The Fairy World
On the morning of Radha’s birthday, Sri Chinmoy concentrated on her third eye and told her that he would enable her to see a fairy that day. The following conversation took place that morning, after Sunday morning meditation at the Sri Chinmoy’s house.
I have brought three fairies here. They are all the time playing inside the house, doing all kinds of things. I have told them to let you view them during the day or at night. They will listen to me. You don’t have to do a thing. I am giving you the receptivity so that you can see them today. I don’t believe in boons and all that, but today I am giving you a boon. And others also can see the fairy world today. But if you don’t see, what can I do? I cannot force receptivity.
I see right now in front of me three fairies who are playing, jumping near your left shoulder. I have kept your third eye open, only this opening of your third eye and the opening of my third eye are a little different. God is very, very bad. It takes such a long time to realise Him, and He says that He is very close to us, dear to us. All kinds of things He tells, but when it is a matter of realizing Him, He shuts the door for us. Even for us to see a fairy He won’t allow. (laughter)
[Later the same day, Radha did indeed see a fairy]
Sri Chinmoy answers many questions about fairies, angels and cosmic gods from his disciples who are present:
Question: How do you know that you are actually seeing a fairy and that it isn't your imagination?
Sri Chinmoy: If I see you right now, is it my imagination? It is so vivid. The fairy world, like other worlds, is also a reality. You can either enter into these worlds or these worlds can enter into you. Only then will these worlds be a reality for you. I say that I was born in India and that such a place exists. Your mind will believe this to some extent, because you have studied about India in school. But when it is a matter of India’s becoming a real reality for you, then you have to see the place. Here also, the fairy world one can really see. But unfortunately my disciples are not blessed with that capacity. It is not at all necessary to use the third eye. If one can have a childlike consciousness, the consciousness of a three-year-old, then one can easily see the fairy world. For that world is a children’s world; it is not the world of grownups and mature individuals. So you can use either your third eye or you can use your innocence and simplicity to see the fairy world. Again, if you can remain in my consciousness for even two minutes, you will definitely see it. So this is not a mental hallucination. The fairy world is a reality.
Question: Will the younger disciples find it easier to see the fairies?
Sri Chinmoy: Where are the younger ones? You people are all grownups. The mind is operating very nicely, very nicely, in all of you. Nobody here is in the child’s consciousness. You are all trying to work with your minds. Otherwise, in minutes you would see the fairy world.
This is all lack of receptivity. There is one disciple I was blessing on his birthday. For seven years I had been trying, but there was nothing, no receptivity. If receptivity does not come even on his birthday, then, Oh God, what am I going to do? So I had to use force. Then, after six or seven minutes, I was able to give him what I really wanted to give him. But it is very bad to use force. If you keep your heart’s door closed, if you keep all your windows and doors closed, then how will the sunlight come in? It is the nature of sunlight to enter into us; but if the windows are closed, then the sunlight cannot come. Again, sunlight is very powerful, and in some way it will enter. Force you can use, but that is very wrong. Sometimes it can damage the individual.
Question: If we see a fairy, then will we be convinced that the fairy world exists?
Sri Chinmoy: Our difficulty is that if we don’t see a thing every day, then we won’t be convinced. If we see something once, then we will only interpret it as imagination. Twenty times we have to see; only then will the human mind become convinced that a thing does exist or does not exist. Otherwise, we think, “How is it that I am not seeing it at once if it really exists? If it really existed for forty years, what have I been doing? I would have seen it.” If we see it only once, still we can deny its authenticity. Our difficulty is the mind. Only if we see something twenty times do we feel that it is real. The first time we see something, we feel it is all hallucination because others have not seen it. But if I have a mango, then whether others believe it or not does not matter. It is their problem. I have got it and I have eaten it. It is all inside me. Where is the proof? The proof is inside me. It is in the taste. It is in my satisfaction. The real proof is in my satisfaction: not your satisfaction, but my satisfaction.
Question: What is fairy language like? Do they speak like us?
Sri Chinmoy: No, you won’t understand their language, but you can hear it with the subtle ear. Again, you can get it with the third eye. Many times the third eye gets the voice infinitely sooner than the ear. It is not a language with words. The language they use is light. The message is in the light. They can sing and do everything through light.
Question: Y saw a fairy once.
