The world's imperfections

Sri Chinmoy: God could have started His creation with perfection. But, fortunately or unfortunately, that was not His intention. What God wanted was to go through ignorance to Knowledge, through limitation to Plenitude, through death to Immortality. The miseries, troubles, frustrations and despair that we are going through in the physical world are nothing but experiences on our way to the Ultimate Goal. And who, after all, is having these experiences? It is God and God alone. God is a Divine Player. He is playing His divine Game and He knows the ultimate end. The more we play, the more we become conscious of the fact that we do nothing and can do nothing. We are all instruments. At each moment God is revealing Himself in and through us, in spite of the fact that we see and create a vast gulf between ourselves and God.

When God created the world, He gave each individual very limited freedom. Unfortunately, we have been misusing this freedom. He gave to each person limited capacity. But this capacity we have been using for the wrong purpose. Early in the morning we know that we have the time to do whatever we want. We know that at 5:30 in the morning we can pray to God and receive His Joy and Love. But instead of getting up early, we get up very late. What is worse, we do not meditate at all. So you see how we misuse our limited freedom and capacity, how we misuse God’s precious Concern and Compassion for us.

All the great spiritual Masters — Krishna, Buddha, Christ and so on — did realise the highest Truth. But when they wanted to offer the world their own realisations, the world laughed at them. Realising the Truth is one thing, and manifesting the Truth is another. As far as realisation is concerned, they were perfect, but when it was a matter of manifestation, most of the spiritual Masters were not accepted. The earth-consciousness denied their inner wealth. Even some of the Masters’ own disciples betrayed them or did not listen to them. Now why does the earth-consciousness revolt when it is going to get something divine and fulfilling? It is because it wants to remain in bondage and ignorance. The camel eats the cactus and its mouth bleeds. But a few hours later the same camel again eats cactus and bleeds once more.

God wants us to be perfect and fulfilled, but if we go deep within, we see that we are satisfied with our pleasures, desires, limited consciousness, jealousy, doubt, fear and negative thoughts. Human beings as such do not want real joy. What they want is pleasure, which is something very different. When we are satisfied with something undivine, how can we blame God? How can we say that He is not giving us the right thing? We have to know and feel that God is doing everything for us. At His choice hour He will grant us the supreme realisation. When we aspire and enter into the Highest, it is He who takes us to our destined Goal. And if we do not want to do that, God says, “Sleep, my child, sleep. The time has not come for you.”

Look around and see how many people really want God. Most people don’t have five minutes a day to meditate on God. Days will run into weeks and weeks into months, and they have not meditated even for five minutes. God comes last in their lives. When somebody is dying they may cry out, “O God, O God, O God!” But otherwise, how many times a day do people utter the names of their own children, and how many times do they utter the name of God? It is God who is our Divine Child, who has the message of Perfection, and not those we think about all day long.

In the outer world we see limitations, imperfections, doubt, fear and death. But in the inner world we see Light, Peace, Bliss and Perfection. When we consciously identify ourselves with and live in God’s Consciousness, there is no imperfection. There is all Perfection. But if we do not live in the Divine Consciousness, naturally we will be yoked to the imperfection of the outer world. A seeker of the Supreme, living in the Supreme, being one with the Consciousness of the Supreme, sees and feels that his consciousness and life, both inner and outer, are projections of God’s ever-transcending Perfection, which is growing into perfect Perfection.

The world of realisation and manifestation can be established only on the strength of our aspiration. When there is aspiration in our heart, perfection will eventually dawn. Only when each individual wants to sing the song of Infinity, Eternity and Immortality can God offer here on earth the message of Perfection. Only if we accept God as our very own can He give us what He has and what He is.