Question: Does God consider it important for the aspirant to understand his past in order to be free of his unconscious enslavement to its influence?

Sri Chinmoy: God does not consider it at all important for the aspirant to know all about his past before he can free himself from his unconscious connection with it. On the contrary, it is not advisable to understand one's past. Understanding is an act of the mind. This understanding is of no avail in the inner world. Feeling is of great importance, and oneness-reality is of paramount importance, for feeling and oneness are the products of the heart. If we want to free ourselves from the fetters of the past, we shall not enter into the past, for the past is still unlit, obscure and impure. We have to march forward to where there is hope, light, assurance and promise. Eventually we shall bring into the past the divine wealth of the future to transform and illumine the past. We can take the past as our own home. If we do not go out and work and get a salary, how are we going to survive? Similarly, we go out of the past, enter into the future and bring back with us the wealth of the future once we have received it. Not by staying in the past can we solve the problems of the past, but by going beyond and transcending the experiences of the past we can illumine the heart of the past and fulfil the life of the past. When the future illumines the past, the Hour of God dawns for the present, and inside the Hour of God man hears the message of God's eternal Now: the message of man's continuous self-transcendence and God's supreme Satisfaction.