Question: Do children sometimes experience this kind of Delight?

Sri Chinmoy: No. Children do not have the highest Delight. They get psychic delight. They get some delight from the psychic being, from the inner being, or from the soul, which they express spontaneously. And very often children express their joy through their pure, uncorrupted vital. But the highest Delight, which comes from the plane of Sat-Chit-Ananda, children do not get. One can feel it only in one’s deepest, highest meditation. Children also have to go through meditation, concentration and contemplation in order to experience this quality.

[Sri Chinmoy then asked his disciples to try to invoke Ananda_] Please place your right hand on your heart. Try to feel the most beautiful child on earth and in Heaven inside your heart. This is the soul. The men will naturally see the child as masculine, and the women will see the child as feminine. The soul is neither masculine nor feminine, but when it takes human incarnation, it takes a form. Try to see the child as only seven days old. In terms of spiritual evolution, some of you do not have even that seven-day-old child, forgive me to say. Although the souls started their journey millions of years ago, there are one or two individuals here who have had only one or two human incarnations. Naturally their souls’ evolution is perhaps only a few hours old or a few minutes old in purely spiritual terms. Now, please think of the seven-day-old child. Then in absolute silence, please say _Ananda seven times.