A deep meditation is one of the most beautiful and fulfilling of all possible experiences. Once we have learnt how to find our way into that desireless inner stillness that is always there inside us, our life can never be the same. Here in the sanctuary of the heart, free of time and the burdens of the mind, everything is clear, everything is already done. Out of this silence comes wisdom, understanding, and delight.

In many ways Guru taught us to take our practice of meditation out into the everyday aspects of our life—karma yoga—to train ourselves to sustain the meditative feeling as long as possible. Walking through a park, sitting on a bus, waiting for somebody, travelling to the next moments of our life, learning to string these moments of calm together as a necklace of day-long moments of happiness.

At first, the experience of meditation itself relies upon a calm environment and some combination of time, place, and correct technique. But then it goes beyond these needs. We begin to realise that while our increasing moments of “success” have been possible through some combination of external factors—a workshop we attended, group practice, a new exercise we tried, or inspiring music—in reality these things have reconnected us with our deeper self, and that “self” is always there inside us, wherever we are.

Guru wanted us to understand our own capacity to uplift and serve the world, reminding us that “every human being is a very special dream of God.” And to also understand that meditation will take us past our identification with our body, thoughts, and personality to a deeper understanding of our ultimately God-like nature. The space in our lives where we put aside the burdens and preoccupations of the day’s dramas, silence our thoughts, and venture past the many attachments and distractions of the mind to a growing stillness—this space allows us to rediscover the very source of all our creative, intuitive, and spiritual capacities. The closer we move towards this “intelligence of silence,” our “inner pilot,” the more perfect our outer lives become.

Meditation comes easily for me today, sitting on the grass in a park in Auckland under a wide blue summer sky, a sky of such startling clarity and endless transparency as to illumine things and gather close the silhouettes of far-off, familiar mountains. There is this lovely sense of stepping outside of the story of one’s life into a state of just “being,” at rest in the here and now, a lovely inner space of pure consciousness. Over in the western corner of the park the tai-chi practitioners are also touching the lives of passers-by and strollers, their calm and gentle movements reminding us of other realities beyond the ordinary.

And I remember Sri Chinmoy’s words, reminding us that we co-create this world and that “Just one smile from my gratitude-heart immensely increases the beauty of the universe.”

From tomorrow on
My morning meditation
Will be as beautiful as the dawn,
My midday meditation,
As powerful as the sun
And my evening meditation,
As peaceful as the sky.

Sri Chinmoy 1

Note: The tai-chi photo from de.wikipedia.org, available under a Creative Commons license

• 1. Ten Thousand Flower-Flames, part 42, #4189, Agni Press, 1982

Five-time Mr. Universe Bill Pearl and his wife, fitness expert Judy Pearl, are better known to Sri Chinmoy’s disciples as Mahasamrat and Bhavatarini; these are the spiritual names that Guru gave them.

I live in Seattle, and they have visited our Seattle Centre numerous times. Mahasamrat is such an amazing person. His vibration is so powerful— Guru once said about him that he could walk into a hospital and help heal people just from his prana, or life-energy. He has such energy and such a deep love for Guru. You can just feel it when you're in his presence. And Bhavatarini is the same way—it’s like you can't take the two of them apart. They are absolutely one.

And even though they are getting older, they both still work out. They have a gym at their house, and people come to train with them. They start at 4:00 a.m. every day. They are living examples of the “never give up” philosophy.

And one of the things that always touches me about Mahasamrat is that he says when he gets up in the morning and goes out to the gym, he passes by a picture of Guru, at which point he kisses his hand and touches it to Guru's heart.

There's a story from India’s great epic, the Mahabharata, in which the warrior and hero Arjuna offers a thousand flowers to the Supreme every day, but he is overly proud of it, whereas his brother Bhima simply offers one flower and then goes about his day. But Bhima reaches a high state of consciousness just from offering that one flower. That story always reminds me of Mahasamrat touching Guru’s picture every morning—to me, that says everything. He's just so much in Guru’s consciousness without even trying.

Every year around November Guru would hold a weightlifting exhibition, and Mahasamrat was always the master of ceremonies. His encouragement of Guru in the weightlifting world was unparalleled—almost unbelievable. How much he encouraged Guru!

