Ten Questions
answered by Sri Chinmoy
during his visit to Istanbul in Turkey
Question: Guru, you have told us that you create soul-birds when you draw. What are the soul's qualities of your abstract paintings, the ones you did before the soul-birds were started? Are they universes, or are they souls, individual souls?
Sri Chinmoy: Each bird is singing the song of freedom. The universe is very vast; the universal sky is very vast. Each bird has a specific task: to fly and fly and, while flying, to bring down the message of Immortality. My abstract paintings are like a fixed place. They do not move, but they have their own beauty. They are like the top of the Himalayas. The Himalayas do not move, since they are fixed, but they are so beautiful! Like that, there are many permanent places in nature — hills, mountains, forests or gardens — that are fixed. My abstract paintings also are settled at one place. They are souls that do not want to move. There are many, many souls in the soul’s world that are not dynamic, not active. Again, some souls are active and dynamic, like human souls. They care for manifestation.
Although my abstract paintings are static, remaining in one place, they manifest God’s Light in one way. The birds are manifesting God’s Light in a totally different way.
Freedom itself is light, but something that does not move also has inner light. In our philosophy, something moves and something else does not move. Even the thing that does not move is dynamic in its own way, but we need a different vision to see it.
The birds are flying; we can see their flying movement. The Himalayas are not moving. They are fixed, according to us. But that is not true! If you want to look with your third eye, you can easily see that the flying birds are not moving, and the static Himalayas are moving. You may say, “How can it be?” The human eye sees that something is fixed, something else is moving.
I see a flock of birds in flight. You also see it; everybody sees it. This is true. Again, we see that the mountains are fixed. But when we use the third eye, we can see everything in a totally different way. The capacity of our human eyes is limited. The human eyes will see that something is moving, but the third eye may see just the opposite. The power of the third eye is like that. The third eye is not fooling us. The third eye has the command of movement, and it can see movement in something static. Again, if something is moving, if the third eye wants to see it in a different way, it will see that that very thing is not moving. Even if something has not moved for thousands of years, the third eye can see movement in it.
In the same way, you can stop time. Yesterday I gave a prayer: “What do I need? A time-stopping meditation.” There is a kind of meditation in which you can definitely see the time — one o’clock, two o’clock, three o’clock — but while you are meditating, you are going beyond time. At that time, from one to two to three and four o’clock time does not move; that meditation is beyond time. With your meditation when you can stop the power of time, everything can be seen in a different way.
To come back to your question, my abstract paintings do have souls. They are settled; they are satisfied. They are not lazy — no! The Himalayas give so much inspiration to millions and millions of people, even people who do not climb up the Himalayas. When we hear about the Himalayas, our consciousness goes so high. As soon as we think of the Himalayas, we get such joy. Such peace we feel. Exactly the same thing happens with my art. The static paintings give us joy. And when the birds are flying, we also get tremendous joy.
We can achieve joy from contrary things, even from contradictions. You may ask, “How can it be?” Joy is always like that! When the ocean is calm and quiet, we get tremendous joy. Again, when we see huge waves, we get joy again. It is the same ocean. When it is peaceful, we get joy. We say, “Oh, it is calm and quiet!” And when it is very rough and mischievous, we can get joy again.
Question: It seems as though seekers of the hoary past were more advanced than seekers today. Is that true?
Sri Chinmoy: How can we know what happened thousands of years ago? As soon as we think of the past, we feel that people were all saints, whereas we are all sinners. We are all sinners — all, all, all! Sometimes we think that disciples of the past were better than we are. Then, when we read their biographies, we see how much jealousy, how much insecurity they had! If the biographers also were disciples, they perhaps tried to appreciate their fellow disciples as much as they could. But we may see how many weaknesses some of them had.
One of the direct disciples of Sri Ramakrishna was very outspoken. Swami Vivekananda himself was outspoken! That is why he liked this disciple very much. Some others could not appreciate his nature, but Swami Vivekananda liked him. When Swami Vivekananda became very famous in America, he chose this disciple to propagate his message in the West. He chose this one, and not others who were extremely devoted to him.
Question: Is there any particular quality by which people would know that we are your disciples, from your point of view?
