Meditation: Self-Transcendence
Sri Chinmoy’s first talk
at the Dag Hammarskjöld Auditorium, United Nations, New York
Meditation is self-transcendence. Self-transcendence is the message of the Beyond. The message of the Beyond is God, the eternally evolving Soul, and God, the eternally fulfilling Goal.
The animal in man is proud of his self-aggrandisement. The human in man is delighted with his self-awareness. The divine in man is conscious of his self-realisation. The Supreme in man is fulfilled in his self-transcendence.
Man needs material wealth to enjoy a prosperous earthly life. Man needs meditation to live a peaceful heavenly life. Man needs revelation to live as a divine hero, to guide and serve and serve and guide as a divine hero. Heaven does not want a weakling. Earth does not need a weakling.
Life is not empty talk. Life is not the breath of illusion. Life is the action of aspiration. Aspiration is the action of man's Inner Pilot. Let us fight the battle of life within. Let us wake up to the reality of our world consciously and devotedly. Ours will be the victory without. Forget we must not, never. We are of God the Infinite and we are for God the Eternal.
Meditation means the evolution of the body and the soul. The body's ultimate evolution is transformation and perfection. The soul's ultimate evolution is the highest illumination and complete manifestation.
He who meditates, consciously dedicates his life to God. He who dedicates his life to mankind, soulfully meditates on the real God. His are the eyes that see Heaven on earth. In him divinity and humanity are triumphantly blended.
Temptation and meditation. Temptation: this is precisely what an unaspiring man knows. Meditation: this is what an aspiring man constantly is. An unaspiring man must descend in the scale of life and feel the very breath of ignorance. An aspiring man eternally ascends in the scale of life and lives in the very Heart of God.
We have hundreds of secrets, but meditation has only one: competence is achievement. Competence and achievement are the smiles of God's unconditional Grace.
Sri Krishna meditated. He became God, the Love Divine. The Buddha meditated. He became God, the Light Divine. The Christ meditated. He became God, the Compassion Divine. Now God wants you to meditate. He wants you to become God, the Life Divine.
Published in The Garland of Nation-Souls.
Freedom
A morning lecture by Sri Chinmoy
at Rackham Hall, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Dear seekers of Truth, Light and Bliss, I am extremely glad to be at this august university today. This university loves progress more than anything. In our spiritual life also, we care for only one thing — progress. We do not care for success; we care only for progress, and in our progress looms large our success. Today’s success is the starting point for tomorrow’s achievement. Success never gives satisfaction, but when we make progress we do get satisfaction. Progress is the Will of God working in and through us, carrying us safely to our ultimate Goal.
Today I wish to give a short talk on Freedom. We all know something about what freedom is, for freedom is very familiar to each individual soul. As a freedom-loving country, America stands in the vanguard of the freedom-loving countries. So, dear sisters and brothers, perhaps you know more about freedom than I do. But from the spiritual point of view, for the seeker of the Infinite Truth, I would like to say a few words on spiritual freedom, inner freedom.
What is freedom? Freedom is our conscious, spontaneous and selfless search for Light, abundant Light, infinite Light.
There are two kinds of Light: the outer light and the inner light. The outer light exposes us, examines us and judges us. The inner light awakens us, illumines us and fulfils us.
Once we enter into the world of aspiration, we come to realise that there are three types of freedom: animal freedom, human freedom and divine freedom. Animal freedom enjoys total destruction. Human freedom enjoys fleeting or deluding pleasure. Divine freedom enjoys illumining and fulfilling oneness. Animal freedom and human freedom are earth-bound freedom. Divine freedom is Heaven-free freedom. Earth-bound freedom is the song of our unlit ego’s supremacy. Heaven-free freedom is the song of our reality’s perfection and divinity’s manifestation.
In today’s world, man and perfection are perfect strangers. In tomorrow’s world, man and perfection will be bosom friends, illumining friends and fulfilling brothers. In the mind of today’s world, divine manifestation is sheer impossibility; but in the heart of tomorrow’s world, the divine manifestation is an unmistakable inevitability.
Spiritual freedom is our liberation from the mire of self-created bondage. When the body is liberated from the mire of ignorance, the body divinely serves God in man. When the vital is liberated from the aggression of ignorance-dream, the vital divinely loves God in man. When the mind is liberated from its tiny, limited ignorance-cave, the mind divinely manifests God in man. When the heart is liberated from its insecurity-prison cell, the heart constantly feels the Supreme Pilot here on earth, there in Heaven.
