Stories by Sri Chinmoy's students and friends

Sweet moments with our Guru

With Guru on my birthday

I had some other experiences with Guru—twice for my birthday. Guru used to celebrate birthdays, mainly for the close disciples, the inner circle of people very close to him—usually not for people like me. I was not well known on the path.

The first time was during the New York City Marathon. Guru was friends with Fred Lebow, one of the founders of the New York City Marathon. We ran this marathon until the year 2000. Disciples used to meet in New York in November for this race. This is also the time of my birthday. I was born on the 6th of November.

There was a kind of celebration at this time and Guru was teaching some songs in the morning. I was seated in the benches beside another French disciple. Guru called the good singers to go down to start learning the songs. I am a good singer, but when Guru teaches songs, you have to write down the words, and sometimes it is difficult to catch the words and then to memorise them. I didn't want to go down. I hesitated to go down and stayed in my seat. But my friend beside me said, "No, no, it is your birthday today. You have to go down. You have to go down and at least participate."

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Everyday Miracles on Sri Chinmoy's Path

Seeing the God inside my son

When I started to meditate under the guidance of Sri Chinmoy, the situation in the family wasn't so good because of the doubts of my spouse and my parents. I could not even talk about meditation. But I had a little corner in the basement where I could be by myself. It was in my office behind the door. I had set up a little altar, a very minimal altar, and I would meditate in the morning. I would try to wake up at least 20 minutes before François, my son, because when he was up, it was another world, since he was hyperactive.

Both children attended the local school. François was in grade 4, Julie in grade 2. At school, François always wanted to joke around and have fun. He would do things that distracted the teacher or made him/her upset. Julie, two years younger, was an example of conformity. François was the opposite! He was a little bit hyper, and this created challenges.

So I had started meditating to help me accept my son and not get too upset with everyday events, either at home or at school. Before the children woke up in the morning, I would go to my secluded area for about half an hour of relaxation, deep breathing, building up my tolerance level…

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Dynamic Spirituality

Sri Chinmoy performs on the world's largest organ

Guru always wanted to play at the Sydney Opera House. For Guru, there was something very magical about that building. Guru liked the building very, very much. Guru said whenever he hears the name Sydney, he thinks of the Opera House. We knew that Guru would love to play the organ, so we got permission somehow, I don't know how. It was a miracle that we got permission for Guru to play the organ.

There were about maybe one hundred disciples. It was not for the public. It was only for some disciples. Also, it was being recorded by the national radio. The gentleman who would show Guru the organ was a very famous organ player himself. It was arranged that he would also interview Guru for the radio program. Guru was very excited about playing this organ. It is the largest mechanical action organ in the world. It has ten thousand pipes.

There were many forces coming together. There was the building itself that Guru loved so much, then there was the organ, which was so special, and the occasion. Guru flew especially to Sydney from Melbourne just to play this organ.

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Achieving the Impossible

All I needed was the Supreme, and I would always win

For three years, starting in 1977, some 200 New York area students of Sri Chinmoy trained as a group for the Pepsi 24-Hour Bicycle Marathon in Central Park, as he encouraged us to challenge our limitations and thus discover our deeper capacities.

Starting a month before the race, which was held on Memorial Day Weekend, Sri Chinmoy would lead us on daily training rides in Flushing Meadow Park. The Pepsi Bike Marathon drew thousands of amateur participants, but also a core group of professional riders who competed seriously for the prizes. None of our team members had experience in racing, though a few of us did cycle regularly and take road trips. The first year we entered as a team was a bit of an experiment, though I think we won a prize or two for the size of our team and for our uniforms. But the second year, 1978, we trained more seriously, and I felt that Sri Chinmoy was determined to show us the limits of what was possible.

A week before the race, Sri Chinmoy chose who would be on the two small teams that would compete for the team prizes. I felt honoured that I was the only woman on the first-string team of ten, but I was quite alarmed when Sri Chinmoy solemnly called us up in front of the whole group and told us he envisioned each of us doing 300 miles in 24 hours!

