Question: Why is it that when everything is going well, instead of being happy and really aspiring, I feel restless and uneasy? I almost don't trust the good things.

Sri Chinmoy: My dearest son, you have to believe in the Supreme's Grace and Compassion. Suppose I am the goal, which I am not. If you come to me from your place without any effort because I have offered you my care and you can go at top speed, then you will feel that you have done nothing. You have exerted no personal effort, so you will not be happy. But if you first cut off your legs and your arms, and then you come to me, you will say, "In spite of this handicap I have reached the goal." Then you will be happy in your own way.

But ours is the sunlit path. I have made a short cut for you people. The difficulty is that when the Grace operates in and through you, you don't realise it. Sometimes Grace does not care for your personal effort. If someone is pleased with you, he may give you something that you want immediately, without your having to ask for it at all. Let us say that you are thirsty and I have water. The natural thing is for you to come to me for the water, but I can also come to you with the water and give it to you. Sri Ramakrishna used to say, "If you are thirsty, then you have to go to the pond; the pond won't come to you." This is one theory. But mine is the theory of the mother and the child. If a child is hungry, then the mother will come running from wherever she is to feed the child. You are unhappy because you feel that you have done nothing to deserve what you are getting. But you have done something in the inner world; otherwise my compassion and the Supreme's Compassion would not have come towards you.

When you are happy, the hostile forces come and say, "What have you done to de serve it?" But I assure you, in the inner world you have done something. You have aspired, let us say unconsciously, but the hostile forces do not want to allow you to maintain your happiness. By hook or by crook they will try to destroy it. The mind will supply you with all kinds of wrong ideas. When Grace operates, it operates unconditionally, true. But in the inner world you have also done something to please the Supreme, and that is why the Supreme has granted you this happiness. At that time try to be grateful; do not take it as an illusion. When Grace flows, you do not have to think about your personal effort; you do not have to prove how hard you have worked. If there is a short cut, why have you to go in a roundabout way to the goal? It is unnecessary. So when you are happy, be grateful to the Supreme and feel also that this happiness is not something undeserved.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Opportunity and self-transcendence, Agni Press, 1977
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