. The Supreme will speak through me. I will be able to escape the necessity of deception.” He was deeply moved.
In another University, I forget which one, I spoke about human love and divine love. I said, “Human love is an express train, destination: frustration. Divine love is a local train, destination: illumination.” One boy was so deeply moved. He said to me, “You are absolutely right about human love. Divine love is something I yearn to experience. I am going to meditate. That is where I will find divine love.”
A woman who is a biographer of Sri Aurobindo and other eminent figures asked me very serious questions. Some of them were about my past, and I answered them.
There were other professors and well-known writers who asked me very sincere questions. I was really successful there. Sri Aurobindo had studied at King’s College, Cambridge.
The woman from Trinity College who was the biographer of Sri Aurobindo, knew that I was from the Sri Aurobindo Ashram and knew that I had written many, many things about Sri Aurobindo while I was in India. After asking me quite a few questions, as I’ve mentioned, she came to me and said, “About six years ago, one of the disciples of Sri Aurobindo gave a talk at this very College: Trinity College. This gentleman gave a two-and-a-half-hour talk. He did not allow people to ask him questions. They found it very difficult to go up to the level he spoke about: the higher mind, the overmind, etc. Many of them left. At the end of his lecture he was feeling physically cold. He said, “Do you have anything here for recreation?” The young boys answered, “Yes, downstairs we have a ping-pong table.” So this Indian speaker ran to the basement with them and played ping-pong to warm up.
So the lady biographer said to me, “Sri Chinmoy, it is again very cold here. Do you want to play ping-pong to warm up?” I said, “No, I have spoken, and now I have brought forward my inner heat. So I don’t have to play ping-pong.” She began cutting jokes about my predecessor.
So these talks at Cambridge and Oxford were very, very significant. The two universities really deserve one’s appreciation, as do Harvard and Yale in the United States. My audiences heard my talks with great seriousness and sincere appreciation.
We went to Scotland twice. The first time, I gave a talk there. We had the same experience that we’d had at the University of Kent in Canterbury. At three minutes to eight, only three students had shown up for the eight o’clock talk. Then we saw a girl coming. We were hoping for a familiar face. She looked like one of our disciples in New York: her hair, her dress, her walk. “Look, Devaji,” Alo said, “there is B.” But it turned out to be a stranger. There was no one that we knew. Then at one minute to eight, eighty or ninety people poured in.
Then I gave my talk. It was very well received, with thunderous applause. In many places my talks received thunderous applause; here also.
One of the important questions was, “Do you think the Christ was a realised soul? Do you think he had any spiritual Light or Power? Do you think he was spiritual? I don’t think so. I want to have your opinion.” This was a young boy who had stood up to ask the question. He obviously felt that Christ was nothing. That was his understanding, and he wanted me to see eye-to-eye with him.
I said, “Unfortunately I cannot be at one with you. I feel that I have realised the Christ, so I can’t say that he didn’t have Light, that he didn’t realise God. How can I say that when I know definitely who Christ was, what Christ is? He was one with the Divine Consciousness and the Universal Consciousness. How can I say that he was nothing and that he is nothing? If your realisation says that he was nothing, then you will have to be satisfied with it. But my realisation says that Christ is spiritually unique.”
“Do you really mean it?” he continued.
“Mean it? This is my realisation,” I stated. “How can I say Christ was nothing, when I know what Christ is?”
Then another fellow took my side, but added, “Christ is the only Saviour.”
“O God,” I replied, “I have told you that I have fully realised the Saviour Christ, who is really the Son of God. He has infinite Light and infinite Consciousness. Now you say that Christ is the only Saviour. This is going from one extreme to another. One extreme says Christ was nothing, was absolutely useless. The other extreme says that he is the only Saviour. If Christ is the only Saviour, then I don’t know what Sri Ramachandra, Sri Krishna, Lord Buddha, Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Aurobindo and other spiritual Masters did on earth. I am sure that they also did something. If you say that Christ was a Saviour, immediately I must answer, ‘Certainly he was.’ But if you say, ‘He was the only Saviour,’ then I have to say that Krishna had something to offer to humanity. Rama, Buddha, Chaitanya, Ramakrishna, Sri Aurobindo and Ramana Maharshi also offered something to humanity.”
I continued, “If you say Christ is a Saviour, I am with you, but if you say he is the only Saviour, I must part company with you. The Supreme is the only Saviour. If you want to know who is the only Saviour of humanity, I say, ‘God, the Almighty, the Supreme.’ He is the only Saviour. The individual souls are also Saviours: Christ, Krishna, Buddha, etc. They are great Masters, too. An individual soul, a great Master, can be a Saviour, but the one true Saviour is the Absolute Supreme.”
