Like a Lotus Born from the Mud

Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai
San Jose, California, U.S.A. May 25, 1989
(Originally in English)

Why is it that the road to God is so narrow? Some even say it is like a razor's edge, so sharp and so difficult to walk on. It is because the road and the way to it are contradictory to our way of thinking and to our worldly desires and temptations. We have to swim in the ocean but we also have to protect our clothes from getting wet. That's how hard it is. We have to live in this world with all its temptations and struggles, and yet we have to maintain our discipline and purity like the lotus that is born from the mud, but is very pure, very clean, and very fragrant. We have to become saints in hell.

 

Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai
San Jose, California, U.S.A. May 27, 1989
(Originally in English)

The purpose of the negative force is to strengthen us. It is like the fact that without water we cannot learn how to swim, and we don't know how to swim. Without complicated highways, roads, and rules of driving, you cannot keep order in society, you cannot learn how to drive well. So, all the temptations from the negative force are meant for us to overcome, so that we can resist them, and become stronger and stronger-- stronger in will, and stronger in power.