In late November 2000, I was in New York for a few days. I had taken a few days off work to be with Guru before he left for the Christmas Trip. During that week, there were meditation functions every evening. On Wednesday night, when we were passing in front of Guru to take prasad, he said to me: "Utsahi, I would like you to talk to us about your work... something serious, something funny... for 30 to 45 minutes. Just let me know when you are ready."

I was in shock. What would Guru want to know about my work? What could I say for 30-45 minutes about my job? Why was Guru asking me to do such a thing? Just thinking about it, I was already all stressed out, and my mind was working like crazy: Why, why, why? But, of course, I smiled and answered: Yes, Guru.

When leaving the Aspiration-Ground, Disharini, who had heard this conversation, suggested that I could talk about meditation classes as well. This opened up a new door... Yes, I could talk not only about my academic and intellectual work, but also about my spiritual work. So a plan started to take shape. Planning something like this is like rolling a snowball: you start with a small thing, and add on to it, little by little...

Needless to say, these moments of preparation were quite stressful; I had to prepare something to present in front of Guru and disciples. But in another way, I loved these moments; they were very special, full of energy.

Two days later, on Friday, November 30th, I felt I was ready... nervous, but ready. That evening, since it was very cold outside, the meditation function was held indoors at PS 86. Soon after we started, Guru called me up on stage.

How can a disciple feel when talking in front of his Master about matters that are intellectual, mental - in front of a Master who has given so many talks with his heart and soul? I had written a little plan on a piece of paper, simply to make me less insecure, in case my mind suddenly went blank:

• "Part 1- My regular classes
• Part 2- My children; a parent and a teacher
• Part 3- Meditation classes."

But these handwritten notes were more to calm my insecurity than anything else...

While preparing this, I had come to realize that everything we do in life can be spiritual. So I had planned to share this truth. In order to set the tone, I started by reciting this poem of Guru’s that I love very much:

Wherever you go, go with inspiration and aspiration.
Whatever you do, do with love and concern.
Whomever you see, see with purity’s beauty
And responsibility’s glory.

Sri Chinmoy 1

Then I started relating some incidents about my job, some serious, some funny. I talked about a conference where I made a presentation, in Nicaragua. I had the turista... To stabilize my system, I had been fasting for two or three days, only drinking water, with salt and sugar added. A young couple let me stay in their studio for the day. Before leaving, they had told me that there was cold water in their fridge. You have to know that in this country, they put their drinking water in recycled rum bottles. I was sick and all alone in their home. I was really thirsty and needed to drink. I took what I thought was a bottle of water from the fridge; but after drinking a full glass in one shot, I realized that I had swallowed four or five ounces of pure rum, with the addition of a bit of salt and sugar...

I also explained how it happened that I became a professor: I had been a child welfare worker in northern New Brunswick for a few years. The Director of the School of Social Work in Moncton, five hours away, had a dream in which he saw me on his staff. He called and told me about this dream, and offered me a professor’s job. I accepted, moving into the academic world. It was actually because of this that I settled in Moncton, where I eventually came to know about Guru and the path. Otherwise, in Campbellton, where I had been living, there would have been zero chances of meeting Guru.

I talked about some of my experiences when giving meditation classes... how these transformed me... how I feel Guru’s presence as soon as we start talking about the path, about Guru, and about one of the constant consequences: after a two-hour workshop, I am totally transformed and energized, while when giving my regular academic classes, after the same amount of time, I am drained, exhausted...

After the initial moments of tension, the presentation went well. I was still nervous, but honoured to be able to do this for Guru. After 40-45 minutes, I bowed to Guru and went to sit down. Immediately, Guru asked for a standing ovation. And then he asked if I would be ready for some questions from the audience. How could I say no? I was pleased to... So I went up again and answered, the best I could, five or six questions from the people present. And then another ovation! Then there was prasad. Guru called me up and offered me prasad from his hand. He then said:

Utsahi, you are a professor of life and a student of the heart. As a student of the heart, you are unique. As a professor of life, you are also unique. As a student of the heart, you are offering your soul’s fragrance to the world at large. As a professor of life, you are sleeplessly and breathlessly learning from the Lord the creation.