Krishna, Christ, Buddha and the others started with the human consciousness, and they achieved the Universal Consciousness. They are within us. They are for us. They are humanity’s greatest pride and the Supreme’s greatest Pride.
Yet before Christ, prior to two thousand years ago, Existence was there. Before Buddha, Existence was there. Before Krishna also... thousands of years ago... Existence was there. Then what happened? Did the world cease to exist? If so, how are we alive today? Before the Saviour Christ, the world existed. That means that Somebody was saving the world, and that Somebody is the Absolute Supreme.
So let us not go from one extreme to another. All these great Masters are Avatars of the highest rank and all — Christ, Krishna, Buddha — are divine instruments of the Supreme.
From Scotland, we went to Wales. You know Wales, in the United Kingdom. I had an incarnation in Wales. Alo did also. We both got tremendous joy in Wales. While coming back, Alo wrote a unique tribute to me, entitled “My Guru.” She saw something which she always sees. What extraordinary experiences she had! So she wrote “My Guru.” A few days ago, I was reading her talk, sitting on my chair in my room. I will ask one of the New York disciples to send it. And what the Supreme said about Alo, about her talk, I will ask somebody to send a copy of also.
There in Wales we were very successful. Many people went to the Carmaerthon College to hear me speak. It was in Cardiganshire, a most beautiful place with soft, rolling, green hills. The campus itself had a certain divine charm.
The Professor of French was so enamoured of my talk that he came and stood right in front of me, looking at me with such wonder, admiration and adoration. And the Professor of Philosophy would not leave us. He was so excited, so happy. He went to a restaurant with us and for at least two hours he asked me questions on Indian philosophy and spirituality. He himself, being a Professor of Philosophy, found it somewhat embarrassing to ask questions on spirituality. Yet question after question he was asking me. He wouldn’t leave me. Two or three of his own students were with him, but he knew that this was his last chance to be with me. If he did not ask me questions on philosophy in front of his students, he would lose the opportunity completely. In the hall, he could not ask these questions because there were many, many students, and he wanted to retain his academic dignity.
In the restaurant he asked many, many questions on spiritual philosophy. Now in that restaurant, some customers were singing songs in the Welsh language, Gaelic. How powerful, soulful and sweet! There were about twenty singers. It was like a divine choir. We were enchanted beyond belief. Alo that night wrote a soulful letter to Akuti, our Connecticut Centre leader, praising that glorious singing. It reminded us of Indian music because there was no end to their music, so to speak.
The other day Alo was telling you that here in Puerto Rico you are not singing our Invocation to the Supreme very well. You were all carrying different tunes and singing in so many different keys. Also many other deplorable mistakes you were making. But in Wales, many different groups sang different lines of music: the young ones sang one way, the women sang one way, the boys and men sang another way — one song but sung in a variety of parts and ways. It was the seventh heaven of delight. They sang so soulfully. The experience was sublime. Alo wrote about it to Akuti and other Connecticut disciples.
Then we went to Switzerland: to Zurich, the main city of the German-speaking part. There we had a wonderful experience. I spoke at a college where there were two hundred or more in the audience. They seemed to range from twelve years of age to about twenty-three.
As soon as I ascended the platform, the students started sneezing, smiling and doing all kinds of mischievous things. For them, the most important thing was to giggle. Oh, what kinds of things they did! For three minutes this went on. Then I said to them, “Look, you are smiling outwardly. It is such an easy thing to do.” I myself started smiling at them. “Smiling is such an easy thing to do. You are doing it and I am doing it. Can you do something much more difficult? Can you smile inwardly?
“You are children and you are always fond of difficult games. Now I want you to smile inwardly. It is difficult to smile inwardly. You try.” While I was smiling at them, I was using my soul’s light. As I smiled at each child, he or she became calm and quiet. Another thing I was telling them: “Since you are all children, you always want to be courageous. Smile inwardly and make others feel that you have done something great.”
By the time they smiled inwardly, they had all become quiet. Then I gave my talk. It was very well received. The older ones asked very significant questions. The youngest ones were about twelve; the oldest, maybe twenty-three. They asked me very significant questions on meditation. I was so pleased with them.
From all the universities in which I spoke, there were so many significant questions. We will put out a book of all their questions and all my answers. You will see.
After an hour or so, they were supposed to leave to play basketball. Therefore almost all of them left. But there were twenty or twenty-five left. Then the President of the college said, “While they were misbehaving, I was looking at you and you were smiling at them. If it had been me, I would have stood up and told them to get out of this place. I was thinking of giving one boy a slap to make him behave properly. I was about to do that. But you were smiling at them to make them behave. You have real power.”
