Question: Recently you said that the philosophy of the New Millennium is to see only the good qualities in yourself and others. If you only see the good, then patience would not need to exist. Is that true?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes, but how often do you see the good in others? When you have a sense of rivalry, when you have jealousy, insecurity, will those negative qualities not stand in your way? As soon as you want to see the good qualities of others, your bad qualities will prevent you from doing so because your bad qualities will be jealous of their good qualities. Bad qualities cannot tolerate somebody else’s good qualities. Usually we enlarge or exaggerate the bad qualities of others, and at the same time, we do not want to see their good qualities.

How many people on earth are ready even to observe the good qualities in somebody else, not to speak of appreciating or admiring them? As soon as we see good qualities, we turn our face away out of jealousy. If somebody is a good singer, so many people who could never become good singers will become jealous. Very rarely does the mind appreciate others’ good qualities or achievements. This moment the mind appreciates them. The next moment, the same mind says, “Oh, that achievement is so silly.”

Another thing the mind says is, “If I had practised, I could have done the same thing.” An Indian village widow will say that if she had practised football, she could have become another Pelé. She will say that either she did not get the opportunity or she did not want it. This is human life. We say, “If I had practised, I could have climbed up the Himalayas or I could have swum the English Channel.” God says, “Then for God’s sake, why did you not try?”

This is how our human jealousy always tries to take away joy from others by diminishing their achievements. But then, who is burning inside? Outwardly we may say to others: “If I had practised, I could have climbed up the Himalayas. I could have done everything. I could have become the world’s fastest sprinter, I could have defeated Carl Lewis.” Inwardly jealousy is burning and burning. Always our jealousy tries to bring down the world standard.

From:Sri Chinmoy,Sri Chinmoy answers, part 27, Agni Press, 2000
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/sca_27