1973

Question: Besides meditating, if you have confusion, say someone has told you something that confuses you in your own spiritual life, how can you clear that up?

Sri Chinmoy: Your name: I have given you the spiritual name Mita, friend, eternal friend, universal friend, friend to the aspiring world, friend to the illumining world. You are the friend to everybody. Friendship you have. Now we have confusion!

When somebody creates confusion, what does he say? He says something which is unreal, and only an unreal thing creates confusion, not a real thing. Somebody says to you, “Your name is not Mita,” now what will happen? Either you have to believe or disbelieve. You know your name is Mita. I have given you that name and whether others know it or not, you know. Even if there is no second person on earth to confirm it, you know that your name is Mita. So here in the spiritual life, you have to know that your name is also Aspiration. If somebody comes and tells you that, “no, no, no, your name is not Aspiration,” then what will you do? Will you believe that person? As your name is Mita, so in the spiritual life your name is Aspiration. Now, if somebody tells you something which creates confusion, that means you are denying your own name. It is like this: who can create confusion in you if you do not allow it? Confusion is an unreal statement, an unreal reality, it is not real. Now, if you are real, who can create confusion in you? If you have faith in yourself, if you have faith in me, if you have faith in God, who can create confusion in you?

Suppose this is your building and somebody comes and says, “No, no, this is not your building. This is my building,” what will you do? He can stay for twenty-four hours saying it is his building. It is not yours, it is his building. How will you believe him? No, you simply will say, “No, this is my building.” So if your building is aspiration, there can be no confusion. But if your building is not aspiration, if your building is doubt, or curiosity or an unsettled state of things in your spiritual life, then I tell you, confusion can get in any moment. You must be firm in your aspiration and feel that your name is Aspiration. Who can tell you otherwise, who can deny it? But if you are not sure of your own name, which is Aspiration, you see that at this moment you have many names: your names may be fear, doubt, insecurity, uncertainty. If you have four or five names, naturally you will lose the game. But if your name is only one, one name you have which is Aspiration, I tell you, nobody can confuse you, nobody. Your aspiration is infinitely stronger than others’ capacity. Their capacity is doubt, their capacity is fear, their capacity is undivine gossip, that is all. But if you think that you have only one name, Aspiration, and one capacity, divine capacity, absolute capacity, supreme capacity, nobody can destroy you. Not even an iota of your aspiration can be destroyed if you feel that your name is nothing but illumined Aspiration.

People say, “He has confused me.” How can he confuse you? That means you have opened your heart’s door. You will open your heart’s door only to God, only to Truth, only to Light, only to Purity, only to Divinity. Do you open your door to your enemy? Do you open your door to the stranger? No. Who brings confusion? He who is a stranger, he who is your enemy. No, a real friend of yours will not bring confusion into your life. A real friend will only bring messages about God, messages of aspiration, love, joy, concern, all the divine messages, divine gifts he will bring forth. But he who is not your friend will bring only undivine gifts, fear, doubt, anxiety, worry. No human being on earth who has aspiration can be confused. Where aspiration lags, confusion starts. It is like that. Otherwise there is no confusion.

Aspiration is a flame, a burning flame which is our divine property, our real divine gift. Constantly it is illumining us, illumining and fulfilling us. And how is it possible that Grace which is aspiration can be confused with something else? It is impossible. Here it is all light now. No matter what you bring in, it is all illumined. But instead of bringing obscurity into light, what we do is that we feel that in darkness there is some joy, some pleasure. That darkness here is gossip, darkness here is lack of faith.

So, instead of keeping ourselves all the time in light, for the sake of pleasure we go to others who tell us gossip and all kinds of things, undivine things. Then we are confused. I wish to tell you that nobody, nobody can take your faith away, nobody, unless you feel that your faith is of secondary importance. If you feel that your faith is of paramount importance, that there is nothing greater than, or superior to your faith, then this imperturbable, unshakeable faith you already have, everybody has, will remain adamantine. But we allow ourselves to waver. We feel that we have been in light for ten hours, now let us go and be in darkness for five minutes. I meditated here for a long time for half an hour; it is a long experience, now let me lie down in the back room. While lying down in the back room all undivine forces come to attack. No, while lying down also I have to continue keeping the vibration of my meditation inside me during my sleep. Twenty-four hours we have to be vigilant. Then there can be no confusion. Always we have to be vigilant.