Then everything was over. One or two students wanted to meditate. They were about twenty years old. I said, “Now two persons want to meditate. If anybody else wants to meditate, I am ready to take you to the other room to meditate.” They applauded for seven or ten minutes. A few professors and the chaplain came with them. They all came inside another room for meditation. The professors were directly in front of me. For five minutes, I told them how to meditate. I taught them how to make the mind calm and quiet. After the instructions, they had a wonderful meditation.
Then they said to me, “Please give us your picture, your photograph!” But where were the pictures? Unfortunately my Transcendental Pictures were all exhausted. (I wrote to New York and X sent twelve or fifteen pictures they had at the Centre.) So I gave them my extra passport pictures. Of course, in my passport picture, there is light. I also had with me a few other pictures that I would never give to anybody, as they do not show any inner qualities; they are only informal snapshots. But about twenty-five passport and other photos I did give them. They were so happy that they could take my picture with them. But I felt so miserable that they needed spiritual pictures of me, because they wanted to meditate at home, and where were my pictures?
A few days later many pictures came from X in New York. We started distributing them at different places. Even then, after a few days we ran short. X had sent only the few photos remaining in the New York Centre, and then we started giving out ordinary pictures.
Now Switzerland: I like the place very much — very solid, clean, orderly. Switzerland is the land of dynamism and the land of beauty. Both Alo and I were very happy in Switzerland. We felt that the spiritual life could be accepted there because of its solid base and its ethereal beauty.
We went to the mountain-tops on a cable-machine and had a wonderful experience. I think you saw some pictures we took on the mountain peaks. We had a really successful experience in Switzerland, and we met some seekers whom we think will help us in the future.
Then we went to Ireland. In Ireland, we had the greatest success of all. Ireland took me immediately as its very own. The press was very courteous, very sympathetic and understanding. Everything they wrote was full of appreciative understanding.
I gave a talk at Trinity College in Dublin. It was wonderful. All of a sudden, a divine inspiration entered into Alo. This was before the press came. Her inspiration was to go personally to three different newspapers and tell them about me. Naturally they wanted to see me, so she invited them to my hotel. My room was on the sixth floor and the tiny elevator was not working. They didn’t mind. They climbed up six flights of stairs, huffing and puffing. These reporters came with deep respect and interviewed me very politely, from three papers.
There I saw a real fight amongst the photographers of the various newspapers. One photographer asked me to take this pose and the other one said, “No, we want him to take a better pose.” The third one said, “No, no, no, those poses don’t show his Indian robes to their best advantage. I want him to stand this way, not sit that way.” At one point they were actually fighting. Different photographers from different newspapers finally decided to each take their own photos. So in three newspapers there are totally different pictures. You have seen the cuttings. Very, very nice articles they wrote. One of them claimed me to be their Guru, the Guru of Ireland. It was so sweet and moving. To get back to the University of Dublin, Trinity College, they asked very sincere — very sincere — questions.
By the way, you know that Swami Vivekananda’s greatest disciple, Sister Nivedita, was born in Ireland. Her original name was Margaret Noble. So I told the audience a few things about her and about Swami Vivekananda’s teachings. They were very struck by my comments as they had totally, as a country almost, forgotten about Sister Nivedita. But in India, she has always been deeply admired for her spirituality and sacrifice.
Now something else is coming to my mind about Nivedita. While I was still working at the Indian Consulate, I would go occasionally on my lunch hour to Central Park, which is just a couple of blocks from the Consulate. I was very fond of (and am even now fond of) animals. So I went to the small zoo in Central Park, and I was looking at a lion. The lion was roaring inside his cage. All of a sudden I saw Nivedita right in front of me. I had been looking at the lion and was rather sad because I had to work so hard at the Consulate and was rewarded, it seemed, by having so much trouble getting the Indian Government to allow me to stay in the United States. They wanted me to return to India by a certain date because I had only a regular visa which limited me to six months in the United States.
I saw myself as a lion in a cage. Sister Nivedita said to me, “Look, this lion is roaring. Soon you are also going to roar, roar, roar all over the world. My Master, Swami Vivekananda, roared; he played his role. Now you too will roar all around the world. Your time is coming. You are the lion. This animal, this lion, is roaring but cannot come out of his cage. You are now in a cage; you are at the Indian Consulate. But soon you will be out of the cage and, at that time, you will roar all over the world. You will do infinite things on earth for the Supreme.”
Sister Nivedita said many more things about which I cannot speak but which, in my life, I will be able to prove true, if such is the Will of God.
