Question: How can we learn to love God with all our heart?

Sri Chinmoy: First of all, let us try to know what heart means. The spiritual heart is the sweetest and most intimate part of us. We can expect it to have the feeling of immediate, indivisible oneness with God. Right now, our physical existence separates us from our heart-consciousness. Also, the mind is using us and, therefore, the heart is not being allowed to come to the fore. Again, sometimes we use the vital and think it is the heart that we are using. In order to give our heart's love to the Supreme, we have first to identify ourselves with the true heart. Next, we have to feel that our heart is composed of only one thing: gratitude. We must feel our oneness with the heart and we must feel that we have become gratitude itself. If somebody calls our name, our inner being will not respond. But if somebody says the word 'gratitude', immediately we will feel that he is calling us and nobody else.

This gratitude is for whom? It is for the Supreme. The moment we can feel that our inner existence and outer existence have only one name, gratitude, we will be able to offer our heart's love to the Supreme totally, implicitly and ceaselessly. Why do we have to offer gratitude to the Supreme? Because God has given us the greatest blessing imaginable. He has given us the aspiration to lead a spiritual life and realise Him. There are billions of people on earth who do not have that urge to realise God, for they have not yet received this blessing unparalleled. We are beginning our conscious inner journey before they are and we will also reach the Goal long before they do.