Question: Are seeing God and feeling God the same thing?

Sri Chinmoy: No. You see a flower and you think, "Oh, it is so beautiful." But you may not feel the beauty in yourself. You can see the beauty of an object, but you may not feel the quality of that object as part of yourself. Again, in feeling there is seeing. Inside feeling, there is a kind of inner seeing. Again, the beauty of a flower you can see. But to get its real fragrance — that is a different matter. The fragrance has to enter into you and become part and parcel of you. Then you feel the very essence of the flower.

With your eyes, you see five or six petals. This is your immediate perception. But feeling also will give you some of the inner fragrance that the flower embodies. And if you can use the third eye, then you not only see what you have to see and feel what you have to feel, but also you become. At that time, you look at the flower and see the flower as such. You feel the fragrance of the flower. And you become the life-breath of the flower; you become the flower itself.

When a spiritual Master looks at a disciple, what happens? First he sees the face, the physical body. Then he feels the good and bad qualities — all mixed up — that the person embodies. And third, he claims all the good qualities and bad qualities of the disciple as his own, as his own responsibility. He immediately claims that person as his very own. So, when you use the third eye, at that time seeing, feeling and becoming are one. In the spiritual life, seeing, feeling and becoming go together.