So there, in Dublin, Ireland, while I was being interviewed by these press people, I was feeling her presence. When all the interviews were over, I saw her right in front of me once more. Again we had a most significant conversation. As you know, spiritual people do not die. Though it was so many years ago that she left the body, she is still roaming around. She is still alive. So... a most significantly special trip, this one to Ireland and the University of Dublin.
A disciple of mine from New England had written a letter to one of his friends who comes from Ireland but who is now in the States. That boy wrote to one of his friends who studies at Dublin University. So at the end of the talk, this friend came up to me and said, “I want to be your disciple.” I answered, “If you want to be my disciple, it is wonderful.” Immediately four or five other students insisted, “We want to be your disciples, too.” Then I said, “Then this could be a type of small Centre. Tomorrow I am going away. But right now, there is a room where I could teach you how to meditate, and then you must keep some connection with me.” They agreed very earnestly.
So we went into a room where we were to meditate, and to my surprise, twenty or twenty-five other students followed us. I asked, “Why are you all coming?” They answered, “We also want to be in your group. First we want to learn how to meditate.”
So I taught them all for a few minutes how to meditate. Out of the twenty-two or twenty-five, I saw that six or seven were drug addicts. I told them that I could not accept them as my disciples, that it was impossible. Another two or three had come only out of curiosity. But ten or eleven were extremely serious and made an inner decision to become real seeker-disciples. These students have been writing most devoted letters to us. They are running the Centre in Dublin very well. I am so proud of them.
Poor Alo, in all the universities, she had to do everything. She had to make all the last-minute arrangements for the halls, the lights, the microphones. She had to become the photographer. Many times our tape recorder failed, and all my talks were extemporaneous; nothing was prepared by me beforehand. All the talks were given on the spur of the moment. Here I was going to give a talk on “Attachment and Detachment”, a very significant talk. The tape recorder failed. Alo used shorthand which she had learned at the age of sixteen. She started to take down my talk in Pitman’s shorthand and she actually succeeded even though she had forgotten so much shorthand. It was such an important talk on “Attachment and Detachment”.
And she has to take photographs to retain the memories of our many activities. This moment she has to become the photographer and the next moment she has to become the stenographer. Then she has to see if my voice is coming through to the audience. I felt so sorry for her that day. She was speaking to the press, talking to the technicians at the University, writing, taking photos, talking to the seekers, making hotel arrangements, getting my Indian robes laundered and speaking to her old friends from the University of Toronto who had come to my lecture. They had not seen her since they all graduated in 1954.
At home in New York, Alo works at our Centre in Queens from 6:00 am to 2:00 am the next morning. She does all our correspondence from all over the world. She transcribes the tapes of all my Sunday and Thursday talks. She does all the cooking, the cleaning of our ten-room Centre, the gardening, the purchasing of food and the laundry. Preparing our Centre for the twice-weekly meditations is one of her most time-consuming jobs. It takes more than two hours. She has to vacuum the rugs, put out the heavy folding chairs, arrange the flowers, incense and candles. Decorating our shrine takes a long time since she puts fresh candles in the vigil-lights each time.
Alo does alone the work of fifteen or twenty disciples. Now some disciples are moving to Queens and have started to help her, but she has the full responsibility for everything. Not only on the physical level, but spiritually, behind the veil, Alo is the very life-breath of the Centre. Our disciples do not yet have the inner illumination to see what Alo is, spiritually, but one day, when their inner consciousness is awakened and illumined, they will value and cherish her. Here in Puerto Rico there are disciples who took her as their spiritual Mother in 1966 when they first met her. These disciples are extremely dear to our souls. Their inner oneness is so precious to our souls.
After England and Ireland, we went back to Scotland for a second time. This time we went to Glasgow. The first time, we were in Edinburgh. There we had a very successful meeting. But we didn’t think of a Centre at all. The last question I answered in my talk was, “You are going away tomorrow. What are you leaving behind? What are we going to do in your absence?” I asked, “What do you mean? In what way?”
They answered, “We want the spiritual life and we want to follow your path. Please tell us something that we can do in your absence. Give us something.” This type of request was made by these students at the University of Glasgow. I asked them, “Do you want me to leave a small group here?” One boy answered, “Yes, that is what I want. Whether others want it or not, for myself, I would like to be part of a small group. But if there is nobody else, I am ready to be your only disciple.”
So I replied, “When the meeting comes to an end, those who want to follow my path, please stay and we shall go somewhere else to meditate.” At that very moment, nine students jumped up. They were very sincere and dedicated. They later came and meditated with me in another room. I taught them how to meditate, and they did so very soulfully.
