Venerable monks on Walk For Peace address Raleigh
Respected Mahasanga
Respected governor city council and a state rep representative and
all these government officials
Hello everyone
How are we today Today is 91 days that we
have walked
And today is so special
You know why it's so special Hm
In this cold weather it's freezing
And all of us here coming out just for this
same mission piece
This is way way beyond what I expected
And more than that
The first state
That we have our governor to join and actually read
the proclamation with us
Many other state uh governor also given out the proclamation
but unfortunately they have duties to do do so they
won't be able to uh they didn't make it on
that day but today is special that we have our
governor governor with us so that is one of the
special things for us too
Thank you so much
Earlier the governor said Thank you for 1,000s and 1,000,000s
of all the residents in North Carolina
To join this mission and I'm here assured that North
Carolina don't have to go to work at all
Because it's been over a weeks
I don't know where you come from
And you have to work or not but you are
coming out for us every single day from morning until
nighttime
This is so amazing that we don't have to do
anything just come out for peace
But I hope that you will go back to your
normal life later but With a different different
Thought diff in my set
From this moment on
We are coming out even though in this weather is
because we have the same
Goal which is peace for ourselves and then for our
nation
For this universe
Is that right So are we willing to walk on
this journey for the rest of our life with the
venerable monks That being said After this moment
After this talk We will have to live
In mindfulness In our daily life
Because this is the practice as we already heard
And I have talked about this many times
This is not something that we brought it to you
We brought it to this nation not to this world
We also practice for our own peace
And we are here just to brought the key for
all of you to open that box where you have
locked peace and happiness in it for a long time
and you have left it somewhere and forgotten it
We are here just to hand you the key but
the person who have to unlock it
Which is yourself
No one else can do this for for us either
even AI nowadays
OK
We still have to do it our own
It means We have to practice
Every day diligently
Of course we have to go to work
We have to make a living for ourselves and our
family
But we still have a lot of time left
Instead Of surfing the internet with your lovers
Your cell phone
Instead Of going around doing different things we spend more
time to practice mindfulness for ourselves
Because this is something will lift us up to help
us liberate all kinds of sufferings
Especially in this world where we live in right now
There's a lot of things going on
A lot of disasters as well
And we don't know when it's our turn
Which we don't want to wait for that moment isn't
it We have to be prepared
And so when that day comes We were not afraid
We are living in this world and the technologies and
everything's moving so fast
Way too fast
And we are here trying to chase after it
And the more we chase
The tired we are Are you tired yet We tired
In our family In our family And the worlds around
us
And earlier Governor Manson
We have to open up
We have to check on our neighbors
We are not living in this world alone
We have every everybody's around us
Look at right now how many people here
We cannot count now
We have different backgrounds
We have different faiths different beliefs
Different skin colors different languages we speak
But we all be able to come here together in
this weather in front of this Capitol just to support
the mission of peace
It means that there's no difference between all of us
Because we have the same blood color which is red
the same taste of tear which is salty
We have no different It's regardless of what religions we
practice but we should be grateful that there are so
many religions in this world to serve every single one
of us
After all that practicing
We still have one comment
Religions that all all the human beings are worshiping every
day which is the religions of peace loving kindness and
compassion
That we are seeking for every single day and we
worshiping every single day and that temple is within our
mind
Is that right So this is something that we should
care for ourselves
We should love our show more to bring that into
action to practice instead of just a saying
We've been hearing those peace loving kindness and compassion a
lot
On paper on banners
On the windshield
Everywhere But yet we have not take that into action
This is the call
This is the time where all of us have to
walk together in spirits by practicing
To make that happen
So that peace can begin within our world
Inside world
Each and every single one of us have our own
world
And that will have all kind of sufferings
That will have all kind of wild animal
Inside of our world which is our mind all kinds
of bad thoughts all kind of Hate anger
Delusion greedy everything
We have all everything in our mind
And when we are not mindful enough We could kill
ourselves
We could kill the others
We could hurt ourselves and hurt the others
Our mind is super sharp
It's sharp more than the knife
And we if we are not clever enough To hold
the handle of the knife
But we hold the knife we will hurt ourselves
And hurt the others
So we must be clever we must be mindful to
know when you are holding the handle instead of the
knife
And of course in this life like my I mentioned
we are not mindful
