So
to find God is something very natural because it's your true Self. There's
nowhere else to go look except within your Self. Without this our life
can never be happy. And then we will be running around always in this
cycle, just like recycled paper! Sometimes it's in different forms,
like people collect recycling material and sometimes they make it into
other, different forms, but it is still the same material. Likewise
our life has been recycled, recycled and recycled, all the same in this
suffering kind of existence and we can not even stay long. That's the
point! I told you it's a hotel. I come into the hotel, go into my room,
and I start unpacking my suitcase, and maybe pressing a little because
it's creased, so I look presentable to you, and put my jewelry here
and there and make it look all perfect like home, but I know it is not
my home. I have to go in a couple of days. Even then I have to do what
I have to do.
Similarly,
the spiritual practitioners are doing what they have to do in this world,
but they know it is not Home. Because they know what Home is. I just
came from my Home. I haven't forgotten it yet. So if we practice every
day spiritually, we will practice going back to the Kingdom of God,
looking at your new House, I mean your real Home, and then come back
here again, come back and forth again. Then you never forget. Even though
you came back to this material world; what I mean by come back, it is
not just like going and coming. It's just a way of speaking. This language
is not enough. So if we come and go every day, we will never forget
our real Home. And even though we are doing things in this hotel called
"life," we will never be attached to it , no matter how we
decorate it. Just like I decorate my hotel room, you know, I make the
bed and all that myself. I don't bother the maid. When I leave, I tell
them, "OK, now you can clean." Because I put things everywhere,
just so it's convenient for me to find. But I know it is not my home,
even when I decorate it.
But
if we don't know we have another Home, a true Home, we will always be
attached to this world, and we'll work and sweat, and feel so much suffering,
because we want to keep these things that we have here. And if we cannot
keep our things for any reason, then we have so much pain, so much attachment,
and we could die, die of suffering, die of pain. A lot of people lose
their money, lose their business, lose their home and they commit suicide.
Or they fall ill because of attachment to their possessions, but spiritual
persons will not feel moved even if they lose everything, because they
know they have something better.
There
is a joke I read on the Internet. It goes like this. There is a person
who is very wealthy, mucho dinero (Spanish for 'much money') and he
is dying. But he wants to take his possessions with him. He has so much
money, so much gold. He used money to buy gold and stacked it all over
in his house and he wanted to take it with him. And he was trying to
take it, but they said, "No, no, you cannot take this with you.
Everything you earn here belongs to this world. At the time of departure,
you leave everything behind; just go by yourself. Nothing! You came
with nothing. You go with nothing." Then the man felt so bad in
his heart, so he bargained with God, with the Angel of Death. "Please
go and ask God, the Supreme Master Ching Hai, whether I can take some
gold with me. I need it. I worked all my life for it. I cannot part
with it. Please!
So,
the Angel of Death felt sorry for him. He shook his head, felt sorry
for the ignorant man and said, "OK, when I visit him, I'll tell
Him." So after God looked down and saw this pitiful state of his
being, he said, "OK, let him take it. It's OK. Don't worry."
So the dying man made a big bag and stacked as much gold as he could
carry, and then at that moment, he died. He died, and took his bag of
gold to the pearly gates of Heaven. And St. Peter said, "Oh, what
is it that you carry in that? You are not allowed to take anything from
Earth to Heaven. Do you know that? " And the guy said, "But
I have spoken to the Supreme Master Ching Hai. She said it's OK."
So, St. Peter said, "Really? OK, I'll go check." So, he went
in and asked the Master, "You really allowed this guy to take something
from Earth here?" The Master said, "OK, he is just a poor
man. Let him, Let him."
So,
St. Peter came back and said, "Yeah, yeah, you did. You did have
permission, OK, but I still have to check what you brought with you.
" So the man opened the bag, and he looked inside. He said, "Oh,
that's that! You brought the pavement, pavement, for the road! (Audience
laughs and applauds) Yeah. You got it? OK. Well, just in case you didn't,
some kids didn't, in Heaven, they use gold to pave the roads. Yes. And
the diamonds we like so much here, they use to build walls, on the pavement
or the path, whatever.
So,
we walk on gold and diamonds and rubies. And all the trees are precious
jewels. All the leaves, everything, they look like jewels but they are
not like solid. They look beautiful, but they are not like piercing.
It's just a very beautiful substance. These are the real gold and diamonds.
The diamonds here can hurt you. Even though they are forever, they are
not. You can destroy them, but the diamonds and gold in Heaven, you
can not. That's where we came from. We came from beautiful palaces.
We came from a precious abode. We came from freedom. We came from loving
and kindness, and we degrade it into the stage of what we are at right
now, with the suffering, and the pitiful helplessness of human existence.
But we don't have to stay like this because we have treasure inside
ourselves. "Lay not up your treasure on Earth, but in Heaven."
How do we do that? Find it again. Find the treasure in Heaven, the real
jewelry that we have inside; the real glory of our true Self.
I
am just here to show you that part, nothing else. That is very important.
So if you'd like to, we will have time to show you and guide you through
the initial steps until you have found your true Self again and are
happy here and ever after. Thank you. (All applaud)