Question: Does Beauty come from Light or Peace?

Sri Chinmoy: Beauty comes from both Light and Peace. When it comes from Light, it carries the seeker high, higher, highest to the transcendental plane of Consciousness. When it comes from Peace, it spreads and spreads and enters into the universal Consciousness. When beauty comes from Light it goes upward, and when it comes from Peace it spreads outward.

Question: Are there hints in the world around us of higher forms of beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: Higher forms of beauty are always trying to express their essence and substance through material things, through nature, through incidents or experiences in life, through ideas and ideals. It is often the expression or revelation of the higher beauty that we experience in life. When we look at a child, the beauty that we see is only an expression of the higher beauty that is embodied in him. When we see a flower, the flower represents the beauty of a higher world embodied and expressed. Whenever we see beauty on earth, we have to know that it is always the expression of some higher beauty. When we see a person who is beautiful, we have to know that his beauty is not skin deep. It is through the physical that the Divine is expressing its reality. So beauty in the physical world is always an expression of some higher beauty. But we may not utilise this beauty divinely. A flower is beautiful, but we may just grab the flower and tear it to pieces. What we have to do is learn to see and use this earthly beauty in a divine way.

Question: What kind of consciousness does one have when one sees beauty in everything?

Sri Chinmoy: When one sees beauty in everything, it is an aspiring consciousness, evolving consciousness, illumining consciousness, fulfilling consciousness, divine consciousness. It means that one has come out of the gross physical consciousness. Actually, reality is nothing but beauty in oneness, beauty of oneness and beauty for oneness. When one has that kind of experience, it means that one has transcended the boundaries of the physical, which is limited right now, and entered into a higher reality. When the boundaries of the physical have been transcended, only then does one have the experience of beauty in everything.

Question: Do children see more beauty than grown-ups do?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes, children always see more beauty than grown-ups do. Because of their tremendous inner purity they see beauty in everything. Even in ink they see beauty; even in darkness they see beauty and light. When they see beauty in everything, we have to appreciate and admire them because they are still in the world of the soul. Because children remain more in the heart and the soul than adults do, they see more beauty. When the mind is developed, this undivine mind immediately tries to see impurity even in light, even in wisdom, even in something progressive. The human mind gets satisfaction by seeing ugliness and impurity even in things that are really beautiful and good. If an artist has created something, the mind immediately tries to find some error in it. But a child does not use the mind. He takes everything as his very own, so he sees beauty in everyone and in everything. He feels that there is nothing which is absolutely undivine, and this is perfectly true. There is nothing absolutely undivine, but some things have more light in comparison with other things. In the inner world everything is beautiful; but again, there can be a comparison made.

Question: If we feel a necessity for beauty in our physical surroundings, is it a form of attachment to the physical?

Sri Chinmoy: It is not actually a form of attachment, although it may lead to attachment. We have to know why we want that beauty: whether it is to satisfy our pleasure-sense or to increase our inspiration and aspiration. Some people have flowers all around their house; they have beautiful gardens and most beautiful furniture. But if they are decorating their homes and their surroundings just to satisfy their life of pleasure, then it is certainly a form of attachment. But if they want to increase their inspiration and aspiration by seeing beauty all around them, there is nothing wrong in this. When a seeker sees a flower, if his inspiration and aspiration increase, if he says, "Oh, how I wish to be as beautiful, as pure as a flower," that is good. When he sees a tree, if he says, "How I wish I could have patience like the tree; how I wish I could bear fruit and offer it unconditionally to the world at large," that is very good. If we have beauty around us to inspire us so that we can be as beautiful, as good, as pure, as divine as the things that we are appreciating and admiring, then it is not attachment. But if we have things all around us just to gratify our senses, then it is nothing else but attachment.

Question: Guru, what is the main purpose of beauty in the creation?

Sri Chinmoy: The Creator Himself is all Beauty. Because the Creator is all Beauty, He wants His creation also to be beautiful. Whatever comes out of Him is an expression of His own Dream and His own Reality, so naturally He wants everything to be all Beauty like He is. When the father is a musician, he wishes his son to be a musician. If he is good, he wants his children to be good. Here the Father, God, is all Beauty, so He wants to see beauty all around Him. What He is within, He wants to see without. Like that, the Source always wants its creation to be like itself.

Question: When we see spiritual beauty, what are the predominant feelings that we will have?

Sri Chinmoy: There can be quite a variety of feelings, but the main feeling will be that you want to embrace the whole world as your very own. You will feel that you are not only embracing the world, but also becoming the world itself. And then you will feel that there is nothing dark either within you or around you. Right now you see darkness all around you and if you are sincere with yourself, you will see darkness inside you as well. But when you have seen real spiritual beauty, you will immediately see that inside you is a flood of beauty and outside it is only a reflection of what is within.

Question: How can a seeker increase his inner beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: A seeker must feel that he is all duty. This duty is not enforced duty; this duty is a God-ordained necessity. A seeker can increase his beauty only by increasing his duty to the Inner Pilot. The more you take your life as a life of divine, supreme duty to the Supreme, the more your body, vital, mind, heart and soul will spread beauty. By increasing your sense of inner and outer duty to the Supreme, you increase your inner and outer beauty as well as the beauty in the world around you. And all these forms of beauty are noticeable and manifested.

Question: How can you see the inner beauty of something you want to paint or draw, and bring it out?

Sri Chinmoy: When you are going to paint or draw something, first meditate for at least five minutes and try to see the essence of the thing you want to paint. Feel that there is a seed inside you, and then try to feel the seed germinating and growing into a plant. Then feel that this tiny plant is growing into a huge tree and this tree is your painting. First see the essence and then see the total substance. First make your creation as small as possible, then make it as vast as possible. Try to see the microcosm and the macrocosm together. Then try to see a bridge between the two, connecting the smallest and the largest, or try to connect them with your aspiration. As soon as you see the connection, you are bound to see the beauty from its origin to its culmination in your painting.

First see life in your creation, then see light in your creation. Or you can do it the other way. First you can see light in your creation, then you can see life in your creation. While you are imagining the seed, try to feel at that time that you are meditating on light; and when you are seeing the tree, feel that you are meditating on life. Or do it the other way. When you take the tree, the culmination, as life or light, or the seed within you as life or light, automatically you will bring forward beauty in your painting. That is because, before it has come into the physical world, in the inner world you have already given life and light to it. When you give life or light to something that you are going to create, you are bound to see beauty in it.

