Sri Chinmoy’s New Year’s Message for 1996
This is the year of the soul’s dream-bloom-surprises and the heart’s reality-blossom-astonishments.
The helplessness of the mind is nowhere. The hopelessness of the heart is nowhere. The uselessness of the life is nowhere.
The readiness of the inspiration-world-mind says to God: “Lord, I shall come.” The willingness of the aspiration-world-heart says to God: “Lord, I am coming.” The eagerness of the dedication-world-life says to God: “Lord, I am come.”
God blessingfully and proudly asks the real God-dreamer-mind to sing, the real God-lover-heart to dance, and the real God-server-life to smile and fly, fly and smile.
— Sri Chinmoy
Sri Chinmoy recites the New Year’s Prayer
This recitation by Sri Chinmoy was recorded at a Peace Concert dedicated to the United Nations in 1995. It appears on the CD, ‘My Prayerful Salutations to the United Nations, Part 9-10’.
Duration: 3:07 minutes
Notes:
Sri Chinmoy held his annual New Year’s Meditation and Peace Concert at Manhattan’s St. Paul the Apostle Church on December 7, 1995.
Remarks about the New Year’s Message
December 31, 1995
Sri Chinmoy gave a talk to his students at the Meikles Hotel in Harare, Zimbabwe.
Sri Chinmoy reads the New Year’s Message:
Some of you may think that “the soul’s dream-bloom-surprises” and “the heart’s reality-blossom-astonishments” are only beautiful words, very pleasing to the ear. But I wish to say that these are most powerful manifestations of my high, higher, highest vision. “The soul’s dream-bloom-surprises” and “the heart’s reality-blossom-astonishments” are not just poetic words meant only to please our ears or eyes. These are realities that are trying to manifest themselves in our heart of aspiration.
Bloom and blossom
Whenever the soul gives us something, it gives it to us as a single unit. It is like those Russian dolls in which two, three, four or five dolls fit inside each other. You open up one big doll only to find another doll inside it. I gave President Gorbachev and his wife a special Russian doll like that. If you see it from outside, there is only one doll. But if you look inside, you will find many others.
The soul gives us one good quality, but inside that good quality there are many other good qualities. In order to find these other good qualities, we have to look at the soul’s gift from this side and that side; we have to examine it very carefully, thoroughly and lovingly. Only then will we see that the soul has put many, many other divine qualities inside the one divine quality that it has given to us. When the gift blossoms, we will see the petals: one, two, three, four — like that.
Surprises and astonishments
There is a difference between a surprise and an astonishment. Something that is surprising our memory keeps inside our consciousness for a long time. It remains either inside our eyes or inside our head. But an astonishment penetrates our inner being. It goes deep within us and touches something deeper — a deeper existence. There it may remain in a subtle form for a few years or forever, or it may eventually disappear. So this is the difference: surprise remains in the earth-atmosphere, but astonishment goes deeper.
Most of you think that I am saying the New Year is only an encouraging year. But not all the surprises that occur will be positive ones. They can also come in a negative way. If you want to make a comparison, definitely more of the surprises will be inspiring, encouraging, enlightening and illumining. But there will also be a few very, very sad surprises.
Also, when I use the word “surprise,” some of you may think I am referring mainly to outer events. You may think, “Oh, some governments that have been undivine for many years will now become divine, or some Presidents or national leaders will become either absolutely divine or absolutely undivine.” When you think of surprises, you think of world events — of something the entire world will come to know or of something that will awaken the world or send shock waves through the world.
But since we are spiritual people, real surprises for us have to do with our spiritual progress. There are some disciples who unfortunately have not been doing well for the past 10 or 15 years. They have not been doing well according to their souls’ satisfaction or according to the Satisfaction of the Supreme. The love, devotion and surrender that for many years they had been receiving from their inner life, unfortunately, they have lost. Those divine qualities are buried in oblivion. But this year most of those disciples will be given the golden opportunity to bring forward their divine qualities again. This year, to their own surprise, even if they do not work hard to bring forward their divine qualities, still the love, the devotion and the surrender that they once had in their spiritual life will come back — even if it is unconsciously.
