But in the case of aspiration it is not like that. There your very nature, your very soul, your very existence wants to remain in the Infinitude. If one remains in the highest Light, in the all-fulfilling Light, then it is for the Light to decide whether the Light wants to give a specific experience to an individual seeker by giving him name and fame and so forth. But if the seeker wants to have both desire and aspiration together, both worldly name and fame and true aspiration for the Highest, then he will be neither in the spiritual path nor in the ordinary material path because constantly he will be pulled by two contradictory forces. One will immediately say that the other is useless. Desire will say, "Aspiration is useless. You are only building castles in the air." Aspiration will say, "Desire is stupidity. There is no end, there is no end." It is like a camel in the desert. All the time the camel is eating thorns. His mouth is bleeding, but again and again he starts eating thorns.
So these are two contradictory forces in us. On the one hand we see realisation and aspiration, and on the other hand we see desire. But there is another pair of so-called opposites: the material world and the spiritual world. This is the material world. We cannot reject the material, physical world in order to live in the spiritual world. The spiritual world is inside the material, physical world. We have to be in the inner world, and the realisation of the inner world has to be expressed in the outer world. We cannot separate the inner world from the outer world. If we leave the world and stay in the Himalayan caves and say, "Oh, people are very bad. My neighbours are very bad. Let me just escape," then we are not realising the truth here on earth the way the truth has to be realised.
Our philosophy is that here on earth we have to enter into the inner world. The outer world has to be an expression, a manifestation of the inner world. But in order to manifest the Truth, one has to have the Truth first. And for that, what is necessary is aspiration.
If we want to unite both aspiration and desire, then we will be ruined. Aspiration will not fulfil us and desire will not care for us because they are like north pole and south pole. They cannot go together. But once realisation has been achieved on the strength of aspiration, then the field of manifestation is thrust upon us. At that time we are not to be blamed for our outer life because it is the higher power that is bringing us the so-called outer achievement. But if the higher power does not care for it, if the higher power cares only for our realisation, our oneness with the Highest Absolute, then we have to be satisfied with that. That is what God needs and God wants from us.
A true seeker has to go through inspiration and not through desire. Then again, if one has both desire and aspiration right now, will he leave aside the spiritual path? No. He has to go through his desire. Today he has to see the percentage. If today he has fifty per cent aspiration and fifty per cent desire, then what can he do? He does not have to give up his ordinary human life. No, he has to pay more attention to the path of aspiration. Gradually, gradually, the percentage of desire will decrease. Then a day will come when he will really see that it is aspiration that is fulfilling him and will fulfil him forever. At that time, automatically the desire in his life will drop off and the life of aspiration will carry him to the end of the road, to the goal.From:Sri Chinmoy,Inspiration-Garden and Aspiration-Leaves, Agni Press, 1977
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