Again the same thing happened. Nine pictures we needed to give them, Transcendental Photos, but the pictures which X had sent from New York were long gone. We did not have nine pictures to give to these new seekers. I felt so sorry. I had to give them the passport picture and some absolutely silly pictures where I am in my ordinary consciousness, not in my highest. That kind of picture I had to give them. When we came back to New York, I asked X to send them more Transcendental Photos immediately. But when people ask for pictures and I can’t give them any, I feel really sorry. Sometimes it may happen that some curious people take my pictures and later throw them into the wastepaper basket. But these seekers did not ask out of curiosity; they were serious. The photos would help them to meditate properly.
Our very last talk of the whole trip was in a public hall in London, the famous Caxton Hall. Many people came, including some of Alo’s old classmates from the University of Toronto. At the end of the talk, we invited all the new London disciples to come up and stand on the platform. They were absolutely thrilled with joy and pride to be asked to stand up in Caxton Hall and be introduced as my disciples.
Now we have about twenty-five disciples in London. Out of these twenty-five, I wish to say that fifteen or sixteen are solid, very solid, disciples. They will really stay. Others may disappear. In all our Centres, this happens.
Here in Puerto Rico, when we started our journey, do you remember how many disciples came and how many new faces we saw? Yet only three or four of those original people have stayed. At least twenty-five old faces have disappeared.
Anyway, these three Centres in the British Isles are doing extremely well: London in England, Dublin in Ireland and Glasgow in Scotland.
During our trip to Europe, we received many, many letters; actually hundreds of letters. Agni’s letter was re-directed from Queens by X. One letter I got from Tony (Nivedan) and one letter was waiting for me when I got back from Indu (Margie Bouret). But from our President Carmen Suro, not even one. Carmen Maria Suro, who has written me the most devoted letters, did not write me even one letter! She was sick, she says. So in the inner world I found out what was happening in this Centre. In the outer world, this Centre was silent.
From Jamaica, West Indies, we got quite a few letters. From our New York Centre, Dulal wrote us many, many stories and anecdotes about the disciples, many good accounts of what was happening in New York. We used to get quite long letters with full information from many New York disciples. Each one told us something new about the Centre.
We used to get letters from the disciples about their sufferings — somebody is dying, somebody has flu, somebody has had an accident, etc. All kinds of news we used to get from the disciples. Dulal used to tell us most of this in his letters. Then we took immediate action.
I want to offer my deepest gratitude to the Supreme and to Mahalakshmi and Mahavishnu. They enabled us to have this divine experience of going to so many countries and offering the Supreme’s Light to the aspiring seekers. As you know, Alo and I are one, so I don’t have to offer my gratitude to her, since on the strength of our inseparable oneness, who will offer gratitude to whom?
These are the outer incidents that took place. In the inner worlds also, we accomplished something very strong and solid in the West. You will see how the Light is being spread and how Truth is growing. This is the achievement; this is the accomplishment.
We have entered into the world. “We” means you, you, you and everyone. You in Puerto Rico are deeply seated in our Boat. When we use the word “we”, we have to feel that each individual belongs to us and we belong to them. We are a spiritual family. This is our Mother Centre, and you will be surprised to hear that while I have told other disciples a few incidents, I have not told them the whole story. The whole story, from the beginning to the end, I have told only you, in Puerto Rico today.
Alo is writing something from the spiritual point of view about each university. I requested her to do this after I heard her telling Mahavishnu and Mahalakshmi what took place, what was the inner experience, what was the vision, and even what was the realisation in each particular university. She will write what she felt, what was happening and what she saw within me. This will be absolutely from the spiritual point of view. When it is completed, you will be able to see it. These juicy stories that I am telling you are all social, but from them, you can learn how the world has accepted us and because of your identity with us, how the world has accepted you.
The Supreme gave us enormous strength and cascades of energy. Otherwise, when I think of our journey in terms of human capacity, I am simply horror-struck. Even now it is beyond my imagination to recall what we achieved in such a short span of time: about twenty-six days, less than a month. How was it possible? Because the Inner Pilot, the Supreme, was operating in us and through us. It is His Mission. We are just His instruments. It is His Manifestation, and to fulfil that Manifestation, we came into the world. Every moment that we are fulfilling Him, we are also realising Him. The more we fulfil Him, the more we realise Him. For one purpose only, we came into the world: to fulfil the Supreme according to our capacity, our individual capacity.
In the morning we were in one place; in the afternoon somewhere else. At night, we went somewhere to give a talk and came back at one or two o’clock in the morning. This was our life.