In the spiritual life, we need speed. To my great joy, we are very close to Detroit, the capital of the automobile world, the city of speed. In the inner life, speed is aspiration. If there is no aspiration, then there is no speed, and God-realisation remains a far cry. We know the speed of an Indian bullock cart and the speed of a modern jet plane. Aspiration has the speed of a modern jet plane. Aspiration is the heart’s mounting cry that finds its satisfaction only when it reaches the goal of the ever-transcending Beyond. Once it reaches the Goal, the inner being is inundated with freedom, the freedom that feeds us, energises us and fulfils the hunger of humanity.
Right now, if you ask, “Who needs freedom?” our answer is that everyone needs freedom. If you ask, “Who has freedom?” the answer is that nobody has it. But if we launch into the spiritual life, if we follow the path devotedly, soulfully and unconditionally, then today’s bondage can be transformed into tomorrow’s freedom. Outer freedom is fleeting and badly lacking in satisfaction. Inner freedom gives us real and abiding satisfaction. Unless and until we have attained satisfaction, we shall always remain unfulfilled and empty.
In order to bring satisfaction into our life, we cry deep within. When God’s Hour strikes in our life of aspiration, we become not only men of freedom but also lovers of freedom. At that time we transform mankind with our embodied, revealed and manifested Freedom Divine.
Now we are in the state of Michigan. The state motto is extremely significant from the spiritual point of view: “If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you.” In the spiritual life, we are looking for a spiritual peninsula. The peninsula is Love, Devotion and Surrender — Divine Love, Divine Devotion and Divine Surrender. Human love binds; Divine Love expands. Human devotion is our unconscious attachment; Divine Devotion is our conscious awareness of our ultimate reality. Human surrender is the surrender of a slave to his master; Divine Surrender is the surrender of the finite to the Infinite. This surrender is conscious, wholehearted and unconditional, and it allows the human being to realise his Source, God.
After God-realisation, the finite human life becomes inseparably one with the Infinite. At that time, the Infinite sings its most soulful song, the song of God-Reality, and the finite sings its eternal song, the cry of millennia.
The moment we enter the spiritual life, one sublime thought, word and idea becomes paramount to us, and that is “consciousness”. Strangely enough, this state of being abounds in lakes. Lakes consist of water, which signifies consciousness. Consciousness and spirituality are inseparable.
When we elevate our consciousness to the highest level of awareness, illumination dawns. When we spread the wings of our consciousness, we fly into the sky of Immortality. Each seeker consciously tries to expand his consciousness, illumine his consciousness and fulfil his consciousness; for in the expansion, illumination and fulfilment of his consciousness, he becomes one with the real, divine Supreme, his Source and his Goal.
Published in Fifty Freedom-Boats to one Golden Shore, part 2
Peace
An afternoon lecture by Sri Chinmoy
at Ingman Room, New Student Union, University of Toledo, Toledo, Ohio
Dear sisters and brothers, dear seekers of the ultimate Truth, I wish to give a talk on peace.
Peace is a most familiar word. Each seeker knows what peace is according to his receptivity’s capacity. I am a seeker. I wish to share with you the peace that I have experienced. By offering my experience, I wish to become totally one, inseparably one, with your life of aspiration and dedication.
What is peace? Peace is our liberation from bondage. What is liberation? Liberation is our universal oneness with God the Unity and God the Multiplicity. What is bondage? Bondage is the dance of our unlit ego. What is ego? Ego is the unreal in us. And what is the real in us? The real in us is Truth; the real in us is God. God and Truth are inseparable, the obverse and reverse of the same coin.
What is peace? Peace is our satisfaction. What is satisfaction? Satisfaction is our conscious and constant oneness with the Will of the Supreme Pilot. Where does this satisfaction lie? It lies in our self-giving and in our God-becoming.
Peace, the world needs. We all need peace. But when we think of peace we try to discover it in our mind. We use the term “peace of mind”. We feel that peace can be found only in the mind, and if once we can discover peace in the mind, then our problems will be solved for good. But at this point I wish to say that the mind we are referring to is the physical mind. This mind is the doubting mind, and in the doubting mind we can never feel the presence of peace. We can feel the presence of peace only in the loving heart. The doubting mind leads us to total frustration. The loving heart leads us to complete satisfaction. We doubt, and then we feel a barren desert within us. We love, and then we feel a sea of Reality and Divinity within us.
Peace is not to be found in external knowledge. Most of our external knowledge is founded on information, and information cannot give us any abiding satisfaction. Peace is not to be found in outer efficiency. Peace is found in self-mastery.
If we want to achieve peace in our inner and outer life, then we must know the necessity of reciprocal inclusiveness and not mutual exclusiveness. Earth and Heaven must be united. Heaven has the silence of the soul. Earth has the sound of life. The silence of the soul leads us to our Source, the highest Reality; and the sound of life allows us to manifest what is within that highest Reality. In the inclusiveness of earth and Heaven we can achieve peace.
Peace is the only authority in our life of ascent and descent. When we ascend, we learn the song of unity in multiplicity. When we descend, we learn the song of multiplicity in unity.
