88. Question: Can outer failure be turned into inner success?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes, outer failure can be turned into inner success provided you take outer failure as an experience. If you cannot take it as an experience, you have at least to take it as an experiment. You experimented with something, and that experiment was not able to give you the satisfaction that you wanted. But if you can offer the experiment itself with joy to the Supreme, then the result of the experiment automatically is placed at the Feet of the Supreme.

An experiment is like a house. If you offer the house to the Supreme, then all the possessions of the house — the chairs and the other furniture — also are offered to the Supreme. If you can offer your experiment to the Supreme, then you are also offering Him the results — like the furniture of the house. On the strength of your offering, you become one with the Supreme, and when you become one with the Supreme, automatically the experiment becomes an inner success.

But if you can take your outer failure as an experience, which is infinitely superior to an experiment, then it will definitely be a success both in the inner world and in the outer world, for each experience consciously or unconsciously embodies the divine Light, which the seeker receives or brings to the fore according to his capacity and receptivity.