We have to say that we travel to love and not that we love to travel. Whenever you go to New York, you also should feel that you are going to New York to love and not merely to travel.
So when I come here, I also come here to love you. My travelling is my loving. The other day at the San Juan television station I said, “I come here to be inspired and to inspire you. When I inspire you, you go deep within yourselves. When you go deep within, you inspire me to reveal my aspiration. The deeper you go with my inspiration, the easier it becomes for me to bring to the fore my aspiration. And I offer my aspiration to each one of you.”
I come here to be inspired and to inspire you. It is you who, after taking my inspiration, bring my aspiration to the fore. That aspiration again I offer to you and try to help you to reach your highest Realisation.
MPR 35. AUM Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 27 January 1971.↩
Sudha is the life-breath of this Centre. She is a most solid pillar of the Chinmoy Centres, and she is also the pioneer disciple. She is our first and foremost disciple. This Centre is our first Centre, and she is our first and foremost disciple. And here, as Alo has mentioned, the Centre is in her hands in our absence; she is our direct instrument.
To Sudha, the Centre is everything. Love, sacrifice and devotion: these are the qualities, the divine qualities, that she has in abundant measure. That is why it is possible for us to have her as a divine instrument, to have her here, inspiring and guiding all the seekers.
“Sudha” means “Nectar, divine Nectar”. The gods, the cosmic gods, drink nectar and then they become immortal. From Sudha in our Centre, you get inspiration and aspiration. It is aspiration that immortalises the seeker in each of us. So these are the things, the divine things, the precious things that we get from Sudha.
On her two broad shoulders, we rest in confidence. We demand, we scold, we urge, we press her in many ways in expecting perfect perfection from her. We want her to be perfect, absolutely perfect in everything. She has to make this kind of sacrifice. She has to have love, devotion and surrender. She has to have a totally consecrated life, a life consecrated to the Supreme. She has done it, and she will be doing it.
So in her radiant example to all those who are coming here to this Centre, she is showing how they can be totally dedicated and totally consecrated, totally surrendered to God the Supreme in the spiritual Master.
Sudha is appreciated by all the members of the New York Centre. Each member is fond of her and proud of her. Why? Everybody sees in her the same burning flame of aspiration and dedication to the Supreme. From Sudha you get inspiration and aspiration in abundant measure. This Centre is extremely proud of her, extremely grateful to her. Sudha and this Centre are inseparable. As she cannot be separated from us and is inseparably one with us, so each disciple can claim like Sudha to be totally one with us, to be totally consecrated to the Supreme. When we think of Sudha, we experience divine pride in great measure.
On Sudha’s birthday in 1967, I wrote a birthday message for her on a beautifully decorated blackboard. It said, “Sudha, Nectar of the Guru, Nectar of the Supreme.”
Then in 1969, I came again on 19 July and wrote on the same board, “The Nectar-Fount of the Guru and the Supreme.”
She is eternally ours. She is in us, she is of us and she is for us forever.
The birthday part, the most important part, is over. Now I want to speak about something else. Every time we come here, I must bring in some strictness. You have to bear with me. I wish to be always strict and stricter.
Now, on the one hand, I am really pleased with you, with each of you here. We are really pleased with the sincere seekers who are coming regularly, faithfully and devotedly. I wish you to continue in this way. But if you lag, if you relax in your aspiration, if you fail to make progress, then I am sorry to tell you that this Centre will not be meant for you at that time.
Our Mission is progressing very fast: fast, faster, fastest. You yourself can see it. We are entering into the whole, wide world. That is what the Supreme wants. Now if you stay here at the Centre only for the sake of counting years: two years, three years, four years, five years; if you stay but you are making no real inner progress, then we feel that we have to say, “This place is not meant for you.” Last week at the New York Centre we asked thirteen persons to leave the Centre, thirteen in one day. They had been with us for three years, two years, one year and six months, etc. Why did we do that? Because they could not maintain our standard, and they were making no progress at all. They were just coming, with no aspiration whatsoever.
Now here in Puerto Rico, I wish to maintain the same high standard. How can we maintain the standard? Only on the strength of our aspiration. In our Connecticut Centre, I was not strict at first. Now I am becoming strict, and I have told them that in two months’ time, nobody will be allowed to come to the Centre with long hair, beard or moustache — beard especially. No drugs or anything like that. Our Connecticut Centre was famous for those things. But now we are becoming very strict.
In this Centre, in Puerto Rico, the standard is good; in fact, it is very high. But if you drop, if someone else lags, if a third person relaxes, if someone’s apiration has gone very low, and if I see that for months a person has the same low degree of aspiration, that is to say, a lack of growing aspiration or no aspiration at all, then when we come here in a few months’ time, those persons will not be here.