I didn’t know that someone was taking photos during the whole presentation. A dozen photos were given to me a few weeks later. In them, I can see how attentive Guru is, his sweet smile when I cracked a joke, his appreciation when he applauded, his divine smile when he offered me prasad.

Little did I know at the time that this experience would transform my work. Since then, I have considered my teaching, my research, my writings as a spiritual experience. At the start of each semester, for example, I take the time to walk around the assigned classrooms, praying and meditating that the students will be receptive and that I will be an instrument of the Supreme.

What a gift! You give a little to Guru and he offers you the world in return. Ever since this experience, my life, my thoughts and actions have taken on another dimension. Gratitude, Guru, for this beautiful experience. Because of you, my regular job has been transformed. Through another miracle of yours, you have eliminated the walls between my academic work and my spiritual mission on earth. All is divine... "Wherever you go... Whatever you do... Whomever you see..."

• 1. The Wings of Joy: Finding Your Path to Inner Peace, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997, p. 194

It was Tuesday, December 2nd, 1997. Guru was offering the New Year’s message that night, before he left for the Christmas Trip. Malahinam, Jyotish and I had decided to drive to New York during the day and be there for the evening Peace Concert that Guru was offering in Manhattan, and to receive the 1998 New Year’s Message.

These annual messages had been of tremendous inspiration and hope for me over the twelve years that I had been on the path. They revealed Guru’s vision for the world for the year to come. Many times over the year, we would recite them collectively, in our group meditations. My favorite one had been the 1993 message:

God is dreaming,
Newness singing,
Oneness blossoming,
Fulness dancing.

Hope no more gropes.
Life without slopes,
Splendid depths and heights
Transform bondage nights.

Sri Chinmoy1

Guru had encouraged us to post this particular message in as many places as possible. In Ottawa, we had it aired on the radio and it was printed in the local papers, both in French and English. Guru had put it into a beautiful song as well, which I love to sing.

So, on December 2, 1997, we had sneaked out of our respective workplaces in order to be with our Guru for a few hours, to receive both his message for 1998, and his light. Our plan was to drive back through the night, arrive in Ottawa at approximately 8 a.m. the next morning, take a shower and go to work... That way, we would only miss one day’s work.

Never did I suspect that this day would give me tremendous inspiration and hope, enlighten my life and change my destiny. It was the day when I would see my soul in its true form...

We found the hall, parked the car. It was relatively easy: we just had to follow the saris... With winter coats on, it wasn’t necessarily easy to recognize the boys in whites, but saris were very visible, and very beautiful. The place was packed; there must have been 400 or even 500 people in the hall, for a soulful concert of blessings and meditation. Many were not disciples, but admirers and devotees of Sri Chinmoy, who, over the years, had come to know Guru and were receptive to his message. We sat there and meditated in order to be receptive to our Guru’s message for the year to come.

Then there was silence, and Guru appeared on the stage. For more than one hour, he played the flute, the esraj, the harmonium; he sang several of his soulful compositions. He ended up with a sublime piano performance that electrified the atmosphere and the audience. Then he read the message for the New Year, and we were invited to go on stage and receive a copy of it, as well as an orange, directly from Guru’s hand. The girls went up first, and then the boys. I must have been in the first 20-25 boys.

When my turn came, Guru stopped the distribution, took an envelope from I-don’t-know-where, and handed it to me. Not realizing what was happening, I kind of pulled on the envelope, but Guru held on to it tightly, looked in my eyes, and offered me his sweetest smile. The world stopped. The crowd kept silent. Many people knew what was happening when they saw the envelope. I did not have a clue... Pulak was there and he took some pictures. (I am very thankful to him for having immortalized the occasion. I can now look at these special photos and remind myself of those beautiful moments...) Then Guru said:

I would like you to go home and meditate before opening this envelope. After 20 minutes of meditation, open the envelope, and then recite it 2 one hundred times.