Sri Chinmoy: There is only one way. If each disciple increases his or her love for the Master, then one day all the disciples will see the Master in one another. Now, as soon as you get angry with someone, you do not see me inside the other disciple. You see all the hostile forces in that person. As soon as you are angry with someone, do you see me there? No, you see all the hostile forces inside that person. The disciples should try to see inside others the living presence of the Master.
Sri Ramakrishna’s disciple Brahmananda, who was known as Rakhal, was so high in terms of spirituality. He had very, very high experiences. He was quite stout, and Sri Ramakrishna was so thin. But sometimes when Brahmananda was walking in a very high consciousness, not looking at anybody, other disciples used to see him as Sri Ramakrishna. He was in such a high consciousness. They used to adore him and worship him, because they did not see Rakhal as Rakhal at that time. While Brahmananda walked, the disciples used to see that Sri Ramakrishna was walking.
When I wrote my comments on the Bhagavad-Gita, I wrote them in English every Wednesday and then we used to send them to Sudha in Puerto Rico. She would translate them into Spanish. There would be twenty, thirty, sometimes forty disciples at the Puerto Rico Centre when she read out my comments, and my face they used to see on her feminine face. Everybody saw it! I received so many letters from the disciples saying that they used to see my face on her face. She identified herself with me so closely that her own face was no longer there. When the meeting was over, again the disciples saw her as Sudha. It happened so many times! Not only one disciple, but everybody saw my face, believe it or not.
If one goes high, very high, others can not only see the Master inside that person, but they can see the person as the living Master. In my case it happened when I was nineteen or twenty years old. That story I have told you. In the burning Pondicherry heat, at one o’clock in the afternoon, while walking barefoot, I was singing. They were songs that I knew, but all the notes I was deliberately singing incorrectly. I was singing absolutely at the top of my voice! An old lady who was like my second mother saw me. I was acting like a real vagabond, but she saw inside me the living Presence of God. She had never before seen the Presence of God. She came to my sister’s place and said, “Your brother was singing so horribly, and in such a peculiar way he was moving around! But I saw the living Presence of God inside him.”
One fellow in the ashram would not drink a glass of water without criticising me. We used to work together in the electrical department. People appreciated my poems, but that was too much for him, so he would criticise me. If my absolutely dearest admirer was nearby, nobody could say one word against me. If somebody said my poems were useless, and my admirer had a book in his hand, he would throw it at that fellow. This particular disciple always used to make fun of my admirer by criticising me mercilessly. Whenever people appreciated my poetry, he would say, “Chinmoy’s poems? He is useless! Americans are such fools! Here in India will he get one disciple?” It went on like that for years.
One day my mentor, my dearest friend, showed my Transcendental Picture to my critic while they were walking in the street. As soon as he saw the picture, he was stunned. He put it to his forehead and said, “Oh my God! Here is God, here is God!” He was sincerely appreciating the photograph and seeing God. The next moment he returned the picture to my dearest friend, and again he started saying that I was useless! At least for one minute he saw God.
This moment he saw God in my Transcendental Photograph. Then, when he returned my Transcendental Photograph, he again started his usual business.
How many people can see God inside my Transcendental Photograph? Have you all seen Him, or are you waiting to see Him? This fellow said very sincerely that he saw God. At that time he was not cutting jokes.
During one of my visits to the ashram, this critic begged me to show him my palm. I said, “Why do you have to see it? You know everything — say anything you like! You have developed so much occult power. Do I have to show you my palm? Just say anything that you know- — I am ready to hear it. You do not need to read my palm.”
Some of Sri Ramakrishna’s disciples were really, really close, and again, there were others who suffered from undivine qualities. Swami Vivekananda got so much attention, but sometimes he did not listen to his Master. Yet Sri Ramakrishna would always say that if his disciples spoke ill of Swami Vivekananda, or even heard people speak ill of him, Sri Ramakrishna would be furious.
Question: Guru, I think I got an inner message from you about how to treat my knee pain. Is it true?
Sri Chinmoy: Look at the faith of this disciple! He had knee pain, and he said I told him in the inner world to drink as much water as he could. Outwardly I did not say anything. He did drink a large quantity of water, and he gave me all the credit.
Question: It worked, Guru!
