Run and smile, smile and run

Part I — Question and answers

_Greg Meyer:_ Why do I get more satisfaction from training than from racing?²

While practising, you are consciously working to transcend your capacities. At that time, you are listening to the message of the ever-transcending Beyond, and this message itself is complete satisfaction. But when you compete against others, you are more concerned with victory than with self-transcendence. Naturally, at that time hesitation, anxiety and doubt have a free access to your heart and mind, and you do not and cannot have satisfaction.

But when you practise, you and your aspiration, you and your dedication, you and your eagerness to increase your capacities work together for your improvement and perfection. And from improvement and perfection, you are bound to get abiding satisfaction.

Because of the feeling of separativity in the mind, we may get fleeting satisfaction when we defeat others. Your supremacy in the Boston Marathon this year, for example, undoubtedly gave you tremendous satisfaction. But perhaps quite a few times during your practice you have had more illumining and more fulfilling satisfaction, for practice carries the message of oneness and self-transcendence, whereas competition carries the message of division and supremacy.

_Craig Virgin:_ How do I cope with the pressures of winning or, on the other hand, the disappointment of losing in a sports competition?³

To cope with the disappointment of losing, you have to ask yourself whether the mind is disappointed or the heart is disappointed. You will come to realise that it is your mind that is disappointed and not your heart. The mind creates division; the mind is division itself, and division is another name for pain, devastating pain. The heart, on the other hand, creates oneness; in fact, the heart is oneness itself, and oneness is another name for joy, spontaneous joy. When you live in your heart, even if your worst rival wins the race, you will not feel miserable. To your wide surprise, you will find that his joy quite unconsciously and unexpectedly will enter into you and widen your heart. Then you will feel almost the same joy that the winner feels.

It was your heart that was speaking in and through these illumining utterances of yours: "Running is the people's sport. When was the last time the average person played ball with Reggie Jackson? Yet millions of people run in the same races and rub elbows with the top runners. In what other sport can the average player run the same course and go through the same trials as the top stars?"

You have already established yourself as a supreme runner. No matter how many races you lose from now on, even if you lose every race (which is absurdity on the face of it), no disappointment on earth will dare to challenge the flood of joy that you have received from and offered to the world running community as a result of the innumerable races that you have won in a variety of distances.

Some good runners, unfortunately, are not sharp. In your case, you are sharp, very sharp; bright, very bright; quick, very quick. And something quite rare in the running world — you have intuition. Your intuitive faculties remarkably add to your success in racing. To our great joy and satisfaction, your body, vital, mind and heart speedily and breathlessly follow your intuitive flashes. You have brought considerable name and fame to America, your beloved country. For that, America's great speed is richly proud of you and America's deep pride is unmistakably grateful to you.

_John Dimick:_ What should a good runner do when he finds that the pressures of his family, community and job mean he cannot train at high mileage or undertake frequent racing?⁴

You are a superb runner. For you the hour has struck. Those who are even unconsciously standing in your way will one day cheerfully and unreservedly support you. Please feel that you have already started a race. Now your only aim is to reach the goal, no matter how many obstacles you have to surmount on the way. Your victory will ultimately be the victory of your dear ones and also the victory of the world running community.

It is my earnest request to you that you practise as many miles as you want and run as many races as you want. When the pressures you now face are transformed into treasures, not only your dear ones but also all and sundry will deeply value and gratefully enjoy them.

_Dick Beardsley:_ Recently I ran a 2:08:53 marathon with primarily a road-racing background. Would it improve my chances of making the 1984 Olympic marathon team if I partake in training and racing the 10,000 metres on the track? If I get the speed down in 10,000 metres, will I run a faster marathon?⁵

When you are running a marathon, mentally try to feel that you are running only thirteen miles rather than twenty-six miles. If you can convince the mind of this fact, and if the mind can convince the body that it is running only thirteen miles and not twenty-six miles, then it will be a great advantage for you. This is not a mental hallucination. A new discovery has dawned in the mind and the mind is passing it along to the body. Both the mind and the body will have to act together in order to reach the ultimate goal.

In the philosophical aspect, you have to feel that your problems are as insignificant as ants and pay no attention to them. You have had problems with cows, dogs, puddles and road hazards of all kinds. You should take these problems philosophically. Although these things are extremely unfortunate and discouraging for a great runner like you, you have to feel that they are almost part and parcel of a runner's life. If you can see them in this way, then when discouragement and temporary lack of enthusiasm attack you, you can easily, successfully and fruitfully overcome these obstacles on the way to your sublime goal.

