There was once a girl who was born into a house of prostitution. And across the
street in front of the market place there was a preacher, a holy man. He used to exclaim the
virtues of God and talk about the house of prostitution. How it was filled with sinners and
he told people to repent.
Yet the girl who grew up in the house of prostitution was twenty-three years old.
She used to look out the window everyday and cry to herself and she would say, "How I
wish I was like that Holy man, how I wish I was spiritual," and she would imagine in her
mind that she was a holy person and yet go on with her work.
Now they both got old and died and went to St. Peter to go into heaven. St. Peter
told the man, "You can't come in you've got to go to hell," and he told the girl, "you can
come in." So the Holy man became dumbfounded and said, "Why? For all these years I've
proclaimed your goodness and your virtues. I told people to repent. How can you let her
in when she was a prostitute and leave me out?"
And St Peter said, "You've been a hypocrite. You were very worthy and talked a
lot and said nothing. In your heart you thought every body was a sinner but you. Whereas
the girl in her imagination, in her feelings, always was thinking of God. So she can come
in, you can't."
The point is this: It's not what you say. It's not what you proclaim. It's what's deep,
deep, deep in your heart that determines what happens to you. It's not reading books, it's
not studying, it's not going to classes. It's sitting by yourself, becoming quiet, going deeper
and deeper within yourself. Transcending your mind and your body until something hap-
pens.