Question: Most of the ordinary human beings take life seriously; should spiritual persons take life seriously?

Sri Chinmoy: Like ordinary human beings, spiritual people too take life seriously. I must say, most seriously. There is only a slight difference. An ordinary human being could be excited, worried, depressed and so forth the moment something goes wrong in the family or in his life. If somebody drops suppose a book from this table to the floor, immediately the man will be excited, disturbed. No matter what happens in his day to day life, he says, “This is life, I should take it seriously.” But a spiritual person takes life in a different vein, a different form. To him each second is most significant because he feels that when he misuses a second, he is not able to go closer or nearer to God. Each second, each moment he takes as an opportunity to realise God. He wants to possess the infinite expanse of Consciousness. He feels that life is most significant, and when one is endowed with life, one has the opportunity to realise God here on earth. And in this short span of life if he misuses it, then he has to come back to this earth again, he has to come back into the world to fulfil his mission. So he is always conscious of the value of time, he wants to enter into the Timeless by utilising each moment divinely, spiritually, because he feels that he has to go far, very far, to the farthest end. If he loses time, he will never reach his Goal. The goal will remain a far cry to him. This is the difference between the seriousness that a spiritual man feels in his life and what an ordinary man feels in his day-to-day ordinary life.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Earth’s cry meets Heaven’s smile, part 3, Aum Press, Puerto Rico, 1978
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/ech_3