Finally, if you can think that through your running you are doing something that has a direct connection with the ever-transcending Beyond, which is far beyond the domain of the earth-bound physical mind, then you will get tremendous inspiration. This inspiration embodies added strength, added joy and an added sense of satisfaction. In your case, if you can consciously think of another world — which we call 'the Beyond' — if you can add another vista or dimension to your already surprising approach to running, then you are bound to be more successful.

In your case, it seems to me that mentally you are not confident of your fastest speed. Either because of your own personal experience or because of ideas that others have thrust upon you, you feel that you do not possess extraordinary speed — specially towards the end of a race when speed is badly required.

To get rid of this absurd notion for good, twice a week try to run between thirty and fifty metres as fast as possible, at intervals of a minute or even longer, for twenty-five or thirty consecutive times. Your mind will all of a sudden be fully awakened to a new discovery of your own speed, which has all along been unnoticed, if not ignored. This mental discovery will help you considerably.

Kindly try this new method and the other suggestions that I have offered. Although you are a great runner, you still have not yet reached your highest potential. Your world-surprising potential is ahead of you and beckoning you.

_Rod Dixon:_ Am I being reasonable to expect my family to understand my physical urge to pursue my running life? I want to please my family, yet I also want to please my running career.⁶

With their human hearts, the members of your immediate family want to possess you and have you all the time around them. Your affection and love for them and their affection and love for you mean everything to them. Perhaps your running laurels are secondary to them. But again, these same members of your family each have a divine heart. Unlike the human heart, which wants to possess and be possessed, the divine heart wants only to give of itself, widen itself, receive the vast world and be received by the vast world. These are the messages that the divine heart receives from the higher worlds and offers to the outer world at large.

Those who live in the divine heart are meant for the whole world. The messages that this heart gives them they do not keep secretly and sacredly inside their immediate family. No, they offer these messages to all of humanity. So if any want to possess you or want to claim you as their own, very own, they should try to live in the divine heart, just as you are doing.

If you and also the members of your immediate family can all live in the divine heart, then your commitment to your dear ones and their full understanding of what you were, what you are and what you are going to become will eventually and unmistakably bring boundless joy and boundless satisfaction to you and also to them.

You come from New Zealand and you now live in America. Like the members of your family, New Zealand may think that it has lost you. But if we look at the truth from a new angle, then we see that, like the members of your family, your country does not actually lose you when you go abroad to run. The way the members of your family have offered you to the world at large, to be claimed by the entire world, New Zealand also has offered you to the world. Yet it can and does still claim your astounding triumphs as its own, very own.

Not only are you bringing tremendous glory to your beloved country, New Zealand, but you are also bringing glory to America and to the entire world. Nobody loses anything. All of us only gain — not only for our personal selves or for the members of our immediate families, but also for the community of nations, for the entire world.

When we use our wisdom-light, we illumine our ignorance-night and add abiding satisfaction to our own small worlds and also to the vast world that is around us.

_Eamonn Coghlan:_ Given an Olympic final, when ten competitors are lined up in the race, and all are 100 per cent physically fit and prepared, what does it take for one runner to win over the others?⁷

The other way is to identify oneself with the sources of the fastest speed and endurance. Here one consciously becomes one with the higher realities that are invisible, yet infinitely faster and stronger than the outer realities or, let us say, outer capacities. If a runner is a conscious truth-seeker and God-lover, then he will adopt the inner way and not the outer way. The outer way is the way of the lion: roaring and devouring the rivals.

Sometimes inspiration, encouragement and determination can come not only from one's fans, but also from a departed soul. In your case, after your father left the body, on the one hand you were stricken with grief. On the other hand, you have to know that definitely his soul has considerably helped you to add substantially solid glory to your already immortal glory.

_Don Kardong:_ Why do you think that runners often are able to achieve a meditative state while running?⁸

Question: What role should competition play in one's running?

_Mike Spino:_ If higher states of consciousness are possible when running, will this always result in superlative performances? Can there be a poor performance and a gain in the life quest? If so, how can this be recognised?⁹

_Mike Spino:_ In our last meeting I was fortunate to have you observe a film of the late Percy Cerutty demonstrating his canter and gallop techniques. You made insightful commentary on the nature of his spirit as it related to this late phase of his life. Could you elaborate further?

_Mike Spino:_ America is seeking a form of an Olympic training centre, yet the American lifestyle negates the use of any mental training that is larger than biofeedback or personality inventory. As a university coach seeking a mental training technique with objective timings, how does one balance the objectives of a programme? Is it a 'given' that as we seek dual purposes of spirituality and performance, we will remain an iconoclast, understood by only a small circle and questioning our own methods?

