University Of Windsor

Question: How Can We Keep The Heart’s...

Question: How can we keep the heart’s door open all the time?

Sri Chinmoy: You can keep your heart’s door wide open all the time if you can value the presence of God. You have to feel that without the conscious presence of God you cannot exist, not even for a fleeting second. If you can feel that you can exist on earth without drinking water or without eating food or without breathing, if you can feel that there is nothing on earth which is essential to your life except to consciously feel God’s presence inside your heart, then you can easily keep your heart’s door wide open. Feel that if you do not consciously feel His presence inside your heart, that is worse than death. You need Him desperately; you need Him at every second of your life. If you don’t have that kind of need or urge, then you cannot keep your heart’s door open. But when you come to realise that nothing is indispensable in your life except God, then your heart’s door will automatically remain open.

Question: How Do We Get Rid Of...

Question: How do we get rid of vanity, ego and pride?

Sri Chinmoy: There are two ways. One way is by invoking Peace, Light and Bliss through prayer and meditation. You can bring down Peace, Light and Bliss from above and then illumine vanity, ego and pride. When Peace, Light and Bliss descend, vanity, pride and ego disappear. This is the spiritual approach.

There is also a practical approach which is quite effective on the ordinary human level, Suppose you are a good singer and you are very proud of your voice. Immediately ask yourself whether you are by far the best singer on earth. Your immediate answer will be no, there are many who sing far better than you do. If you have studied and have become a great scholar, you may feel you have every reason to be proud. But if you become sincere and ask yourself whether you are the greatest scholar on earth, your immediate sincere answer will be no. There are some people who far surpass you in knowledge and wisdom. No matter in which walk of life you are eminent, there is always someone who has far surpassed you. How can you be bloated with pride when you know that there is someone who has surpassed you in your field? We are proud of ourselves because we feel that we have achieved something which others have not achieved. But the moment we see that there are others who have far surpassed our capacity, immediately our achievement pales into insignificance and our pride has to die.

The difficulty with this approach is that this realisation may not last. It may last for five days or five months or five years: then we totally forget about others who have surpassed us in our field. Again we enter into ignorance and build up our ego, pride and vanity. Then after a while perhaps sincerity once more dawns. Nobody wants to fool himself all the time. Because we are spiritual people, sincerity wants to come to the fore in us. We see that there are others who have better qualities and capacities than we have, and then we try to compete with them and transcend our present capacity.

At this stage of development, for many people the spiritual process of trying to bring down Peace, Light and Bliss is simply impossible. So let us take the practical point of view and compare ourselves with others. With the spiritual approach of aspiring for Peace, Light and Bliss, there is no competition. If we get Peace, Light and Bliss, immediately we are satisfied. Also, if we have the feeling of oneness, at that time we don’t compete. My right eye does not compete with my left eye. My right arm, if it has a little more strength than the left arm, does not compete with the left arm. The right arm does not have a superior feeling, because it has accepted the left arm as its very own. When the right arm throws the shot-put, the left arm does not feel miserable. On the contrary, it feels that this is their mutual achievement and it shares the achievement with the right arm. The right arm also gladly shares the achievement, because the left arm and right arm feel their oneness. When we have brought down Peace, Light and Bliss we establish our feeling of oneness with everything and everyone. If another person has achieved something and we have not achieved that thing, on the strength of our inner oneness we feel that it is also our achievement. In oneness there is no competition, no competition whatsoever.

Question: There Are Several Paths To Spiritual...

Question: There are several paths to spiritual attainment and each stresses something different, such as Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga and Jnana Yoga. How can a person know which path is his path, which aspect of the spiritual life he should stress?

Sri Chinmoy: One can easily know. An individual knows whether he likes love and devotion in his life more than knowledge or wisdom. He himself knows whether he is more inclined to work and serve or he is more inclined to pray and meditate. Each individual knows what he wants to do. When morning dawns, immediately he may start working because he feels that work gives him joy; or he may start praying with love and devotion because he feels that this gives him joy. When an individual enters into the spiritual life, he is bound to feel whether he is most inclined toward Bhakti Yoga or Karma Yoga or Jnana Yoga—whether he is most inclined toward love, service or knowledge.

If there is a Master who advocates the path of love, devotion and surrender, one aspirant will go to him. If there is a Master who wants dedicated service, devoted service, surrendered service, someone else will go there. If somebody teaches knowledge and wisdom, then somebody else will go to him. Some will teach the path of the heart, some will teach the path of the mind and some will teach the path of action. It is the seeker who will know which path is meant for him. Then he has to stick to his path. In the university if you like history, you go to the history professor. You don’t go to the geography professor if you don’t like geography. The subject you like, you study; the subject that you do not like, you do not study.

You are bound to know which path is for you because there is always an inner urge for you to achieve something, embody something, reveal something and manifest something. If you want to manifest something, naturally you first have to have it inside you. And why do you have to have that particular thing? Just because there is someone who is pushing you and inspiring you to achieve it. That someone is God within you.

Question: Must Someone Be A Seeker In...

Question: Must someone be a seeker in order to know about God?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes! If somebody is not a seeker and he wants to know about God, then he will only argue unnecessarily. If I am a layman, it is only stupidity if I challenge a doctor or a scientist. If I want to understand some medical ideas, then I have to be at least a nurse; I have to know the ABC’s of medicine. Then when the doctor says something, perhaps I will understand it.

If I don’t feel any need for God, if I don’t want Him, then what can I expect to learn from the person who has Peace, Light and Bliss? In the spiritual life we are all seekers; we have an inner hunger. If we are hungry, then God is there to feed us. But if we are not hungry, then even if I go into a restaurant I will not eat anything. If I am not hungry, it is not your duty to feed me. A spiritual Master is like that. If somebody is hungry, he feeds him; if somebody is not hungry, then the Master does not feed him.