Question: How can I make my music full of supreme beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: You can make your music full of supreme beauty if you can remember constantly that your music is only an extension of your inner consciousness and that it is also an expression of the divine within that is crying for manifestation. If you can accept or feel or be aware of the divine within you, then you can bring to your music, through the expression of your life's reality, the supreme beauty. But always feel that the divine within you has accepted music as an expression of its reality for your own perfection in life.

Question: How can we bring beauty into our physical mind?

Sri Chinmoy: It is useless to try to bring beauty into the physical mind unless the mind has been transformed by the inner light — the heart's light or the soul's light. If you do, it will be like throwing something valuable into the garbage pail. The physical mind is like a garbage can. What is the use of bringing beauty into something that is overwhelmingly ugly and impure in every sense of the term? What you should do first is try to purify the mind. Beauty is purity; beauty and purity go together. When the mind is very pure, it is also beautiful. Then nothing ugly or undivine will dare to enter there. First purify the physical mind as much as you can. Once you have cleaned it thoroughly, then you will be able to bring the divine beauty into it through your inner cry. Once the mind is purified and illumined, the thing that you want to put there will automatically come from above.

Any abode will be occupied by tenants of its own standard. If it is a good place, good people will go there. If it is a temple, spiritual seekers will go there. If it is a bad place, bad people will go there. So when you purify the physical mind, automatically beauty will enter there.

When you want to preserve something in the material world, you have to keep it in a vessel that is pure. If you have something pure and divine — say a material object — you are not going to put it in an undivine, ugly place; you will put it somewhere that is also beautiful and pure. If you have a flower, you will place it on your shrine and not inside the refrigerator or in the closet. Similarly, if you want to keep beauty in your physical mind, you have to make your mind very pure and divine.

Question: How can one describe to a small child spiritual feelings which tend to be abstract, as opposed to beauty which a child can receive with the senses?

Sri Chinmoy: For us, something like prayer is not abstract. We fold our hands and cry inwardly to someone who is above or within us. If you want to explain prayer to a young child, do not try to convince him only with the physical. Tell him that prayer is something totally different than just folding his hands and looking up. Tell him that prayer is something that we do inside, but if we want to see or feel it, then we have to fold our hands. You can tell a child that prayer is something which he will feel when he folds his hands and talks to God. Then, when he folds his hands and feels something within — whether it is awe or love or sweetness or softness — then for him prayer will no longer be abstract. It will be a reality.

For meditation he has to sit calmly and quietly. When he sits like that, immediately he will begin to feel that he is meditating. This concrete action will take him into something which is abstract. You can teach a child through outer action, but do not neglect to emphasise the inner feeling. When he starts feeling joy, peace and love, gradually he becomes that joy, that peace, that love and all that he is feeling. When he feels something, how can it remain abstract? Now he feels that his body is his own. His body is not abstract because he is identified with his body. Whatever he is identified with he claims as his own. If he identifies himself with prayer or meditation, he feels peace, joy, love and so on. And once he feels these things, he gives form to them and they no longer remain abstract. Through outer action, make your child aware of something within him. In the beginning that thing will be abstract, but afterwards it will not be abstract.

Question: Are some souls more beautiful than others?

Sri Chinmoy: Those souls that have manifested more than other souls are more beautiful than the other souls. Every soul has light, but how many souls are manifesting it? If they are manifesting, they are more beautiful than if they are not. We appreciate something in somebody else which is worth achieving or worth becoming. So some souls are more beautiful because they have manifested more or are manifesting more than other souls. Naturally they will be more beautiful to humanity and Mother Earth, because they are offering something divine to humanity.

When a flower is fully blossomed we appreciate it. When it is only a tiny bud we can't appreciate it as much. When somebody is just learning something, his wisdom won't be appreciated as much as the wisdom of someone who already knows quite a lot. The more light you manifest, the more your beauty is appreciated. And this appreciation is nothing but a further manifestation of beauty.

Again, some souls care more for light, some souls care more for power and some care more for peace. The souls that care for light and delight will be more beautiful, because they are trying to spread beauty in its chosen forms.

There are some souls that want to manifest power or peace or some other quality. In these souls we will not be immediately struck by a sense of beauty. They do have tremendous beauty in their highest manifestation, but it is not seen as easily as their more predominant, or you can say more manifested, qualities are seen. Peace and power are also beauty. But when we see light in something, most often we feel that that is beauty. When we see a flower we will say the flower is beautiful. Or we will often feel that a child is beautiful. But if we see a huge tree or the vast ocean, immediately we will say it is big or vast or majestic; the word “beauty” does not come to our minds. When we think of the flowers and fruits, we may say the tree is beautiful; but we do not appreciate the beauty of the tree as such. Like that, when we see light or delight in something, immediately we say it is beautiful.

Question: Is there a connection between love and beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes! Divine love and divine beauty are inseparable. Love is the flower, beauty is the fragrance. They go together. A flower is an object, a creation of God. But the flower has to offer its quality, that is its fragrance. Only when you come near a flower will you see and appreciate its beauty. But even when you are far away, its fragrance can permeate the air. If a flower does not have any fragrance, half its divinity is gone. Beauty comes forth from the flower which is love. Flower and fragrance are inseparably one.

Question: How can we see the inner beauty in people and not the outer physical beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: First of all, you have to know what happens to you when you see the physical beauty of someone. An old acquaintance by the name of jealousy enters into you. You say, "Oh, I am not as beautiful as so-and-so." We always feel that others have more beauty than we have. They feel that they are ugliness incarnate and you feel that you yourself are ugliness incarnate. This experience never ends. After you observe somebody's outer beauty, very often you feel jealousy. But instead of being jealous when you see somebody's outer beauty, try to have a divine attitude. You can say, "If it were at all necessary for me to be as beautiful as she, I am sure that God would have made me as beautiful. So it is not necessary for me."

What happens when you are aware of somebody's inner beauty? When you are aware of somebody's inner beauty, it means that you are in the inner world. When you are in the inner world, there is no competition. If you are aware of somebody's inner beauty you will never be jealous. In the inner world, you feel the inner beauty of that particular person as your very own. When you go deep within, anything that you see in somebody you will not see as his individual property; you will see it as the universal property. In this way, if you see the beauty of someone else, you will feel that that beauty equally belongs to you, because inner beauty is part of the universal Reality. If you want to be aware of other people's inner beauty, try to go deep within. Live in your heart and your soul, not in your mind. Then you will feel that whatever you see in others is also yours.

Question: What is the most beautiful thing on earth?