_Mike Spino:_ I have experimented with moving visualisations in an attempt to transfer 'sitting awareness' to running consciousness. What suggestions can you make for this transfer, and is sitting a necessary prerequisite for the development of elated running consciousness?

_Gary Fanelli:_ Sometimes when I am racing, I ask myself, "What am I doing here, beating my brains and body out?" I've had some injuries, but I continue racing. What is the best attitude toward this?¹⁰

You are an American. Americans take life as a challenge from the cradle to the grave. When you run, you are challenging yourself and nobody else. When you work very hard in your running and get severe injuries, you should try to have a divine attitude. Try to feel that the constant increase in your capacity to endure pain is of paramount importance. When you increase your capacities, automatically you establish a glowing hope and a soaring promise for your fellow runners all over the world.

_Cahit Yeter:_ After averaging nearly 7,000 miles over the past three years, I believe I have satisfied my thirst for very long, long runs. Meanwhile, I am still entering many long races. Most of the time, winning itself does not come into my mind, but sometimes I think of running beyond the records most other men have run. I'd like to know, since winning is everything in America and I am part of it, why I have lost my desire to win.¹¹

You have won an amazing number of races on the strength of your outer desire. Now aspiration, the inner desire, has come to the fore. It wants to play its role most significantly in you, just as the outer desire has played its role over the years. Until now you have exercised your outer desire to conquer the world and show what you possess in order to draw the world's attention and admiration. You are now trying to exercise your inner desire to show the world what you have to offer for the world's improvement, which is an intrinsic part of your own improvement. Previously you wanted victory for your own satisfaction, and that victory you achieved by defeating others. Now you want the victory that comes from the satisfaction of establishing oneness, genuine oneness, with others.

A radiant example of your oneness we saw recently when you ran in our Sri Chinmoy Marathon held in New York. Out of your loving, sympathetic oneness-heart you asked that your prize be given to the runner who came in last. Such is your feeling for your fellow runners! For you, they are like members of your own family. As the older one, who is more experienced, you encourage the younger ones to come forward by spreading your joy and satisfaction all around. Fortunately or unfortunately, one of the members of our Team stood last, and she was deeply moved to receive your trophy.

_Mary Slaney (formerly Decker-Tabb):_ It is known that some female athletes, because of drugs, have a chemical advantage over their competitors. How can a natural athlete, such as myself, justify the use of world rankings, knowing that other athletes using drugs are consistently ranked higher than so-called natural athletes?¹²

Nature embodies the cosmic energy. This cosmic energy is infinitely stronger than any man-made chemicals. This energy comes from the ultimate Source and it leads us to the ultimate Source while fulfilling and satisfying us along the way. Chemicals and other artificial things will ultimately fail, for they are unnatural. Anything that is unnatural is like a balloon. For a while it will dazzle us and puzzle our human mind, but eventually it will burst.

