Question: How can my aspiration be stronger and purer?

Sri Chinmoy: In your case, your aspiration is strong, it is pure. But now let us come to the comparative degree: you want to make it stronger and purer. I wish to say that you have to be strong and you have to exercise your inner freedom. When you exercise your inner freedom, your aspiration will automatically become stronger and purer. Right now you are not exercising your inner freedom. But if you know that something is good for you, really beneficial for your life, at that time you need not and must not have any fear.

There are many things which you know are absolutely good for you, but you are afraid of what others are telling you. You are listening to the members of your family. You have surrendered to others’ wills and not to your own will, that is, to your soul’s will. You have to do what you feel right from within, what comes directly from the Supreme within you. Right now you feel, “If I say this to my father or mother, then I won’t be able to go to school; they will throw me out of the house.” But when you take this attitude, then you are not using your own will. You have to say to yourself, “Whose child am I? God’s child. Why have I to think of my human parents?” I am not saying anything against the human parents. But when you are determined to do something for God, the Supreme, then even if you are only thirteen years old, you can and you must exercise your own power.

You say that you are living in a land of freedom. Very often people use their limited freedom to lord it over one another. But when they have to use their own inner freedom to become something, to grow into something, to bring to the fore their own divinity, at that time most of them are silent. I am not saying that children have to fight against their parents. But when you are convinced that you are doing the right thing, when you are absolutely sure, at that time you must not surrender to the will of your parents. Although they are older than you, you have to know that God can speak through a child’s mouth. The God within you is telling you what to do. In your case you are doing very well in your spiritual life. But if you want to do better, then use your will-power. I am your spiritual father. If you listen to God’s Will within you, then I will meet with all the consequences to protect you, to save you, to show you new light.

Always be brave. Otherwise, today you will be afraid of an individual and tomorrow you will be afraid of a cat or a mouse or an ant. Fear is like that. When you are afraid of one thing, then before long you will be afraid of everything. But if you are not afraid of anything, then you won’t be afraid of God. He is All-Powerful, but He is also All-Loving. Just because you know He is all Love, you approach Him. When you approach Him with love, you get His omnipotent Protection and everything else that He has and He is.

If you are afraid of ignorance in someone, no matter what the quantity, large or small, then you are surrendering consciously to the ignorance of that person. Then naturally his ignorance will enter into you. And ignorance itself is bondage. You may think, “Perhaps I did the wrong thing. What do I know? I am young.” But just because you are a seeker, you know better than others. It is not your arrogance or stubbornness that is telling you this. You definitely know what to do because the soul within you is giving you the message of reality. The soul is all light, all illumination. When the soul tells you what to do, you have to feel that that is the only thing to do. So be brave inwardly; then strength is bound to come, purity is bound to come. If there is no strength in sight, then ignorance will devour us. Be brave, be brave.