Hey, what is it? (Master!) Master. (Master! Master! Master! Master!) Oh, looks good. Oh, my God. You know what happened? (No.) You know what happened back there? (No.) Some very enlightened “idiot” put the wrong clock on my table. And it said four o’clock, 4:20 (PM), when I released you. And now somebody told me it’s only three something. I don’t apologize for this. So are some people still meditating there? (No.) No more? (No.) OK, fine, then sit down, sit down, sit down. No, no, just sit, just sit down, just sit down so people can see behind. I stand, it’s OK, but you all sit, please, please. Please. Oh, I even have a chair. I sit also, so please. See, what I tell you to do, I do. Sorry, the difference between the chair and the non-chair.
Oh look, I have a beautiful purse here, look at that. Now, you know the difference between me and the Buddha or not? I mean, the Shakyamuni Buddha. He doesn’t have a purse like this. He wouldn’t dream of it. See, it’s good to be a woman, you can carry a purse. (Oh, yes.) Not just any purse, it’s a microwave magnetic electronic purse. Oh, it’s beautiful, look at this. Now I could put some hundred dollars in here too, and make up, it’s big. Wow, talk about working lady. It’s good. Well, never mind. It’s like that, it’s fine, and I just clip it on here. And I have a very long tongue. They say the Buddha has a very long tongue. Very long. So when He speaks, the whole Universe can hear. All I need is a “long” microphone. Not even a “long” microphone.
Who says that we cannot be better than the Master. There’s hope for you. Maybe next time, if you become a Master, you won’t even need a microphone, because you’re very loud mouthed. Maybe in the future, they just put the microchip in your teeth, no? (Scary.) (Maybe.) Huh? (I hope not.) No, why not? (They’ll follow you around.) They’ll follow you. No, they may not know. The sound just comes out. It doesn’t have to come from here. When I speak here, the sound comes from there. See that? See that guy there? He’s the one who’ll be following around.
Oh my God, who is that enlightened “idiot”? The time has changed already to wintertime, right? And they are still in summertime. No wonder everybody laughed at me and said, “No, no, no, no.” I thought you were being polite, like, “Master, we love You so much, we forsake our dinner,” something like that. You always give me this kind of stuff. That’s why today when you said it, again, I don’t believe you anymore. That’s the problem when you overuse one tactic all the time. I thought you don’t want to go because you always say, “Oh no, we don’t need to eat,” and all that. You could have told me it’s only three o’clock. You could have told me like this. Never mind, never mind. It’s good like this. I thought I’d come out and have dinner with you, symbolically, but like this is good.
We have what? (Another hour.) Another hour. Thank you, thank you. Thank you so much. What do we do now with an hour? Just look at [each other] like that. My God. What is it that you like to look at one person so much? Just like a movie star, your favorite. You keep looking at the same film again and again. Yes, some movie stars, you don’t get tired from. But some are so tiring. Even if they have an Oscar and all that, I don’t dare to go. It’s always the same expression. Me too, but you don’t have to pay for it, so it’s OK. Well, my God, we could have gone on and on about dog- and cat-people, instead of coming here, sitting like dog- and cat(-people) ourselves. OK. (Chicken[-people] too.) Chicken(-people)? Oh, yeah. Quack!
The gym is supposed to be for the meditation hall, but because we are so many, they don’t use it. But you could use it anytime, sit and rest or something. Did they put carpet for you there already or not? (Yes.) They did? OK. Because I just told Tong last night – actually not last night, this morning about five o’clock – I said it’s empty, and some people… We don’t have chairs everywhere, so if you put a carpet in there, the kids can go in there, play and roll all over on the floor, whatever, for warmth, in case it’s cold outside. It’s nice to have an extra place to sit anyway. I’m sorry, you have to sit on the floor. Should we go in there and sit on the carpet? (No. No need.) No? (It’s OK.) Why? It’s the same? (Fresh air.) Fresh air? (Yes.) OK. It’s OK, it can be washed. Right? Actually, it is OK. It’s not that dirty, is it? Mostly nobody comes here. It’s only you who brings the dust here. It’s only a handful of residents who live here, they don’t make it dirty so much; they clean every day.