Sri Chinmoy: The most beautiful thing on earth is our heart's gratitude to the Supreme, to the divinity in humanity, to God. This is the best and most valuable thing on earth. This is the beauty unparalleled, and it will remain so throughout Eternity.

Question: How can one discriminate between lesser beauty and higher beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: The lesser beauty will always try to bind and limit us. The higher beauty will always try to illumine and liberate us. The moment the higher beauty dawns in us, we will feel others as our very own and we will try to liberate them. And while having that kind of feeling, we will see that we are already received and claimed by others as their very own. When the higher beauty dawns in us, we see that what we do for others, they have already done for us. When we have the higher beauty, it means that the finite in us has gone and we are trying to make the Infinite our own. The moment we try to bring down the Infinite as our own, to our wide surprise we will feel that it has already claimed us as its very own.

Question: How can we always see beauty within ourselves?

Sri Chinmoy: You can always see beauty within yourself only by praying and meditating. When you pray, you have to think that your Source is one; and when you meditate, you have to feel that you are for all. When you are praying to the One, you are going up, up, up to the Highest. When you are meditating on the many, you are spreading your light to all.

Question: How can we become inseparably one with beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: First, you have to become inseparably one with light instead of with darkness and ignorance. If you become inseparably one with light, which is wisdom, automatically you become one with beauty. First you have to become one with the Source. When you become one with the Source, naturally the possessions of the Source will become yours. If you become one with the consciousness of a tree, then you have also become one with the consciousness of the flowers and leaves of the tree.

Question: Being sensitive to beauty, how can one avoid being upset by others' ugliness?

Sri Chinmoy: You are sensitive to beauty, but becoming upset when you notice ugliness all around you does not help you increase your sense of beauty or your capacity to appreciate beauty. So you have to become wise. If there is light somewhere, you try to increase this light to more light, abundant light, infinite Light. But if you see darkness somewhere, you don't do this. Your goal, let us say, is to the north, not to the south. If you look towards the south, you see that it is all flooded with darkness. So do not look in that direction. You will not even look at it. Inside yourself you want beauty and light; but this moment you look at beauty and see it in an infinitesimal measure, and the next moment you look at ugliness and see a flood of ugliness. This is wrong. Once you see beauty at a particular place, either inside yourself or around you, try to focus your attention on that particular place. When you focus your attention on the place where you have seen beauty, your appreciation of this beauty will increase. But if you see ugliness and become upset, you will not be able to focus your attention on the things that you want to see. Although your present is not flooded with light, although you cannot quite see the Goal, you know the road. The road that leads to infinite Light you have seen. So you will not consciously and deliberately take the road that leads to infinite darkness.

Question: Could you speak on beauty's evolving manifestation in man?²¹

Sri Chinmoy: Beauty's evolving manifestation in man is man's increasingly conscious awareness of his ultimate height and his God-ordained mission on earth. The more he is aware of his transcendental height, the sooner he will be manifesting beauty. His God-ordained mission is to expand his own inner and outer reality. His inner reality is his dream; his outer reality is his conscious appreciation of his own achievements.

In order to manifest the beauty in evolution, or in order to become beauty itself in the process of evolution, man has to feel that his Source is Delight, and that he exists on earth only for Delight. While he is manifesting beauty, he has to feel that beauty is nothing short of Delight. In thinking of beauty, in imagining beauty, in revealing beauty, in offering beauty, he has to feel that he is playing with Delight, dancing with Delight, drinking Delight and sharing Delight with the rest of mankind. This is how beauty can be manifested in the process of evolution.

Question: Why is it that the beauty of nature gives me such boundless joy?

Sri Chinmoy: Precisely because the beauty of nature is the expression of the One who is all Beauty.

Whenever we see something, we see inside that thing the inner presence, the inner consciousness, of its creator. The Creator of nature is God Himself. He expresses Himself in and through Nature. When we see nature's beauty, we get overwhelming joy because the Creator and Owner is God. When we see a house, if we love the owner, we love the possession.

The One who is all Beauty is inside His creation, like a mother's heart is inside her child. A mother's heart cannot be separated from the child's existence. Just because we appreciate, admire, adore and worship the One who is all Beauty, we appreciate His creation as well. Sometimes when we want to see the mother, we get joy just by seeing the child because we have found somebody who is part and parcel of her being. The creation itself is part and parcel of the Creator. Since the Creator is not at our beck and call right now, we are satisfied with the creation.

Question: How can we maintain our inner beauty when we have to go to undivine places?²³

Sri Chinmoy: On the physical plane, we wear shoes when we go outside so that our feet do not touch the ground and get hurt. When there is something undivine, something that may hurt us, we take precautions to protect ourselves. Similarly, when we go to any undivine place, we need protection. When we are at home, when we are not in the battlefield of life, we are protected. But as soon as we go out into the street, we come face to face with a hungry lion. He is more powerful, infinitely more powerful, than we are. At those times we have to become more cautious and conscious. When we are in broad daylight, we do not worry. But when it is very dark we feel that some undivine force will attack us, so we become more cautious. How do we become more cautious and conscious? By remembering the necessity for aspiration, and by remembering the Supreme Pilot within us more often.

Question: Is it unspiritual to try to enhance one's physical beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: If you mean by wearing all kinds of make-up, then yes, it is unspiritual. But if somebody does not take a shower or wash his hair for three weeks and then starts taking a shower and washing his hair every day, this enhances his physical beauty in a very spiritual way. If you comb your hair, if you wear clean clothes, it adds to your beauty.

You may say, "If I don't clean my body or comb my hair, what right do you have to complain?" But I do have a right, because when you are dirty and untidy, at that time you are representing ugliness to me. Now what right do you have to bring ugliness into my life? When people in the street are not washed, they will say, "It is our body." But if it is their body, then they should stay inside their room. They don't have to come out. If they do, they are either unconsciously or deliberately poisoning our eyes. We are trying to be normal and natural, but they are acting like abnormal creatures. Like animals, they are just roaming wild and we cannot find any beauty to appreciate in them. Because of their untidiness and ugliness, others suffer. The lower consciousness which they embody does not stay with them; it immediately enters into us.

