Selected Questions and Answers

Being Healthy in All Areas of Life Minimizes Suffering

Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai, Videoconference with initiates from the Indiana Center, USA, September 1, 2002 (Originally in English) Videotape #753

Q: My question is about physical illness and physical pain: Are they tests or lessons that we go through?

M: They’re karma, but we can minimize them at any time. Number one, do spiritual practice: Get in touch with your healing power every day. Number two, maintain a healthy lifestyle. Number three, be happy at all times and see the positive aspects of all events. Number four, pray and meditate more and more each day to strengthen your physical, emotional, mental and spiritual being. You have to live healthily. And the vegetarian diet is the healthiest diet of all. That helps.♥

Politics and Spiritual Practice

Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai,
Videoconference with initiates from Singapore,
August 11, 2002 (Originally in English)
Videotape #745

Q: Why are all the government leaders and people who have achieved success in the world not pursuing spiritual practice? And why are the great spiritual practitioners not successful in political careers?

M: Maybe the government leaders are pursuing spiritual practice in their own way, but not openly. Not all of them do this, of course, but some do because they don’t want to broadcast it. So we don’t know. So if you see any good presidents, ministers or prime ministers, you should realize that perhaps in their own homes, in privacy, they practice some kind of spiritual discipline.

And regarding the second question about why spiritual people aren’t successful in politics, it may be because spiritual people don’t care very much about political achievement. Do you care? Do you want to be Prime Minister of Singapore? You can try! (Q: No!) See, you said, “No!” So how can you be successful if you don’t want to be? A spiritual person can be successful in anything he or she wants to undertake, but it’s just that most of the time we don’t want to undertake too much. We’re happy wherever we are and we do whatever is already assigned to us.

Similarly, perhaps some politicians are already in their positions, but nonetheless go out and try to find a way to practice a spiritual way of life. So they continue being politicians and practicing spirituality at the same time and sometimes you don’t know this.

So it’s OK. We don’t have to be successful in politics, but we can if we want to. It’s just that after practicing a spiritual method most of us don’t want to get involved in political affairs. Being in the political arena is a very difficult, strenuous job. It’s a big competition, and you have to be very much ‘out there’ in order to get the position you want. Sometimes if one’s a good politician one doesn’t have to use any tricks. But some bad politicians do have to use tricks in order to get to high positions. So most practitioners don’t like to go into that kind of place because they’re content being within themselves and doing whatever is necessary just to survive and continue their spiritual practice. It’s not that they can’t be successful; it’s just mainly that they don’t want to.♥

Make Your Life a Meditation

Spoken by Supreme Master Ching Hai,
Videoconference with initiates from Hamburg, Germany,
October 6, 2002 (Originally in English)

Q: Master, can you tell me how much I have to meditate each day to at least reach enlightenment in this lifetime?

M: You’re already enlightened; it’s just that you mean complete enlightenment. It depends on your own efforts. Even if I tell you, brother, I know you’re anxious to become a Buddha and that’s understandable, but the more anxious you are the less you can concentrate on your real goal. So the deal is this. Suppose I tell you, “If you meditate four hours a day or even ten hours a day you’ll reach complete enlightenment at sixty years of age,” it won’t come true either because during the four hours or ten hours maybe you sleep half the time, or someone disturbs you or you feel tired and you don’t really concentrate well. So it’s not about how much time you put in but about how much concentration you have.

Your question concerns many people, but just enjoy. Why hurry? Enjoy yourself on the road, enjoy the way on the road, on the way to Heaven; enjoy many other things and don’t think of the future and the past. Just think of the present.

Every day do your job well. That’s a kind of meditation. Every day treat people the way they should be treated, the way you want to be treated. That’s meditation. Every day help someone who’s in need and show your love and sympathy to someone who’s distressed. That’s meditation. Everything adds up.

Make your whole life a meditation, and then the whole of life is the process of enlightenment. It’s not enlightenment; it’s the process of it. It’s beautiful. Don’t leave us so soon. Suppose if you get enlightened and your karma is finished. Then you die and we cry and miss you very much. What should we do? If everyone is like you and the center is gone then who am I talking to now? [Master laughs]♥