Sri Chinmoy Answers
questions at Aspiration-Ground in Jamaica, New York
Question: When I am involved in giving meditation classes, I find it hard to keep up my running.
Sri Chinmoy: If you have to make a choice between practising sports and bringing disciples to the Centre, inspiring people through songs, through talks and in so many ways, then I will definitely, definitely prefer your bringing people to the Centre. In our spiritual life, physical fitness is of paramount importance. People who have good capacities in sports I will definitely tell to practise. Those people who are talented, who are good runners, good throwers and good jumpers, definitely I want to encourage. But if others who are not so talented spend hours each day running ten or fifteen miles and then resting for three or four extra hours because they are exhausted, then they are making a most deplorable mistake. They will have no time to do manifestation work.
Always we have to keep a balance. Sports you can do on a daily basis for physical fitness. Then, if one is good in particular events, one must practise. But in general, if I have to say which one is more important, sports is secondary. Aspiration and manifestation must come first. Sports also includes aspiration, true, but if you want to spread divine light in infinite measure throughout the length and breadth of the world, then individual or collective success in sports may not have as great an effect as other activities.
There will be many people who are infinitely better athletes than my disciples are. But if you can pray, meditate and bring disciples, if you can increase the number of aspiration-plants in my heart-garden, then that is infinitely more significant than spending hours daily practising sports. We came here to be sincere God-seekers, soulful God-lovers and self-giving God-servers. We have to pay utmost attention to the things that are most important. Spirituality in the strict sense of the term must come first and foremost.
Question: How can I increase my sincerity?
Sri Chinmoy: It is only through your prayers that you can increase your sincerity and all other divine qualities. If you have a pure heart, with your pure heart you have to pray for everything that you need. If you need peace, you must pray for peace. If you need sincerity, if you need love, it is through prayer and meditation that you will develop these qualities. You have to be at once the student and the teacher. As the student you will bring forward your sincerity and purity. As a teacher you have to give yourself marks — sixty out of one hundred, seventy out of one hundred or ninety out of one hundred. Every day you have to ask yourself how many good things you have consciously done and how many bad things you have consciously done. Unconscious things you do not know, but conscious things you do know. Try to decrease the things that you are doing wrong in various fields and try to increase the good things that you are doing. By taking the side of the good actions, you will be able to increase all your divine qualities. You be the judge. You be the teacher; you be the student. This is the way each individual can make fast, faster, fastest progress.
Question: How can we know whether we are making the fastest progress or not and if you are satisfied with our progress?
Sri Chinmoy: You will be able to know if I am satisfied with your progress from your own happiness or unhappiness. Early in the morning, as soon as you get up, look at my picture and see if you are happy. When you are going out to work, see if you are happy. When you talk with other people, no matter how miserable they may be, see if inside you there is your own happiness. This happiness is your progress. When you are happy, even if somebody has scolded you or insulted you, deep inside you will remain absolutely unperturbed. You will be a sea of peace. Your progress will be reflected in your happiness, and inside this happiness if you can feel illumining and fulfilling peace, then definitely you are making very fast progress.
Again, this happiness has to be the happiness of the heart. If you are not doing the right thing, your heart can never be happy. But if you are doing everything correctly, your heart will sing the song of happiness. If you are truly happy with your aspiration and manifestation, then you are making true progress and definitely you are making me happy.
Question: You once said that you have God-realisation-victory but you do not have God-manifestation-victory.
Sri Chinmoy: That is absolutely true. Only God-manifestation-defeat I am getting. Those disciples who are ready to manifest the Light of the Supreme feel that only if they do something, is it good and perfect. If somebody else does it, then it is imperfect. There are many, many defects that the disciples have, but this defect is so undivine. People are not establishing their oneness. The world has billions of people, but I am dealing with only a few thousand disciples. I do not see even twenty disciples who have really conquered jealousy. It breaks my heart when you are working together towards the same project and if one climbs up the ladder first, the other ones who helped him climb up the ladder feel miserable. This is not the right attitude.
When they climbed up Mount Everest, Hillary happened to have the brain, the finances and so on, and Tenzing was the guide. Tenzing was a simple Sherpa from Nepal. The whole world bestowed so many honours on Hillary — he was even knighted by the Queen of England — while poor Tenzing remained in oblivion. But we know that without Tenzing, Hillary could not have climbed up Mount Everest.
