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Sri Chinmoy Answers

a question at the United Nations

Question: Why is it so hard to find peace of mind?

Sri Chinmoy: As individuals, we do not have peace of mind because we feel that we are the most important person on earth. We feel that if we do not do this or say that, then the world will collapse or everything immediately will go wrong. We can get peace of mind only if we can consciously feel that we are not indispensable. The moment we sincerely feel that we are not indispensable, we will not have to go anywhere to get peace, for peace will immediately come to us. If we feel that it is our duty to serve the world, that is good. But if we feel that it is our duty to illumine the world and that if we do not illumine the world, then the world will remain full of darkness, then we will never have peace of mind. I am not indispensable. You are not indispensable. Only God is indispensable.

Another easy way to have peace of mind is to feel that nothing is unduly important in our lives. If we have lost something, we must not feel that our life will be ruined. We should just try to feel that the thing we lost was unimportant. Everything and everyone on earth can desert us, as long as we do not desert God and God does not desert us. God will never desert us because He is all Compassion, and even if we try our hardest, we will not be able to desert God because He is omnipresent. So we need not worry or become upset about anything on earth. Except for God and our inner cry for Truth, nothing on earth is indispensable. If we have the inner cry, then we get God. And once we consciously get God as our very own, we have everything.

Published in My Meditation-Service at the United Nations for Twenty-Five Years

When You Are With Your Master-Lord
and
When You Are Without Your Master-Lord

When you are with your Master-Lord and when you are without your Master-Lord.

When you are with your Master-Lord, even ten thousand elephants cannot budge you an inch.
When you are without your Master-Lord, even the tiniest possible ant can take away your very life-breath.

When you are with your Master-Lord, the entire aspiring world soulfully adores you, to tell the truth.
When you are without your Master-Lord, the entire aspiring world shockingly ignores you, to say the least.

When you are with your Master-Lord, your life means sweetness, your life means happiness, your life means fulness.
When you are without your Master-Lord, your life means temptation, your life means frustration, your life means destruction.

When you are with your Master-Lord, give him at every moment your physical breath, your vital breath, your mental breath, your psychic breath.

Your physical breath is your ignorance-surrender.
Your vital breath is your action-surrender.
Your mental breath is your thought-surrender.
Your psychic breath is your will-surrender.

In doing this, at every moment you will grow into an ever-transcending, ever-illumining and ever-fulfilling instrument of your Master-Lord, both in his universe of realisation and in his universe of manifestation. You will become undoubtedly his absolutely most perfect instrument throughout Eternity and you will be always with him, for you are eternally his life-breath-manifestation.

Always be with your Master-Lord.

You will be his Eternity’s choice.
You will be his Immortality’s voice.

May 18, 1978      Sri Chinmoy

Published in I Wanted to be a Seeker of the Infinite

Poems on the Wall

A story by Sri Chinmoy
told at Aspiration-Ground in Jamaica, New York

I am making a confession. Usually I do not believe in confession; I believe in forgiveness and illumination. Seven or eight, or perhaps even ten poems I have "copied." Copied from where? Copied from the wall!

It was around eleven or twelve o'clock at night in Pondicherry. My brother Chitta and I stayed in the same room. We had turned off the light. He was in his bed and I was in mine. He was fast asleep. All of a sudden I saw that the room was illuminated. There was a long wall on my right side. Right near my feet was the entrance. What did I see? A full poem, in Bengali words! The poem was written on the wall, but there was no name. It was so beautiful! Then I meditated and meditated. I knew that those words had come from another world. Some poets, I have heard, have had the same experience.

I copied several poems and I claimed them. Those poems came from the poetry-world. From this world, poems or words can come into your heart or into your ear. One of the poems I still vividly remember: Srashta amar jagater jyoti. That poem came from the poetry-world.

I am sure that many, many poets have had the same kind of experience. Many, many poems, line by line, may enter into your heart, into your mind, and then you just copy them. In my case, the poems were written on the wall at night.

Published in The Temple and the Shrine

Diary Entry

by Sri Chinmoy
while in residence at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, India

17 May

"Chinmoy, do you know where Kanu Priya works?"

"Yes, I know. He works at 'Honesty'."

"Do you think he could go through some of my Bengali proofs?"

I said: "Certainly he could. Please let me take the proofs to him."