One of my poems speaks about naturalness. It says:

```

If you want to grow

Of God's Vision-Reality.

Stay with your natural ability. Already you are a radiant example of nature's unquestionable supremacy over the so-called chemical miracles. You have been chosen as the US Athlete of the Year. You can definitely bring high, higher and highest glories in the running world not only to your beloved country, America, but to all mankind.

Part II — Talk

Talk at the opening of the United States National Senior Olympics<sup>13</sup>

O Senior Olympians, your hearts' wisdom-light is telling the entire world that you belong to Time eternal, running along Eternity's Road, challenging the giant pride of self-doubt on the battlefield of life. You are the supreme hero-athletes who look forward, upward and inward. Forward you look to declare you can. Upward you look to declare you will. Inward you look to declare you are, eternally are. You can conquer the limitations of the body. You will transform the teeming imperfections of the body into perfection. You are the Olympian pilgrims who smilingly and proudly shake hands with impossibility. Already you are in the galaxy of immortals. You are creating a oneness-world-home with the physical fitness of your body-fort and with the universal fulness of your heart-victory.

O Senior Olympics, O Senior Olympians, O self-giving sponsors and organisers of this unprecedented Senior Olympics, to you I bow, to you I bow. With my mind's prayerful admiration and with my heart's soulful gratitude, to you I bow.

Part III — Interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Question: Do you have a philosophy on physical fitness?

Question: Which comes first — the inner life or the outer life?

Question: How does exercise and competition help the inner life?

There are many athletes who get inspiration and enthusiasm only when they compete with others. I cannot blame them. If someone is in a position to compete with somebody else, that means he is inspired, he is enthusiastic. If he is competing with someone, then he can bring to the fore his utmost capacity. Otherwise he may be lethargic. He may not practise daily. The physical discipline in his life may come into existence only when he knows that he has to compete with somebody else. Otherwise, he may not take these physical exercises seriously.

Question: Is improvement and building on previous records important, or is the main thing to exercise daily?

Question: Spiritually, what can we get from games? Volleyball, for instance, is one of those sports that they will be doing in the Senior Olympics.

From the spiritual point of view, there are many things we can learn from games. One is fellow feeling. Then, in volleyball there is something called a serve. Let us take the term 'serve'. By playing, we are serving mankind. You will say, "How?" Let us say you are playing volleyball, and I am in the audience. You are giving me joy and inspiration. You are playing so well, you are smashing the ball and doing all kinds of things.

Question: Why is the development of the Senior Olympics important?

Question: In your remarks tonight, what do you anticipate saying to the Senior Olympians?

Question: Could you talk about the concert that you will be giving?

Question: What is the relationship between meditation and sports? I know in martial arts, which is something I've done for many years, there is a direct relationship, but does it also exist with sports?

Part IV — Question and answers

Question: For a very long task, such as an ultramarathon that goes on for many days, do I need to have patience or should I just try to have dynamism?

Question: Is there some spiritual quality that I can invoke during the 3,100-mile race this year or something new I can do to really please the Supreme? Outwardly I know the goal is to finish the race, to transcend my best time and so forth, but is there something I can do inwardly to please the Supreme?<sup>16</sup>

Now the question is, what qualities do you need to bring forward from your inner life while you are running? The first one is enthusiasm. Who embodies enthusiasm? A little child. Who can be more enthusiastic than a child? He enters into a garden and runs here and there, here and there, appreciating everything that he sees. Then, in addition to enthusiasm, you need eagerness. Again, who has more eagerness than a little child? If he plays with a toy, he is so eager, his whole world is the toy.

Every day when you run, you have to feel that it is a golden opportunity to appreciate the One who is inspiring you. Always you have to feel that the Supreme is inspiring you to run this longer than the longest distance. Somebody is begging you, urging you, to do the right thing. Again, when you agree and say, "Yes, I will do it," then that Somebody Himself runs in and through you. First God comes and begs us, "Be a nice person, be a nice person." Then when we have decided that we should become a nice person, when we have said, "Yes, my Lord, I have decided to become a nice person," God Himself becomes that nice person. Similarly, when you run, if you offer the prayer, "God, please make me a good runner. I want to make progress this time in my running," then this is a good prayer. At that time God Himself will become a good runner inside you.

Now, while running 3,100 miles, you have to deal with fatigue — when you are tired, exhausted, dead. As long as you are in the mind, you will always have fatigue, tiredness, weariness and everything. But the moment you enter into the heart, there is no fatigue. What you will find is constant energy.

When you are doing something for the Supreme and you are in the heart, you can work hours and hours, day and night. When we love something or someone, this is what always happens. Yesterday is an illustration. In spite of being tired, your best friend made such beautiful decorations for your birthday. Her tiredness disappeared because of her love. But if she had been in the mind, she would have only worked for a short time and then given up. Then she would not have created such beautiful things.

If you are in the heart, there is a constant supply of energy and sweetness. We all have to develop sweetness. Sweetness is not masculine or feminine. People say that only girls can have sweetness and not men, but sweetness is not something masculine or feminine. Sweetness is a reality which is constantly supplying us with newness and freshness.

Early in the morning when you get up, if you have a sweet feeling inside you, then everything is beautiful. If inside you there is sweetness, the whole world is beautiful. But if inside you there is bitterness, then no matter what you see — even if you look at my Transcendental picture — you will not get any joy. Even if you look at a beautiful flower, there will be no joy. But inner sweetness sees the world as most beautiful.

