I think that I learnt all of my most important lessons in meditation by simply observing Guru, just by being there around him. “God does not expect you to be perfect. He just expects you to be available.” Yes, just being available was almost enough.

I tried to feel that what I saw and felt in him was also within myself. So you begin with imitation, imagining inside yourself that self-same calm, that poise, detachment, radiant peace. Then imagination becomes a slowly blossoming reality, you can feel these qualities growing inside yourself – beneath the dross of imperfections, your little divine Self remembers and stirs. Guru was a mirror – look hard and often enough and there you are, smiling back at yourself.

Guru taught us many things that are simply not found anywhere else, little secrets unique to our path. And not just taught but brought them into our consciousness as the living breath of our discipleship, drilled us over and over until each lesson had sunk in. ‘Soulfulness’ for example – where else is this found? In our singing – “Be more soulful!” In our meditations – “Please be more soulful!” Or filing slowly along in a walk-by procession – soulfulness!

To be as close as possible to the consciousness of our own soul – its sincerity, purity, humility, sweetness – and then to maintain this as long, as deeply, as often, as consciously as possible in our lives.

In April 1982, one evening Guru inquired of those present if any of us were proposing to run in the Boston Marathon, only two days away. Nobody was. Clearly disappointed, he asked whether any of us would now do so – about a dozen of us raised our hands, myself goaded into acquiescence by my impulsive friend Simahin, and we filed past our smiling Guru on the stage. I was astonished by this sudden turn of events and amazed by my own mad act of abandonment – my first entirely unintended marathon!

The next night around 9 pm we caught Guru’s old blue bus for the overnight trip and now there we were, start time for the great Boston race, untrained, unregistered and looking for an opportunity to vault over the starting area’s picket fence without officials seeing us when the gun sounded.

We flew down the hill at a fantastic pace, trailing the greatest marathoners on the planet. I cast aside all common sense in the exhilaration of these first few crazy, high-velocity miles, impervious to all misfortune. But misfortune eventually came – and at 20 miles I remember slowing to a walk and shuffling up the aptly named Heartbreak Hill, much chastened by this first experience of ‘the wall’.

Racing down our avenue of dreams, we had felt like champions, that first thrilling mile a gauntlet of cheering, rapturous crowds – but with 42 kms of America’s countryside behind me, I limped across the line in 3:20, Simahin close behind me.

During our bus ride back to Queens, Guru asked us for stories. “I am the marathon Guru,” he said to us, half-jokingly, “and all of you will have to run at least one marathon before you go to Heaven.”

Then he told us how pleased he was with the handful of runners who had accepted his challenge and how much progress we make when we run. He added that our willingness and our cheerfulness were much more important than our timing in the race.

The way my Guru Sri Chinmoy affected me, in a large sense, is how we are all affected by each other’s consciousness. When you spend time with someone who is really happy, you come away happier than you were before.

Why do we choose someone as a friend? It is because we feel reinforced by their presence. This may not be conscious, but there is an inner kinship, and you are touched by that person’s life. You feel a sense of well-being in their presence. Of course, the opposite is also true. So on a very casual basis, all of us are affected by the consciousness of those around us.

With a spiritual Master, however, it is also more than that. To be in the presence of someone whose spirituality is that powerful lifts you. You walk away spiritualised by the encounter regardless of its nature. With a spiritual Master, you try to soak in what they are constantly emitting. This is something that has stuck with me throughout the years about Sri Chinmoy. 

Dodula: I was a happy nun at my convent. I had friends and was successful in my job working with children. The institution where I worked and lived was situated by the lake with a view of the mountains. I felt like I was at the zenith of my life. No outer circumstances could have made me leave the convent.

In 1988, I was taking an advanced training course at the University of Zurich so I could serve as a therapist for children with behavioural problems. I was hoping the course would help me to serve these young people better. I was looking for teachers whose theories reflected life; however, with the majority of the professors, I did not see any correlation.

One evening after the lectures, I was on my way out when I saw a poster in the foyer that said “Introduction to Meditation.” I thought to myself, “When I studied here in my younger years, this topic was unknown. But the Bible says, ‘Try all and keep the best.’” So I decided to attend and see what the evening had to offer. The lecture was given by psychologist A.K. Beyer (whom I now know by his spiritual name of Kailash). In his case, I felt that word and deed went together. After the lecture I registered for an upcoming meditation seminar.

Gunthita: When Dodula first came to Kailash’s lecture, she was dressed in her black nun’s costume. To everybody’s surprise, she was one of the ten people who signed up for the follow-up. Kailash spoke the first evening, and I continued the remaining three evenings. Kailash told me that in case this nun continued for the entire course, I had better not speak about how to become a disciple, in order to avoid problems with the church. Sure enough, she was one of the few people who stayed until the last class.

Right from the beginning she was so open to Guru. She loved his Transcendental photograph; she said it was always smiling at her. She bought many books, which she also gave to her nun sisters and the Mother Superior. She also bought quite a few pictures of Guru and put them up in her little room.

When I was in New York, I was inspired to tell some of the experiences she had with Guru’s music and with the Transcendental picture in connection with the children she was teaching. The stories were as beautiful as fairy tales, but they were real! Guru’s only comment was: “Is she not a disciple?”

I answered: “No, Guru, she has been a Catholic sister for 27 years!” Guru just smiled compassionately at my answer.

Once I had almost finished collecting humanitarian aid for two or three truck deliveries that were supposed to go to Russia. Before the shipping, I and many other Austrian disciples went to Celebrations, a meeting of the disciples with Guru in America.

There, Kritagyata, a nurse who collected humanitarian supplies in America, told me that she had received a huge shipment of medical supplies for Russian children’s hospitals. The transport directly from America to Russia would, however, have been financially impossible and bureaucratically extremely difficult to manage by official means.

So the idea arose that we European disciples could take all these packages in our personal luggage back to Europe. At the next large international disciple meeting, disciples from other Centres could give these packages to the disciples from Vienna. The idea was that I would then add all these medical supplies to my already planned large aid delivery.

Secretly feeling relieved, I informed Guru that it was completely absurd to even think about bringing all these countless large parcels illegally to Europe in this way without Customs finding out. These parcels were significantly more voluminous than suitcases and, moreover, immediately identifiable from the outside as medical supplies. That was probably clear to everyone, and my many years of experience only made me smile pitifully at this idea. This is why, right from the beginning, I considered this project over and done with or rather hopeless and crazy. “One problem less,” I thought, but I did not know Guru that well yet.