Part IV1

Sri Chinmoy: You have a soul. Each soul has a special colour. The soul has many colours, but it has a preference for one particular colour that signifies the way it can make the fastest progress in terms of manifesting God’s Light and Delight. In your case, the colour blue is best. Narada’s colour is violet.

Each individual has to bring to the fore his own divine potential. At the age of 22 you have already brought forward your divine potential considerably. It is your soul’s capacity that you have brought forward through the capacity of your body, vital, mind and heart.

Your soul’s capacity sometimes takes the form of indomitable will-power. Sometimes it takes the form of universal oneness-love. Sometimes it takes the form of peace, light or joy — qualities that the soul has in boundless measure. These are your soul’s qualities that are being manifested in and through your life of self-sacrifice for suffering humanity.

There are three or four predominant soul’s qualities in your life. When these qualities come forward and start manifesting themselves in and through you, then not only your world of outer running but also your world of inner running has a very special significance.

The most important and significant quality of your soul is sacrifice — sacrifice for suffering humanity. Sacrifice is an experience that we get on the human level. But from the divine point of view there is no sacrifice; it is all oneness. On the human level people may say that you are making a sacrifice for your sister when you are helping her jump. Perhaps at that time you should be concentrating on your own competition, or on your studies, so you are making a sacrifice. But from your point of view, it is not a sacrifice because Carol is so close to you. You and your sister are one, and oneness contains divine joy and delight. Joy cannot be taken away from oneness, and oneness cannot be taken away from joy.

There is an outer consciousness and an inner consciousness. In the outer consciousness you have already done something extremely great for mankind. You have established something immortal, and millions of people are being inspired by the results. When the world thinks of Carl Lewis the sprinter, spontaneous admiration immediately comes. Everybody is appreciating, admiring and adoring you. It is the outer man who has done this, and it is the outer man who is getting the acclaim, appreciation and admiration from mankind.

But there is also a Carl Lewis the inner man. And there is also an inner consciousness, which we call the heart’s love for mankind and the heart’s cry for the improvement of the world. Aspiration, prayer, concentration, meditation, contemplation, love, devotion and surrender are the realities of the inner life. These are the things that become part and parcel of our consciousness when we become the inner man.

The inner man establishes a sleepless reality that lasts for Eternity. Two thousand years ago someone came. Five thousand years ago someone came. What came was the inner man. The world called them the Saviour Christ and the Lord Buddha, and what they offered to the world will remain permanently. When you consciously become the inner man, you give the earth something that is not only immortal but also of permanent value.

When we think of the Olympics, everybody thinks of Carl Lewis. You stood first; you brought glory to America. So many people are inspired by you. But there are also many people on earth — in remote villages of India and Africa, for example — who know nothing about you. Because they are ignorant, they are not getting anything from you in their heart of hearts. Even if somebody tells them that Carl Lewis is the world champion, they will not get anything from you. But if somebody tells them that Christ said this or Buddha did this, immediately they will receive something. They do not have to be a follower of the Christ or Buddha or Krishna. Still they will inwardly get something in their heart of hearts because what these souls have brought to earth is immortal and eternal.

So when the outer man does something, it does not have the same effect as when the inner man does something, and it does not last in the same way. When the outer man does something great, the world immediately gets tremendous joy. But unfortunately it does not last. But the offering of the inner man elevates the consciousness of each individual on earth and also of those who will come to earth again and again in future incarnations. The contribution of the outer man lasts for a few years or for many years. Then it becomes a kind of historical fact. But the contribution of the inner man lasts forever. So humanity will only get the highest benefit from Carl Lewis the inner man.

Earlier I was speaking about your soul’s colour, which is an aspect of light. The light of your inner consciousness will permeate the entire world, not the achievements of your outer body. The outer body’s contribution will be appreciated and admired by all those who know about it. Millions of people on earth will admire you for what you have done. But when you become the inner man, countless people will unconsciously get tremendous inner upliftment from your very existence on earth. They don’t even have to know who Carl Lewis is. That is what Carl Lewis the inner man can do for humanity.

Carl Lewis: I was mentioning to Narada that concentration and meditation have always been foreign to me. I did not feel I could sit down and meditate and be totally relaxed. What paves the way for the inner life? It has been a mystery to me up until recently. I haven’t grasped meditation and contemplation. I can see the ideas and effects, but I haven’t grasped what path to take.

