"I am reminded of a beautiful incident in the life of Ramakrishna's wife, Sharda Devi.

"Ramakrishna died, but before dying he told Sharda, 'Remember, I have been here always and I will be here always, so don't think of yourself as a widow. Only my body is going to die – but you are married to me, not to my body.'

"In India, when a husband dies – and particularly in Bengal it is more severe for the woman, for the wife – her head is shaved…because half of the beauty of a woman is in her hair. She cannot wear any colored clothes; only white is allowed. She cannot use any ornaments, particularly the glass bangles that are used by married women. When the husband dies, she has to break her glass bangles.

"Just by the way, I have to inform you why the glass bangles have been chosen as a symbol of marriage: because here in this life, everything is just like glass – breakable, easily breakable. And when the husband dies, she has to break her bangles on the floor. They need to be made of glass, not of metal, not of gold.

"But Ramakrishna prohibited her: 'In spite of the whole tradition, I prohibit you. Continue the way you have lived with me. I have loved your food, your sweets. Every day, prepare my food, my sweets; and sit just the way you used to sit before me while I was eating. One day I will be coming.' Ramakrishna died.

"Everybody tried to convince Sharda, 'Don't be mad, don't go against the tradition. Ramakrishna was always half mad, and it seems that before death he has lost his mind completely!'

"But Sharda said, 'I am not married to the tradition, not married to the convention – I am married to this beautiful half-madman and I am going to follow him.' She did not cry. She continued using ornaments, glass bangles, colored clothes; she did not shave her hair.

"People said, 'We used to think Ramakrishna was mad; this Sharda is even more mad. She is a widow, and she is behaving as if she is newly married.'

"And she would prepare the food with the same enthusiasm and would bring it to Ramakrishna's room and sit in front of him with a small fan in her hands, as she used to sit – as for thousands of years in the East, wives have sat with a fan, so that no fly or anything can sit on the food."