We really want Puerto Rico and New York to be of the same standard in the field of aspiration. In no way do I want you to be behind them or New York to be behind you. Run and run the fastest, just as you do in your sports, where you are doing well.
We are very pleased with your sports. This morning we saw your capacity and, for that, we thank each individual competitor, plus the instructor, Nadeshwar. He has taken great pains in teaching you, and I am most pleased and proud of him and proud of each of you.
In the spiritual life here, I want everybody to listen to Sudha, so that we can be proud of each of you. She is the spiritual leader of the Centre here. So please cooperate with her. Whatever she says, try to do it, and do not enter into any kind of argument or controversy with her. Rest assured that she won’t make any decision until she takes our permission. When it is a serious matter, she immediately phones us or writes to us, and only with our direct knowledge, approval and permission, does she tell you what to do. Then she will try to implement our decision. In serious matters, she speaks to us on the phone, and she will always let you know what we want. But in regard to the ordinary activities and general management of the Centre, please listen to her, so that you don’t enter into conflict. Jealousy and all these emotional reactions you have to conquer for the sake of your spiritual lives. However, as I just said, with regard to anything important or serious, she will ask us, and only with our express permission will she tell you what to do. She will be able to quote us at that time. She will say, “I asked Guru; I asked Alo, and they said this; this is their wish.” But in the everyday management of the Centre activities, in all that is going on, please listen to her. Then surely there can be no conflict between your aspiration and her guidance.
Now, to come back to my main point which I have not yet touched upon: Alo has come to Puerto Rico to take you, all our Puerto Rican children, to New York for our Athletic Competitions.
Now, here is my request to each competitor here: suppose a New York disciple has won in a particular event. Immediately try to identify yourself with that runner or jumper, and try to feel that it is you who have run the fastest; it is you who have done the very best. In that way, you get the greatest joy on the strength of your oneness. Then if somebody has stood last, either from this Centre, our Puerto Rican Centre, or from New York, immediately identify yourself with that poorest runner or thrower. Then what will happen? When you identify yourself with that so-called inferior one, you will offer your sympathy to him since he is weaker than you. You will become one with him. With the superior person, you will feel that it is you, with your enthusiasm, zeal and pride, who are entering into him and identifying yourself with him. That is your best achievement. If somebody wins or somebody loses or does not do well, you will feel that it is your best performance or your worst.
In that way, you will identify yourselves with your spiritual brothers and sisters in New York and Connecticut. It is one family. Here we are all one family. You are going there to New York, and I am most pleased and most proud. But with this kind of spirit, you will please go: brothers and sisters will be meeting together, not like Olympic or other sports people who sometimes compete with an undivine spirit. You will be seeing your own brothers and sisters; they will be seeing their own spiritual brothers and sisters in you. To compete in an undivine way is not sportsmanlike; it is nothing but a battle of egos. We shall not do that. We shall compete with inner identification and divine oneness.
So, dearest children, the real game, the real championships up there in New York will be to see how you identify yourselves with them and how they identify themselves with you. What I am telling you, I have already told them in New York: how to identify themselves with you. If you stand first, anyone from here, I have told them immediately to identify themselves with you, and then they will have the greatest joy and pride. Similarly, if you do very badly in one particular item, they will identify themselves with your poorest performance and become one with you. With the poorest competitor, you will identify yourself with your sympathy and concern; with the best, you will identify yourself with joy, enthusiasm and pride, for we are all one. You will please all behave in this way.
For your Guru and Alo, the real success will be in your inner attitude, not in your outer performance. Yes, if in the outer world you do well, I will be very pleased. But I will be more pleased and extremely proud of you if you have the feeling of oneness with your brothers and sisters of New York and Connecticut. You are all our spiritual children who will be giving us inner joy in their oneness and union. As for the performances as such, do your best; they will also try. Everybody must apply his or her best efforts; compete to your utmost capacity. In this way, humanity at large will know that in the physical world, we have acted with a spiritual consciousness.
[Sri Chinmoy’s talk continues after refreshments.]
I wish to tell you that no one can bind me with money. It is impossible. With material wealth, with outer gifts, no! With love, devotion and surrender, yes, you can bind me. If you have divine love and devoted surrender, at every second, you can bind me. People in our other Centres also have wanted to bind us by giving us thousands of dollars to run our so-called “Main Centre” in New York. We have also been offered land and property. But we have refused to accept these offerings because there was, behind them, a subtle unspiritual motive, a desire to bind and possess us. Some of those people have already left the Centre on their own initiative.
