Question: What about an experience we had in the inner world, such as an experience during meditation? Do we remember this consciously?

Sri Chinmoy: In the case of an ordinary seeker, when he has some inner experience, he does not consciously retain it, even though the essence remains in his inner life. Even if it is a high experience, after four years or so he totally forgets it. The experience is lost because the ignorance in his life swallows it. He says, “How can I have had such an experience? If I did have such an experience, how is it that afterwards I did so many wrong things? How is it that I did not meditate, I did not pray? That means it was not such a significant experience.” His doubt devours the experience. But in the case of a realised person, he knows that whatever he saw or felt was absolutely true. Also, he can remember the inner experiences that he had even at the age of seven or eight, or in previous incarnations, because of his inner vision. But ask an ordinary seeker, and even if he has had only two major experiences in his life, it may take him an hour to remember, or he may not remember them at all.