When Mahasamrat and Bhavatarini visited the Seattle Centre recently, we tried to honor them in the way Guru would have. So we celebrated Mahasamrat’s birthday, even though it was a month early. We had a cake. The boy disciples did some really cute skits acting out different stories that Guru had told about Mahasamrat. We had big pictures of him posing as a bodybuilder. In every way, we tried to bring to him how much we loved him and how much Guru loved him. And we all had a wonderful time.

Bhavatarini and Mahasamrat are a unit.  In her own right, she is also extremely knowledgeable about nutrition and fitness and very down to earth with a most compassionate nature.  We all feel that she is a true sister.

We have a statue of Guru in a park in Seattle, and whenever anyone comes to visit, we always go to the statue and try to have a little ceremony there with flowers and a garland for the statue and so on. In fact, Mahasamrat was present when we dedicated the statue, so he is quite familiar with it.

So of course we went to the statue with the two of them. When you see Mahasamrat standing next to the statue, you can see just how much he and Guru have the same vibration, and how much they look like brothers.

He and Bhavatarini live in a small town in Oregon, and all kinds of animals come to their house—deer, turtles, birds, and more. Bhavatarini, in particular, has a real connection with animals. She feeds them and they are never afraid of her.

And whenever you're with them, you feel those big hearts of theirs, which embrace not only people, but animals and nature and the whole world. They are both really special, unique souls, and I feel privileged to know them.

When two oneness-hearts talk
To each other,
We see the most beautiful dance
Of affection and sweetness.

Sri Chinmoy 1

• 1. Seventy-Seven Thousand Service-Trees, part 9, Agni Press, 1998

This is a story about my mom and Guru. Over the years, my parents have become increasingly grateful to Guru. Originally they were not at all—quite the opposite—but they have since grown to be quite thankful to Guru in a deep way.

A little background about my mom—the first time she can remember going to the doctor was when she had her first baby. She grew up in the Italian countryside in a very poor family. Her mother knew about herbs and the old ways of curing sickness, so she never went to the doctor. To this day, whenever she gets a pain or feels anything wrong, she says, “As it comes, so it will go.”

Several years ago my mom called to tell me about some shoulder pain she was having. She never complains, so I knew it must have been pretty bad. “My shoulder hurts so much I can’t sleep at night,” she said. “I can only sleep sitting up.”

A couple of days of this went by and I told her, “Mom, talk to Guru, tell Guru.” I knew that in their bedroom my parents had a photo of Guru, and they also had a Transcendental photograph in their car which Guru had told them they could have, so my mom knew that was for protection. So I told her, “Mom, just tell Guru.” She didn’t, and day by day her shoulder pain got worse. Finally she got to the point where she couldn’t sleep for two full nights. She was in her late eighties, and this was very much telling on her health. Unbeknownst to me, she finally became so desperate that she inwardly spoke to Guru. I got a phone call out of the blue, and my mom asked me, “Does Sri Chinmoy talk to you?”

This was after Guru had physically passed away. Nevertheless, I said, “Yes, he can, if he wants to. He can speak to you, too.”

“He did speak to me,” she confided.

“What happened?” I asked.

“I was in so much pain and I didn’t know what to do, so I talked to him and he said to me very clearly, ‘The problem is not your shoulder. There’s nothing wrong with your shoulder. The problem is that your handbag is too heavy.’” She finished by saying that she immediately knew this was true—in fact, many years ago a doctor had told her that her handbag was too heavy and she shouldn’t use it. I asked her if she had been carrying it lately and she told me she hadn’t picked it up in a few weeks because her shoulder was getting so bad.

However, at that exact point her shoulder pain started getting better. Guru had fixed her shoulder, and she knew it.

To this day, if she forgets this incident and we’re talking about Guru, I’ll say, “Remember how he talked to you, and how he cured your shoulder?”

“Oh yeah, that’s right!” she’ll say, recalling the whole experience.

I hope this sweet story can serve as inspiration to others and to increase our gratitude to Guru. He is very much here, aware, and taking care of us often before we even know there’s a problem. Sometimes what we call a problem just indicates a time when Guru can help transform us in some way. He can use that experience as something to help us in our spiritual life.

As God knows that we have
Many problems,
Even so,
His Heart has
All the solutions
For each and every problem of our life.

Sri Chinmoy 1

• 1. Seventy-Seven Thousand Service-Trees, part 25, #24523, Agni Press, 2002