Then he offered me his huge smile. I smiled in return. Then he let go of the envelope. I did not know what to say; I said nothing. Gradually, I realized what was happening. But it was too much, too fast, too intense. My heart was full of gratitude... I would need months thereafter to comprehend and digest what happened there in a split second. Slowly, the reality of what had happened started to sink in: Guru had given me my spiritual name, my soul’s name. I walked back to my place. People were happy, congratulating me. I was in bliss. But I had to wait another nine or ten long hours before I would know what my spiritual name was.

When we were in the car driving back home, I sat for a long time in the back seat with the envelope on my heart, cherishing the moment, heart full of gratitude, joy, bliss. Finally, we arrived in Ottawa. First, I had to do a few things in order not to ruin this special moment. I called my office and told them that something had unexpectedly happened and that I would come in later that day. Then I showered, sat at my altar, meditated as well as I could. And then the moment came. I opened the envelope and delicately took out a handwritten card, with three birds on top, on which Guru had written:

Utsāhi

The seeker divine whose
Enthusiasm, eagerness and self-offering
In the inner world are tremendous
Is known as Utsāhi,
To please the Lord Supreme in His own Way.
I am very proud of you, Utsahi.

Guru
Dec 2nd 1997

And there were two more birds at the bottom, flying in the sky of eternity. At this point, I was a bird as well, flying with delight...

When I started on this spiritual journey, I was extremely shy and withdrawn, and felt unworthy of our Guru’s compassion. Also, from a tender age, I had been damaged by life experiences that left me deeply hurt and bearing a profound sadness. There was no way that I could consider myself worthy of God’s Grace. In addition, when I joined Guru’s path, language was also a problem: I could not express myself well in English.

But, over time, I realized that Guru cared for me – and for everyone around me as well – with great love, concern, and gratitude for all we did, no matter what our language barriers or other handicaps or past experiences. He looked at our hearts and not at our limitations! My growing realization of this fact eventually transformed the way I looked at myself. Depreciating myself and focusing on my bad qualities was not fair to anyone, including him, myself, and the Supreme. Thus, I gradually realized that the negative approach was the opposite of my soul’s inner cry and of my mission in life which, after I received my name, could be summarized by one word: enthusiasm. My journey’s goal became much simpler, yet very challenging: to manifest enthusiasm in my everyday life!

From now on, my purpose in life, the mission of my soul’s incarnation was clear: to be enthusiastic, to have enthusiasm. A simple life... Guru looked at my soul... He saw what I was here for... He offered it to me, and now it is my honor and duty to manifest enthusiasm...

Gratitude, Guru, for this unforgettable moment, gratitude for having awakened my dormant soul, gratitude, infinite gratitude... Some time later, at his house, I offered Guru one of his own talks, entitled “Gratitude". I printed it in the shape of a heart.

Gratitude means
To become a flower in every part of
Your being: body, vital, mind and heart.
Everything in Your being will exist only as a flower.
There are 86,000 subtle nerves inside you, but there
Will not remain anything else except a flower.
You as an individual will become only a flower
To be placed at the Feet of the Supreme.
This flower is completely open;
All the petals are blossomed.
This is gratitude....

Inside the physical body there are thousands of nerves
And inside the subtle body there are thousands
Of subtle nerves.
When everything disappears, when you exist only
As a most beautiful flower and you feel that you
Are ready to be placed at the Feet of the Supreme:
That is gratitude.

But it may take hours,
Days, months, years or many incarnations
To come to that stage.
For one second of gratitude,
The preparation may take quite a few years.

So when I say
That gratitude is the most difficult thing
And the most important thing,
Please remember that I am referring
To this kind of gratitude.

When everything of yours has gone away,
When everything of yours has melted
And there only remains one flower,
When you remain only as a flower
Ready for worship,
And you have placed yourself
At the Feet of the Supreme:
That is gratitude.

