(continued…)

“It is I who create my happiness
By virtue of
My constant self-giving.”
– Sri Chinmoy

Self-giving is the meeting place of meditation and action, where our inner and our outer life converge. Inner and outer self-giving go together, grow together and flow together. Self-giving in meditation is the best training for action: self-giving in action is the best training for meditation.

Self-giving in meditation must be practised. It starts as an attitude. In business, they say, “to make money, you have to spend money.” Thus is it in meditation, as in life. The more we give, the more – ever more – we receive. Self-giving is a magic wand. As long as we feel we are meditating only for our own immediate wants and needs, our practice remains narrow and unclear: the moment we feel we are meditating for a higher purpose or goal, the moment we feel we are offering our meditation rather than taking from it, our heart instantly expands and with it the horizons, promise and possibilities of our meditation.

Likewise, self-giving in action must be practised. No matter what we are doing, in our work, study, leisure, sports, interactions with others, in all our physical, mental and emotional activities, no matter how important or insignificant, practise giving all of ourselves fully, wholeheartedly and unreservedly, being inside the breath of every moment. To live and act “self-givingly” is to never hold anything back, to be always fully in the moment, in the now. In this way, our actions become an extension of our meditation, and vice versa.

Self-giving is the flow of the river of life; the pulse of action; the heartbeat of progress; the first, last and only requirement of being, doing and becoming; the password to God-realisation.

“My self-giving is my God-becoming.”
– Sri Chinmoy