It is good to make yourself pleasant in appearance, but do not do anything that is not natural and normal. If you want to wear all kinds of cosmetics, that will be a terrible mistake. But if you can be clean and neat and always keep your body in a pure consciousness, if you can keep your mind calm and quiet and serene, and if your vital is dynamic and not aggressive, then automatically your face changes. If the body is not lethargic, but active and ready to serve, if the body-consciousness is awakened, then automatically the face changes. There are so many spiritual things one can do to make oneself more beautiful in a natural and normal way. Constantly the inner is perfecting the outer. If you want to enhance your physical beauty, then do it in a way that will also be of help to your spiritual life.

Question: What are the things that obscure our inner beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: There are three principal things that obscure our inner beauty: lack of clarity in the mind, lack of purity in the vital and lack of sincerity in the body. If the body-consciousness is sincere, the vital pure and the mind clear, then we automatically get inner beauty. In the absence of these divine qualities, we see ugliness in ourselves.

Question: How can I help my little daughter always see and feel beauty as she does now?

Sri Chinmoy: The best way is for you to see beauty in her all the time. What you see within her will automatically come forward in her life. Her outer life will be an expression of her inner life. You have sown the seed of beauty in her. Now allow it to germinate and water it always.

Question: Guru, when we see in you what appears to be a new beauty, is there a special significance?

Sri Chinmoy: When you see in me a new beauty, there can be many reasons. I may have entered into a world of beauty, or my soul at that time may want to offer some light to seekers who will receive it according to their capacity. This light can be felt by one person's physical mind as beauty and it can be felt by someone else as power. Whether it is seen as beauty or power, it will be able to elevate your consciousness. If your physical mind sees light as beauty, and if somebody else's mind sees it as power, there is a special reason. On that particular day, if something has happened to bring ugliness into your life, then you need beauty; so you will see beauty. Somebody else may have felt insecure or might have done something wrong on that day, so if he sees my power aspect he won't make the same mistake again.

Question: How can we identify with our soul's beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: First of all we have to feel that the soul is all beauty only for one reason: because the soul is consciously aware of God. The soul is consciously aware of God at every second, twenty-four hours a day. That is why the soul is all beauty. If we want to be all beauty like the soul, we also have to be aware of God's Presence at every second of our life.

You want to identify yourself with your soul's beauty. That is an excellent idea, an excellent aspiration. If you can become fully aware of God's operation in and through you at every second of your life, then you will be identifying yourself with infinite Beauty. God is infinitely more beautiful than your soul or my soul or any individual soul. If you can have a free access to the infinite Beauty which is God, automatically you become one with the soul's beauty, because the soul is an infinitesimal fraction of the Beauty that God embodies. If you go to the Source, you get everything to your heart's content. If you want to be one with the soul's beauty, then think of perfect Beauty, God. Then if God wants, He can give you all His Beauty, or He can give you what you actually want — the identification with your soul's beauty.

Question: Guru, is ugliness a quality in itself, or is it just a lack of beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: It is both. Ugliness is a quality and it is also a lack of beauty As a quality, ugliness comes from our life of irresponsibility. We do not fulfil the divine duty within us. If there is something that we have to do and if we do not do it on time, immediately this lack of duty creates a kind of disharmony in our physical life, our vital life and our inner life. When there is lack of harmony in us, immediately we see chaos, and chaos itself is ugliness.

Lack of beauty comes when we do not aspire to become good and self-giving. Even if we become great, that does not necessarily mean that we are aspiring for divine beauty. Greatness and goodness can be separated. When we want to become good, we aspire. When we want to become great, we also aspire, but in this aspiration we use unfortunately our desire-weapon. This desire-weapon first fulfils us and afterwards kills us. We have a knife and, for some time, we use it carefully. But there comes a time when we don't use it carefully. Since we feel that we know how to use it, we become negligent; that is when the desire-knife stabs us. But our aspiration-weapon is not actually a knife. It is more like a flower within us. In the beginning we see that this aspiration-flower is like a bud. Then gradually, gradually we see one petal open, then two, then three, then four. Each petal takes a long time to blossom, but once the flower is fully blossomed we get the sublime fragrance. At that time, even if we remove the flower, the fragrance remains. And when this fragrance permeates our whole body, we become all-beautiful.

Question: Guru, what is the relationship between physical beauty with spirituality and physical beauty without spirituality?

Sri Chinmoy: Physical beauty without spirituality is like an empty vessel. There is nothing satisfying or fulfilling in it. Physical beauty without spirituality, you can say, is skin deep. But if there is spiritual beauty, inner beauty, an inner cry for God inside the physical beauty, then the physical beauty becomes soul deep. We know how deep the soul is. It has an eternal connection with the Source, the Supreme. If there is no inner beauty in one's physical beauty, then it creates temptation for others and problems for oneself. This kind of beauty tries like a magnet to draw others. It is like a sick person: when others stay with a sick person, they become sick too. So beauty without spirituality is dangerous.

But again it is in and through the physical that the Divine manifests itself. It may happen that inside the physical there is divine beauty, but one may not be aware of it; the divine beauty may not yet have started manifesting in and through the physical. That is why we see only the physical beauty. If we are not aware of the inner beauty, naturally we shall separate the physical from the spiritual. But it is always possible that inside the physical beauty there is divine beauty waiting to be fully manifested. Some people are really spiritual, but they are not aware of their spirituality at all. Their hour has not yet struck. That is why they are leading an ordinary or undivine life. But inwardly they are ready. In a matter of a day or a week or a few years, they will begin to follow the spiritual path. Some people say, "I want the spiritual life, but not now. After three years or six years or ten years I will be ready." These people are getting some indication of their latent inner beauty. Otherwise, they would categorically say, "Spiritual life is not meant for me. I don't need it or want it." Instead, they say that after a few years they will accept the spiritual life. This means that their spiritual qualities are already coming to the fore, but they are not yet fully aware of them.

When physical beauty and spiritual beauty go together, then perfection dawns. Again, physical beauty is a matter of judgement. You may think some person is extremely beautiful. But somebody else will say that person is quite ugly. Your sense of beauty and somebody else's sense of beauty may totally differ. Now who can be the judge? Nobody! Appreciating a person's physical beauty may create problems for us. But if we only deal with the spiritual and see inner beauty in people, then there cannot be any problem. Concentrate on bringing the inner beauty forward and not the outer beauty. Inner beauty is love, divine love. Inner beauty is universal oneness. Inner beauty is self-giving. How can these things create problems? Let us bring to the fore our inner beauty and let the outer beauty take a very secondary place.

Question: Guru, since you say that gratitude is the most beautiful thing on earth, what is the effect of gratitude on man and God?

