1. Inner strength

Either I shall have to
    Cry like a child
Or I shall have to
    Smile like a child.
These are the only ways
To constantly gain inner strength.
There are no other ways.
    When I cry like a child
    Or smile like a child,
Lo, inner strength becomes mine.

2. Joy

A human life of joy
    Is a life of and for
God's Satisfaction-Toy
    In humanity,
    In His Universal Reality.

3. Oneness

Oneness with the past
    Is our oneness with frustration-night.

Oneness with the present
    Is our oneness with hesitation-night.

Oneness with the fast-approaching tomorrow
    Is our oneness with God-preparation
    For a new dawn.

4. Spontaneity

Spontaneity
Is God-transcending
    Reality,
    Divinity
    And Immortality
In our life of ever-mounting oneness
    With the Absolute.

5. Avatar

An Avatar is he who is
Heaven's unrecognised infinite capacity
    For
Humanity's immortal perfection.

6. Mother

The human mother tells the child,
"Look up!
There is the truth."

The divine Mother tells the child,
"Look within!
There alone
    Is the beauty of truth."

7. Gratitude

Gratitude
    Is self-expansion
    And
    God-manifestation
In the life of the sincere seeker's
    Ever-mounting aspiration.

8. Punctuality

The seeker's regularity
    Makes God
    Smile.

The seeker's punctuality
    Makes God
    Dance.

9. The Guru's love

If ever a disciple realises,
    Even for a fleeting second,
What the Guru's love is,
Then God-realisation for him
Can no longer remain a far cry.
God-realisation then becomes
    As easy as drinking water.

10. Supreme

As long as the animal in us
Plays the role of our Supreme,
    We cannot become a genuine seeker.

As long as the human in us
Plays the role of our Supreme,
    We cannot become a real seeker.

    But
The day the Divine in us
Plays the role of our Supreme,
    That day not only will we
    Have the Supreme as our guide,
    But we will ourselves become the Supreme —
    Our only Goal.

11. Light

Give light;
    You will receive more.

Become light;
    You will receive much more.

    Ask God
Whether to give light or become light;
    You will become boundless light.

12. Devotion

Devotion
To the inner reality
    Is liberation
From the shackles
    Of temptation and frustration.

13. Cry

Cry for name and fame;
God will not allow you
To participate in His cosmic Game.

    Cry for surrender-participation
In His cosmic Game;
God not only will allow you
To play with Him,
But also will share with you
His infinite Delight.

14. Child

A human child
    Cries for possession.
A divine child
    Cries for perfection-progress on earth
    And
    Perfection-progress in Heaven.

15. Salvation

If you think of sin,
Then you need salvation.

    If you think of ignorance,
Then you need liberation.

    If you think of oneness,
Then you need God-realisation,
Self-realisation.

16. Self-giving

The self-giving life-tree
    Becomes slowly,
    Steadily
    And unerringly
The God-nourishing,
    God-immortalising
    Fruit.

17. Creation

Creation is
    God-preparation
    In silence,
God-transcendence
    In silence.

18. Marriage

A God-ordained marriage
    Leads to
    Heaven's door.

A man-made marriage
    Is the door to
    Hell itself.

19. Acceptance

A surrendered life
    Is God-satisfaction acceptance-light
In the heart
    Of a genuine seeker.

20. Peace

Peace is not in seeing,
Peace is not in receiving,
Peace is not in feeling,
Peace is not in giving;
Peace is in praying to God
    For peace-role
    In the seeker's aspiring life.

21. Education

The best education
    In the human life
    Is self-giving.

The best education
    In the divine life
    Is unconditional surrender
    To God's Will.

22. Vision

With our outer vision
We see the world
    The way we want to see the world.

With our inner vision
We see the world
    The way God wants us to see the world.
How does God want us to see the world?
He wants us to see the world
    As God-preparing perfection.

23. Capacity

God never asks us
    To do something beyond our capacity.
He always grants us
    Infinitely more than the necessary capacity
When He asks us to do something for Him.

24. Beyond

The Beyond
Is in my heart's cry
For my nature's transformation
    And
For the constant Satisfaction
    Of my Beloved Supreme.

25. Sacred

A sacred life is needed
    To receive God.

A sacred life is needed
    To reveal the divine in us.

A sacred life is needed
    For the real in us
    To become universally real.

But a supreme life is needed
    To carry the message of God.

26. Immortality

Immortality
Is not a vague word;
    It is a reality.
And this reality dawns
Only when the seeker becomes
A conscious and constant cry
    For God-satisfaction in himself.

27. Spirituality

Spirituality
    Is the only reality
That grows in our inner life,
That glows in our outer life
    And
That flows in God's ever-transcending
    Silence-Life.

