It is morning – the last day of the retreat at Toronto. The line monitor collecting the tokens moves to the next family. “Tokens, please…” Immediately ten hands go up at once, handing tokens to the surprised volunteer….

Yes, this is a ‘family’ of ten. Coming from the French speaking Quebec province of Canada, all from different backgrounds, they had come together as a family under Sylvi, a feisty energy-healing teacher. “We made the choice to be together as one family,” they say.

Their relationship with Amma started in 2001 when, entirely by chance, they heard about Amma from a friend and decided to come for the 2001 retreat in Rhode Island. Most of them spoke just French, with little or no English at all and they had no idea what to expect. Over the next three days at the retreat, they went through experiences with mixed feelings….On the one hand, the Indian customs, chanting and worship were different to them; though everyone spoke English it did not do them much good, since they spoke very little of it themselves. Together they moved about in a bubbled existence of their own, speaking and laughing loudly, taking up a lot of space.

“People were really getting mad at us,” one man says with a smile. “On the other hand there was something so attractive and beautiful about everything here…just being in Amma’s presence and seeing the happiness of those around her was breathtaking. “There was something blissful about them that made us feel that we wanted to be a part of this too, we wanted to belong here….and that made us come back for more.”

In 2003 they went to see Amma in New York. Most of them were smokers and as they smoked outside, another devotee got into a conversation with them. “Why don’t you ask Amma to help you quit smoking?” he suggested. The group thought about it and decided to give it a try. Most of them were skeptical. “I thought – ‘Yeah, I can ask, but I don’t really want to quit’,” says Sylvi. “Besides I did not really believe that something like that could really happen.”

On the last day, when they went for darshan, they asked Amma to help them and she glowingly gave them her blessings.

But more blessings were on their way. This was the time that Amma was beginning to sing bhajans in global languages, French being one of the first few. “Ishwar Tumhi” had been composed in French and now - surprise of surprises – Amma wanted the group to sing with her, impromptu, in French. And right there, in the the middle of darshan, even as she cradled a devotee in her arms, someone held up a microphone and Amma sang with the group – a momentous experience - and as it turned out, a life-changing one for the entire group.

A few weeks later, Hamsini, another French devotee at the ashram sent them a personal two minute tape of the group singing with Amma. Thrilled, Sylvi taped the two-minute clip back to back, making it a two hour tape before she shared it with the group. “It was only two minute each time, but it was sooo powerful!” one woman comments, “We could feel it working from the inside.” After a few days of playing the tape, not only did the song hum constantly in their heads, they also felt Amma’s presence with them stronger than ever.

As Amma always says, change can never be forced. It is something that happens spontaneously within oneself. With Amma’s constant presence in their living rooms became easy to relinquish their smoking habit. “I did not suffer at all – you know, that was my greatest fear to quit,” said one woman. Today, one year later, Sylvi and her ‘family’ are ‘smoke-free’!

Today morning, as the family of ten went up for darshan, Amma was ecstatic. She made a gesture, holding up her fingers to her lips – smoking a pretend cigarette…Yes, she certainly remembered! “We have stopped smoking, Amma,” they informed her through the translator. “You did a good job,” she told them lovingly with a twinkle in her eye.

God’s grace comes in many forms – whether or not it is evident, it is surely and constantly present. When we have the humility to open up in receptivity, that grace guides us and helps us change into better human beings. It was this openness that possibly brought about this transformation in the lives of Sylvi and her ‘family’ – one that they themselves did not believe possible.

- Radhika