Sri Chinmoy: When an individual offers gratitude to God, immediately his receptivity increases. His vessel becomes large. Then God is able to pour more of His Blessings into the person or enter more fully into that vessel with His own divine Existence. God is infinite, but only according to our receptivity can He enter into us. God is like sunlight. If I leave this window open, sunlight will come in here. If I keep all the other windows closed, it cannot come in there. The more we offer gratitude, the more we increase our receptivity and capacity. The more windows we open, the more God enters into us with Light, abundant Light, infinite Light. When we offer gratitude, immediately God's Light comes pouring into our being.

Question: Guru, does the world have more beauty or less beauty than it had one hundred years ago?

Sri Chinmoy: The present-day world has more beauty than the world of one hundred years ago. An individual or country or nation or the world is composed of many parts. We have to separate them all. We have to see on the physical plane how many divine things have occurred recently and then compare them with the achievements of a hundred years ago. We have to see the physical things that have been discovered, and know whether they have been used for a good purpose or a bad purpose. We are creating and creating and each creation is beauty. But we have to know whether this power of creation has become a form of destruction or not. We have to know whether all the things that have taken place for the last one hundred years are divine — that is to say, whether they are progressive and being used for the divine purpose. The answer can be given by each individual soul.

You may say, "Oh, four thousand years ago we were all spiritual people." We like to bask in the past. Our parents and grandparents never told a lie, we think. Falsehood was not born at that time. Go to any Indian village and the people will tell you, "We have fallen, but our parents were all saints, and our parents' parents were absolutely all gods." But if you know a little bit of world history, you will know that their parents also quarrelled, fought, killed and did God knows what else.

Now, look at our achievements. Astronauts have gone to the moon. We have the atom bomb, the hydrogen bomb and all kinds of scientific inventions. Of course, with these creations we are destroying the world like anything. Achievement we have got, progress we have made, but God alone knows how we are using these things or going to use them. Still, we are all in the process of evolution. Gradually, gradually we are going from the animal life to the divine life. We cannot say categorically when the consciousness of earth was more divine. Historians will widely differ as to that. But one thing we can say is that the general trend, by virtue of evolution, is progressive.

We have tremendous power at our disposal, although if it is not properly used it can create real problems. But almost any earthly achievement can be used in two ways. The radio is a comparatively modern achievement. Two hundred years ago there were no radios. Now the radio is doing wonderful things in spreading knowledge. But if you use the radio to listen to undivine music, how is it helping your soul? The jet plane has conquered distance and made the world very small. But again, the jet plane can do something very damaging. It can carry bombs from one place to another.

There was a time when the question of a destructive purpose or a constructive purpose did not arise because there was no achievement at that time. But evolution has come to a point where, when we achieve something, it becomes common property. We do not try to keep our achievements only for our own use. If we get something, we share it. This achievement is a real kind of beauty. The main thing right now is that we have to learn how to utilise all our achievements for a constructive purpose.

Question: Guru, what is the relationship of Beauty and Power in the Divine Mother?

Sri Chinmoy: Beauty and Power go together. Beauty is Power; Power is Beauty. Both are Light that an individual sees in his own way. When Light is being manifested in the Divine Mother, you may call it Power and somebody else may call it Beauty. When somebody sees the Divine Mother's Light, if the soul feels that by seeing this Light as Beauty its progress will be faster, then it sees the Light as Beauty. If the soul feels that by seeing Power its progress will be faster, then it will see the Light in that way. Beauty and Power are both manifestations of Light, but each individual will see Light in the way that will best help his soul's progress.

Question: Guru, is beauty dynamic and changing or is it merely a reflection of our soul's evolution?

Sri Chinmoy: Beauty is dynamic and changing and it is also a reflection of our soul's evolution. When we speak of dynamism, it means life-energy is flowing most powerfully. Life-energy is a river constantly flowing. Although it is continuous, the movement itself is change. Movement we notice. But when the river enters into the sea, when it has reached its goal, at that time it seems to be stopping. But it is actually becoming one with the silence. From this silence again it will come back to the place where it started its journey. Before we start to do something, everything is static. When we begin to do it, everything becomes dynamic. And when it is done, the fulfilled action enters again into something which is absolutely silent. By constant action we create new energy in our life. This is one kind of beauty.

The other kind of beauty is the soul's reflection. The soul represents the Supreme, who is all Beauty. When the soul comes to the fore, its light is reflected by the rest of the being. When you pray and meditate you feed the soul and the strength of the soul increases. But when the physical and the vital also add to the soul's capacity, then its strength is really great. You may have thousands of dollars, but if your child gives you one dollar, then you will have one thousand and one. Here also, when we consciously aspire with the physical, with the vital, with the mind and with the heart, we acquire the ultimate wealth. Then the increased capacity of the soul adds to the soul's beauty immediately. This beauty is the reflection of the soul's progress and evolution.

Question: What is the essence of nature's beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: The essence of nature's beauty is the Supreme Light or the Supreme Delight in nature. Nature itself is not complete. Nature is not the doer. Nature has somebody as its boss, and that is the Absolute Supreme. As soon as something is created we immediately ask who did it. As soon as we see a creation, we feel that it is incomplete unless and until we know from where it came. Nature is God's creation. Again, the Creator is inside the creation. That is why we can say that nature itself is God. But we have to know that it was not nature who was the Creator. The Creator was Above, and after creating He became one with His creation.

I write a poem. Because of my inspiration, aspiration, capacity and dedication, I feel that it is a part of me. The poet and the poem are inseparably one. At that time you can say it is Guru's poem or you can say it is Guru's consciousness. It is the same. Similarly, nature is God's creation and it also embodies God's Consciousness. That is why we can easily say that nature and God are one. Nature functions as a representative of God Himself. But we have to know that nature is aware of the fact that there is somebody inside it who is regulating it. If that portion of the Creator which is in nature is taken away, immediately nature becomes lifeless.

Question: Guru, can you describe the Supreme's Beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: The Supreme's Beauty only the Supreme can describe. If you try to express the Supreme's Beauty, you will immediately be challenged even by a child. Try to describe to a child who has never seen the sea how vast, how powerful and how beautiful it is. The child will ask, "How big is it? Show me." Then you will spread your arms out and say it is so huge. The child will say, "That big?" Then again you will say, "No, it is far, far bigger. It is much farther than a person can reach."