Y: Well, I don’t think it was actually a fairy. It was in the old Connecticut Centre. Downstairs, in the living room, as you looked towards the altar on the right hand side, was a dresser. I think a statue of Guru’s head was on top of this dresser. It was four feet high. I was sitting in the ante room and I couldn’t see the altar itself, because I was too much to the side. I was looking at the dresser, and I was sort of half asleep, perhaps, or not in a completely awake consciousness, when I saw something very small. It appeared to be a girl wearing something long. I immediately got the feeling that it wasn’t anything of great importance; it was just some little being coming there and looking to see what was going on. But immediately my mind came forward, and said something like, “Is that an angel?” And when that happened, it disappeared.
Sri Chinmoy: From the highest point of view, it is not at all essential to see a fairy. Not at all. You have to know that the world of fairies is a world that cannot be higher than this world. No. In this world you will realise God. You will not only realise God; you will actually become God. That is God’s Dream. Look at a fairy. It is just like a child! Compare the fairy’s capacity to your capacity, when it will be all blossomed. Even your present achievement cannot be inferior to the achievement of the fairy world, not to speak of your future capacity one hundred or one thousand years from now. The fairy world is a delicate, sweet, childlike world. It is like children playing in the garden. You get joy. But when you think of the children’s capacity, it is very limited. Their capacity is to give us joy. They are moving around; they are playing, dancing, singing, and that gives us joy. But when it is a matter of real accomplishment or achievement, it is a different thing.
So, in your case, what you saw was a fairy, not an angel. If you had seen an angel, your mind would not have said that it was of no importance. An angel is definitely of real importance. But again, it is not of infinite importance to see an angel. No, not at all. Still, when it is a matter of capacity, there is a tremendous difference between a fairy and an angel. Angels can do many things. In the Bible they do all kinds of miracles. These stories are true. Fairies cannot do these things. They are children. Fairies can give you joy, they can give you inspiration, they can give you enthusiasm and make you feel that you are a child.
So, what you saw was not an angel. But you were right when you said not to use the mind. While you are eating a mango, if your mind comes to the fore and says, “After all, it is not so important to eat a mango,” then the taste that the mango embodies, you will not be able to get. While eating something, if you say, “It is not essential,” then whatever little taste or capacity the thing has, you won’t get it. If you are doing something or feeling something or trying to achieve something, if you immediately say, “It is not so important,” then the capacity or wealth of that particular thing, you will not get to the fullest. Even if the capacity that it has is eager to come into you, still you will not get it.
Let us say that I am giving you a flower with utmost love. I am giving you a flower, but I have much more than a flower. Today I am giving you a flower to see how much devotion you have for me. If you take it with utmost joy, then tomorrow you will get something more, because the thing that I wanted to give you, you have taken with utmost joy, gratitude, love and delight. I came to you in the form of a flower and you have accepted me. Then, tomorrow, I will come to you in the form of a lion. But if you do not accept me in the form of a flower, then I will hesitate to come to you in the form of something infinitely more meaningful.
Question: What do fairies do?
Sri Chinmoy: Fairies give joy: inner joy, outer joy. They give joy to sweet, innocent people through dreams. Sometimes, during meditation, they dance around. On a limited scale, they can fulfil wishes. They are always happy. They don’t create any problems. They are divine to some extent. We have disciples who are very well-liked by the fairies.
Question: Are fairies very tiny?
Sri Chinmoy: In size they are small, very light — like children. In India I have seen fairies only one-and-a-half feet tall. They can be masculine or feminine.
Question: Are fairies cute?
Sri Chinmoy: Some look cute, but sometimes they look clumsy. Right now with my third eye I am seeing some fairies which are not beautiful. Just because they are like cute children, we like them. No matter what children wear, say or do, we like them. Sometimes, the way the fairies dress, they are very untidy and unclean. Of course, we feel this only when we are using our purity-heart to see them and judge them.
If we see an angel, our whole being will be swimming in a sea of delight. But if we see a fairy, we may get an altogether different experience. At times the fairies are quite restless and, like human beings, they have a tendency to quarrel and fight and adopt undivine means. This can create a headache in the innocent human observer. Again, many fairies are good, like good human beings. These fairies undoubtedly give enormous delight to the human observer.
Question: What do they wear?
