Question: When you are fat and you lose weight, is that any help to the soul?

Sri Chinmoy: Losing weight does help the soul, because the mind becomes clear. When one loses weight, when the body becomes light, the mind does not have that heavy pressure. Again, many spiritual Masters of the highest order were unimaginably, unbelievably fat. India’s Troilanga Swami was one of those. Again, some were thinner than the thinnest. In terms of physical fatness, the Jain Master Mahavira and the Lord Buddha were also not thin. God-realisation does not depend on physical fitness or fatness. But, to be perfectly frank, if you are fit and not fat, it helps the mind considerably to start decreasing its normal train of thoughts. At that time the mind does not become jealous or impure. In this way, physical fitness does help the mind, and if the mind becomes clear, the mind is likely to listen to the soul, which it often does not do when it is clouded.

So, to come back to your question, it helps to lighten the mind by losing weight. Again, I am telling you that fatness has nothing to do with the soul, but it has to do with the physical proper, the mind and vital. If the vital and mind are under control, then it is infinitely easier to realise the soul. Physical fitness has nothing to do with the soul, but physical fitness can help the mind. If the mind is in a better frame of consciousness, then definitely the mind can be of tremendous help to the soul. The heart is always eager to be of service to the soul, always. But one day the mind tries to be of service to the soul, and then it may take weeks, months or years for the mind once again to be of any service to the soul.