Part IV — Desire

Question: If we are not able to extinguish our desires, is there any point in trying to meditate?

Sri Chinmoy: Certainly, as long as we really want to meditate, and not to welcome desires. Nobody can say in the beginning of his spiritual life that he has no desires. The very moment we are born, we enter into the world of ignorance. If we wait until all our desires are extinguished before we begin our spiritual life, then we will never begin our spiritual life — not in this incarnation or in any incarnation.

We have to see our goal. If our goal is God-realisation, and if we start running towards that goal with one-pointed aspiration, then gradually the desires and passions that are holding us back will fall away. We have to know where to place our attention. If we try to pay one hundred percent attention to our meditation, desire will soon leave us. But if we decide that we shall give fifty percent of our attention to desire and fifty percent to aspiration and God-Life, then we will never overcome desire.

If we meditate regularly today, desire may come tomorrow, but the day after tomorrow desire will leave us because, like everything in this world, desire will become jealous of its rival. But if we are unduly disturbed by the presence of desire in our heart or in our mind, then desire will never leave us. If we give more attention to our aspiration, for a while desire will torture us mercilessly. But eventually it will give up and leave us because we are not paying any attention to it. If we make someone feel that we don't need them, they will stop coming to us. So desire will say, "All right, let her go with meditation and aspiration. If she does not need me, I can also do without her."

We should meditate early in the morning and sometime in the evening, without fail. We have to feel that there is a divine child inside us and that is the soul. Just as we take the time to feed our human body three times a day, we must also feed the divine child within us. If we really care for the divine child, the soul, who makes us consciously one with the Absolute, then we have to feed this luminous child within us at least once every day. If we don’t eat, eventually we will die. And if we don’t meditate, our inner life will starve and we will never be consciously one with God.

We want to realise God. The more we feed the soul, the more quickly we progress and the nearer we come to our God-realisation. We must not waste time worrying about our teeming worldly desires. What we want is aspiration and meditation. We must start paying attention to aspiration and meditation. Then desire will feel unwanted and will automatically leave us.