Question: How can I bring more strength and warmth into the art of my life?

Sri Chinmoy: It is always through conscious dedication. Conscious dedication means that you are offering yourself to something to please it in its own way. If you are dedicating yourself to something with the idea that one day you will achieve it or acquire it and then utilise it in your own way, that is not real dedication at all. If you want to make money so that you will be able to use it in your own way, this is wrong. But if you want to make money so that the Supreme can utilise you and your money in His own way, if you have that kind of attitude, then automatically you get strength and warmth in your life.

If someone who is superior uses us in his own way, automatically we get strength and energy; and the Supreme is our real superior. But when we want to do something for our own sake, even when we want to throw ourselves into it heart and soul because we know that ultimately we will be able to control it and regulate it, often strength, enthusiasm and warmth do not come. Again, when we are insincere we feel that if we can do something in our own way, then there is no need to listen to the Inner Pilot, the Supreme. We think that if He uses us in His way, we will become slaves and have to surrender to Him. But the moment we become sincere seekers, it pains us deeply whenever we do something in our own way without first approaching Him. If we do even one thing without His knowledge, His approval, His permission, His direction, then we feel miserable. Warmth, energy and strength sincere seekers get only when we know that we are doing something to please and fulfil our superior, the Supreme.