Perfection Journey
“One hour at a time, one day at a time, one lap at a time. Enjoy the journey. Find your highest capacity. We hope to give as much as we can to help you get through this.”…..Part of pre race speech by Sahishnu.
https://vimeo.com/163476918
Each and every
Heart-dream of mine
Has the capacity
To take the highest flight
And the longest journey.
Sri Chinmoy, Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, Part 181, Agni Press, 1993
Yolanda comes to the starting line
Sahishnu introducing the runners
“I have come every year since 2007, so this is my 10th year.”
Of all the runners attending the race Fred Davis 111 may be the one who has attended more of these events back to back than anyone else.
He confesses that over the years he has never felt that he has performed as well as he is capable of doing. His personal best over 10 days he set in 2010 when he did 505 miles. Still at age 68 he is tirelessly enthusiastic. Fred has completed 325 ultras over the past 34 years.
Fred says that the thing he likes most about the 6 and 10 day race here in Flushing Meadow is the contributions of all those who help and the other runners who like himself enjoy attending.
Sitting with Fred as we speak is a newcomer to the 10 day race Yolanda Holder. She has previously completed 6 day races where her best performance has been 403 miles in the Across the Years race in Arizona. She says that Fred has been very helpful. “He has been telling me to take it easy. Don’t go out too fast, because we have 4 extra days.”
Fred who has come here from his home in Cleveland even picked Yolanda up at the airport. “He is wonderful. He is a blessing.”
Admitting to some pre race jitters she says her left foot has been bothering her but says that Fred tells her it is all in her head. “I am very nervous because I haven’t gone past 6 days, 403 miles. I don’t know what is going to happen. Normally this is kind of normal for me. I am kind of anxious.”
When asked what brought her here to the East coast from her home in Corona California. “I like a challenge. The race director invited me. He has been following me in my 6 day race in Arizona. He was amazed that I can power walk.”
Link to Yolanda’s website:
http://www.yolandaholder.com/#!about/c66t
“This is challenging. Even doing 6 days is challenging. 10 days…..we will see.”
As for a goal. “I do see a number. I want to break the American Women’s record which is 510. So I definitely see 511.” The previous mark was set in 1997 at the race here in Flushing Meadow.
Yolanda says that she has developed several plans in order to be able to do this. “I have it on a little card because when you get tired sometimes you can’t add and you can’t think. You can’t think properly when you are doing 6 day races. So I wrote down every day what number I should be on.”
I tell her that Fred is the master of the pre race charts. “I have one this year but it is a little different,” he says. “Before I used to break it down into 24 hours. This time I have broken it down into 18 hours. If I get behind I have 6 hours left. My goal this year is to just stay out here. But as you know sometimes I can disappear for a whole day.”
“This year I am not so much worried about mileage. My goal is to be on my feet 18 hours a day.”
Yolanda says, “he has a goal and I am going to keep on him.”
“If I am on my feet for 18 hours I can do at least 54 miles a day. Right now my minimum goal is 540 miles.”
Click to Play:
Manoshri and her sister Gautami are back at the race for their 2nd year. Helping them both this year just as she did last year is their Mom.
https://vimeo.com/163189554
For now it is mostly just the tents of the 10 day runners which are going up.
Where the reason-cloud ends
My journey begins.
Where the doubt-poison ends
My goal begins.
Sri Chinmoy, Ten Thousand Flower-Flames, part 6, Agni Press, 1979
The crew has been working for 4 days now setting up the village.
Continue reading “Set Up for the 6 & 10 Day Race…April 17th”
A Photo taken at midnight on the 11th of April 1982. Sri Chinmoy along with a large group of his students participated in the 12 hour walking race on the Jamaica High School Track
In 1980 he participated in the 12 hour walk for the first time. The date was April 20th. He completed 45 1/4 miles
Footage courtesy of Abakash:
God wants you to do Him a favour
Before He does you a favour.
He wants you to keep
Your heart-door open
For a few fleeting minutes,
And then, what He will do,
You know:
For hours and hours
He will walk on your life’s shore.
Sri Chinmoy, Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, Part 13, Agni Press, 1983
Early on the evening of April 12th the race is about to begin
Pratyaya is the race director
Sri Chinmoy walking around Jamaica High School in 2007
The first lap
Sri Chinmoy walking in 1980
One person will run the marathon in two hours and another will have to exercise patience and run it in 10 or 12 hours. The race goes to the swiftest; that is one theory.
But in the inner world, the race goes to the one who has utmost patience. Because of our infinite patience, our hope of realising God will one day be manifested into reality.
