Sri Chinmoy: This evening’s programme I am lovingly, affectionately, blessingfully and proudly dedicating to our dearest Anoushka.
After Ranjana led the Sri Chinmoy Bhajan Singers in performing a song Sri Chinmoy dedicated to Sukanya, Sri Chinmoy told his guests: From now on, my beloved Brother and my dearest Sukanya-di and my dearest Anoushka, I need your indulgence-ears, compassion-eyes and forgiveness-hearts.
Maestro Ravi Shankar, Sukanya and Anoushka thoroughly enjoyed the portrayal of many stories from their lives, which included various dramatic and humorous vignettes, as well as music and dance. At the end of the evening, Ravi Shankar offered the following remarks.
Ravi Shankar: I would like to give the final gratitude. I don’t know how to express myself. I feel very emotional. Your Guru has adopted me as his elder brother and given me so much love that I really am overwhelmed. You are all so lucky to have such a wonderful person to give you light and love. It shows on all your faces, and this is the most beautiful thing that one can think of.
Not only am I very, very happy, but I feel very emotionally choked with this evening’s programme. It was wonderful. My wife and daughter and I really enjoyed this evening. Thank you, Sri Chinmoy, my Brother.
Also attending was Ambassador Anwarul Chowdhury, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for the Least Developed Countries. Ambassador Chowdhury commented to the audience:
I was telling Ravi Shankar that he is not only a man of music, but a man of peace. And I believe that all the music he has created over the years has brought so much joy and happiness to us, and so much peace, peace within and peace without. So I was inviting him to come to the United Nations. (Applause)
At a function following the performances, after the guests left, Sri Chinmoy offered fortune cookies as prasad to each individual and made the following comments:
Sri Chinmoy: This fortune cookie represents my gratitude. The message inside the fortune cookie says, “O make my life a ceaseless flood of gratitude.” 9 This gratitude you deserve from your Master, so I am offering it to you. What else can I give you except my gratitude and gratitude and gratitude? In such a short time, my disciples staged such a wonderful performance. Our guests got unprecedented joy. Anoushka was telling me repeatedly, “Amazing, amazing, amazing!”
We came into the world to make others happy. And if we can make others sincerely happy, if we can touch their hearts even for a fleeting second, we feel our spiritual life is worth living. We are all joy-beggars. There are no exceptions. Each and every human being is a joy-beggar. Today we begged our Lord Beloved Supreme to give us Joy. He has kindly listened to our prayers, and our Beloved Supreme has inundated us with boundless, boundless Joy. For that, I am offering Him gratitude, gratitude and gratitude from the very depths of my heart.
Each of us represents the Absolute Supreme inside our aspiration-heart. I am offering this gratitude to my Guru, my Supreme, inside you.
Our programme lasted for three hours. But even then, there was no sign of tiredness from our guests. They were enjoying everything immensely. When we enjoy something, we go beyond the domain of time. It was my intention right from the beginning to give specially the daughter a little joy in some way. And now my children have given the whole family enormous joy, enormous joy.
Ravi Shankar wrote me a letter: “Will you not become my youngest brother? I have lost my brother, Ragendra. I want you to be my youngest brother.” Today he said that I have adopted him. It is the same thing. Who adopts whom? We have adopted each other.
After Ravi Shankar accepted our invitation, a few days later he had a very serious heart problem, but he did not want to go to the hospital. His wife was panicky. Then I talked to her, begging her, “Please, please, I am begging you, he should go.” Then he agreed. He said he did not want an ambulance. He wanted our boys to take him. Immediately I sent Ketan and Sanjay. It was around 11:30.
I also went to the hospital to see him. Alas, alas, he was in the emergency room. I saw that Sukanya was very, very serious. I started meditating most seriously, most powerfully. About an hour we were there. I was in my highest, deepest meditation. Even the wife was not allowed to see her husband. Then finally she went in to see him. After some time she came back and said, “Now, Ravi-ji wants us to go.” He was very, very deeply moved and very grateful that I came, and he wanted to come and see me, but the doctors did not allow him.
Later he called me. I said, “How do you feel?”
He said, “I am very, very tired.”
I said, “I am begging you not to come to our function. I am concerned about your health. We can postpone it. We can do it some other time. You are saying you are very, very tired. You do not have to come. Please, please, some other time we shall perform.”
He said, “No, I am going to come. I want to come. I have so many things to tell you. I want to speak to you first privately. Then I will be at your meeting.”
I was fully ready today to meet first in a private room. He wanted to discuss so many of his problems. Today when he arrived, he said, “No, today I don’t want to think of my problems. Here I have come to watch your performances.”
This is human life. But all is well that ends well. Now look at this: how happy we have made him, and how happy he has made us. Here is the proof that there is light at the end of the tunnel. My New Year’s prayer for 2004 says: “At the end of a very long and uncertain Ignorance-flooded Night-Road, the Beauty of a New Hope and the Ecstasy of a New Promise shall unmistakably blossom.” 10
The message starts with the word “uncertain.” In this case, uncertainty reigned supreme because of his health. Now look at the end of the prayer – unmistakable hope and promise.
This will remain an unforgettable memory in my heart, an unforgettable memory. I am sure they will also cherish it forever.
9. Sri Chinmoy, Enthusiasm songbook, Part 8,<em> from the lyrics of Song No. 100, composed 14 November 2003. Agni Press: New York, 2005.<p>↩
10. Sri Chinmoy, New Year’s Messages from Sri Chinmoy,<em> 1995-2007.<p>↩
From:Sri Chinmoy,Depend on Grace, Agni Press, 2023
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/dg