Even if he imagines what you are trying to describe, he will not be satisfied. The moment you try to express anything in our human language you are limiting it. The moment you try to express anything divine you limit it. Why can't I describe God-realisation? I can try, but I will have to write thousands of pages and even then, if you have had the experience yourself, you will give me zero because my description is not complete. These things have to be experienced; they cannot be described. Action is one thing, but explanation is something else. When I want to describe something that I have done, it does not remain the same. The Supreme's Beauty I see twenty-four hours a day. I can see it at any moment. But when I have to explain it to you, I am using my mind. That is like standing in front of the mightiest ocean and with a ruler trying to measure it. It is a hopeless task because I have such a limited instrument at my disposal. This is the unfortunate thing. When we want to explain the Supreme's Beauty or the Supreme's Light, we have to use our physical mind. It is the best thing we have for dealing with the world at large. It is far more developed than the body or the vital, but in comparison with the soul, the mind is absolutely weak and insignificant.

If you remain in the heart, explanation is not necessary. There identification is the medium. Just stand in front of the ocean and enter into your heart. Immediately the consciousness of the whole ocean enters into you and you become one with it. Why? Because at that time you identify with it. If you can use your heart to identify with the infinite Beauty, or with whatever you want, then you will know its attributes. Through identification we get everything, but through mental scrutiny we can never explain the infinite Beauty of the Supreme.

Question: Do some animals see more beauty than others?

Sri Chinmoy: Here we have to know what kind of animal it is. If it is a tiger or a lion or an elephant, it will not see any beauty. Their beauty is destruction. A tiger's beauty will be in devouring you. That is his satisfaction, and that satisfaction it considers beauty. In our human life also, satisfaction is beauty. There is no difference between satisfaction and beauty. As soon as you see a beautiful flower you are satisfied. But also, our satisfaction lies in becoming one with the beauty that we see. We want to be as pure as the flower. But a tiger's satisfaction will be found only in destruction.

Again, there are some animals that are very mild and won't try to destroy anybody; they will only try to go towards their own goal. They are trying to reach something, not destroy something. So naturally they are creating beauty. In the animal kingdom beauty means harmony. A deer is not going to eat me up. The deer's very nature is to run and run towards an unknown goal. The deer's constant movement is not for destruction, but to see something, to feel something and to reach something. That movement gives it satisfaction, and that satisfaction is real beauty. We human beings do not care to move. Most of us are lazy. Again, when we do move and encounter some obstacle, we feel that we are lost; immediately we feel that there is no goal and we don't try to go in another direction.

Question: How can I inspire the world more with your divine beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: You can inspire the world more with my divine beauty, which is my Realisation-Light, through your self-giving to humanity. You can offer yourself devotedly and unconditionally to humanity only when you discover that each human being is a living manifestation of your Inner Pilot, the Absolute Supreme.

Question: Is there a difference between the beauty that is in simplicity and the beauty that is in something very striking?

Sri Chinmoy: Simplicity itself is beauty. If somebody is very simple, because of his simplicity he is beautiful, and if someone has inner beauty, because of his inner beauty he is simple. If somebody is inwardly spiritual, he is like a beautiful and simple child. But you have to know the difference between the beauty that is in simplicity and the striking beauty of a God-realised soul. A child is most simple, but you have to know the capacity of a child. His simplicity is beauty; his beauty is simplicity. When somebody has prayed, meditated and realised God, he may not be as simple or as innocent as a child. But look at his capacity! When it is a matter of achievement or capacity, the child is very limited. He has to grow up and gain inner strength. His simple beauty cannot be placed on the same footing as the inner beauty of a spiritual Master.

But when a Master is not simple, that does not mean that he is crooked or complicated. No! Only he may not want to act in a very simple way. He may be guarded or cautious or more restricted than a child, but when it is a matter of capacity, he can do millions of things for himself, for God and for earth which a child cannot do. Naturally his capacity, his achievement, his offering to the world is much more striking.

A child's beauty is undeniably appreciated. But when somebody, with his sincerity and aspiration, has achieved something in the inner or the outer world, his beauty's capacity is much more appreciated, much more valued by the world. You may say that the child is offering beauty according to his capacity. A kindergarten student is sharing knowledge with his friends. But if his eldest brother, who has a Ph.D., is also sharing his capacity with others, we have to know who is giving more benefit to the world. How many people are getting benefit from the child's capacity and from the brother's capacity? Undoubtedly, everybody can get some benefit from the eldest brother's capacity. Even the child's friends, who are getting a little joy and a little knowledge from the child, can be taught by the eldest brother. But the little child with his little capacity cannot teach most of the world.

The capacity of beauty differs. Simplicity is the first rung of the spiritual ladder. But if you want to compare the beauty of simplicity with the beauty of another, more evolved type which offers infinitely more light, then naturally you will say that the more evolved beauty is infinitely more significant. The child's beauty is important, but if you need something to use on a world scale, then the capacity of the person who is spiritually and inwardly mature is much more important or, let us say, much more beneficial. The world derives much more benefit from that person's inner beauty.

But a child will not remain a child forever. He will also grow up and get his Master's degree and his Ph.D. He who is a beginner in the spiritual life today will not be a beginner tomorrow. The beauty of his childlike simplicity will grow into a more mature and powerful beauty.

Question: What is the best way to appreciate nature's beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: The best way to appreciate nature's beauty is to sit and meditate with nature. If you take a tree as nature, then sit at the foot of a tree and meditate. If you take the sun as an expression of nature, then look at the sun and meditate. If you feel the ocean or sea as nature, then sit in front of the water and meditate. While looking at the tree or the sun or the ocean, try to feel your oneness with it. Anything that you consider as nature or nature's beauty, you should try to become one with.

Again, if you want a particular thing from nature, you have to go to that thing. If you want to have vastness, then just go out of the house and look at the sky and you will enter into vastness. If you want to have a very vast, pure consciousness, then stand in front of a river and meditate on the river. And if you want to get height in your life, then go to a mountain and meditate there. So whatever you want, you have to stand in front of that particular thing and invoke it. You have to invoke the spirit of nature or become one with the soul of nature. That is the best kind of identification.

Question: How can I become a vehicle for beauty within my work and life?

Sri Chinmoy: Feel that without beauty there is no life in you: you are a dry flower which can be of no use. Appreciate beauty in yourself and in others. From your appreciation you will develop the capacity to become a vehicle for beauty.

Question: When we want to create, how can we invoke beauty to inspire us?

Sri Chinmoy: Let us imagine a bird that is flying in the firmament. It is constantly flying, flying. When we look at the bird, immediately we are fascinated by its capacity. We cannot fly, but we have the capacity to identify ourselves with its action. If we look at the bird while we are in a meditative mood, we feel as if we are also flying. At that time, our inner being is flying; our aspiration is flying.