— 27 October 1983
Footage Courtesy of Abakash:
In order to become an expert in any walk of life, we must needs work very hard. We also must know that no sincere effort will be in vain. Each and every sincere effort will be crowned with success, of course, at God’s own choice Hour.
Sri Chinmoy, The Core Of India’s Light, Part 2, Agni Press, 1992
“Guru was in a white dhoti, and the whole background is kind of white. The blue carpet was giving a feel like the sea. Everything was white and blue.”
Adarini talks about one of my favorite photographs of Sri Chinmoy. It is a picture that she took just moments after he had given a concert at the Jefferson Memorial in Washington. The air charged with energy as storm clouds are rolling in across the Potomac. Within minutes the rain will thunder down upon us.
I remember the moment very well because I was fortunate to have been there. But Adarini’s interpretation of this moment adds even more to this special memory. One now that took place nearly 30 years past.
“Guru at that time was walking back and forth. He said the had to walk back and forth 7 times in order to come down from this high plane that he was on.”
“The picture is not perfect. It is a little grainy. But the feeling you get from that picture is unbelievable. For me there is this peace and this vastness.”
Question: What is the spiritual significance of a photograph
Sri Chinmoy: A photograph is at once meaningful and fruitful. The inner life can be seen on the outer face. The inner reality can be visible on the face of the outer reality. The inner height can be measured by the outer eyes. The inner depth can be felt by the human heart. Each photograph, if it is taken from a higher plane of consciousness, leave behind a new hope, a new aspiration and a new realization for Mother Earth to cherish and treasure.
Sri Chinmoy, Flame-Waves, part 10, Agni Press, 1978
“You are not going to play this ever again.”
Bhashwar jokes as he watches an old film of himself and Sakhshat competing in a 400 meter race that took place back in 1980. It is the first time that either of them has seen it. In this event Sakhshat is the clear winner. At the time Sakhshat was 30 years old and Bhashwar 34.
I am showing the film to them on my lap top. Of course I don’t want to embarrass either of these 2 incredible athletes. Both are gifted runners, who competed against each other many many times over the years. Not just in the Sri Chinmoy annual sports day but also in Masters competitions.
I have filmed and videoed many of their Sri Chinmoy centre competitions. What is remarkable about the particular race that I am showing both of them now is that this 400 meter race is the very first time that they competed against each other.
The two friends sit side by side as they relive an intense brief experience that took place 36 years ago. The screen is small and the reflection glows brightly in their faces. Their eyes stare transfixed upon an event that signaled the very beginning of a unique and significant phase in both their lives. Something that inspired them both, not just physically but also most definitely spiritually as well.
As Bhashwar watches their first 400 meter race he is enthralled. He repeats the word “wow”, again and again. Sakhshat leads the race from start to finish, he is silent.
Sakhshat: “I think Guru wanted me to have a good experience.” He laughs, “I lost all the rest of them, except one or two.”
The film continues and shows a few other races.
Sakhsaht: “Look at Guru.”
Bhashwar: “He is into this stuff.”
Clearly as you watch even this short piece of film it is abundantly clear just how enthusiastic Guru was about sports day. I have filmed him competing in a number of events. He looks most enthused though when he is standing at the finish line and holding his own stop watch, and timing some of the faster disciple races.
Click to Play Interview Part 1:
Continue reading “Eternal Friends, Eternal Rivals, Eternal Brothers”
It is late February of 2016. In a large meeting hall of a hotel in Port Dickson Malaysia, 35 year old Kumaran Muniandy tells me an incredibly inspiring story. He has spent the last few days attending the functions and activities of the visiting disciples of Sri Chinmoy. It is a yearly gathering, and lacking a better description, is often referred to as simply, the Christmas trip.
Kumar is a native Malaysian and has come from his home. It is a long and complicated bus trip. Compared with that of all the disciples who are visiting Port Dickson it is almost insignificant. Most of those who have come here have traveled from all around the world to be here. But in some ways, in the always unpredictable journey of life, Kumar perhaps has come the furthest.
What makes Kumar’s presence here unique however is that he is, in no small way, fulfilling a request made of him personally exactly 10 years earlier. A time when Sri Chinmoy last visited Malaysia, a little more then a year before he passed. At the time in 2006 Kumar was working in a textile shop on Langkawi.
As he relates the experience now, so many years later, he is visibly moved at being able to share what had happened to him on that day when Sri Chinmoy walked into the shop where he was working. As divine fate would have it, Sri Chinmoy had come there to purchase saris.