Sri Chinmoy: Usually fairies like many colours. They like gaudy clothes, all different colours: green, red, black. But angels don’t like gaudy colours. They like subtle, ethereal, delicate colours. Their beauty is very ethereal, simple, shining. If you see an angel, you really feel something. But if you see a fairy, it is like going and mixing with a child.
Question: Do you often see fairies?
Sri Chinmoy: A few days ago, on our way back from Washington D.C., we went to a service station to buy chocolate. I was outside the car. Two young American men came out. They were looking at me with utmost contempt, but I was smiling at them. One was a bad fairy and the other was a good fairy. Bad and good were mixing together. If the good one had seen me alone, perhaps his reaction would have been different. But because he was with the bad one, they both looked at me with contempt.
Question: Do fairies have different incarnations or do they just exist?
Sri Chinmoy: The world that the fairies live in does not follow the process of evolution. Therefore, fairies do not and cannot evolve and they do not feel the necessity of coming into the world in different incarnations. Again, fairies don’t die. If they want to dissolve and end their fairy life, they can do so.
Question: Would a human soul go into a fairy world or become an angel?
Sri Chinmoy: On very rare occasions it can. Every rule admits of exceptions. Otherwise, usually it is the other way around. From the fairy world, fairies will take human incarnation because they see the limitations of their own world. But this also is rare. Fairies or angels see that human beings have more capacity because human beings can pray, they can meditate, they can realise God.
In Puerto Rico, one of our disciple’s granddaughters was a beautiful fairy. After she died, she went back to the fairy world. Fairies come to the human world and think that they will change their fate. But usually they don’t like it, so they go back to the fairy world where they will be happy again.
Question: Are fairies conscious of the existence of God?
Sri Chinmoy: They are. Only they are not trying to become one with God consciously, like the human beings who want to realise God. They are happy with what they have and what they are. It is not necessary for them to realise God.
Question: Where do fairies live?
Sri Chinmoy: They don’t live on the physical plane. They have their own land.
Question: If fairies have their own world, why do they come here?
Sri Chinmoy: Because I invited them. [laughter]
Question: On other occasions why do they come to this world, Guru?
Sri Chinmoy: They like it. Do you mean that you don’t like to visit some other places? You don’t always have the means, but if somebody supplies you with the capacity, you will go. Suppose you don’t have money but somebody says, “I will give you money, come.” Then you will go with that person. Aren’t you curious to go to some other part of the world? Fairies are also curious. But they need tremendous purity. Otherwise, they won’t be able to stay in a new place. So I supply them with purity in the new environment so that they will be able to come and stay. Otherwise, they will die. It is my purity that is holding them here. But it is only for today. Then I will take them back safely.
Question: How far away is their world?
Sri Chinmoy: Quite far. But it is an inner world. The distance is not in terms of height. It is inside the heart, the universal Heart.
Question: Must angels also be given special purity to function on earth?
Sri Chinmoy: Angels don’t appreciate it if we are impure, but they will be able to operate inside our impurities. But fairies cannot. Fairies usually die. They are like fresh flowers.
Question: Sometimes children have imaginary friends. Are they fairies?
Sri Chinmoy: The mother tells them that they have a friend. They have such faith in their mother; so who knows? Children are full of imagination. Y mentioned an experience that she had as a child, of a goddess who came to her in a dream. In Y’s case, it was Athena, the Greek goddess. That goddess has some connection with her. A being of Athena’s visited her six or seven months ago. I don’t know which time it happened — when she was a child or just recently, six or seven months ago — but first the being came to me for a blessing.
Question: Why do they come?
Sri Chinmoy: Because they like an individual. An inner affinity is there. There are quite a few hundred people they like. It is like visiting old comrades. How many beings just move around! They have nothing to do.
Question: When they visit you, what do they do? Do they talk to you?
Sri Chinmoy: Sometimes they will bless you or they will talk to you. They do it out of good will. When they visit you, you may not get the result until a few days later, but you will get something. When I visit you people in your dreams, you never see. Only X has given me a full description.
Question: How can you invoke an angel?
Sri Chinmoy: The way you invoke the Supreme. If you see an angel, you really feel something. Everything changes for a few minutes or a few days. Your consciousness changes; you are flowing. It is so beautiful.
Question: Do you have any disciples who are angels?