Nolini-da said: "Actually, I need more than one person."

"In that case I can go through some of the proofs."

"But do you have time for that? You have so many other things to do."

"Nothing can be more important than your work," I said.

"In that case, you see the proofs of the new edition of Banglar Pran and let Kanu Priya see Ma."

Published in A Service-Flame and a Service-Sun

Questions at the United Nations

answered by Sri Chinmoy

Question: At our United Nations meetings, should we meditate on specific themes related to United Nations conferences as well as on general qualities like peace and love?

Sri Chinmoy: There are two approaches. Some people feel that if they can organise a peaceful outer situation, then they can have a peaceful life. They feel they have to bring the world into order before peace and other divine qualities can descend. They start from the outside because they feel that this is what will fulfil them. The second approach is to start from inside and try to bring what is within to the fore. This is the way of the soul. According to this approach, first we try to achieve peace, light and bliss in the inner world; only then do we feel, through prayer and meditation, that we can offer it to others.

So these are two different approaches. There is no contradiction between them. Both are aiming at the same goal: peace, love, light and bliss. The approaches are different but the ultimate achievement will be the same.

I personally feel that if we have peace, light and bliss within us, then we can more easily bring these qualities into the world at large. It is my inner conviction that politics is dying to be illumined by inner light. In the political world, quarrels and misunderstandings are the order of the day. Again, on a deeper level, politics knows that spirituality can transcend outer world-divisions. Spirituality is the flow of oneness. When there is oneness, there is no feeling of supremacy. Oneness never quarrels. So if we pray and meditate on peace, light and bliss, we will definitely be able to serve those in the political world.

Question: Is there any way that we can meditate specifically to help the United Nations?

Sri Chinmoy: Inside your heart there is the soul, the direct representative of God. You know that if you pray and meditate every day, your soul will come to the fore and you will have abiding satisfaction in life. Please feel that the United Nations also has a soul. Inside the body of the United Nations, inside this building, there is a most powerful, most illumining and most fulfilling soul, which has to be brought forward. If you can feel the presence of the soul of the United Nations during your meditation, then your meditation will be most helpful.

All those who are working at the United Nations are unconsciously being illumined by the soul of the United Nations. And when they work for the United Nations most devotedly and selflessly, they are aspiring in their own way and doing their own form of meditation. The soul of the United Nations offers each worker its special blessings and gratitude.

The soul of the United Nations embodies the dream of the United Nations: peace, brotherhood and oneness founded upon self-giving and the recognition of the universality of man. If you can cultivate these sublime ideas or ideals during your meditation, you will most effectively and most fruitfully help the soul of the United Nations.

Question: How do you eradicate negativities and imperfections in the soul?

Sri Chinmoy: There is no negativity in the soul. The soul is all divinity and perfection. It is our divine, immortal existence on earth and it carries the message of perfection within us. The problem is that inside our inner existence is not only the soul but also the vital; and inside the vital is a lower vital, an aggressive vital, a destructive vital. Since we are not consciously aware of the presence of the soul, whatever we feel inside our body, vital and mind we take as the soul. But this is a mistake. There are many wrong, undivine tendencies and movements within us, but these have nothing to do with the soul. These are enemies that have accidentally entered into our living room. We wanted to have only our friends, but in an unguarded moment we opened the door and our enemies entered.

These enemies we have to either throw out or transform through conscious and continuous effort. If we want to learn something, we have to practise or study for hours and hours. Similarly, if we want to perfect our nature, then we have to bring to the fore the soul and feel its presence at every moment. How can we do this? Through our prayer and meditation. When our prayer goes up, it reaches the highest Height. And when we meditate most soulfully, peace, light and bliss descend into us in abundant measure. When we can reach the highest Height or feel ourselves inundated with peace, light and bliss, the wrong forces within us are automatically illumined and perfected.

Published in My Meditation-Service at the United Nations for Twenty-Five Years

Sri Chinmoy offers this prayer at 7:28 a.m. before using a standing double-arm machine up to 230 lbs. with both arms simultaneously and 250 lbs. with each arm separately — the morning after the passing of Sri Chinmoy's beloved sister Lily.

Published in My Morning Soul-Body Prayers, part 5

Sri Chinmoy offers this prayer at 7:47 a.m.

Published in My Morning Soul-Body Prayers, part 5