When you want to create something, you want to invoke beauty to inspire you. So at that time, you have to identify yourself with someone who is creating. You want to do something unique, but the type of thing that you want to do somebody has already done or is doing. Only you want to surpass him. So try to identify yourself with the consciousness of the person who has already done the thing or with the person himself, and try to get inspiration, aspiration and capacity from him.

If you want to write something spiritual, read my writings and identify with them. If you want to draw something, take your ideal artist and identify with his creation. But you have to be careful. An artist may have a very bad character. His creations may be divine, but his character may be undivine. In that case, don't identify with the creator but identify with the creation only. If you identify with a creation of beauty, that beauty will inspire you to create something beautiful. Identify, identify, identify. Identification is not imitation. Far from it! But if you identify with something and get the capacity or quality or essence of that thing, then you can develop it and increase it in your own way.

Question: What is the relationship between beauty in the physical, the vital, the mind and the heart?

Sri Chinmoy: If a person has four children and they are playing together, he gets tremendous joy. But if he has only one child, he may not get the same amount of joy. Similarly, if you have a beautiful body, beautiful vital, beautiful mind and beautiful heart, when you see them operating together harmoniously and divinely, you get the greatest joy. How can you make yourself beautiful in all parts? How can you make them all what you want to be? It is through self-giving. You have to give time and attention to the physical in you; that is to say, you have to keep your body clean and neat. You have to offer time and attention to your vital; that is to say, you have to act, you have to be dynamic, you have to move around; you will not stay at home and rest all the time. You have to give time and attention to your mind by reading spiritual books and by concentrating. You have to give time and attention to your heart by praying and meditating. If you don't pray and meditate, you will remain insecure, but when you meditate you become aware of your oneness with God. By paying attention to the physical, to the vital, to the mind and to the heart, you are giving them the nourishment they need. If you want them to please you, you have to feed them first; you have to pay attention to them. Once you give them proper nourishment they will all dance in front of you like divine children.

Question: Is beauty in the eye of the beholder?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. According to one's inner achievement one appreciates the outer beauty. Again, he who has realised the Highest has a different way of appreciating beauty. He sees the past, present and future at a glance and he determines the value of beauty according to the soul's already achieved reality.

Question: What is beautiful about the mind?

Sri Chinmoy: There is only one thing beautiful about the mind: eventually it does come to realise that light is necessary, that the feeling of oneness is necessary, and at that time it recognises and confesses its countless mistakes. This realisation, recognition and confession are themselves a true form of inner beauty.

Question: If you say that someone has a beautiful soul, does this mean that that person has an aura of a particular colour?

Sri Chinmoy: When I say somebody has a beautiful soul, it does not mean he has a certain coloured aura. It means that the person has received Light, Peace and Delight from above to a considerable extent, and that these divine qualities have come to the fore in him and are being manifested in the earth-consciousness. It may be, however, that the possessor of these qualities is not aware of them. But when a Master discloses the fact, the seeker gets the immediate opportunity to recognise them, increase them and utilise them for a divine cause in his own life and in the life of aspiring humanity.

Question: When beauty manifests through an individual, does this victory increase the impetus of universal Beauty-manifestation?

Sri Chinmoy: When divine beauty manifests through an individual, it is a clear indication of divine victory, and this victory is an added life, added light, added achievement and added perfection for the universal Beauty-manifestation.

Question: Do God the Father and God the Mother manifest their Beauty in different ways?

Sri Chinmoy: God the Father and God the Mother have one heart, one soul, one physical consciousness. But the individual will see them according to his understanding or capacity. Each individual is given the opportunity to appreciate Their Beauty either together or separately. One individual will say that God the Father is more beautiful and another will say that God the Mother is more beautiful. But God the Father and God the Mother are not like human beings who have only one appearance. If the individual is totally identified with God the Father or God the Mother on the physical plane or in the earth-consciousness, then inside God the Father he is bound to see God the Mother, and inside God the Mother he is bound to see God the Father. Their Beauty cannot be separated.

Question: Guru, if gratitude is the most beautiful thing on earth, how can a disciple feel more gratitude towards his Master?

Sri Chinmoy: A disciple can have more gratitude for his Master through self-giving. By self-giving the disciple becomes what he wanted to be and infinitely more. He wanted to have an iota of Peace, a little Light, a little Bliss. That was his hope. But when he begins real self-giving to a divine cause inside his Master, then, instead of just an iota, he is given Peace, Light and Bliss in infinite measure.

But again, if the seeker feels while giving that he will get much more in return, that is not real self-giving. It is a bargain. While giving he has to feel that even if he does not get anything in return, he will give because he is getting inspiration from within. Whether he will get something in return from his Master or the Supreme in his Master is not his business. His business is to give, and it is the business of the Supreme whether or not to give something in return. If the disciple feels that he is getting the utmost joy while giving and if he is not thinking that he will get infinitely more in return, then gratitude is bound to dawn in his life. When a seeker gives spontaneously with joy, if the action itself gives joy and not the expected result, then automatically the seeker's life is blessed. And inside this blessing the seeker's gratitude towards the Supreme inside his Master is growing.

Question: Guru, how is beauty manifested through oneness?

Sri Chinmoy: Oneness itself is beauty. There cannot be any beauty higher or more illumining and fulfilling than oneness. Just because the world is lacking in oneness, the world is suffering. When there is oneness, beauty is automatically there. God has the universal Consciousness at His disposal; that is why He is all Beauty. When there is inseparable oneness, that oneness itself is beauty. It is the self-revealing light of the divine within us.

Question: If a soul is more evolved, will it take on a body that is more physically beautiful, or is there no correlation between physical beauty and spiritual development?

Sri Chinmoy: No, there is no correlation at all. There have been many spiritual Masters who were physically quite ugly, and there have been many who were very beautiful. If you ask God whether my soul is more beautiful or more developed than that of some handsome movie actor, God will sincerely tell you that my soul is far more developed. It depends entirely on God's Will and on the individual soul's will what kind of house his soul will live in.

If somebody has plenty of money, even then he may not care for a big mansion. He feels that a small room is enough. And somebody who has very little money will spend everything he has to rent a big house to show off. But this big house may get him into tremendous financial difficulty. Then he has to get a loan from the bank in order to pay the rent, and perhaps he will not be able to buy proper food for himself. So, although he has a very big house, he is starving and bankrupt.

