Self-Transcendence 3100 Mile Race

“Life is hard for everybody.  Everybody is running their own version of the 3100 mile race.  Everybody has their own difficulties.  Definitely I felt that if I could inspire even one person to stick it out one more day.  To never give up.  To just push your way through the tunnel.  Than that is somehow really worth it.

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“You just have to come to the starting line and everything will be okay.  Good that I listened to her.  So I registered very very late.” “It is hard to believe because you cannot capture it.  Because it is all grace.  It is all grace, grace, grace.  That I could do it at this age (56 years old). “So what more can I say than gratitude.  All gratitude to the great Sri Chinmoy Marathon team, because they are working so hard.  Very very hard, and still they are all very nice.  I admire this really very much.” Continue

photo by Alakananda The practical world has boundaries and dimensions that can be measured and recorded and kept safe.  Human beings need to have firm structures in order to pursue the things that matter to them.  But spiritual seekers feel the call and pull of the divine world that exists within us all. A realm of light that has no dimensions or boundaries. Continue

For the last 2 days this 37 year old Czech runner has been running very well.  Yesterday he ran 71 miles and at this moment in the morning there is nobody faster on the course.  His pace is so smooth and flowing it would be nearly impossible to guess that he has been here doing this very same thing for the past 34 days.  In the process also amassing 2187 miles. This is Atmavir’s 8th race and it seems that the lessons you learn running 3100 mile race never end.  No matter how many miles you have run.   No matter how many years you  have dedicated yourself to its baffling wonders.  How to cope with bad days and also how to cope with days when you switch to autopilot and let the mysterious inner force within carry you almost effortlessly along. “Right now I am one lap faster than Ashprihanal.  In the afternoon it could change.  So I don’t mind.  If I am running I enjoy it, and if I am not running, I try to be a happy walker.  But I have to say that I am a really miserable walker.  Only Stutisheel is slower than me.” Continue

“I get some peace, joy and I offer my gratitude to Sri Chinmoy.  After that I get some more energy, and I can run faster, faster, and faster.” There are times in most of our day to day lives when it appears that our world increasingly becomes more complex and confusing.  There is a part of us inside that yearns for peace, sweetness, and simplicity.  But despite our best intentions, not to take the tangled path we quite often do, and end up in a place where peace is even further away. Since 2012 Vasu has been coming to the 3100 mile race each year and been using the hard half mile loop to strip away the extraneous parts of himself that do not give him joy or fulfillment.  His life here is all about simplicity, devotion, and an incredible amount of dedicated hard work. Continue

Earlier in the morning I asked Ananda-Lahari if he had any stories he might like to share.  I thought he might recall some memorable experience from the many years he has run the race.  Never once thinking he would come up with proof of the existence of the almighty. “On one hand it was really funny and on the other it was really touching.  It is a really nice story for me. One day Kodanda was riding his bicycle next to me during the race a few years ago.  He was holding in his hand a piece of watermelon.  He was looking at it and saying, if this is not proof that God exists than what else.” “How can such a thing be created from dirt.  Look at its beauty.  You could feel and you could see that these were not just words.  He was really feeling and appreciating this creation of God that came from dirt.” Continue