Sri Chinmoy 3

• 1. Sri Chinmoy, New Year's Messages from Sri Chinmoy, 1966-1994, Agni Press, 1994
• 2. I still did not know what IT was...
• 3. Flame-Waves, Part 12, New York : Agni Press, 1978, pp. 8-9

Beyond speech and mind,
Into the river of ever-effulgent Light,
My heart dives.
Today, thousands of doors, closed for millennia,
Are opened wide.

Sri Chinmoy 1

"You will like him," said Nasser, a Professor-colleague of mine at the University of Moncton in New Brunswick, a small province in eastern Canada. He was referring to the fact that every Sunday morning in the fall of 1986, one of Sri Chinmoy’s students would drive from the Halifax meditation Centre – located two hours away – to offer his spiritual Master’s message of inner peace and harmony to local seekers, inviting them at the same time to join Sri Chinmoy's "Path of the Heart."

Seven or eight people would come and learn how to meditate; each session would end with a few treats that he would offer us. Strange to my eyes: he comes, pays all of his own expenses, never asks for a dime and offers us some food as well. Every week he also brings a few meditation books and tapes. No sales pressure, though: they are there for us to look at or to buy, if we choose to. He surely did not pay his trip expenses with the books sold during those September sessions!

That morning, as soon as he arrived in the classroom (which had been transformed into a meditation hall), he put a Transcendental Photograph of his Master, Sri Chinmoy (whom he referred to as Guru) on a small table in the University of Moncton’s Education building. He set up another table with the books and tapes. Before settling down to meditate, though, he said something like: I would like to stretch a little after such a drive. Why don’t we all go for a run?

I thought this was a little bizarre, to say the least: we come here to learn how to meditate, and he takes us out for a run...this is crazy, was my mind’s initial reaction. As usual in my case, the first reaction was not necessarily the most illumined one. But my heart’s response was positive.

Seeing him run was a treat. He ran with such grace, such elegance, such light. Although I wasn’t a runner at the time, I could appreciate the agility of what looked like a feather-like series of synchronized movements that he seemed to thoroughly enjoy. His feet barely touched the ground; he ran like a deer, or like a gazelle! (I learned later that Guru had told him he had been a gazelle in an earlier life.)

So my mind was judging his actions – and him as well – but my heart was opening up. How many times thereafter this kind of mind-heart dialogue occurred, I cannot say! My critical mind, coming from a human perspective or an academic viewpoint, would think: These things are crazy. A deeper voice, in loving silence, would whisper: This is beautiful. It is the food my heart and soul need. Gradually I was being introduced to the language of surrender.

But that Sunday morning, I was definitely not ready to surrender... Meditate, sure! Surrender? No way! So the idea, suggested the gazelle-runner, was to silence the mind, to transcend the mind and get to the heart, home of the soul. To go beyond... to dive into a river of spiritual consciousness. How? In silence, he suggested.

I went back home that Sunday morning with an audio tape by a female singing group from Sweden, whose voices made you believe, if you simply closed your eyes, that you were listening to angels descended directly from Heaven.

"This meditation group offers free workshops," I told my family upon returning home to my suburban home. "This is unbelievable!" My wife replied, "Are you sure this is not another gimmick, like that other meditation group we went to? Remember, we ended up paying $500 for the two mantras they gave us? And besides, we badly need this money to feed the kids."2 She was right! We were not rich; I had just completed my doctoral thesis, and this five-year task, without a paying job, had been quite expensive. We needed money for our young children, the house, the car... But in my heart, I wanted to continue, to explore, at least, this message of inner peace.

So the following morning, before the kids got up (this had to be early, because our son was an early bird), I sneaked out of bed, went into the basement, created a little space in my office area, sat on the floor, and started reciting AUM, trying to empty my mind of all thoughts, like the running guy had suggested. I quickly realized that my mind was a bottomless source of ideas. One thought goes, one hundred others come... My preliminary conclusion: in my case at least, the unending parade of ceaseless thoughts is simply impossible to master.