All of us here are seekers. We are all children of God. We are progressing according to our inner intensity and our soul’s necessity. Each individual member of the world family has a special way of achieving peace. A child feels that he can achieve peace only by making noise. Inside noise, what looms large for him is peace. An adolescent finds peace only in constant activity. A youth finds peace only by creating a new world or by destroying the old world. An old man finds peace in unlearning most of the things he has learnt from the ignorant world. When he unlearns, he feels considerable peace. He also achieves peace by placing himself at the Feet of the Supreme Pilot.
Peace is our inner wealth. This inner wealth we can bring to the fore only when we expect nothing from the outer world and everything from the Supreme Pilot within us, at God’s Choice Hour. Often, when we work for the world and serve the world we feel that it is the world’s bounden duty to offer us gratitude or to acknowledge our service. When we expect something from the world, we are bound to meet with frustration. But when we expect from the Inner Pilot, He fulfils us beyond the flight of our imagination. But one thing we must know, and that is that God has an Hour of His own.
Our duty is to pray for peace, meditate on peace, concentrate on peace and contemplate on peace. God’s duty is to inundate us with His Peace. When we know the art of surrender, the kingdom of peace within us cannot separate itself from our living reality. It is our conscious inner surrender, our unconditional surrender to the Inner Pilot that expedites our journey towards the discovery of the all-illumining and all-fulfilling Peace.
Now we are in the state of Ohio. The state motto is most significant for all seekers: “With God, all things are possible.” The moment we enter into the spiritual life, we feel there can be no better, more encouraging and more illumining message than this. A beginner-seeker believes in it. An advanced seeker goes one step further and feels that God is the Doer, God is the Action and God is the Fruit thereof. So, our first lesson in the spiritual life is that everything is possible with God. Then later we come to feel that we do nothing, that it is God who does everything in and through us. This is the great lesson, the ultimate lesson, that we learn from our inner school.
The capital of the state of Ohio is Columbus. In the state of spirituality, there is only one capital, and that is aspiration. On the strength of aspiration we can achieve our Goal. On the strength of aspiration we transcend constantly our earthly reality and existence. No matter in which field we apply aspiration, the mounting flame within us, we are bound to achieve success. The state of Ohio offers us a shining example. From Ohio, seven American Presidents came, and offered their loftiest height and light to the whole country. Not only in the field of politics, but in every walk of life, when we aspire, our aspiration leads us to the destined goal.
Every day the Almighty Father, the ever-Compassionate Father, gives us ample opportunity to discover something new. The thing that we are discovering is love, love divine. Love divine is at once eternally ancient and eternally new. When we discover love divine within us, we grow into the very image of God the eternal Lover and God the eternal Beloved, who ever abides within us.
Published in Fifty Freedom-Boats to one Golden Shore, part 2
I Meditate
A talk by Sri Chinmoy
I meditate.
I meditate not out of curiosity.
I meditate out of necessity.
I meditate not out of fear.
I meditate out of love.
I meditate not out of possessiveness.
I meditate out of selflessness.
I meditate on God not because God is great.
I meditate on God because God is good.
I meditate on God not because God will give me everything I want.
I meditate on God because God will give me only the things that I need.Some people think that I am not practical, while others think that I am not sincere. Still others think that I am stupid. We all know that criticism is the order of the day. Such being the case, how can I expect to be an exception? Again, in all sincerity I must tell the world that perfection is still a far cry in my life. I have made an inner promise: I shall fear no criticism when I am right. I shall ignore no criticism when I am wrong.
There is a special reason why I meditate. I love to converse with God. He is such a charming conversationalist, and I am a charmed listener. I am my heart’s hunger-cry. God is His Heart’s Feast-Smile.
When I do not meditate, conscience torments me, joy deserts me, peace hides from me and satisfaction ignores me. When I meditate, God’s blue Eye blesses me, God’s green Heart embraces me, God’s red Feet shelter me.
Meditation is the flowering of my confidence in myself and my confidence in God. I have no confidence in human beings precisely because I know them and precisely because I do not know them. I have complete confidence in God not because of my helpless life, but because of my sleepless heart. I have complete confidence in myself not because God is my only choice, but because He is always His unconditional Boon.
I meditate to unlearn and to learn. I meditate to unlearn my earth-bound mind-education. I meditate to learn my Heaven-free heart-aspiration.
Early in the morning, when I hear God’s Voice, I open my inspired eyes and meditate. During my morning meditation God says to me, “My child, go and prove to the world that you are all for Me.” Late at night, when I hear God’s Voice, I close my tired eyes and meditate. During my night meditation God says to me, “My child, lo and behold, you are of Me unmistakably and eternally.”
Published in AUM – Vol. 6, No. 3, March 1980