Question: Are the little sporadic experiences that we have during meditation part of realisation, or are they small steps to realisation?

Sri Chinmoy: In a sense each experience is taking you to realisation; each experience is a step towards realisation. But again, if instead of walking slowly, one has the capacity to run very fast, then one need not have thousands or millions of experiences before realising God. Each experience certainly helps us; it gives us confidence, it gives us joy. Somebody may say that he wants to eat a mango today, an orange tomorrow and another fruit the day after. Before he gets the fruit that he calls the goal, he will get many little tastes of fruit. But only when he eats the fruit that is his goal does he get full satisfaction. But again, if somebody is absolutely sincere in saying that he does not want anything but realisation, he will say, "I don't want any other fruit. I want only the fruit that is meant for me, the fruit that is my goal, the fruit that will offer me complete satisfaction."