Question: Good afternoon, Guru. Earlier Narada shared with us a poem of peace that you had written. Following that, there was music that we heard and phrases that we repeated. Everything seemed to imply a level of positivity, oneness and reaching fulfilment with God, oneness with God. How does one try to reach that level of oneness from day to day when there is turbulence and volatility within? How does one transform the level of turbulence and volatility within into this level of fulfilment and oneness?

Sri Chinmoy: Early in the morning let us try to pray for at least ten minutes. Either let us pray or let us meditate. Meditation is more difficult, much more difficult than prayer. You are accustomed to praying, specially in the West. In India, in the East, perhaps it is easier to meditate. I am not saying you are inferior and we are superior — far from it! Your soulful prayers reach God sooner than the soonest.

After our prayer and meditation in the morning, let us try to look at a flower and see the beauty of the flower. Let us try to smell the fragrance of the flower. The beauty and the fragrance of the flower will definitely give us joy. The flower we are seeing in front of us with our human eyes. Now, let us try to imagine this beautiful flower with its celestial fragrance inside our heart. Then let us go to our place of work. Yes, we shall have to enter into the hustle and bustle of life. There is so much turbulence and so much wrong movement there. But if we know that deep within us is beauty, beauty unparalleled, and fragrance, fragrance unparalleled, then the outer world of conflict, turmoil and negative forces will not be able to disturb us. To a great extent we will be able to keep ourselves free from the outer circumstances. We will not be disturbed because our inner beauty and fragrance will be of constant help to us.

Early in the morning we are starting with inner beauty and inner fragrance. If the inner beauty we can maintain throughout the entire day, then when somebody is unkind to us, we do not have to be unkind to him. Let us say that the “tit for tat” principle will not work. The other individual will see something divine within us. Like a magnet, something within us is pulling the person who is misbehaving towards us, and that is our love. Our love-power is infinitely stronger than his negativity-power or his misconduct. This all-pervading love we can have only when we see the beauty within us and when we feel that we are nothing but fragrance. Our entire being is inundated with Heavenly fragrance. We have that fragrance as our divine weapon. We have protection within us to face the outer world.

The outer world of uncomeliness can easily be challenged and defeated by our own inner beauty and inner fragrance. This inner beauty and fragrance is our indomitable strength. We have to feel that our inner light, our inner power – whatever we have deep within us – is infinitely stronger than the forces of the world that are disturbing us. Provided we can use them properly, these divine weapons can easily fight against the disturbing outer situations. But if we do not have inner wealth, inner resources, then we suffer.

Early in the morning God gives us ample opportunity to pray to Him and meditate on Him. The last song of mine that you just learned was, “To be cheerful is to be on God’s Side.” When we look at a flower, the beauty of the flower and the fragrance of the flower will without fail make us cheerful. Once we are cheerful, we are bound to feel that God within us is for us, because we have taken His Side. But if we are doomed to disappointment, depression and frustration right from the morning, then we cannot achieve anything. Everything will fail us because we have started walking along the wrong road.

We can start walking along the right road by praying, meditating and looking at a flower or looking at something else that is most beautiful, something that pleases us immediately. Anything that pleases us in a divine way has to be seen or even imagined. Imagine a baby’s smile, or the smile of a little child. The child may not be in front of you, but you can imagine his smile, and you can see his smile. That smile will offer tremendous strength and encouragement to you as you face the outer world.