Question: I just visited my family and they are not particularly aspiring. I am curious to know whether you would encourage us to visit our families, or should we attempt to avoid a lot of visits if it is hard on our aspiration?

Sri Chinmoy: You know your parents better than anybody else does. Are they progressing in their acceptance of your spiritual life? Let us say that two years ago they were totally hostile. Do they now feel that perhaps spirituality is not so bad after all? Do they feel that they have played their role in bringing you up, and now you have the capacity to make your own decisions? You have to know how much they are progressing in accepting what you are doing. With utmost difficulty you climb up the tree of aspiration. If your parents are hostile, they will compel you to drop from divinity’s branch. You have found your truth and they have found their truth, so let them stay with their truth and you stay with yours.

Some parents were very hostile at first, but they have slowly made a conscious compromise. They are accepting what their children are doing in a clever way, not a sincere way, because they know that they will not see you any more if they do not accept it. Now, why should you be a victim to their deception? When you go see them, in millions of tricky ways they will try to ruin your aspiration. But some parents have accepted the fact that their children have entered the spiritual life, and they also try to be a little spiritual.

There was a time four or five years ago when some parents literally dug my grave every day, but now they speak well of me. Before, they were ignorant. They found fault with us; they were against us. There was a time when parents were embarrassed to speak to relatives about their children because they felt that their children had gone to the dogs by accepting the spiritual life. Now the same parents brag like anything because their children have become good, spiritual, divine. They are not taking drugs or leading an immoral life. Light is shining in their faces. If they are appreciating their children’s qualities and achievements sincerely, then these parents should be accepted. So you have to see how much progress they have made. If they have not made any progress, then it is a hopeless case. But if they are making progress, then go and see them from time to time, even if you cannot keep your aspiration at the highest pinnacle.

But if your parents constantly find fault with you, if they have no sympathy with what you are doing and are only waiting for the opportunity to drag you back into the old family life, then it is a deplorable mistake to visit them. If they are trying to bind you to the ordinary life, then it is not your sincerity that takes you to see them; it is your stupidity. There is a great difference between sincerity and stupidity. If I become very angry, on the spur of the moment I may tell someone that I will kill you. On second thought, I know that it would be sheer stupidity to do so. But if I surrender to my stupidity in the name of sincerity and I do kill you, then I have kept my promise, true. But what will be my karma?

They are your parents, true. But if they deliberately try to create additional confusion in your life, then why should you allow them? Already you have enough insecurity, enough doubt, enough weakness. Why should you drink in more poison just because they happen to be your parents? So you have to see whether they are allowing you to go in your own way or not. If your parents are not progressing, then you are under no obligation to see them. If you listen to the inner dictates of your soul, the Supreme will tell you when to go and visit parents and when it is not advisable to go. If you find it difficult to listen to your soul, just weigh the pros and cons and use your wisdom and common sense.