If they tried to do something great and good over the past four or five years but failed to succeed, this year they are going to succeed. This year they will receive a very, very extraordinary Grace from our Lord Beloved Supreme to conquer the weaknesses that prevented them from regaining or increasing their love for the Supreme, their devotion to the Supreme and their surrender to the Supreme’s Will. Even if they were unwilling to surrender to the Supreme’s Will, this year some of them will do so willingly, happily and cheerfully.
Again, there will be a few unfortunate disciples who will get malicious pleasure — not only unconsciously but also consciously — in standing against light. If light is descending from above, you may wonder how seekers can revolt. But it is possible; in fact, it has been happening throughout the centuries. Why? When the light descends, if the vital is not reasonably pure, the vital sees that light as darkness. If the vital is very impure, even if you bring down the highest, brightest light, the vital’s impurity will see this light according to its own standard — as something dark. Again, if the vital has purity, even inside pitch darkness it will see light. (Of course, inside darkness there is light in very small measure.) So, in the cases of these unfortunate disciples, the vital will not only fail to receive the light, but it will actually become worse, and the disciples’ spiritual life will descend considerably. Either they will suffer on the path or they will leave the path and try to find happiness elsewhere.
The vital becomes impure when an individual cherishes wrong thoughts and wrong feelings, when he or she cherishes insecurity, jealousy and so forth. These reasons you know. But on the material plane, the vital also becomes impure when it deals with material power, mainly money-power. People who have a lot of money face additional problems in trying to keep their minds pure. That is why Sri Ramakrishna and other spiritual Masters were of the opinion that money-power immediately corrupts human beings. Jesus Christ said it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, which is absolutely true. Wealthy people have to be very careful with regard to their money when they enter into the spiritual life.
This year, if wealthy people do not surrender to the divine light and the divine purpose, then they are bound to misuse their money-power. If they try to make more money from the stock market, or horse races or God knows what this year, they have to be very careful. I am advising people not to get involved in gambling this year. If they try to become very, very rich by investing and other risky methods, this year their surprise may come in a negative, very shocking way.
If you do not want to use your money for a divine purpose or for manifestation, no harm. If you want to hold on to your money, then hold on to it; keep it for yourself. But do not try to increase your money-power by doing the things that have brought you more money over the years. If you do, your problems will increase like anything because this year material wealth will stand in the way of your aspiration. So if you try to become rich this year, you may become the very unfortunate loser.
The helplessness of the mind is nowhere.
For the last 10 or 15 years, some disciples or seekers have been doing things wrong — unconsciously or consciously, willingly or unwillingly. Each time an individual does something wrong, he or she tries to muster the courage and determination not to do it again. But again and again, that person does it. Then, after doing the same wrong thing hundreds of times, they come to feel that it is impossible to stop doing it. The individual feels totally helpless, and he or she gives up.
For so many years you have been cursing your mind because it is so weak. But this year, if you try to discipline your mind, you will not be helpless. This year you can get enough strength in the mind to do the right thing and to become the right person. For everything there is a choice hour. Just as early in the morning is the best time for meditation, even so this year can be an extremely, extremely good year if you utilise each day in a prayerful, soulful way. In other years, even if you were exerting 70 per cent of your capacity, you became frustrated because you did not get the results you expected. But this year, I am assuring you, if you can exert even 20 per cent of your capacity — which is your readiness, willingness and eagerness — then your love, devotion and surrender will definitely increase.
These three divine qualities embody everything. Inside love is everything, inside devotion is everything, inside surrender is everything. Surrender is the top of the tree. If you can increase your surrender, if you can climb up to the topmost branch, then easily you can climb down to the middle of the tree, which is devotion, and to the foot of the tree, which is love. Again, if love is strong, then you will have the energy, dynamism, enthusiasm and eagerness to climb to devotion. Then, when you have come to the devotion-level and have very intense eagerness to do the right thing and become the right person, then easily you can climb up to surrender.
