M. Of course, you don't know until you try. But as you see, from our lining principles, you can see that, even if the Quan Yin method doesn't do you any good, or you are not certain of the benefit of the Quan Yin method, one thing you can be certain that it will do you no harm. No harm if you eat vegetarian diet, at least, you will be healthy, if you don't believe in any spiritual compassion at all. It is proved scientifically that vegetarian diet is healthy for you. All the hospitals in the world are built for the meat eaters. You know that! Most of the meat eaters are in the hospitals anyhow. Okay, one stand point.
The so-called five precepts are to protect you from the uneasiness of mind. Should you have only a very loving and one pointed relationship. You don't take what doesn't belong to you. You do not gambling, which causes misery to yourself, to your family and to others. You do not take alcohol and make your mind, your vision blurs. And if you take drugs, it is not good for you. So, for all this very apparent so-called material guidelines, as least you know our teaching, our method will benefit you somewhat. And from there you start. And you get to know better.
At least, we offer you somewhat immediate proofs of enlightenment. And at least, we don't cash any money for it, before, between, and after. You have no conditions, no binding whatsoever. Suppose even afterwards, you don't want us, we also don't do anything to you. Understand? So, in any ways, you don't lose anything, you will only gain. That is some symbolic things I can tell you. But moreover, you might use your intuitive wisdom to ascertain which path to follow. It doesn't matter what I say, you have to know it. Pray to your Inner Self, to God, to Jesus, to Allah, to Buddha, to whoever you believe, to help you to decide. And if you see a stronger pull to come to us, then you know it is for you. Should you do not felt it or you felt stronger pull into the world. All right. Then you are not yet ready. Understand? It is very simple.
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Q. Is it necessary to meditate two and half hours every day? Why?
M. We have to meditate two and a half hours because it is necessary to cleanse our soul, our infected areas, with a lot of elixir. Now, if you are dirty from a day's work, and you come home, you need two gallons of water, no less. Every day we mix in the world, and are infected by others, affected by everyone around us, and by our own unavoidable misdeeds. For example, when we breathe we kill a lot of invisible beings, when we eat vegetables, we kill vegetable lives. So the two and a half hours are like two gallons of water to wash our souls. If you wash with one and a half gallons, it is also okay, but you are not completely clean. Then tomorrow you will add again some more dirt, and you only clean with one gallon. Thus every day you are not completely clean, and you may smell one day. (laughter)
Q. Why does one need to meditate two and half-hours each day?
M. Just like you have to eat two or three hamburgers now and again. (Master and all laugh; applause) That is, more or less, the portion of food that you eat every day to sustain your body. So there is a portion of spiritual nourishment that you should take every day in order to become strong again in God, in Godlike qualities. You don't have to, but this is prescribed, the doctor's prescription, fixed amount.
It's more or less; it's not so strict. Besides, we can meditate in sleep as well. We can meditate on the bus, we can meditate on the airplane, meditate in the toilet, excuse me. (Laughter) Yes, yes, we can do so. We can do many jobs at the same time. There is always time to meditate. Cut down on some of the "unfavorite" television programs, read only the essential things in the newspaper; talk less on the telephone, then you'll have a lot of time; stay in bed a little bit less. Sometimes, we don't sleep, we stay in bed late in the morning, just turning around. (Laughter) That's the time we can meditate very wonderfully. Instead of tossing and turning, you just meditate, concentrate. That's it. Very simple. Instead of thinking all kinds of nonsensical things, you just concentrate. That's where your meditation is. You don't have to sit down and cross legs like the Buddha; you just lie there and concentrate. I'm showing you how to utilize your "lazy" time, oh, I'm sorry, (Master and all laugh) your "unproductive" time, or some other time in which you scatter your mind all over and you don't do anything. Those times we can gather together and remember God. Very easy.
Q. Specifically, what does Your initiation involve and once one is initiated, what would the day-to-day practice involve?
M. Okay. Yes. First of all, it's all free of charge and no binding involved, except that you have to bind yourself, should you want to continue to go further. Hmmm? So, the conditions - no experience required. Yeah? No previous knowledge about any yoga, or any meditation required. But then, you have to commit yourself to a lifelong vegetarian diet. No eggs. Milk okay. Cheese okay. Anything else without killing is okay. Egg because it also involves of half-killing, even though it's how to say... infertile. And also it has kind of quality to have a tendency to attract negative power. You know, that's why many people of the black and white magicians field, or many voodoo people - so-called voodoo, they use eggs to draw some of the entities from possessed persons. If you know it or not? You know? Oh, that's fantastic! At least, I have immediate proof, if not immediate enlightenment, for you. (Laughter) And after initiation... the time of initiation, you experience the light and the sound of God. Yeah? The music of the spirit, it draws you up to the higher level of consciousness. You will understand the taste of samadhi - the deep peace and joy. Yes. And after that, you continue to practice at home, if you are serious. If you are not, I cannot push you, I cannot bother you any more. If you continue and you want me to help you all the way, then I continue. If you do not... you see that's the way. And two and a half hours a day meditation. Wake up early in the morning.