28. Hope

Real hope is not mere wishful thinking.
Real hope is the seed of reality in us
Which is bound to manifest itself
    In God-satisfaction
    Reality-tree,
    Reality-flower,
    Reality-fruit.

29. Ignorance

When I consciously do not mix
    With ignorance-night,
Delight spontaneously mixes with me
And promises me
    That light will always mix with me.

30. Instrument

Lord Supreme,
Make me a hallowed instrument,
A flute,
So that You can play on me
With Your all-illumining,
    All-liberating,
    All-immortalising
    Delight.

31. Soul

The soul not only tells us about
    The existence of the supreme Goal,
But also shows us
    Where the Goal is
    And
    What the Goal is.

32. Becoming

Lord Supreme,
I am becoming
A surrendered instrument of Yours
Precisely because
That is what You want
For Your constant and continuous
    Satisfaction in me.

33. Energy

The divine in me grows
Only when I devotedly allow
The supreme Energy to flow.
    What is the supreme Energy?
The supreme Energy is my constant
    Offering of my gratitude-heart
    To the Supreme.

34. Silence and sound

God's Silence-Life
    Is God's perfect Love-Life
    In God.

God's Sound-Life
    Is God's constant Satisfaction-Life
    In man.

35. Soulfulness

Man's soulfulness
Is God's all-fulfilling Oneness
With the seeker's promise
    To the Absolute Supreme
    For God-manifestation.

36. Reality

Earth-bound reality tells me
    That I am of ignorance-night
    And for ignorance-night.

Heaven-free reality tells me
    That I am eternally
    What God wants me to be:
    His constant and conscious instrument.

37. Divine journey

The divine journey
    Is the continuous, eternal journey
    That is not only nearing God-Reality
    But is actually bringing God-Reality
    To itself.
And this journey is not only the soul's
    Continuous preparation
    In us,
But also the soul's full blossoming
    For us.

38. Child

A human child
    Eventually becomes
    God-Perfection.

A divine child
    Eternally remains
    In God-Satisfaction.

39. Eternity

Eternity
Is the God-height in man.

    Infinity
Is the God-length in man.

    Immortality
Is the God-depth in man.

40. Clarity

Clarity is the greatest wealth
That a human mind can achieve.

    Purity is the best wealth
That a human heart can achieve.

    Surrender is the best treasure
That a human life can achieve.

41. Prayer

When I pray,
I pray to God to make me perfect.
    When I meditate,
God tells me that
I have all along been perfect,
    But I have only to realise it.

42. Will

Human will is nothing more
Than disheartening hesitation.
    Divine Will is nothing short of
God-preparation in us,
God-Perfection for us
    And
God-Satisfaction in and through us.

43. Faith

Inner obedience
    Immediately increases our outer faith.
Outer obedience to the spiritual Master
    Immediately increases our inner faith.
And when our inner faith is increased,
Our outer ignorance is not only decreased
    But immediately and totally diminished.
At that time we become
    Perfect instruments of God-manifestation.

44. Enlightenment

Salvation
    Is the first enlightenment
    In our inner eternal journey.

Liberation
    Is the second enlightenment
    In our heavenward eternal journey.

Realisation
    Is the third and last
    All-illumining and all-fulfilling
    Enlightenment
    In our eternal journey
    Toward ever-transcending
    Existence, Consciousness and Bliss.

45. Bliss

Bliss
Is divine intensity-height.
    Bliss
Is God-intensity
    For
Universal Reality.

46. Creativity

Creativity
    Is a God-loving reality in us.
Creativity
    Is constant God-embodiment,
    God-revelation and God-manifestation
In the seeker's evolving life
    Of God-Satisfaction.

47. Everlasting

There is only one everlasting reality
    In the human heart
And that everlasting reality is man's
    Constant, increasing and expanding
    Gratitude.

48. Service

Sow the unconditional love-seed.
Lo, God grants you
    The God-service-tree,
    The tree that bears
    Nectar-fruit
    And
    Nectar-satisfaction.

49. God-Dream

God-Dream
    Is unrecognised
    Reality in us.

God-Reality
    Is unmanifested
    Divinity for us,
    Only for us.

50. Surrender

I surrender my outer existence to God
    Not because He is very great,
    Infinitely great,
    But because He is the only Reality
    That loves me sincerely,
    Truly,
    Eternally.
Even I do not love myself
The way God loves me.
To Him alone I surrender.

Editor's preface

During a meeting of his Connecticut Centre on August 11, 1975, Sri Chinmoy asked each of his disciples to give him a spiritual word, and he then spontaneously recited a poem based on the word. The different words, and Sri Chinmoy's poems have been collected in this volume.