Sri Chinmoy: First you. You are the first, and the absolute second is B. Third is C. These are all, all, all, all angels. When a mother tells you about her children, she makes you feel that they are all angels. It is because of her love. We are all angels, if we really lead a better life.
Question: Can we see guardian angels?
Sri Chinmoy: Easily you can see them. You call them guardian angels; in India we call them presiding deities. But the capacity of an angel also is very limited. An angel has much more capacity than a fairy, but still it is limited.
Question: Once we become your disciples, do we need a guardian angel? Do they still stay with us then?
Sri Chinmoy: Once you become a disciple of a spiritual Master, you don’t need anything except the Supreme inside that Master. You don’t need anybody. Angels you don’t need, presiding deities you don’t need. You don’t need Gabriel. Before I came into your life, you all had guardian angels. After I came into your life, they all left. They were no longer needed. If they want to help without creating any problems, then you may take their help. But their help has to be unconditional. Very often their help is conditional. Then, if you want to go beyond them or pass them, problems start. But eventually you do have to go beyond the world of the angels. At that time, you will see how they will try to hold you back. Personal deities often do that. They help, they help, they help and feed you. Then, when you want to go beyond them, they try to cut your throat. But if you are strong enough, then you go beyond them.
Question: Are angels large?
Sri Chinmoy: They are not larger than human beings. Some are tall, some are short. But in the subtle world, angels can be six feet or ten feet tall. Usually, baby angels are three feet tall. Baby angels are very cute. They grow usually. By nature, angels are not fat. Angels are always beautiful. The Archangels, in terms of spirituality, are more important because some of them enter into the field of creation and manifestation.
Question: Are all angels masculine?
Sri Chinmoy: Angels can be masculine or feminine. Female angels are more dynamic than male angels. The female is always more dynamic.
Question: I don't know how much of this I can believe, Guru.
Sri Chinmoy: Dearest child, live in the heart. There are many things which the eye sees that will have no value unless the heart also feels them. The eyes will see something. But if the heart does not identify with that particular thing, immediately we will discard it. Who will say that if we see with our naked eye, then we shall believe? No, no, no! With our naked eye many things we see, but immediately we discard them, because our heart has not identified with those things. Unless the heart has identified with some reality, no matter how many times we see it with our eyes, immediately we discard it. We feel, “It cannot be true. If it had been something else, some different shape or some different colour, then it would have been true.” This is what we feel.
Question: When we imagine something, is that a mental process?
Sri Chinmoy: Imagination is not mental hallucination. Hallucinations come from the subconscious plane. This subconscious plane can be in the mind, it can be in the vital or it can be in the gross physical. But when you imagine, there already reality exists. There would have been no scientific discoveries if there had been no imagination. Imagination itself is a reality, but you have to be in the flow of imagination.
There is a world of imagination. Either you enter into that world or you let the world enter into you. Some people sit and try to imagine so many things. But all the time they are using the mind. That is not imagination. Only make yourself receptive and then just fly and fly. But don’t think of going north or south or east or west. Feel that you are in an airplane and that you have just left the ground. Then take the plane in any direction. Do not say, “If I go north, then the plane will crash.” Just throw yourself into the flow of some reality. Feel that there is a flow going on, like a river, and just throw yourself into it. That is real imagination. In false imagination, all the time you are limiting yourself. “If I imagine this way, then the world will appreciate me, adore me.” That is false imagination. But if you just throw yourself into the flow, then that is sincere imagination.
Imagination and creation cannot be separated, but you have to know the difference between real imagination and false imagination. Real imagination is a continuous flow. It is flowing, flowing, and you can take as much as you want. But false imagination is when you are trying to grab something, trying to shape something in your own way.
Question: What is the relationship between God's imagination and God-realisation?
Sri Chinmoy: In God’s case, imagination, realisation and manifestation go together. In our case, when we imagine something, it may take many years or even incarnations to give reality to that particular thing. In His case, it is not like that.
Question: What is the difference between the Indian gods and the Western gods, like Zeus?
Sri Chinmoy: There is no difference. I am an Indian and you are an American, but where is the difference between your heart and my heart? There is no difference if you really use the heart. But if you don’t use the heart, if you use the mind, then you will say that these are two separate entities. Just because I use the heart and you people use the heart, that is why you are in my boat. But if you don’t use the heart, if you use the mind or the vital, I tell you, we won’t be together.
Published in Conversations with the Master
