Question: What concrete or practical things can I do, either during meditation or apart from it, in order to see light? I am not afraid of seeing light but I do not know how to do it.¹¹¹

Sri Chinmoy: You are using the word ‘practical’. Here I wish to say that concentration is practical, meditation is practical. We have to know that God, who is all Light, is natural. Only what is natural can be practical plus practicable. So try to feel that concentration and meditation are something natural in your life. It is only when you do not meditate that you are doing something unnatural.

You say you are not afraid of light. Wonderful! But there are many people who are afraid of light. They feel that if they can hide themselves in a dark room, then they will be able to see the whole world and pass judgement on it from the safety and security of the darkness. When light comes and is ready to enter into them, they feel that all their weaknesses and limitations, all their negative ideas and negative thoughts, will be exposed. But the very function of light is to illumine, not to expose — to transform our negative and destructive thoughts into positive and affirmative thoughts.

You want to know how you can receive light or how you can bring the light that you have within you to the fore. For that you need preparation, which is nothing other than your pure concentration and meditation. When you start your concentration or meditation, try to feel that you have come from light and that your whole existence exists inside light, that you not only embody light but are light itself. This is not imagination or mental hallucination. Far from it! It is a real, solid, concrete truth. If you can realise this, you will see a spontaneous flow of light from within. First you will feel it inside your heart. Then you will feel it in your forehead — in the third eye; and finally you will feel it throughout your entire being.

There are also other ways of seeing light. One way is through your breathing. Each time you draw in a breath, please feel that you are breathing in something that is feeding, purifying and energising everything inside you. And what is the thing that you are breathing in? It is nothing but light. After a while you will feel that this light you are breathing has totally filled your being. At that time you will see and feel that you are nothing but light itself.