In the beginning Kumar gave no special notice to the elderly Indian gentleman sitting in a chair. When he had to cross the floor close by he says, “Guru called me.”
“I was thinking, this is a normal customer. Then when I went near he asked me my name. I said, Kumar. He said, O, that is my name.” As he recalls this moment now he laughs with a kind of infectious excitement. After this he says he spoke for a few minutes to Guru about the saris that the shop had for sale.
“Then Guru asked me whether I had an interest in music. I said yes.”
“If you are free come and join us tonight. There is a concert.”
“I said, okay Guru. Sure.”
Not having any idea what would come next, he invited his Mother and sister to come with him that evening as well. He adds that the day was also his birthday. Kumar did not know yet what a gift he was about to receive.
“Once I entered into the hall, only then did I realize actually with whom I am dealing. Before that I was thinking it is just an old Indian man who has invited me to a concert.”
“When I sit in the second row I see a slide show describing who Guru is. Then my body started to shake. I was very nervous at that time.”
Kumar says that for the first time he was beginning to realize the significance of his chance meeting in a Langkawi Sari store. “I feel like I am facing God.”
Kumar was enthralled with the concert. His focus entirely upon the man who played so many instruments and with whom he now immediately felt a special heart felt connection.
After the concert was over, Kumar says, “Guru called me from the stage.”
“After that I sat in front of Guru. He said, I knew Kumar that you would come. I am so happy so see you here.”
Kumar does not say all that was said in the conversation he then had with Sri Chinmoy. “It was all about the real life. About the soul. He explained to me actually who I was.”
Sri Chinmoy also spoke to Kumar’s mother. He told her, “you are the luckiest Mother in this world to get Kumar here. At that time I was just crying. Guru was explaining to my mother who I was. My past life and everything.”
Kumar says that Guru did not give him any specific instructions of what he should now do with his life now. Instead he gave him this simple phrase. “kumar, the track is ready for you.”
He is incredibly animated as he recalls this now. “I could not close my eyes when that came.”
The next day he attended the functions with the disciple group. “I still could not close my eyes. I was wondering what is happening. Why has Guru told me this.”
The next day Sri Chinmoy and the rest of the group were leaving. Kumar went again to the hotel and met with Sri Chinmoy who then handed him his transcendental photo. He also urged Kumar to come to visit with him in New York as soon as he had a chance.
There would be one last opportunity for him to be with Sri Chinmoy. Kumar went to the airport to see him off and was able to be with him before he boarded the plane.
“I took a blessing from Guru. He then took 5 envelops from his bag and handed them to me. He touched my head and blessed me.”
“After his departure my whole life had changed. It was then that I realized what was the importance of a life.”
Surprisingly it would be just 3 months later when he received an unexpected phone call. His sister had just an operation and was about to receive chemotherapy. Sri Chinmoy spoke with his sister and then talked to Kumar. Sri Chinmoy said, “do not worry Kumar. Do not worry. Everything will be okay.”
Then after 6 months there was another call. It started with Sri Chinmoy chanting his name, Kumar, 3 times. “He gave me a very good message.”
At that time Kumar says he was trying to get to New York to visit Guru. “Unfortunately I couldn’t get my visa. 2 times I tried. Rintu also helped me.”
Now 10 years have passed as we talk about all of this. In a short time he will be leaving to return to his home where he is now working in Human Resources for a small college.
I ask Kumar what it means to him to be able to come to Port Dickson now, and be with disciples of Sri Chinmoy. “I was not confident that I would be able to come. To this place at this time at this point.”
“When I sit here and do meditation then I realize that this is the same month that I met Guru 10 years ago. I am okay. I have life problems but when I come here I can see it. Guru is somewhere here. I can really feel it. It is like he is watching. I do not want to miss this.”
Click to Play Interview:
Each moment is a golden opportunity
For our divine adventure
And supreme advancement.
Sri Chinmoy, Seventy-Seven Thousand Service-Trees, Part 20, Agni Press, 2001
This is the follow up program.
This is a program a group of us made describing the yearly Christmas trip that disciples take to many different countries around the world and what they do for inspiration and fun.
Click above to Play:
Sri Chinmoy was unique among spiritual Masters in demonstrating that sports can play a vital role in the life of a spiritual seeker. Himself a life long athlete, Sri Chinmoy encouraged his students to take seriously both the challenges of the inner life, and the opportunities for self-transcendence offered by participation in sport.
Run and become.
Become and run.
Run to succeed in the outer world.
Become to proceed in the inner world.