Question: In the spiritual life, are we supposed to feel responsible for other people or not?

Sri Chinmoy: It depends on which plane you feel responsibility. When you breathe in, God alone knows how many tiny insects you destroy. If you have to think, "Oh God, I am destroying so many insects, so let me close my nose," then I tell you, this kind of responsibility will take you to the other world.

Clever people will say that there is no responsibility at all on earth. They say, "I didn't create the world. God created the world. So let God suffer; it is His business." Again, others will say, "God has created the world, that is true. But since God is an Old Man and we are young people, it is our bounden duty to help God."

But God says, "No. I am eternally young. I know what is best for Me and what is best for you. If you really care for Me, if you have such love for Me, then try to please Me in My own Way. I have created the world. You feel that although I have created the world, it has now gone out of My control, so you have come to help Me. But even if it has gone out of My control, which it hasn't — be kind to Me. Since I have created the world, don't try to become the manager or proprietor. Please just feel that since I have started this whole business, I am the employer and you are the employee. Don't reverse the game."

So God tells us to listen to Him and feel that we are employed by Him. If we are employed, then naturally our duty is to please the Boss in His own Way. This is our only responsibility. Once we accept the spiritual life, we have to feel at that time that God is our only responsibility. Even if we have wives and husbands, still we have to feel that God is our only responsibility. That does not mean that we will not love our husbands and wives, far from it. But we have to know why we are loving our husbands, why we are loving our wives, why we are loving our children. We are loving our dear ones just because inside them God is there. God may say to us, "Since you are here on earth, I am giving you a specific mission. You take care of your daughter. You take care of your son. You take care of your husband. That is your responsibility." Once we enter into the spiritual life, our only responsibility is obedience. There is no other responsibility. Obedience is our conscious oneness with our own highest part.

If God or your spiritual Master tells you that your only responsibility is to take care of your daughter, then you have to obey your Master. But if you say, "No! There was a special reason why I came into that family; my responsibility is also to my father, my mother, my sister," then this may be wrong. True, there was a special reason why you came into that family, but how do you know that reason has not already been fulfilled? Once you accept the spiritual life, at that time you have to feel that you have no mother, no father, no brother, no sister. When you come to the spiritual life, at that time your family has already played its role. In most of the cases, the parents have already played their role and the children have also played their role in such a way that the parents have actually got what they wanted from their children. Unconsciously the parents want their children to become good, kind and spiritual. The parents tried and the parents failed; they could not make the children good, kind and spiritual. But the children have done that themselves because they have entered into the spiritual life. So what the parents even unconsciously felt was their responsibility for their children, the children have done on their own. They have done the job infinitely better than the parents ever imagined was possible.

Once children accept the spiritual life, at that time their parents' responsibility is over. Then they become the Master's responsibility. Once you accept the spiritual life, at that time your responsibility is obedience to the Master or obedience to God, if you get the inner command. You may say, "Oh, my parents have taken care of me, paid for my university degree, done everything for me." That is true. But if you follow the spiritual life, you will realise God. At that time your soul, out of its infinite compassion, will give an iota of light to your parents. And even if you do not give consciously, unconsciously it will flow. This iota of light that you will give to your parents, who are not spiritual, is worth infinitely more than the thousands of dollars they have given you to study in the university. Thousands of students are coming out of Harvard and Yale every year with the highest degree. But out of the millions and billions of souls entering into the world each year, if even one realises God, then what happens? In India they say that when one person in a family realises God, then twelve generations from both sides — predecessors and successors — will all be liberated. When one realises God, compassion flows immediately: "He was the instrument, she was the instrument for my entrance into earth, so let me do something for them."