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Inner communication

It was Christ himself who sent me to Guru

I was an ordained Christian minister serving at the Metropolitan Community Church in Manhattan. I had found my “church home” there, and loved the community as well as the opportunity to serve the poor and downtrodden—but I was feeling a lack of spiritual direction for myself.

I began to feel desperate spiritually. Where was I going to find a place to address my personal spiritual growth? How was I going to grow in my walk with God? I couldn’t live without a place to grow emotionally and spiritually. I felt like I was dying inside. I couldn’t stand it anymore.

Late one evening, I went into my bedroom and sat down to pray. I prayed to Christ and asked him to help me. I needed a new spiritual director. I needed someone who could guide and advise me in my spiritual life. Someone really, really far ahead of me, someone I wouldn’t catch up with in just a few years by learning all that they could teach me. I wanted someone so far ahead of me that I could spend a very long time learning from them.

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Constant Growth and Progress

Purifying your mind by serving your spiritual Master

On my first Christmas trip, which was in 1990, I went to Hawaii and then Bali with Guru. Every morning, early in the morning, we would wake up about 4:35. We would go down to the beach and wait for Guru, and Guru would practice throwing shot put. He had many special shot puts made from lighter ones to very heavy ones. The heavy one was very heavy, maybe 80 kilograms. Guru would practice. We would give Guru the shot put and then we would also pick it up. There was a line of us and we would take it in turns to give Guru the shot put and then also pick it up.

With the very heavy weights, you would have to go very close to Guru. I was not super strong. I'd have to go very close to Guru to be safe and to give it to Guru safely. You were very, very close to Guru when you would do this. As a guard, often you would have to work around Guru. You learned how to purify your consciousness, to be in a good consciousness because when you're around Guru, you're very aware of his consciousness and you want to be your best too.

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the life-saving Divine Force

I did my job

A bad fall, a broken ankle, a cast on my leg, a sudden sharp pain in my chest . . . events cascading with increasing speed left me unable to breathe, as each time I tried to take a breath my chest muscles snapped back from the pain.

I was staying with my parents in my family’s home while recuperating from my fall. Now here it was, 5:30 a.m., and I was in agony from the pain in my chest. I knew enough from nursing school to suspect the worst: a pulmonary embolism, a blood clot in my lungs. Unable to take more than the shallowest of breaths, I could not call for help. So I had to use my cell phone to wake my father in the next room.

The look on his face when he entered my room confirmed my worst fears⎯a blood clot had formed in the leg under the cast and had now entered my lungs. My father the surgeon quickly called 911, then in his best professor-of-medicine style, explained that I was at immediate risk of a stroke (if the clot traveled to my brain) or a heart attack (if it went to my heart). Thanks, Dad!

While Dad went to greet the ambulance, I called Ashrita in New York, who fortunately answered despite the early hour. I later learned that he had immediately called our restaurant Annam Brahma, as the workers there would have had the quickest access to Guru at that time.

I ended up spending a week in the hospital on life-saving drugs⎯but I know it was really Guru who saved my life. A few hours later I would have been on the train back to Boston, and if the clot had showed up then, I would have been unable to call for help, explain my predicament, or ask Amtrak to arrange for an ambulance at the next station. Plus, the stops between Delaware and Boston can be almost an hour apart⎯I might not have survived until I got to a hospital.

A few weeks later, arriving in New York for August Celebrations, I ran into Dipali, who looked like she was seeing a ghost, she was so startled to see me alive. She told me the “inside story”: Guru had told the restaurant staff at Annam Brahma that my soul was leaving the body and he had to bring it back.

“I did my job,” Guru told them.

Treasured friendships

Guru's first meeting with Mother Teresa

We were told Mother Teresa was staying at a church in Rome, very close to the Coliseum. It was near a church but it was a convent. It was so simple. There was no running water or heat, and the nuns lived with such simplicity. Guru was so excited and so delighted.

When Guru got there, Kailash was driving, and I got to be in the car with Guru. There were about 50 disciples who were already there waiting. They wanted us all to gather at the back entrance of the convent. It was quite beautiful. There were beautiful trees and a view of Rome.

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