Those disciples who are working on manifestation should take it as a tug of war. Some people are in front, some are holding on at the very back. Everybody is trying his best — it is teamwork. Usually when one side wins, all the members of the team are in the seventh Heaven of delight that their team has won. Unfortunately, when it comes to manifestation work, that team spirit is missing. If five people have been working on one project, then at the eleventh hour if one individual is responsible for bringing the success, those other team members do not claim the victory as their own. I feel so sad when this happens. While the five disciples were working on the project, they could not tell which one would get the glory. It came at the last moment. I give glory to each and every one who is involved in a project. Some are doing well, while others are not. With your jealousy you are absolutely killing me. You are ready to climb up the Himalayas ten times all by yourself. How many times you will fail, God alone knows. But when somebody wants to climb up only a few thousand feet, you are trying to push that person down. This applies not only to the Centre leaders, but also to important Centre members who are working together.
If somebody brings a new member into our family, he becomes your brother, she becomes your sister. But instead you are thinking, “Somebody else brought him, so what glory do I get?” Even if you did not bring the person, you can keep that person in our family with your affection, kindness, compassion and love.
There are many, many difficulties we have, but jealousy in the manifestation-world is the worst. Not a single Centre is free from this jealousy. It is like a hungry wolf which is devouring others’ good qualities. Your good qualities are there, who denies it? But again, you have one bad quality, which is jealousy, that is devouring or trying to devour others’ good qualities. If you really care for the manifestation of God’s Light, then try to establish oneness, oneness, oneness. My heart-garden needs plants, flowers and fruits that will look beautiful, not dry and dead!
Question: A seeker saw you meditating in a video and asked me what method you use when you meditate. How should I answer that question?
Sri Chinmoy: I have no set method. I have many inner beings, and one of my inner beings will tell me, do this, do that. After God-realisation there is no method. You jump into the water and swim. You do not know whether you are swimming towards the north or the south. Once you are inside the ocean of light, peace and bliss, that ocean itself is the Goal. When I start meditating, at that time I am in the Goal. I do not take five hours or ten hours to enter into the Goal. In a few seconds I enter into my highest consciousness. At that time, not only do I see the Goal, but I become the Goal. Once you become the Goal, why do you need any set method to meditate?
Question: If we are only meditating for fifteen minutes each morning, is that really enough for God-realisation?
Sri Chinmoy: For God-realisation, there is no fixed requirement. We have disciples who say they meditate for twenty hours. Meanwhile they are only sleeping and snoring! It does not depend on the number of hours. You develop your physical muscles by taking exercise. Similarly, by meditating sincerely and soulfully, you develop your inner muscles. Again, it depends on God’s Grace. If God sees that you are meditating most soulfully for fifteen minutes, then God will definitely give you not only the capacity but also the opportunity to meditate for a half hour or two or three hours.
I will never be able to say that by meditating for fifteen minutes you will realise God. Again, who knows? If God wants you to meditate even for five minutes and then He wants to give you realisation, He can. God sometimes acts like a child. If a child has a flower or a tennis ball, he can go and give it to a certain person. That person may not be right in the front row. He may be in the tenth row. Again, although God is a child, He is a conscious child. He sees our past, present and future. In this incarnation perhaps someone is only meditating for fifteen minutes because he does not have enough time, he has so many things to do. But how do you know whether he meditated for hours, days, months and years in his previous incarnations? So it all depends on God’s Wisdom. He knows when you started meditating.
In my case, in my previous incarnation I realised God. In this incarnation, at the age of twelve, when I became fully conscious of my previous God-realisation, it was just like turning the pages of a book that I had already devoured. But in terms of hours, my eldest brother Hriday definitely used to meditate more than I did. In my family, two or three members meditated more than I did. They used to meditate for eleven or twelve hours daily. For me, it was five, six or seven. In my case, meditation became spontaneous. While I was running, jumping, throwing or doing other activities, I could meditate. I was able to do many, many things at the same time, whereas while my brothers were meditating, they were unable to do anything else.
God-realisation does not depend on how many hours you meditate. It depends on how intensely and deeply you meditate. In the Mahabharata, there is a story about how Arjuna used to worship for hours and hours, while Bhima used to worship for only a few seconds, and yet Lord Shiva was more pleased with Bhima. So to come back to your question, it is not how many minutes you spend in front of your shrine, but how devotedly you pray and meditate that is the most important thing. Then God will give you whatever is necessary — the capacity plus the opportunity.