Sri Chinmoy: Then how is it that you are again suffering?
Question: That was my left knee. Now it is my right knee!
Sri Chinmoy: Again you can start drinking water.
Question: I did, but it did not work!
Sri Chinmoy: You need faith, faith! Of course, the first time you did feel that you got an inner message.
I also had to have faith. When I put ink on my left heel to succeed in the pole vault, how much faith I needed at that time! My last chance was coming up. I had to run, run, run to my house, because Mother Kali was asking me to put a mark on my left heel. Now, what has ink to do with my pole vault? But I did it, and I succeeded in my pole vault.
Again, Sarada Devi inwardly told me to go to the visa office on a Saturday to get my passport so that I could come to America! How can you believe such a thing? She told me to go to the government office on Saturday. The time also she gave: eleven o’clock. I had faith, and I did get the visa.
Shyama Charan Lahiri, Lahiri Mahashoy, had tremendous occult power. He was Babaji’s dearest disciple. Look at his faith! He had two daughters. One daughter was about eighteen years old when she married into a very rich family. Then she came back to her parents’ place and got a very, very serious disease, like cholera. It was only a matter of weeks before death would come. Shyama Charan Lahiri’s wife was crying and crying, telling her husband to go and bring famous doctors. He said, “You do not need famous doctors. I will cure our daughter.” He made a kind of mixture with mustard oil and some spices. He said to his wife, “Give this to her. She will be all right.”
Alas, she had no faith in her husband, so she did not give the remedy. She said, “What will people think? If our daughter dies, people will blame us. Her husband and our whole family will blame us.” She threw away the remedy. Then the doctors came, and they could not cure the daughter. The wife cried and cried. Still she did not believe that her husband could have cured their daughter.
Then what happened? They had three sons. One son, the middle one, became absolutely crazy. The wife sent the husband to this doctor and that doctor, and the husband obeyed her implicitly. He was a great yogi, but he went to so many places because his wife was sending him. Still she did not have faith in him at all, but the doctors could not cure the son.
The case became very, very serious. Then the wife said, “All right, all right! You are crazy, but now let us use your crazy remedy.” Shyama Charan Lahiri made the same preparation — mustard oil and spices — and the son was cured. His wife was sending him to bring various doctors, and he did bring them, but they could not cure the son. Finally, Shyama Charan Lahiri’s cure was successful.
Faith, faith, faith, faith! In my case, I recommend coconut water. I do not say that if you drink coconut water, everything will be cured. I do not say that, but I see that through coconut water I work most of the time quite successfully. Some people have very serious, severe pain from appendicitis, and they have to go to the hospital. I tell them to drink coconut water, because I know that I will be able to relieve their pain through coconut water. There I have put spiritual power. I will not say that coconut water will cure anyone! But I know that whatever I want to do to help an individual, I can use coconut water. In many, many cases — hundreds of cases — I have used coconut water. With coconut water, my force works. For everything I say to take coconut water, absolutely; but I do not dare to say that people will be cured just by drinking coconut water.
The day Ravi Shankar came to play for us, it was raining heavily. A high-ranking official at the United Nations and his wife came to me. They said that twice the wife had suffered a miscarriage and lost a child. They were so miserable. Now the wife was again pregnant, and they were asking me if I could do something, begging me to do something. I was preparing my speech for Ravi Shankar. I said, “All right, I shall pray, but from now please take coconut water.” I know how much faith they had in coconut water! The child did come into the world, in perfect condition.
The daughter of a famous politician came to our museum. She was very, very nice. While signing our guest book, she said that in two or three weeks she would give birth. I was horrified that arrangements had been made for me to lift her. What if something happened? I was so unwilling, unwilling, but what could I do? I prayed to God, and I lifted her as slowly as possible. I knew that nothing would happen, but she was the one who had faith. In two or three weeks she would give birth. Such a risk she took!
While signing the guest book she said to me, “Now please give me some advice.” Was I the one to give her advice? I said, “Please, from now on, every day until you have the child, drink coconut water — twice a day, if possible.” Because she took me as a spiritual person, she accepted my message very, very seriously. She did drink coconut water, and afterwards she thanked me.