Sri Chinmoy: There are two roads — the road of the mind and the road of the heart. By God’s infinite Grace, right from the very start you have taken the path of the heart. You are so fortunate that you were born into a family where affection, love, family feeling and oneness are so strong. In the spiritual life, we want to be the dearest, closest and also the most perfect instrument of God. God is already using you as a supreme instrument of His in the outer world. He has offered a new vision to the world in and through your outer existence. Now you want your inner consciousness to come to the fore most powerfully.

In order to find the inner man, you have to walk along the path of the heart where there is true love, true peace, true light and true delight. In your case there is again a great advantage. Some people have to start acquiring things right from the beginning. They don’t have anything in stock. In your case, you already have something very spiritual, but you are not fully aware of it. Once you become fully aware of it, through your meditation and concentration, you will see that whatever you have inwardly is also going out from you. It is spreading like the beauty and fragrance of a flower. While spreading its own beauty, it is also staying with you.

To come back to your question, the power of concentration you do have. When you take the starting position, when they say, “Get on your mark, get set, go!”, you have tremendous power of concentration. But now you need the power of meditation. Concentration is like the sun — bright, brilliant, very powerful. As soon as you see the midday sun, you feel its strength. That aspect you have.

What you are missing is the other aspect of your reality, which is peace. In the evening, at night, or in the small hours of the morning, you can become very peaceful. That is also something that can give you a tremendous sense of satisfaction. When you look at the power aspect of life, you are so happy that you have become one with it. But the peace aspect which is also a form of power, you are not experiencing. So if you value the inner man, which you do, then you have to meditate to get peace.

When we look at the ocean, we see waves and surges. It is full of life-energy, so dynamic. That dynamic aspect of life comes from the power of concentration. But beneath the surface of the ocean, at the bottom it is calm. This deep and peaceful aspect of life comes from meditation. If we want power, if we want to go as fast as possible and reach our destination, then we need concentration. But if we want to inspire humanity, if we want to take countless people along with us towards the destination, then we need meditation.

The power of concentration will take you to the goal faster than the fastest, defeating everybody. But the power of meditation, which is all boundless peace, will be able to carry everybody with you. What you now need is meditation. If you didn’t have the power of concentration, you could never be the fastest human. You do have it. At every moment I observe in your life the power of concentration. But the power of meditation, which is infinite peace, you have to develop. So if you meditate regularly, then like the power of concentration, without fail you will also get the power of meditation.

Concentration gives us the victory. But meditation gives us joy and confidence. After we have achieved the victory, a kind of fear may enter into our mind that tomorrow perhaps we will not be so fortunate. Today you have won; you are so happy. But a few minutes later you may think, perhaps Calvin Smith will do better in the next meet. Perhaps the day after tomorrow I will not be able to perform as well. Even when concentration brings the victory, you are always afraid that you will not be able to perform well or that somebody else will surpass you. So it is very important to have the power of meditation so that doubt will not be able to attack you and take away your joy.

Now Calvin Smith and others have different names, while your name is Carl. But once you have the power of meditation, if somebody calls you Calvin, you are not going to mind because you have become one with him. When you have won by virtue of the power of meditation, you have won it for me, for Narada, for everybody. When you win with the power of meditation, you have won for mankind, and that victory will forever last. Meditation is something new to your mind, but not to your heart, not to speak of your soul. Your heart is quite familiar with meditation because you have a beautiful, soulful heart. But your mind is not accustomed to the Eastern type of meditation, although your heart is more than prepared. Your heart is quite familiar with it. Your heart is all love, good will, fondness and oneness. Your heart was fully prepared but the mind has taken 22 years to know what the heart already has in boundless measure. So meditation is something new to your mind, but your heart knows it extremely, extremely well.

Carl Lewis: I just wanted to say that last night was really beautiful. I want to especially thank all those who did the singing.

Sri Chinmoy: These things that you have said are so profound that I wanted to set tune to them. Your words have tremendous prophetic power. Then, when they become songs, they have even more power, they become part and parcel of the universal harmony. The songs that I have composed embody the power of your words. When we set tune to them, we embody the power in the words. Otherwise, the power just remains before us, but we don’t have the happiness and joy that it contains. When we sing songs, inside our songs we see happiness. Music keeps us in tune with our universal Self.

During the Olympics, spiritually we will all be there. We will be 100 percent for your victory — not 99 percent but 100 percent for you.


CL 62. On the morning of 12 November, Carl Lewis visited Sri Chinmoy at Progress-Promise, the spiritual teacher's meditation hall.