Spoken By Supreme Master Ching Hai Group Meditation in LA, CA, USA
March 13, 1994 (Originally In English)          

The ego is a terrible thing. So what we should fight, what we should criticize, what we should be on guard with...it is the ego not the other person. It is enough to take care of ourselves and control our own temper, and bad habits and all kinds of ego tricks. Never mind if we left it unguarded and then go attack a neighboring country. You know, you don't have enough army to even protect our own country so don't attack other country. That is the problem with us.

It is just like a strategy in war. Only if people attack us then we use our defense. Otherwise we don't need to spend so much money on army, first. Second, if our defense is not enough, don't attack other country because you'll murder yourself, you commit suicide. But that's what we do all the time. We don't guard our own country, the five senses, the deadly enemy. We don't guard ourselves; we don't guard our mind; we don't guard our thinking; we don't guard our talk.

You just try to watch other people. And even if that person is really bad, you are taking in all the bad things because you pay attention to it. Just like you're receiving things; otherwise, how do you know it is there? If you open a door and ask five persons to come in, you have to have them. If they are outside, you don't notice them, you don't ask them in. You don't have
 them in your house. Is that not so?