A famous actress said to me, “Can you please find a husband for me?” It is absolutely true! Was I the right person to find her a husband? She was so nice, so devoted, so devoted. I told her to drink coconut water! Perhaps she was cursing me for saying that coconut water would bring her a husband. Coconut water I use for so many things. Believe me, occultly I did something. She had faith that I was a spiritual person, so she believed me, no matter how stupid it seemed that she should drink coconut water to get a husband.
If some special individuals ask such sincere questions, what am I going to do? Is it not their faith in me that compels them to ask me? I can see that they do not want to make fun of me. I see seriousness in their questions. If they take me seriously, I can do something. Faith is like that. From the outer point of view if you want to judge, you will say that it is crazy; but these individuals had tremendous respect for me. Because I felt their sincere respect, I told them to drink coconut water, and there I put my spiritual force.
Question: Guru, how did coconut water get that honour? Did you really like it as a child, or is it some quality of the coconut?
Sri Chinmoy: I pour my consciousness into the coconut water. Otherwise, no; the coconut water itself will not be able to cure anyone.
My mother cured me with coconut water when I had the worst possible case of smallpox. The doctors had given up all hope. My eyes were closed; I could not open them. With a little coconut water my mother challenged the doctors, and she was right. Coconut water has something special to do with my life. So many people I have saved from their suffering through coconut water!
Faith, faith, faith, faith! Faith is a reality. If the Master says something, then it can be done. When I request some disciples to do something or to get me something in the evening or at night, the first thing they will say is, “Oh, it is not possible at night! The shops are closed; nobody will be there at nine o’clock or ten o’clock.”
Once I told a disciple that I wanted to have a violin. When it is a matter of playing the violin, I am still an eternal beginner! It was night time — so late, so late. I said, “Let us see.” We were driving and driving; there were no stores. Finally we saw one small store, a sports store. I went inside. I was not looking for a violin at that moment, but what did I see? There was one violin in the area where they kept exercise machines! How did it happen? A friend of the owner’s had given it to him to sell.
This kind of thing has happened many times.
Faith! Three or four days before Sri Ramakrishna’s passing, he wanted to have the amalaki fruit. Swami Vivekananda said, “It is out of season.” But one disciple said, “Since this request came from Master’s mouth, there should be amalaki somewhere.” He went from village to village. He found only one amalaki fruit, and he brought it to his Master. Sri Ramakrishna said, “This is called faith.” That was Nag Mahashoy.
Once on the street somebody was speaking ill of Sri Ramakrishna. Nag Mahashoy grabbed the sandals of that man and thrashed him. The man was much stronger than Nag Mahashoy, but the disciple’s anger had such power! Then that man never spoke ill of Sri Ramakrishna again.
Sri Ramakrishna had two approaches. He said to his disciples, “If somebody is stronger than you, just say to yourself, ‘He is not a man; he is an insect.’ Why do you have to pay attention to an insect? And if somebody is weak, say, ‘You? You are speaking ill of my Master? If you speak ill of him, then you will go to hell!’” Sri Ramakrishna said that if your Master’s critic is stronger than you, you may be beaten by him, so the best thing is to say that he is just an insect. Why do you have to pay attention to an insect? But if he is weaker than you are, how can you tolerate his criticism of your Master?
Sri Ramakrishna and Mathur Babu were once having a conversation. Mathur Babu asked, “Can there be on the same stalk one white flower and one flower of another colour — blue or any other colour?”
Sri Ramakrishna said, “There can be.”
Mathur Babu challenged Sri Ramakrishna. He said, “It cannot be. If one flower is white, another flower on the same stalk has to be white. There cannot be any other colour.”
The following day, out of the blue, Sri Ramakrishna showed Mathur Babu a small plant with one white flower and one flower of another colour. Either Sri Ramakrishna used his will power, or it was quite natural. I have seen this kind of thing in Chittagong, and in Pondicherry: two flowers of different colours on the same stalk. Mathur Babu did not have faith, but Sri Ramakrishna proved that it could happen.
Anything can be done if we have faith. Our difficulty is that our faith has a very short breath. After five minutes or five days, our faith disappears. In my case, I tell everybody, “Have faith, have faith, have faith.” But when it comes to medical science, at times I have no faith!