So here in Puerto Rico, people should not be under the illusion that so-and-so is very dear to us because he or she has given some money or is helping in some other material way. No, only devoted, obedient love, devotion and surrender can keep you close, closer, closest to me. By giving us material things, you cannot bind us. A true spiritual Master can never be bound by material things. He can only be bound by spiritual qualities which come directly from the aspiring soul.
To some extent, with material things, you can help us in manifesting our mission if you do it sincerely and selflessly. Moreover, where there is true dedication and devotion, the Supreme will supply you with the material things which you need in order to make your work for Him possible. He will bring material possessions to you. We shall soon see in all our Centres, especially New York and Puerto Rico, people who have both devotion and material wealth. But this does not mean that people who do not have material wealth and have only dedication and devotion are inferior. No. The truly superior ones are those who have constant inner aspiration and constant outer dedication. They are really superior. Again, those who have material wealth and are helping devotedly can feel that they are doing selfless, dedicated service. This has to be understood by each of you.
The first and foremost necessity is inner aspiration; along with inner aspiration, if you have material wealth and you offer it devotedly, then it becomes a divine service, a truly selfless action. In India, we called it Nishkama Karma, which means literally “Desireless Action”. Otherwise, you are only aggrandising your own ego. Your ego has to be transformed; it has to be transcended. So if any of you are under the illusion that if you give us this or that, you can become very close to us, you must understand that this is not the way spiritual Masters function. On the contrary, if there is no satisfactory inner progress, I eventually ask that person to leave the Centre. It is like a university; if you cannot pass your examinations and you make no progress, ultimately, after giving you many chances to improve, and seeing no change, they ask you to leave the university. Either you have to maintain a certain standard or you have to leave. We want both New York and Puerto Rico to maintain a uniformly high standard.
To maintain a high standard of this type in the spiritual life, inner aspiration and outer dedication are necessary. We will be proud of those who feel that their lives are totally dedicated to the Supreme’s Cause, as Sudha has done. Please try to do as she has done. Otherwise, there will be a false understanding, a total misunderstanding, and these misunderstandings will remain in your mind. So right from the beginning, I am telling you that if you want to be close to me, then dedicate yourself, heart and soul, inwardly and outwardly. But by trying to bind us outwardly, without inner communication, inner oneness, or an inner feeling of identification, it is simply impossible. You will be fooling yourselves.
So here, there are quite a few people like that, and I am telling them, I am warning them, that if within you, you do not have inner communication and oneness, then outwardly it is foolishness and stupidity to try to bind us with money. Try rather to go deep within yourselves and establish your oneness, your inner oneness with me on a very solid basis. Then you will be safe and secure, and we will also be confident in our oneness with you, and we will be most proud of you.
Next Friday at Columbia University in New York City, we shall be holding our highest meditation once again. Those who come here to this Centre at seven o’clock in the evening can join us spiritually. And if you like, I can ask Sudha to be here at seven. [Everyone assented enthusiastically.] So all those who want to come here and meditate at 7 pm this coming Friday, are most welcome. You will join us spiritually. Sudha will be here. We shall all meditate together.
And then the next thing — this is my request for the week: Alo has worked very, very hard in New York, and this week, after I have left, she will be here for a rest. I don’t want anyone to come here at odd hours and ask her, “Can we take you here or there?” If she needs anyone’s help, she will phone them. Otherwise, please do not bother her. Tomorrow is Monday; tomorrow there is no activity here at the Centre. Nobody should come. The day after tomorrow, Tuesday, there is nothing also, just for this week. Wednesday is the regular meditation. Thursday — packing. On Friday morning, Alo will be going with the Puerto Rican children to New York. So this week, there will be no selfless service at all. If she changes her mind about this or if she needs you, she will call. Otherwise, please do not come here under some pretext either in the morning or at noon or in the evening, and then stay here for two or three or four hours.
When we all go to New York, in addition to yourselves, so many people will be coming. About two hundred people will be there. More than a hundred people alone are participating in the sports. So many people to feed, accommodate and organise for their particular sport-items. So much work! So Alo has come here this time only for Sudha’s birthday and for relaxation. Please also do not bring her personal problems, or come here under some pretext, to talk to her for hours. It is very exhausting when you do that.
You know that when I am serious, I can be very serious. You know, too, that I am all love, all compassion, but again when I use my divine authority, I am very, very severe. So please listen to this request of mine.
MPR 36. AUM Centre, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 19 July 1971.↩
From:Sri Chinmoy,The Master speaks to the Puerto Rican disciples, 1966-1972, Agni Press, 1993
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/mpr