No disciple of mine will ever be able to tell me that he is not getting the opportunity to pray and meditate because he is doing so much manifestation work. I know how many hours you have manifested and how many hours are still left for you to pray and meditate. Again, if you are really, lovingly, soulfully and devotedly manifesting, then that is part of meditation. There are some disciples who are making the complaint that they have no time to meditate because they are working so hard. They are fooling themselves. If you are really working hard, divinely and supremely, then God will give you time. And if you are working with utmost devotion, inside that devoted service you are getting the benefit of meditation.
Question: My daughters are now 17 and 19. They have not lived with me for about five years, but when they get unhappy or have really difficult problems, I want to just put them on a plane and bring them here. Should I just pray harder, or should I bring them here?
Sri Chinmoy: If they are not praying and meditating, if they are not following your way of life, then it is useless to bring them here. You can only offer your goodwill — nothing more. If you start praying to God for each and every one of their problems to be solved, then you are stupidity incarnate. You have to save yourself first. You came into the world to love God, to please God, to fulfil God. This is your first responsibility. Goodwill you will definitely send to your daughters. But if you start praying to the Supreme to solve their problems, then you will only get entangled more and more in their problems. This is absolutely not advisable. You pray and meditate for your own illumination.
We are all God’s creation. God the Creator is responsible for God the creation. If your children were following the spiritual path and were having temporary difficulties, then definitely you could pray to the Supreme to solve their problems. But if they are not praying or meditating on a regular basis, then you are under no obligation to do so. Just send your goodwill. They need it; they deserve it. But you have to save your own life first. That is what God wants from you and from everybody.
Question: Do the primary qualities of a soul change from incarnation to incarnation?
Sri Chinmoy: If one soul, let us say, in his previous incarnation was a great musician, then he may not want to continue in that field. He may want to be a scientist. Then again, if he wants to be both a musician and a scientist, he can. But generally if he wants to be an eminent scientist, then he will not be able to manage both capacities. He will spend all his time becoming a world-famous scientist. Inside himself he has not lost anything. He has kept the capacity of a great musician, but it will be dormant. In each incarnation, God decides how much He can manifest in and though a particular individual.
Question: I was wondering if the main quality that our soul's name represents would change from incarnation to incarnation.
Sri Chinmoy: Once I give the name, then that quality does not have to change at all. That quality only you have to increase and increase for God-realisation. For God-realisation, that name will be of tremendous help to you. Some capacities have to change because of outer necessities, but if you have one good soul’s quality, that is more than enough if you increase and increase it.
Question: When we use instruments to play your songs, how can we best bring out all the divine qualities of the songs through the instruments?
Sri Chinmoy: No matter how complicated or how difficult the music is, if you can make your mind absolutely simple and your heart pure, then definitely you can bring to the fore utmost divine Blessings, divine Compassion, divine Affection, divine Love, divine Gratitude and divine Pride. Only these two things you need. First the mind has to be simple. From a simple mind you will get peace. Peace is in simplicity and simplicity is in peace. Then the heart has to be pure. Inside the heart not only will you be able to see a flower, but you have to feel that that beautiful, fragrant flower is your own heart. Then you can bring to the fore the utmost spiritual qualities of my music.
Published in Sri Chinmoy Answers, part 20
Inner Blessings are of Paramount Importance
A talk by Sri Chinmoy
at PS 86, Jamaica, New York
Dear ones, I observe your birthdays every day, every day, in the very depths of my loving and grateful heart.
Inwardly I have blessed everybody. Unfortunately, this year I could not observe outwardly the birthdays of many, many disciples, and some of them are very close to me. Their hearts have to forgive me, because their souls know how much I love them, how much I care for them. So many disciples had birthdays recently. I could not observe them outwardly because I am dealing with so many problems.
There are many, many disciples and many dear ones whose birthdays I could not observe outwardly. Do not feel sad, do not be upset if I have not been able to observe your birthdays outwardly.
Inner blessings are of paramount importance. Inner blessings, inner love, inner affection and concern — these are the most important things. They are infinitely more important than the outer blessings you get when you are standing in front of me and we are singing the birthday song for you.
Published in Our Sweetest Oneness