Question: Guru, you keep trying different doctors, so you must have faith that eventually you will find the right one.
Sri Chinmoy: I am trying, but perhaps I am trying to break the cosmic law, or my own law! Today another doctor is coming, after eight doctors have failed to relieve my shoulder pain. If it is God’s Will, then God will cure me. I have my connection with Mother Kali. I know that, if she sanctions it, in a minute or in a second I can be cured. My philosophy is that God is also inside the doctors. I say this, and I practise it. I say to myself, “Perhaps this one can cure me, or that one can cure me.” On the human level we cherish hope, hope, hope, hope. You can say that I am desperately trying to break or go beyond my own realisation. Why should there be only one kind of realisation?
For years and years I was opposed to acupuncture. I taught you that we have thousands of subtle nerves, and these nerves are jolted by acupuncture. It destroys their rhythm. I told everybody my philosophy, and now I have broken my rule — I have tried acupuncture! I tried to have faith in acupuncture, but in this case the pain came back three times.
Again, look at my faith: I tried injections for my knee pain. My Chinese doctor was so kind. For three weeks, sometimes even for a month, I used to feel better. Then the pain would come back. Now my doctor has gone to the other world. His soul has to work in and through some of my doctor-disciples!
Question: Is there a limited number of great souls? It seems that the great souls keep coming back in different lifetimes.
Sri Chinmoy: New great souls are coming. Old great souls are coming, too. The old ones are coming back and coming back. Let us say that they were once upon a time spiritually great, and now they want to be great in some other field. They may want to become scientists or generals. Some great souls do want to change their fields, as we change our jobs.
At the ashram, I changed my job eight times! The Mother did not approve of anybody changing jobs. For the others in our family she was dead against it. But in my case she said, “Go ahead and work in another department.” That is how in one incarnation I changed my job so many times.
Some souls were great in one incarnation, and then in another incarnation they entered into another field where they were absolutely beginners, beginners, beginners, beginners!
Question: Is it still the same great souls who do great things in so many different fields?
Sri Chinmoy: In one incarnation they are great in one field. In one aspect of life somebody may be great, and in another aspect he may be useless, useless, useless!
New great souls do come to earth, but they do not become great souls overnight. Nobody can be great or good overnight. Some started their journey in a particular field four hundred years ago, let us say, and then after some time they became great. Others started perhaps two hundred years ago, and then after a few human incarnations they also became great. The ones who became great later we can call new souls. Some became great many, many years ago. They worked hard and they became great. Others started later. It is a matter of when they started their preparation.
Question: Guru, do they have the potential to be great right from the start? Is it that they are already high souls, and they do not have to evolve as much?
Sri Chinmoy: When the farmer puts seeds under the ground, some germinate. Again, the same type of seed if he puts somewhere else, nothing happens; the soil is barren. There is no hard and fast rule.
All the students are studying in the same school, and the teacher, let us say, is super-excellent. One student becomes great, and another becomes deplorable — he does not complete his studies and get a degree. How God’s Grace works, we have no idea. We simply have no idea!
Sri Aurobindo said that the capacities of the great souls — Vashishtha, Vishwamitra, all the sages that came in those days — will one day pale into insignificance. New souls are coming — great souls, greater souls. Sri Aurobindo ends his story “The Ideal of Forgiveness,” which I rendered into Bengali verse, by saying that from Heaven, some mightier souls are coming. They will be so great that the capacities of their predecessors will pale into insignificance. Vashishtha and Vishwamitra are souls of the highest type, but Sri Aurobindo said that new souls will come who will be far superior to the old ones. Whether they have already come or not, God knows!
Sri Aurobindo said that we are not the sons of the past, but the sons of the future. Again, he said that, in the great field of spirituality, the past has to be followed by the future.
When Sri Aurobindo’s knee was fractured, many letters came to him, asking what was the reason. The doctors also asked. To each individual he gave a different answer. Four or five different answers he gave to explain why his knee was fractured. Which one to accept? We have to be satisfied with one particular reason or the other. To the same question, different answers came from Sri Aurobindo.
Some spiritual Masters say that below the knee it is all inconscience, so we have to bring down light into the knee. Then we will be cured. Light, light, light is the cure!