The beauty that we see in spiritual Masters is the soul's beauty rather than physical beauty. That beauty does not create any problems, either for its possessor or for others. Just because of your aspiration you see their inner beauty and you accept them because of it.

Question: How can one see and feel beauty in one's work and school work?

Sri Chinmoy: School work and other work must be taken as a part of self-discipline. The result of self-discipline is satisfaction. If we care for satisfaction, we have to feel that inside our self-discipline there is nothing but the revealing light of beauty.

Question: Does outer cheerfulness help us to manifest inner beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: Absolutely! Outer cheerfulness considerably helps in developing and increasing our inner beauty. But this outer cheerfulness, like everything else in the spiritual life, has to be sincere. Some people come up to me with folded hands and show all kinds of false devotion. Devotion is necessary in the spiritual life, but if you just fold your hands and bow down because somebody else is doing it, that is all useless insincerity. In everything we do we can be very sincere or we can be very insincere. If we are sincere, then we get something from the Supreme. But if we are not sincere, we will get nothing. So cheerfulness also has to be spontaneous. It has to come naturally from within and not just be something you are creating or showing off with. If you have that kind of cheerfulness, your inner beauty is bound to grow, because that kind of cheerfulness will help you tremendously in your spiritual life.

Question: How can I cultivate the mature kind of beauty that you spoke of without losing the innocent childlike beauty?

Sri Chinmoy: When you are with your older spiritual brothers, you have to feel that you are only one year old. Show all your innocent qualities to them. They will be pleased with your childlike simplicity, and not with your cleverness or how much you know. But when you are in front of your equals or your younger brothers, at that time you won't be strict or complicated. You will maintain your childlike quality, but also you have to prove to them that you have some wisdom, some light. Just as you are inspired by the wisdom of your superiors, others have to be inspired by your wisdom and height.

When you are with your younger brothers, feel that they have to come up to your height of sincerity and light. And when you are with your elder brothers, try to climb up the ladder to their height. When you are with the little ones, at that time keep your divine dignity, but not pride. And when you are with the older ones, have the feeling that you are climbing up to them. In this way, you won't lose your childlike simplicity.

When I cut jokes with you people, I become much younger than you. And when I become serious, at that time you can hardly approach me. When I meditate, at that time I am somebody else. This moment I act like your real spiritual father — very stern and strict — because I have to inspire you to go up the ladder. And the next moment, when I cut jokes with you, I act like someone who is much younger than you. If you can do this, then you can be both spiritually mature and childlike.

Question: Guru, purity and beauty seem to have a feminine quality, whereas power and dynamism seem to have a masculine quality. Can you speak about this?

Sri Chinmoy: This is all in the mind. Just go one inch above the mind and you will see that purity and beauty, and power and dynamism, are neither masculine nor feminine. The mind makes these separations like feminine and masculine. But once we go beyond the mind, there is nothing of that sort. With the mind we judge things, and this becomes masculine and that becomes feminine. In French my head becomes “la tête”, and my nose becomes “le nez”. So my head is feminine and my nose is masculine. But this is all arbitrary. That is why the Indian term for God, “Brahman”, is neuter. The highest realisation of all Indian Seers was that God is neither masculine nor feminine. Beyond the mind there is no such thing as masculine and feminine. Even the soul is neither masculine nor feminine. It is absolutely neuter.

Question: Is our inner beauty due to the Grace of God?

Sri Chinmoy: Yes, inner beauty is undoubtedly the result of God's Grace. Is there anything good, divine or progressive that we can get or do without the Grace of God? Inner beauty is life's satisfaction and life's perfection. How can we get life's satisfaction and perfection from anybody or anything but God? And God and God's Grace, God and God's Compassion, are inseparable.

There is nothing we can do without God's Grace. Just because God's Grace is there, you are praying and meditating and trying to realise God. Perhaps your friends and relatives are leading a very undivine life. Their time has not come. God's Grace has not been received by them. So you have to be so grateful to God that God has awakened you, whereas your friends and relatives are not yet awakened. Anything good that we do, anything good that we become, comes directly from God. Without God's Grace we cannot budge an inch.

I will tell you an interesting incident. Once one of my elder brothers, who is very spiritual, entered into a kind of joking discussion with a mentor of mine. They were very fond of each other, so my brother was cutting jokes with this elderly man. My mentor said, "Without God's Grace nothing can happen. And again, with God's Grace everything can happen." My brother said, "All right, you just give me a gun and I will see whether I need God's Grace to shoot you. Then, after I kill you, let me see what God's Grace can do for you!" So my mentor said, "Just because God knows you are going to shoot me, God is not giving you a gun right now. If this is not God's Grace, what else is God's Grace?" So my brother lost the case.

Question: Needless to say, you've answered every question I've ever asked so I identify with all the questions and all the answers.

Sri Chinmoy: Very good! I am all pride. All my love and gratitude to you and your wife. I am wearing one of the dhotis your wife made for me. Perhaps she does not feel how grateful I am to her, but God inside her knows how grateful I am for all the things she has made for me. So you and your daughter have to enter into her and make her feel how grateful I am for the clothes she makes for me.

Editor's introduction to the first edition

Without beauty the world would certainly be a drab and depressing habitation. Even now the natural beauty inherent in this earth is often obscured by the disharmony and ugliness of its inhabitants. When man's undivine tendencies are purified and transformed, this earth of ours will be resplendent with the divine Beauty of the Supreme.

In this volume the God-realised spiritual Master Sri Chinmoy answers questions on beauty from the highest spiritual point of view. If we can understand, accept and learn from his wisdom, we can hasten the evolution and revelation of beauty both in ourselves and in the world at large. When we begin to live in a realm of divine beauty, both inner and outer, our joy and satisfaction will know no bounds.

Editor's note from the first edition

Over the course of his numerous university lecture tours and at his various spiritual Centres around the world, Sri Chinmoy has answered thousands of spiritual questions. But perhaps none are of such widespread interest as this series of questions on the subject of beauty, which he answered during a meeting of his Connecticut Centre on 14 September, 1974.

What exactly is beauty? What is its meaning and spiritual significance? How does it reveal itself in different planes of consciousness? Questions like these have fascinated philosophers and poets from the beginning of time, but it is rare indeed for a God-realised spiritual Master to discuss these matters. This volume reveals the quintessence of beauty as seen by the inner vision of a great Yogi. The revelations offered here represent a unique treasure which will always be cherished in the hearts of spiritual seekers and lovers of beauty the world over.