Sumangali.org: In The Spirit Of Serendipity

It’s been hot in England. That’s newsworthy enough, but you know how we Brits love to talk about the weather. It seems like summer is just around the corner, (perhaps somewhere in Spain or Portugal). The tulips are big as goblets, the birds compose new rhapsodies until bedtime, and new-mown lawns send out their familiar green perfume, which itself acts like a happy pheremone on me. All these triggers lay forgotten in my mind through winter, as they always do, to be rediscovered like a perennial gift each year, never losing their thrill.

Another sure sign of summer is the flight of hot air balloons in the morning. The long roar followed by soft silence tells me they are coming near, and I rush to the window to find them in the sky. I have never flown in one, but so love to watch them, strangely fast and graceful for their imposing dimensions.

I lived in Bristol for a few years, and always looked forward to the annual Balloon Fiesta. Up to 100 balloons gather together from around the world, in all their fantastic colours and shapes: there a flying mobile phone is not out of place next to a floating dog, a fire extinguisher a similar size to an entire inflatable cathedral. At night they stay tethered to the ground with lit flames for a beautiful “balloon glow”. In the early morning and at dusk they mount the sky in flurries. To see them closely and in numbers is to witness not only their true size, but their unique charm.

Now that we have more reliable methods of flight, the hot air balloon has been reduced almost to a novelty; largely the plaything of champagne breakfasters and the mouthpiece of corporate advertisers. In 1783, however, hot air ballooning was a more serious, and a much more dangerous affair. An intrepid (probably unsuspecting) sheep, duck and rooster were the first passengers. Following their survival of 15 minutes in the air, the Montgolfier brothers took off from Paris two months later, not only staying up for 20 minutes, but also, like the farm animals, staying alive. Human flight (with any notable degree of success) was born. [source]

That which flies is not necessarily light in weight though, as any jumbo jet will tell you. Last year my meditation teacher Sri Chinmoy (then aged 75), lifted some hot air balloons, seated with one arm overhead. They are not so buoyant beneath their natural habitat of sky. A 140-foot tall rabbit weighed in at 369 pounds (167.4 kg), followed by a multi-coloured 90-foot balloon at 397 pounds (including the pilot and basket).

Speaking of Sri Chinmoy’s one-arm seated lifts of a 575 pound (260.8 kg) dumbbell a few days earlier, longtime registrar of the British Amateur Weightlifters Association Jim Smith commented: “Sri Chinmoy is giving back to people the importance of having the mind, body and spirit together. No other human being on earth has ever lifted over 3 times their own body weight, even with two hands and while standing!”

Up until Sri Chinmoy’s passing last year, age 76, he strove to inspire people to transcend their limitations through sports and meditation. He was also a prolific writer. Here is one of his many uplifting aphorisms:

You do not have to fly
To the blue-vast sky.
The blue-vast sky will enter into you
If you turn your mind into
a silence-home.

—Sri Chinmoy
From Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, Part 211

You can find our more about Sri Chinmoy’s weightlifting feats, and see some video clips, at Sri Chinmoy TV