Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai, worldwide broadcast videoconference with Supreme Master Television staff and global audience, Los Angeles, California, USA, December 31, 2011
(Originally in English) (DVD#993)

First of all, I want to wish all of you and the audience and the world a very, very happy, lucky, vegan New Year. And I think I have tried everything.

I don’t know if anything else I should say because I have said a lot already. It’s not what I say, it’s what we apply. And it’s not only what I say, it’s also if anyone listens or not. But nevertheless, it is New Year, and since you request, we say something. One more time won’t hurt. Even Buddha has already said everything. Buddha has tried his best to sacrifice everything for us. Jesus gave up his life for the world. Also, Guru Nanak, Mahavira, Prophet Muhammad, Peace Be Upon Him, etc. So many Masters, so many great saints and sages have told us everything already, New Year or old year.

It’s not just because of the New Year that we should be happy and celebrate, but we should start like a new resolution, a new lifestyle, if we haven’t tried it in the past year. Every time it’s the New Year, we should make a vow to begin our new life. Everything that we don’t like about the past year, from ourselves or from our environment, we should change. All the sages have told us already to live and let live, and to love all beings as oneself. This is a time to begin to reflect whether we have done that or not. The Buddha, Jesus, and all the Masters have told us to live a compassionate life, yet when we commemorate Buddha’s birth even on that day, many Buddhists still have lunch eating dead animal flesh. At Christmas, or often at any Prophet’s birth celebration, many still do the same, killing and making suffering for humans and animals, because humans misinterpret; they misunderstand all the loving messages of the Masters, either knowingly or unknowingly. All other sages and saints have endured hardship and sacrificed everything to remind us of a more compassionate way of life.

I hope in the New Year, all of us try to vow to do our best as well to follow their example, to repay their kindness, to save our lives and the lives of all on the planet. It is our duty, actually, to do that.

Because you see, disasters happen everywhere nowadays. Every time you turn on any television, it’s only about war or disaster, most of the time. It just breaks my heart to even watch TV. We cannot say, “It’s okay in my area or my country, there’s no disaster. I celebrate New Year, nothing happens.” It happens elsewhere. And you will always ask me, like everyone else would ask me, “Why… Why does it happen in Africa? Why doesn’t it happen where I live?” It’s because we are all one. You see, the whole world community is connected. So disaster doesn’t necessarily break out in a particular place. It breaks out elsewhere, somewhere that already has some potential for disaster, or in vulnerable areas. For example, if you eat something that is not good, the pimple breaks out on your face. It’s not breaking out, maybe, in your stomach, or on your hand, or in your mouth, because you keep putting the food in it, but it breaks out on your face. Or if you have a digestion problem in the stomach, it affects your brain, and you get a headache. Or if a mother smokes while pregnant, the fetus inside her womb suffers from poor blood circulation, for example. Or, when he or she is born, the baby has sometimes Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, as we all know very well. And if the parents are smoking in the house, the children sometimes have trouble. Even if not too much in youth, after 50 years of age, they have trouble with the lungs or breathing system. So the consequences include long-term effects.

Thus, if we continue with the killing of man and animals, then disasters will break out elsewhere or right where we live, personally affecting us, our family or the surroundings or the neighborhood. Remember, in the Bible, the story of David the King: He forced the wife of one of his subordinates to become his wife and then killed the husband, and Heaven punished with disaster for his country. That is even stated in the Bible. But how many Christians would consider that as the law of cause and retribution? That is the law of cause and retribution. That is the, “What you sow, so shall you reap.” So there’s no need to say it’s only Buddhist doctrine that says that, or Jainism or Sikhism or Hinduism or even Islam. All the Prophets have told us to do good things and be good, but would we try now to follow their example?

Since this may be the last time I have the chance to speak to all of the world audience via multi-channel television, and in this way, I might as well tell you all this. Because we are all one, there’s no differentiating where the problem will break out. If somebody does some bad things here, the problem might break out elsewhere. So do not keep asking me why disasters happen in poor countries. People in poor countries suffer more because these are vulnerable areas. Just like your face is more sensitive, so if your digestion system is no good, you have pimples all over your face. Your face doesn’t eat anything. Your face doesn’t have anything put on it, just nice and nutritious cream, or not; but even then, the pimples break out on your face because you don’t have enough purity in the blood, because you have a digestion problem, because you eat too many things that are not good or are not constructive to your blood’s purity. And sometimes, you eat something in your mouth, but your liver has problems. And sometimes someone has a cut here, but then he has infection elsewhere. It goes into his liver. Or the person smokes here on his mouth, but his lungs will have cancer, for example. And if he eats meat too much or too much fat and so on, the heart will have problems. It’s because the whole body is one. Similarly, the whole world is one. So, disaster will happen here, or it will happen there. It’s the same. It’s a warning for humanity as the consequence of actions that we took.