Question: Guru, is it possible within a lifetime to change our consciousness permanently? Or will it only be a slow process, in which our good qualities gradually increase?
Sri Chinmoy: There is no hard and fast rule. It is all a matter of grace. From earth comes aspiration, and from Heaven comes grace. When they meet together, it can happen. Some people already have the capacity to change their nature.
Again, suppose that somebody was very, very undivine. In India there were so many rogues who did absolutely bad, bad things, but they became divine. They say even the person who wrote the Ramayana was so horrible that he would cut off people’s fingers. He wanted to make a garland of thumbs! He was so bad, so impure, that he could not say the name of Rama. He had to say it in the opposite way: “Mara, Mara.” But then he became divine. He became the greatest sage. In many cases, people were very, very bad, notorious to the backbone, and they became saints. Alas, unfortunate things also happen. Some people begin with absolutely saintly qualities and then they end up in jail, because they start doing bad things. In the beginning they were so good.
Now, to come back to your question, it is quite possible in one incarnation for the seeker to change his consciousness permanently if he wants to. If God’s Grace descends most powerfully, and if the seeker’s receptivity-vessel is very large, then he can do it. He does not need many incarnations. Otherwise, in a slow process it can take two or three incarnations to change one’s nature.
Sometimes a little plant is growing up straight. We see that one day it will become a tree. But alas, a storm comes and it breaks. Like that, some seekers stop making progress. Let us say that for thirty years someone was doing well, but then something happens — there is a dislocation in the person’s faith, or some other calamity. Then he does not make any more progress.
We are supposed to make progress. To my great sorrow, some disciples who joined our path right from the beginning have descended considerably. But I go on with the hope that, in their next incarnation or in the evening of their life, they will get back their aspiration.
From pre-school, children go to kindergarten, primary school, high school, college and university. But what happens? Some people give up high school, or they do not go beyond high school. They are supposed to go up to the M.A. level, let us say, but it does not happen. In exactly the same way, some people in the spiritual life arrive at a certain standard, and they feel that that is enough for them. In the ordinary life, if you have completed your B.A. and you do not go beyond that level, you keep that title. The knowledge that you got from the university you keep. Unfortunately, in the spiritual life, once you stop making progress, in most cases or many cases you go down.
In the ordinary human life if you stop making progress, there you stay. In the long jump if you have covered seven metres, and you cannot go any further, that is enough for you. Your achievement is over, but it is recorded that you have jumped seven metres. In the spiritual life, the situation is totally different. You have climbed up the tree to a certain height, and if you do not want to climb up higher, you just go down. You cannot stay there! In the ordinary life if you hold a Master’s degree, you keep that degree. But in the spiritual life if you have climbed up the tree and you are stuck, you are not going higher, then you go down. In very rare cases you get stuck and you do not come down. But in most of the cases, once progress stops, people come down. This has happened in the case of many disciples. Again, some disciples have maintained their standard.
I shall give you an example. When people joined our path, they felt that insecurity they had to conquer, jealousy they had to conquer, pride they had to conquer in order to make the fastest progress and to become very dear to the Master. Everything that was wrong in their nature they felt they had to conquer, and every second they tried to develop purity, purity. Anything they saw in themselves that would stand in the way of their progress, they would try to conquer. Alas, alas! After twenty or twenty-five years, some have given up completely. And these forces — pride, anger, jealousy — that they previously wanted to conquer, they have now taken as weapons. If a newcomer comes to the path, if he is shining and doing well, the jealousy-arrows of those particular disciples may come and attack him.
In your case, you made the fastest progress. Such service you gave from the beginning — service, service, service! Even now you are continuing. The service that you give, not even ten per cent of the disciples can give. Twenty-four hours a day you are working, working, working, working. Some people are jealous of you. I am telling you this today. Again, there are many people who are proud of you. They feel, “We have a jewel here! He is doing so well.”
We have no idea how fast one can make progress. Let us take the case of Sri Aurobindo. Sri Aurobindo’s Guru, Vishnu Bhaskar Lele, was so proud of Sri Aurobindo. He said it took him seven long years to silence his mind, to make his mind calm and quiet — seven years — and Sri Aurobindo did it in three days. How proud Sri Aurobindo’s Guru was of Sri Aurobindo!