And then the famous doubt-delegation poured in. Yes, my family was right. This is nonsense. Plus, this cannot be free... there is surely something fishy there. And so much for emptying the mind, anyway. After all, I need my mind. In my work as a professor, this gift-of-God mind is my bread and butter. In a university, the mind is king of kings. Plus, Descartes was right: "I think, therefore I am." If you stop to consider it, there is not even an argument: God gave us this faculty so that we could put it to good use, constructing a logical world, full of enlightening discourses, deductions and conclusions. So much for a Sunday morning dream and the Monday morning wake-up... Except for the little voice, which came to me in the initial words of Sri Chinmoy’s poem, The Absolute:

No mind, no form, I only exist
Now ceased all will and thought...3

No, we can’t live without the mind, obviously. But then the inner voice responded: Have a childlike heart. Remember how peaceful you were when you were a child, looking at a flower, looking at your mother. Be a seven-year-old child and see the world, see yourself, see others, with different eyes, the eyes of the heart. So, on the following mornings, I continued to sit down and try to silence the mind. One of the joys of meditation was listening to the Swedish girls’ tape; these songs carried me to great experiences of light and bliss.

But my mind always came back with questions: What the heck was the running freak talking about? It’s time to return to real life... the life where nothing is free. The kids need bread and butter. How can a meditation centre survive on selling a few books and tapes? Definitely, this stuff is not made for a married man, sole breadwinner of the family. In today’s society, nothing is free. I thanked my family for bringing me back to reality. And it was true: how could this guy give away free the mantras of AUM, Shanti and Peace, offer free meditation classes, and afford a 400-km trip to talk to a few seekers on a Sunday morning?

No, I thought, I am not like Jonathan Livingston Seagull, who wanted to spend his life flying. I have to be in touch with reality, be a breadwinner and a responsible father. I travel so much. I attend meetings and conferences, here and there, all over the place. Besides all this, I have to admit that I find mental activity fulfilling... Better to just be realistic and stop this fantasy-world where you empty your mind of thoughts. Thoughts are needed for the world to evolve, for science to continue its progress... and for my ego to continue its journey towards becoming a full professor!

But still, I decided to continue to explore what the gazelle-guy had to offer. And a few weeks later, in spite of all my doubts and tribulations, I submitted an application to become Sri Chinmoy’s disciple. I wrote down a few words about my little self, the inner search that had been calling me for so long, my daily Hatha yoga exercises during the past ten years. As I learned later, the letter and a photograph of me were sent to Queens, New York, home of Sri Chinmoy. In late October of 1986, the answer came from Halifax: "Congratulations, Sri Chinmoy has meditated on your photo and has accepted you as his disciple! You are invited to go to see him in Queens, very soon."

Oh, oh, another weekend away from home! This sounds great, but there is friction in the air. I am excited, but very apprehensive... A Guru in my life?

The awakened consciousness of man is visibly tending towards the Divine. This is a most hopeful streak of light amidst the surrounding obscurities of today. This is a moment, not merely of joining hands, but of joining minds, hearts and souls. Across all physical and mental barriers between East and West, high above national standards, above even individual standards, will fly the supreme banner of Divine Oneness.

Sri Chinmoy4

• 1. Sri Chinmoy, Supreme, teach me how to surrender, 1975
• 2. The purpose of reporting these anecdotes is not intended as any disparagement of my ex-wife. On the contrary, she remains a very good friend to this day. It is simply to illustrate the challenges faced by many people, including myself, when embarking upon a spiritual journey - questions from family, friends, and work colleagues are quite challenging, particularly in our Western world. These considerations make the initial commitment very difficult. I’ve seen the same kind of problem come up with other seekers many times over the years.
• 3. Sri Chinmoy, My Flute, Agni Press, 1972
• 4. Sri Chinmoy, Yoga and the Spiritual Life