Question: How do you offer your soul's oneness to people who aren't disciples, without entering into their consciousness?

Sri Chinmoy: You have to remember that you are trying to offer something to the divine in that person. The divine in each person is God. So when you see a person, please do not think of that person as a human being. Think of him as a representative of something divine, of God. Then naturally your attention will be focused on the divine in him. Everybody does not have to follow the same spiritual path as you. One boat is not big enough to hold all of humanity. A person need not have a Master; he need not follow a spiritual path. But inside him the Supreme exists, just as inside you the Supreme exists. It is the same Supreme. If you know that the Supreme exists in others just as He exists in you, then your problem will be solved.

We have come into the world to conquer our pride, but after we meditate or follow a spiritual path for a short time, a kind of spiritual pride enters into us. We feel that we are the only people who embody God. This is very bad. We know that ordinary pride is bad. When we see somebody who is very proud, we laugh at him and say, “Look at his pride.” But spiritual people sometimes become very proud of their inner achievement of Peace, Light and Bliss. When this kind of spiritual pride enters into us, we do not see the divine in others. We feel that it is beneath our dignity to feel oneness with them. We want to see darkness in others so that we can feel that we are at the top of the Himalayas and they are at the foot of the Himalayas. But we should not have that kind of feeling.

As soon as we see someone, we should try to go to the root of that person. The root is God. If we know that the root is God, then there can be no problem, because the moment we look at a person, we will not see the human in him or the animal in him, but the divine in him, the Supreme in him. That person need not be a spiritual seeker at all. If we approach the inner divinity in the other person, we will not have to enter into that person’s human consciousness.