Sri Aurobindo was going high, higher, highest. He went beyond that Master. Lord Krishna was guiding Sri Aurobindo at every moment. Then his Guru became jealous of Sri Aurobindo’s achievement, and he said, “You have been attacked by hostile forces.” Sri Aurobindo said, “I want to be governed by the hostile forces and not by you any more!”
Look at the Master’s sincerity! He did have sincerity. Who will say that his own disciple has transcended his achievement? Spiritual Masters usually do not say if somebody is making great progress. Lele said that in three days Sri Aurobindo attained such height that he was able to silence the mind. Again, when Sri Aurobindo went beyond him, Lele’s jealousy started and he said, “You are being attacked by the hostile forces.”
Sri Aurobindo’s Guru was a very, very great soul. Once Sri Aurobindo had to give a speech. He had made no preparation, and he was full of worries and anxieties. Lele said, “Just go on the stage and bow to Lord Vishnu.” Such faith Sri Aurobindo had! With no preparation, Sri Aurobindo bowed to Lord Vishnu and gave the most wonderful speech, his Uttarpara speech. That kind of faith he had in his Guru. But wrong forces can attack, as they attacked Lele.
Parents and children may be on the same spiritual path. In general, when the daughters make progress or do anything great, the fathers are happy. But when some fathers see that their sons are making progress, alas, alas, the problem starts! The same is true of some of the mothers when they see that their daughters are making progress. When their daughters go faster in the spiritual life, there are some mothers who compete. Alas, this is jealousy! Parents should always have oneness with their children.
We have seen jealousy also in the case of some famous women. They are so much older than their own daughters. Then they do all kinds of unnatural things, and sometimes the daughters look older than the mothers! Why do the mothers do it? To become young, or to look younger.
Even between two hands there can be jealousy. If my right hand is stronger and my left hand is weaker, I may form a low opinion of my left hand. I may say that it is useless, useless. But if I am a spiritual person, I will always try to show sympathy. I will have oneness with both my right hand and my left hand, and I will show sympathy to my left hand. My right hand will say, “Poor little brother, you are the younger one in the family.”
When sincere spirituality is involved, compassion goes to the other party. When there is no real spirituality, there is separation. The superior one will say to the inferior, “You are weak, so you are useless, useless, useless.”
In the beginning, many of the disciples who have been with us for many years used the divine method to conquer jealousy, insecurity, impurity, pride and other wrong forces. I gave a prayer for each day — “Supreme, I must conquer” * — and I do hope that people sincerely repeat those prayers. If the disciples had continued right from the beginning to be strict in conquering wrong forces, by today they would have become saints. Our difficulty is that, on the way, we give up. Then, when we see that somebody has many divine qualities, a variety of divine qualities, we become jealous.
Sometimes jealousy-arrows do disturb the one who has capacities. Again, no matter how many jealousy-arrows others may hurl at an individual, God is there to save him. In my case also, some people were jealous of me, but they could not prevent me from becoming what I am, because God was with me.
Once again I wish to say that it may take a few incarnations or it may take one incarnation to change our human nature, but it is very difficult, very difficult. Human nature, they say, is like the tail of a dog. When you hold it, you feel that it has become straight. Then, as soon as you release it, again it becomes coiled.
Every moment if we are very strict with ourselves — not every day, but every moment — then nature’s transformation definitely can take place in one incarnation. It has happened. So many sinners of the first water, absolute sinners who did such bad things, did realise God in one incarnation. It has been done in India and everywhere, in each country. But again, some good seekers have fallen down on the way. They were very good to start with, but they descended.
It is all God’s Grace, God’s Grace, God’s Grace, God’s Grace. Receptivity is needed, plus God’s Grace. Again, we do not know when God’s Grace will descend. Four people are standing together, and a child will come and give a flower to one person. Why? Just because the child likes that person. There is some connection between the little child and the one to whom he gives the flower.
* A Day in the Life of a Sri Chinmoy Disciple, p. 46. New York: Agni Press, 2008
Published in Not Every Day, But Every Moment: Illumining Questions and Answers, Comments and Talks
