Question: Guru, why does the Supreme allow you to suffer?

Sri Chinmoy: Allow me? Two reasons. One reason is that I am a very bad man. The other reason is this: He says, "Since you have a big mouth, you have to prove that you have a big heart also. Otherwise, you are a liar." 'Big mouth' means that I claim that I have realised God. He says, "You have realised God? Then prove it. How? By showing that you have a big heart. If you have a big mouth, then you have to have a big heart." Only a big heart has the right to produce big talk, say big things. Anybody can say big things, but when it is a matter of doing, most of the time they can't do it. So the Supreme says, "Since you have used your mouth and said many, many things about Me and about yourself and about humanity, now I want you to have a big heart, too. How can you have a big heart? Through identification. You have to identify with somebody's back pain, somebody's leg pain, somebody's tooth pain. Like that, identify, identify." It doesn't mean that I have back pain because I have taken somebody else's back pain. My back pain may be for some other reason. Somebody may have a very serious type of disease which I am taking as back pain. Then, in a few days, this back pain dissolves; it goes away. Again, if the Supreme wants me to immediately throw this disease into the Universal Consciousness, that also I can do, without taking it directly. Some mediums take pain from others and then they suffer. In my case, when He wants me to take, I take; and when He wants me to throw, I throw. On many, many occasions, He does not want me to take someone's suffering as my own pain. He says, "Don't take it into yourself. Just throw it."

From:Sri Chinmoy,God and the Cosmic Game, Agni Press, 1977
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/gcg