I have also done my best all these years to try to remind everyone of the same message, that we have to be loving and kind. Probably I have said more than enough of what should be said. So it’s up to everyone now to decide the course of their lives, which are also linked to all others’ lives and to the survival of this planet. I do pray at the New Year’s Eve that everyone chooses the wise path of the saints and sages, which is love and respect for all beings on the planet, so that they themselves will also be loved and respected in Heaven, now and hereafter. By the way, I thank all of you who wrote to me about the changes in your life, that you have turned back to your own Self, your glorious and original Nature, which is loving kindness. I thank all of you who are bettering your own life and in turn bettering the world by cleaning up society with your own example by, for example, quitting smoking, stopping gambling, refraining from intoxicants, choosing vegan, helping others in any way you can, etc. I thank all of you for all that, the audience and the world’s people, the leaders and citizens of the world, all alike. I pray God to bless your sincere effort to be good and do good and continue in this noble way of life.

This year, I did not have the heart to celebrate Christmas while knowing that again and again, billions of innocent animals of all kinds, from the sea to the forest, are massacred for this occasion. Jesus was a compassionate Master, the Son of God, and we who follow Jesus should be the same. Also, there’s so much turmoil in the world, it just wouldn’t help my heart to feel happy in any way. I was, at Christmastime, in the mountains, very deep in the mountains. There was no water, no electricity there, and I meditated day and night before Christmas, and also after Christmas. It’s just because at the New Year I thought, Okay, I’d go down to the city where there is a little facility to contact you, talk to you, maybe for the last time. I don’t mean last time-last time, but when we’re together like this, and also that I could talk to the whole world like this, maybe for the last time.

And then we all will have to go into deep meditation. We have talked enough. I mean, everyone has grown up and understood things. We don't have to talk a lot in order for people to understand. It is the practice of the knowledge. It’s not the talking much. Anyone who has a caring heart would understand my message, even spoken once, because they cannot also bear all this suffering caused to humans and animals alike. You know very well.

So, and by the way, for the Supreme Master Television staff around the world, and in the headquarters there, I thank you all. It has been a privilege to be working with you all these years. Together, maybe we have caused a little good change in the world. Too little, too little for us to celebrate anything; but for whatever little change we have caused in the world, I thank Heaven and all of you for your good effort. May God bless you forevermore. Thank you, forever. I also congratulate those who have realized that life is not just about getting a diploma, getting a job or getting married, begetting children, and then die. So, though this is what our system seems to emphasize and encourage for everyone, life does not start here when we are born, or end when we are dead. And enlightenment is only the beginning.

Congratulations also to those brave and wise beings who float above all shackles and temptations designated to ensnare the pure souls into physical, emotional, and mental slavery, to so much sorrow and trouble that they forget their true great Self, forgetting to soar higher into the higher spiritual dimension, forgetting to go back Home to their great original Abode. Again, I tell you, enlightenment is only the beginning. The journey will continue, full of wonder and miraculous encounters and discovery for those who truly want to know the miracle of life, and the real love from the universe and from your heart. I take this opportunity to remind all fellow beings, here and elsewhere in the universe, to continue striving for noble ideals, the lofty goals of peace and unconditional love. Even if you fail, please try again and again, until you succeed. And succeed you will, sooner or later. The sooner the better, because you will know things that you never thought you would know before, when you uplift yourself into a higher spiritual understanding. You thought you knew already everything – some might think like that. No, no, no. Even I don’t know everything yet. I mean, how much can our brain accumulate and digest? Even if I know everything, I have to take out some that I need every day. I cannot sit here and say, “Now I know everything already.” I cannot know everything at one go; It’s all in store for us. We have to meditate deeply in order to realize the spiritual splendor and treasure that we have within ourselves, that has lain dormant there, life after life, unused, or very little used. I wish all of you good luck with the new start for betterment in the New Year, and I embrace you all with my love and best wishes. I will continue to meditate and pray for us all. Love love.

Oh, by the way, please, all of us, at least our Association members, please be more diligent in your spiritual practice. Forsake all else except the necessary duties to your families and the world. Save time for meditation for World Vegan, World Peace.

I love you all−disciples and non-disciples, animals, trees, rocks, and the planet−I love you all, so much. Even if I don’t see you again, you are all in my heart, and in my meditation and in my prayers. Happy Vegan New Year, to you and to all! And I love you very much. I love you all with all my heart.

To watch the Supreme Master Television program with Master’s New Year 2012 message, please visit: http://video.suprememastertv.com/daily/2012.01.02/BMD1936.wmv

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