Wow, I’m very shy now, sitting here like this. I mean, caught unguarded like this, I was coming out to have dinner. Because I didn’t have breakfast, I didn’t have lunch, I didn’t have dinner. No, I ate late last night though after I saw you here at two o’clock. Because I said, “I don’t have anything to eat.” They just give me a vegan mixed grain powder, what a “scatterbrain.” It was too sweet. So they heard me and then they came and cooked something. It was delicious, it was vegan congee, Aulacese (Vietnamese) (vegan) congee and something they cooked well. There were two beautiful kids here, they cook so good, so good, that my attendant, she fired all the other cooks. The old and tried and trusted cooks, all got fired, because of these two girls, so young, I think 16 or something only.
They’re still in junior high; they cook so good. Tastes so delicious, maybe they cook with love. Well, actually love is not enough. You must have a mother who is an excellent cook as well. (Yes, yes.) And you have to really want to learn all the secrets – a little bit here, a little bit there. One little ingredient missing, the food is not the same. (Yes.) Sometimes, even though you study a recipe, but you don’t have the chef next to you and to tell you, “Just a little bit here and a little bit there.” Because mostly, in the recipe, they would tell you, “Two average carrots,” “four tomatoes…” But you don’t know what is the “average” carrot. How how big is the “average?” And how are the “four ordinary tomatoes?” Something like that. And if you buy a little bigger tomato or a smaller carrot, then it won’t taste the same.
Ah, talking about food. And the smell as well from the kitchen. Oh, it’s “killing” my stomach. Well, we have to pass time somehow, so we talk about it instead. Better than nothing. So, if you buy a little different, or you put just a little tiny bit less salt or more salt, a little, one or a few more drops of soy sauce, it tastes different. So, for your reference, I really taste many people’s cooking from my so-called recipe. I don’t recognize it at all. This one cooks different, that one cooks different. Ah, my goodness, and afterwards, I said, “Don’t ever mention my name when you cook this.” People will not buy my book or will not even talk to me if you cook like this.
Similarly, we the practitioners – now it comes to serious matter, not just food, you know me. This is just for the bait. Similar to us, we the practitioners, do not just sit there. We have all kinds of things. We have theory to study, we have precepts to keep, and we have meditation to practice. We also have... (Master to see.) Sure, sure, we have Master to see, that also. That’s a bonus. But we also have action. To put into action what we have learned. And to exercise our wisdom and power of spiritual achievement, and the compassion that we have developed together along with the spiritual improvement. Therefore, we do many things. We do not just sit there. We sit there. We contemplate on the Most High. We connect with the Power, Which is within ourselves, which is the highest of all beings. But then we also keep our moral standard high. We be a good person – be a good boy and a good girl. (Yes.) And then from the spiritual power inside, we develop love and compassion and wisdom also.
Wisdom so that we live a more comfortable life, and we live a simple living. And from simple living, we don’t have to work as hard as before, but earn even more, because one penny saved is one penny earned. So now you live more simple. You have more money than before, even though you work the same job. Or maybe work a less busy job, because you can organize your life. You can be content with whatever life gives, without wanting more and more things, costs you more trouble, more headache, more money. More money means more work. More work means more health-consuming, more time-consuming, more energy wasted. Instead of having time to meditate and directing energy to the good cause, we have to waste it on earning money and paying tax more because we earn more, or have to take care more, paying more for accounting and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah because we have too much work.
So now that we have a simple life, you see, we have more time. More time means more meditation, more wisdom. More time also means more charitable action. More happiness to everyone around us and for ourselves. More time also means less work. More healthy. More time for family members. (Yes.) More happiness within a marriage and family. You see so much good comes out of this spiritual practice. If the whole world people knew, they would forsake everything except to do meditation and follow our way of life, because this is really the only way of life that we should follow. Not that we forsake every other way of life, but by following this way of life we improve in every other way of life, and we enhance all kinds of other ways of life that we couldn’t have time for before.
Photo Caption: Greeting Saintly Souls With Love
