The Republic News
Cebu City, Philippines
Yoga Master Speaks
“Oh, Philippines! India offered you the fulfilling message of the heart’s universal oneness. Spain offered you the glowing message of the Christian faith. America offered you the convincing message of the loftiest democracy. Your soul is now offering the all-convincing, all-glowing and all-fulfilling message of self-acceptance, self-illumination and self-manifestation founded on the most fertile soil of your inner faith. Unmistakably are you walking along the path of your inner faith supremely triumphant will be at the end of your journey’s close.”
Thus says Sri Chinmoy Kumar Ghose of Bengal, India, yoga master, about the Philippines after his fourth day of sojourn in the Philippines. C. K. Ghose, a spiritual leader and teacher of the movement called A UM, was in Cebu City in connection with his Far Eastern tour for a series of lectures on yoga. Unable to arrange engagements in Manila, he proceeded to Cebu to speak at the University of San Carlos and Southwestern University. Prior to his visit to the Philippines, he went to Japan for the same purpose but was able to give only two lectures due to the widespread student strikes in the different colleges and universities in Japan. His next stop is Silliman University, Dumaguete City.
“People are not using Love properly,” he declared. “They are using Love to possess and be possessed. Real love is something that expands and liberates and gives us the feeling of true oneness of the entire world.
“We need a new world, and for that we need a new consciousness. When we give to God what we have and what we are, we immediately grow into a new and divine consciousness."
In his two lectures and in an interview, he clarified many misconceptions about the yoga movement.
In the Yoga movement, three attitudes are emphasized in relation to God — Love, Devotion and Surrender. Yoga is not a religion, he says, it is a spiritual movement. On the contrary, it accepts all religions; it even transcends all of them. In fact, he has disciples coming from different religions and denominations. For the movement the field is the entire world.
Sri Chinmoy Kumar Ghose, as a lecturer, has lectured at Harvard (on “The Vedanta Philosophy”), Princeton, Yale, and other leading American universities. On his way to Japan he spoke at Berkeley.
Published in The Republic News, Cebu City, Philippines, November 12, 1969
The Record
Bergen, New Jersey
Sri Chinmoy is interviewed after he lifts a Piper Arrow III plane plus eight men (total weight: 4,748 lbs.) at the Sparta Aviation School, Teterboro, New Jersey.
Interviewer: Why do you do this?
Sri Chinmoy: I am trying, according to my humble capacity, to be of dedicated service to the world. I have been going to the United Nations to offer meditations since 1970. In addition, I have composed many songs and poems, plus I have done thousands and thousands of paintings. All this I am doing to inspire others. Similarly, others also do many, many things to inspire me. If I am inspiring people and people are inspiring me, then we become good human beings. When we are inspired, we try to do many, many good things for mankind. When we are not inspired, we do many, many bad things. Inspiration is a divine element inside our life. When we are inspired, we try to climb up the Himalayas. When we are inspired, we try to swim the English Channel. When we are inspired, we go from one country to another country to inspire people and to be inspired by them. I feel that when we inspire humanity, we automatically become good citizens of the world. This is my philosophy. My weightlifting feats I have done solely to inspire humanity.
What humanity wants is joy, and inside joy is peace. If we are happy, we will not go and strike others; we will only go and shake hands with them or embrace them. But if we are miserable, we may go and strike others to get rid of our misery. People who are happy will never do bad things. Only unhappy people are fighting, dropping bombs and killing one another. If I am happy, will I go and find fault with my neighbours? Is there any human being who is happy who has done bad things? Only unhappy people do bad things. Here, with my weightlifting, I am inspired and you are inspired. We are only thinking of making each other happy. And when we are happy, we get peace.
Interviewer: What is the 'oneness-heart' that you talk about?
Sri Chinmoy: What 'oneness-heart' means is that your good qualities you are giving me and my good qualities I am giving you. Your divine qualities you are offering to me gladly and my divine qualities I am offering to you gladly. When you have oneness and good feelings, you give me what is best in you and I give you what is best in me. We exchange our good qualities. That is called a 'oneness-heart'.
Published in A Mystic Journey in the Weightlifting World, part 1