While you are running this long distance, you are seeing hundreds of cars passing by and so many people are making noise. But you should feel that you are not running around that big block; you are only running inside your own heart-garden where there are beautiful flowers, plants and trees. If you can not only see but feel that each time you are going around you are only running inside your beautiful heart-garden, then you can bring sweetness into each and every step that you take.

The surface that you run on is solid concrete. I cannot even walk on it. When you are running around, after an hour or two hours or a few days, this solid thing that you feel you are striking against starts striking your mind. You start thinking, "This is so bad. Every day I have to do sixty miles," this and that. But who counts the mileage? It is the mind. The mind is saying, "Oh my God, today I have to do sixty miles, and I have not yet done twenty miles!" Then you are finished! The mind, your worst enemy, is coming to torture you.

But the heart is not counting the mileage. The heart is only running, running, running. Then at the end of that session, the heart says, "Now let me see how many miles I have done." By that time, perhaps you have done forty miles already. The heart does not calculate. The mind calculates from one to two, two to three, three to four and so on. The mind tries to go to the destination by cutting, cutting, cutting. But the heart tries to see and feel the starting point and the end at the same time. For the heart the destination is not somewhere else. Only for the mind is the destination somewhere else.

The heart will simply say, "Please take me to my destination." Yesterday in the prayer I gave before lifting up 1,300 pounds, I said to the Supreme, "Take me to my destination. It is a very long journey." While I was giving the prayer, it was my heart that was talking. How soulfully I was saying it! So inside the heart the starting point and the finish line are together.

If you can feel that you are a five-year-old or six-year-old child, tiredness will not come into your mind. A child does not know what tiredness is. He knows only enthusiasm and eagerness. Never think of sixty miles or 3,100 miles. Never take the distance in that way — never! Only run for the joy of it. When you run for the joy, even while you are running, sometimes you are thinking of me or of something very divine and sweet. Then by the time you would have normally come to nineteen miles, you will have covered twenty-three miles. You will ask, "How did I run so fast?" It is because your heart was enjoying some divinity when you were thinking of me or thinking of your soul. When the heart starts operating in and through the legs or the body, then the distance will always become much more. Otherwise, you will run five miles and then give up. When the heart runs, you will have already run twenty miles, and then you will say, "How could I have come so far?" The answer is because at that time you were in another world. The divinity of that other world was constantly helping you and supporting you.

When you run, never think that you are forty-three or forty-four years old. Only think that you are six or seven years old. If you are only six or seven years old, then why do you have to worry? When I lift heavy weights, at that time do I say, "Oh my God, I am sixty-nine, nearing seventy years old. How am I going to lift?" Then I would be finished! I will only go there and say, "Oh my God, it may drop on my head! I will die or have to live in the hospital the rest of my life." This is the kind of ideas that the mind will supply me with.

But the heart does not see the weight in that way. The heart sees the weight as a big toy. When a child gets a toy or when my dog Chela gets a toy, it may be so big that he cannot move it even, but he is so happy that such a big toy has now come into his possession. In my case, I take the weight as a toy. In your case also, when you think of the long distance, try to imagine that it is something to play with. Do not think of distance as something you will cover. Do not think that you will be tired, you will be exhausted or you will die. You have to take running as a game you like to play. Any game that you like, feel that you are playing that game. Do not feel that you are running such a long distance, and that every day you are getting tired. No! With tiredness comes sadness, and then you become upset — everything!

A child plays every day with new toys. Today's new toy can be quite inferior to yesterday's toys. But just because it is new, the child gets tremendous joy. My dog Chela has so many good toys. But if you bring him a new one, even if you bring one that is exactly like the toys he already has, he will be so excited! The same way, each day when you go out to run, you should see newness, newness, newness. Always think of the heart-garden. When you walk or run in a garden, you do not become tired because of the beautiful flowers and fragrance. Everything is charming, everything is inspiring. When you think of the street, there are only roaring lions here and there, with deafening noise. But while you are running in your own heart-garden, such a sweet feeling you are getting. It is your own garden; you are the boss.

When your mind is operating very powerfully, you are not the boss. Your boss is self-doubt, self-criticism, fear, worry and anxiety. You are constantly thinking, "Will I be able to complete the race?" Those wrong forces become your boss. But when you run inside your heart, at that time your boss is your love of God; your boss is your surrender to God's Will. If you can keep that feeling in your outer life while you are running, then there will be no problem. Always take it as a garden, not as a street, not as a big block.

Do not run with the mind. Even if today you fool the mind, tomorrow the mind will come back with redoubled trickeries to make your life miserable. You should say to the mind, "You stay with your trickeries. I want to play with my heart-toy, not with you. You consider your toys as beautiful, but I don't agree. In those days I was a fool; I enjoyed you. But now I am wise. I want to enjoy my heart-toy. The heart-toy always brings me happiness and newness, newness and happiness."

When you run, if you can make yourself feel that inside your heart Somebody is running or your heart is running or you are running with your heart, then tiredness disappears, the power of distance disappears. Only the power of oneness, oneness, oneness with God's Will appears.

All my blessings, all my love, all my gratitude, all my pride and pride and pride go to you for running this long, unimaginably long distance.