Question: How can we always see the divine qualities in others?

Sri Chinmoy: If you do not see the divine qualities in another person, you will feel that you are seeing a tiger, a snake, a panther, a bull or some other animal; you will see jealousy, doubt, fear or other negative qualities. When you see undivine qualities in others, you have to feel that these are ferocious animals. Then what will happen? Those ferocious animals will devour you. If you see a tiger in front of you, do you think the tiger will just go away? The very nature of a tiger is to devour you. If you see the undivine qualities in others, then immediately those ferocious animals will come and devour you.

On the other hand, if you see in each person a divine child, or a beautiful flower, or a burning candle symbolising the ascent of the flame of aspiration, you will be full of joy. If you see inside them somebody praying and meditating, or a most luminous, divine child, you will be full of joy. If you see the divine in a person, then your strength, inspiration and aspiration will increase. Every divine quality that you have will increase. The moment you think that you see an undivine quality in someone else, feel that your whole hand is full of ink. You are soiled. You can wash it with a good thought. But if you touch the ink again, even though you have washed your hand once, it will again become dirty and black.

If you do not look for the negative qualities, automatically the positive qualities come forward. It is like this: either you like a person or you dislike him. If you do not dislike someone, automatically you like him. It is either one or the other; there is nothing in between. At a given moment, either you are thinking of God or you are thinking of Satan. At every moment the mind is either thinking of something positive and creative or of something negative and destructive.

So the best thing is to see the positive things in others. If you consciously see the positive things, then the negative qualities cannot come forward.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Aspiration-Glow and Dedication-Flow, part 2, Agni Press, 1977
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/ag_2