Learning how to put your gifts and your power to work in the most positive manner is what it is all about right now. Many people are just existing, until one day they wake up and find out who they are... We are here on Earth because this is where people have all the possibilities for growing to their fullest potential. As you awaken to another level of consciousness, you will be able to reach out and be a beneficial presence to other people.

This is the secret. You must step back, separate yourself from your everyday thoughts and habitual gestures: look at them. It is patient work, like the work of the watchmaker who observes the spirals and gears under the lens, cleans and calibrates. The secret is to retreat deep into oneself until one encounters an almost imperceptible vibration, which then becomes more and more evident, a silent, separate, calm vibration. Those who anchor themselves in this possess serenity all day long.

In an Indian village everything is related to the sacred and nothing is done without some sacrifice... If we are building a house, a hermitage or any other building, the craftsmen will come along and the first thing they will do is choose an auspicious day and hour. When the time comes for work to begin, they are all there for the blessing, ready to consecrate their work. They will not begin any work without that. When the work is coming to its fulfillment, ... there is another blessing because we can neither begin nor complete our work without God... The builder also relates to the cosmos. Building is a total act and therefore, it is totally consecrated.

We must begin where we are. For many people the heavy responsibilities of home and family and earning a living absorb all their time and strength. Yet such a home -- where love is -- may be a light shining in a dark place, a silent witness to the reality and the love of God. We must begin where we are, but once we have put ourselves and our lives into God's hands to be used when and where God wills, we must be on the alert, peacefully busy, but inwardly watching for signs of the will of God in the ordinary setting of our lives. To ears which have been trained to wait upon God in silence, and in the quietness of meditation and prayer, a very small incident, or a word, may prove to be a turning-point in our lives, and a new opening for God's love to enter our world, to create and redeem.

My mind is still; my ego has been set at rest. The peace in my heart matches the peace at the heart of nature... No longer am I a feverish fragment of life; I am indivisible from the Whole. I live completely in the present, released from the prison of the past with its haunting memories and vain regrets; released from the prison of the future with its tantalizing hopes and tormenting fears. All the enormous capacities formerly trapped in past and future flow to me here and now, concentrated in the hollow of my palm. No longer driven by the desire for personal pleasure or profit, I am free to use all these capacities to alleviate the suffering of those around me. In living for others I come to life.

I found my inner silence, the silence that emanates from the center of the self. I felt it for the first time as something perceptible and real... I felt all shining like a mirror. I had the sense of eternity in space and time. I felt "washed" and clean, whole and at the same time without boundaries, as if universal life had entered me and my heart was beating in unison with its rhythm. But most of all I knew that this was more than just a state of mind. It was a way of living and being and of relating to others.

To realize that we are one with the Creator, as Beethoven did, is a wonderful and awe-inspiring experience. Very few human beings ever come into that realization and that is why there are so few great composers or creative geniuses in any line of human endeavor. I always contemplate all this before commencing to compose... Spirit is the creative energy of the Cosmos. Our soul is not conscious of its power until it is enlightened by the Spirit. Therefore, to evolve and grow, we must learn how to use and develop our own soul forces... The real genius draws on the Infinite Source of Wisdom and Power.

Each day, I remind myself that we are not here to control the environment, but to learn the lessons of humility and surrender. When I am capable of that, my life takes on a wholly different meaning. I no longer feel so small and separate. It is as though I am being held by a power that is both infinitely great and infinitely tender. My love does not exist in isolation; rather it is supported and enriched by my love for this world. This kind of trust is not something of our own creation; it comes to us in a moment of extraordinary grace.

Have you ever, as a small child, wandered farther from home than you meant to or were aware of until you found yourself in a place where you had never been before? All at once you realize that YOU are in this strange place. Stock still, not breathing so you can listen, you stare at grey rocks with whorls of lichen on them like faces, tree-roots like snakes, the tress themselves heavy with leaves and silent. Your heart comes into your throat. Quietly, very quietly, you get back onto the path, then you take to your toes for all you are worth. This may have been the first experience of panic fear ... but you met someone there: you met yourself.