The hopelessness of the heart is nowhere.
After trying repeatedly to discipline the mind and failing, the heart feels it is a hopeless case. The heart itself becomes all hopelessness. Once you feel helpless and hopeless, at that time you give up everything. But this year you do not have to suffer in this way. To your helplessness-mind and hopelessness-heart you have to say, “I am going to strengthen you. I will bring from within my own inner power to make you strong, because I need you as my instruments.” Then you will transform your helpless mind and hopeless heart into divine instruments that you can use for your own spiritual progress.
The uselessness of the life is nowhere.
When the mind becomes helpless and the heart becomes hopeless, naturally the life becomes useless. After repeatedly failing every day for several years, we come to feel that our life is useless. We say, “I shall not try anymore because I know I will fail.” But this year no failure, no failure! Just use 20 per cent of your capacity and you shall regain the intense love, devotion and surrender that you cherished for years and years.
This is the year of surprises for all the disciples. You will say, “How did I get back my love? How did I get back my devotion? How did I get back my surrender? I do not know what I have done.” It is all because of extra Grace; it is because unsolicited, unconditional Grace has descended. I assure you, if you again want to have all your love, devotion and surrender, you are bound to regain it.
But if you do not control your vital, if you do not keep your vital reasonably pure, then you wilt not be able to accept the Grace when it is descending. Something will make you feel that the Grace is not something you need or want. But if you can keep your vital pure, you will see miracle after miracle occurring in your life. If you have been doing something wrong for years and years, and suddenly you stop doing it, is that not a miracle? If you can gain back your purest love, purest devotion and purest unconditional surrender, is this not a miracle? Again, if you have been doing something good for years and years, and this year you increase it, is this not also a miracle?
The readiness of the inspiration-world-mind says to God. ‘Lord, I shall come’.
Inside readiness is inspiration. If you are ready, then inspiration comes. Previously, there was no readiness. For the past 11 years, what I call the real readiness of the mind was missing; there was no readiness in the mind, therefore inspiration did not come to the fore. But now, that readiness is here.
The willingness of the aspiration-world-heart says to God, ‘Lord, I am coming’.
This year is also bringing willingness and eagerness. Readiness, willingness and eagerness: these three divine qualities are at our disposal. They are knocking and knocking at our heart’s door. Previously there was no readiness, willingness, or eagerness. The world had lost these divine qualities. Since we are part and parcel of the world, when the world loses something, we also lose that thing. Again, if we lose something, the world loses the same thing. For the last 11 years something has been wrong in the aspiration of the world and the aspiration of the disciples and seekers. For the last 11 years the divine forces were losing ground, and the hostile forces were gaining.
But now, with our help, the divine forces can gain ground again. Our best way of helping is to feel that we want and we need the divine forces. There are many things in life that we want but do not need. Again, there are many things we need but do not want. During the past 11 years we needed many divine things, but we did not want them. But this year we can once more feel that we both need and want them. We want to possess them, and we want them to possess us.
God blessingfully and proudly asks the real God-dreamer-mind to sing. the real God-lover-heart to dance, and the real God-server-life to smile and fly, fly and smile.
We are all God-lovers. But the real God-dreamers, the real God-lovers and the real God-servers are those who can claim that they belong to God and nobody else. If you are a real God-dreamer, a real God-lover and a real God-server, you have to convince your body, vital, mind and heart that you belong to God only. You have to repeat this hundreds and thousands of times. And each time you say it, you have to have the conviction that you do belong to God alone.
When we do something divine, not only the subtle parts of our being, but even the gross physical is elevated. When we do something for God happily and cheerfully, even our physical being goes up high, higher, highest. Here ‘God’ means our own divine life. There is no separation between our divine life and God; they are like the flower and its fragrance. So when we do something for our divine life, at that time our physical — which is the foundation of our spiritual life — flies and transcends. Along with the heart and soul, it sings the song of self-transcendence.
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