Before you sleep, meditate two hours; and maybe half an hour in the lunch time. When I am not here to speak, you have one-hour lunch. You can hide away somewhere and meditate. That's already one hour. Yeah? And in the evening, you make one more hour or half an hour. In the morning, get up earlier one hour. Regulate more of your life, you know, less TV, less gossip, less telephone, less newspapers, then you have a lot of time. Yes, truly we have a lot of time but sometimes we waste away our time. Just like our car running in the backyard instead of going to Long Island, yeah. Are you satisfied with that? Or... ? Yes? Yes, and nothing more. No conditions for you, nothing else except you commit yourself to this lifelong practice. And everyday you experience different changes for the better, and different miracles for your life, not that you wish for it. It will happen anyhow. Understand? And then you truly experience what's heaven like on earth, if you are really serious about it. That's how many hundreds of thousands of our disciples still hang on, still hang on to me after many years, because they have better and better experiences, because they are serious about it and they do practice.
Q. If initiated, can one practice meditation an hour in the morning, half hour in the middle of the day and an hour at night? Does one have to meditate two and a half hours continuously a day?
M. No, no. You can separate it. You can do it on the bus, in the park, on airplane and the train, etc. to make up for the hours that you need.
Q. After initiation and if Master is not with us, if I have any problems with my meditation, what should I do?
M. The Master is always with you, hm. Master is not the body. We are wisdom. We are connected with the whole universe. And the master who is worth his name is omnipresent. So, whenever you are in trouble, the Master knows. And the Master is always helping you to progress. Whether you see the Master or not, it depends on your power of samadhi. Otherwise, Master is twenty-four hours awake and taking care of you. So don't worry, okay?
Q. Master, will there be someone to guide us in the Quan Yin meditation in Singapore in the initial stages?
M. Yes. I will leave a few monks or nuns here for you. Actually Quan Yin messengers. They don't look like monks. They look like me. They are ordinary like you. I will leave some of the people who have practice for a long time, who know the initial stages of practice, for you. Besides, you can always write to me. Nowadays, we have a fax machine. Don't worry. And the inner connection is always there, one hundred percent, never broken. So that is the best guidance.
And then later on, you don't have to rely on anyone, because you will get the answers from the inside, quickly and you know it. And the teacher will know where you are, what you are doing, and what kind of danger you are in, or what practice you need. From inside, teach from inside, not from the verbal.
Verbal is just ordinary thing, like we talk to each other, you know, have fun. Talk about some old stories to encourage you to practice, things like that. But verbal instruction is never a perfect teaching. The perfect teaching you can only find from inside, and that is between Master and disciple individually, for each one different inside. Even if you sit next to each other, you don't know what level he is or what the Master transmitted to him inside. All different, okay? Depends on each level.
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Q. I heard on some of Your tapes that You recommend not mixing practices. Perhaps You can clarify for us what You intended by that.
M. Only when it has anything to do with breath control; that is all. Otherwise, there is not much there. For example, there are many kinds of so-called meditation. People say anything is meditation, so we are confused. But actually there are different types. There is a kind of mantra practice; they recite something. People also call that meditation, so that's confusing. People tell you to pay attention to your breathing- you breathe in and breathe out, and that they also call meditation. Some people say you have to pay attention to the solar plexus, the abdomen, all the time; that they also call meditation. Fine, there is nothing wrong with that.
But we abuse the word "meditation" too much and confuse people; because otherwise, I would say that everyone meditates anyhow. This morning when some of the television interviewers said, "We are not used to meditation; we don't know what is meditation, and you tell us to meditate," I said "Yes, you meditate all the time; some people meditate on money, some people meditate on girls, some people meditate on drugs when they don't have enough of them." That's their meditation. When you pay attention to something to a very extravagant degree that is when you meditate.
Therefore, I say to you, "Be concentrated, be one-pointed with my teachings". That's why you get the best results. If you meditate on my teachings and meditate on money at the same time or meditate on a mantra at the same time, of course, you are divided and that's very logical. I am not a dictator. I just tell you what is good for you. Whatever you want to do, you have to pay all your attention to that point. Whether you meditate, you fix the car, or you drive a taxi, if you don't pay attention, you will get into trouble.
That's very simple, but people think I am forbidding you this and that. No, everything I tell you is just good advice as a duty of a teacher. Whatever you know, you have to tell them. Of course, you make the choice. If you don't follow my advice, it's okay. You are responsible for your actions, the success of your meditational practice. But I am responsible to tell you what is good for you, so don't misunderstand that it's a kind of prohibiting or dictating. Everything I tell you is the age-old essence of a practitioner who wants to get away from all the traps of this materialism and rise above this mind-matter controlling power so that he can realize there is something greater than his own body and his own machine brain, the computer.
That's it. All of these are kind of secret codes, secret methods, to speed yourself on the highway of spirituality. There is nothing dictating about that because if you don't do it, I will never say anything to you. I will never scold you. I will never ring you and say, "Hey, you didn't do it." Or I will never check up on it. It's all your choice. The path of freedom is a path of responsibility, self-responsibility, so I never impose anything. Just to suggest, just to tell you, "This is a good way. If you do it, you surely will get that. If you don't, okay, you'll get half or maybe three quarters."
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Q. If someone has taken the initiation already and after that they cannot practice or do what they have promised, is it a big sin and can they quit being a practitioner?
M. Sure they can, anytime. It's difficult to be a disciple but it's easy to quit. It's just that they stopped at that level they attained, and do not progress if they don't sincerely want to achieve a higher level, and if of course they committed sin, then they also would be handled like everyone else.