That is why we always react when the world is
throwing lemon and bitter melons and rock at us
Is that right We react a lot
And every single time we react we suffer
We cry
We become anxiety
Depression
And then when there's time that you cannot
Bear those feelings
You commit to suicide
A lot of people a lot of children a lot
of teenagers nowadays cannot bear those feelings because our mind
is weaker and weaker every day
We are not mindful with our action our speech
Our thoughts And the key for us to share nothing
more than just our breath
Within our breathe our breath right here
We live in this world with every breath going in
and out every second
And of course we breathe just like a machine like
a robot to live to survive
We never pay attention to our breath
To see if it's long or short
To see how it go in and go out
We all live with the past
And live with the future
Always thinking about the past and chase the future but
never stay at this present moment which is here and
now
When here and now this present moment is really something
that we need in life
Without this I might just keep heading out there
On everything
Any movement Anything's happened surround us we will head there
We would catch that object and we forgot our ourselves
We forgot our breath
And this is what we do in every single day
That is why we suffer
I have seen this suffering so much surround me in
Fort Worth Texas
Where I reside
And where I travel around the world to to do
disaster relief with my foundation
I have seen so much so much and so much
sufferings physically
Materials But especially mental
With mental health
Mentally suffering is something that all of us have
And this is something that we need to change
We need to fix it
Otherwise we'll go back to our old days and continue
sufferings
With the year of 2026
We should do something better for ourselves
And as a human being
We deserve better We don't have to live like that
With sufferings We can be better
We can live happily peacefully every day
But it's required effort
Requires some energy from us to put in
In order for us to have peace
If we cannot have peace for our own world there
will be no world peace
If all of us here in North Carolina
can have peace in each and every single family
This whole state of North Carolina will be at peace
Do you believe that Peace always begins from within
We already know that
So when we practice mindfulness which is our breath
This is when you bring peace for yourself
By focus
Aware of each breath going in each breath going out
within this nostril
Pay attention to it
Just put awareness to that breath going in
Awareness of that breath going out just like a gatekeeper
sitting right here
That gatekeeper will count we know who's going in who's
going out
Just mindfully knowing each breath going in and each breath
going out
That's all we need to do
But do not force our breath to be long or
short
Just breathe normally like what we are breathing how we
breathe right now
And when we breathe in
We can also count or say in silently
we breathe out say out silently
And then when thoughts arise that wild animal inside of
our mind and I always say the monkey mind
This monkey mind is within us
That monkey mice would jump here and there
If you are from India
Yeah that monkey might probably can go back to India
just like that that quick
To have some chapati some roti and come back here
and then done
Or I Vietnam I can just go back to Vietnam
and have someone sell which is like Pizza or something
like that
Things like that
Our mind is always thinking of all those things in
our life rapidly
So within any thought pop up within our mind
What we should do is aware of that thought acknowledge
of that thought observe it
And bring your concentration back to this breeding again
Don't try to push it away
Don't try to eliminate it
Just bring your concentration back after you acknowledged that thought
Back to the breathing and then breathe in breathe out
that monkey might jump again
Acknowledge it come back here
Acknowledge it come back here come back come back come
back
Keep bringing it back
That is the point because we don't have a habit
of bringing our concentration back to this present moment
Because we always had it out there remember That is
why we now we train ourselves to have a new
habit
To come back to this present moment which is with
each and every breath going in and out
If we can do that We will know what is
going on with our mind our thoughts
We will not chase after it again anymore
And then when you hear any noise any type of
sound just acknowledge the sound sound sound silently and come
back here with the breathing again
Sensation on this body
Itchy numb pain anything on this body to acknowledge is
itchy itchy numb or feeling feeling feeling come back here
Observe it acknowledge it come back here
That is very simple
And when you see something Just acknowledge that oh you
see see object object
You don't have to question you don't have to follow
that object
But when you practice meditation like this your eyes should
be closed
So we cannot see anything just focus in here
But don't use your eye to look down to this
nostril OK It's gonna make your your headache
Seriously if you use even when yogi when they practice
they close their eyes like this but they cannot see
their breath yet
They tend to look down using their eye look down
to this to this nose to see the breath
The more they do it the more that this head
will be tense and then become headache
So don't just your mind aware of each breath go
in and out
Even if you cannot see your breath at the beginning
it's OK as long as you know that there's breath
going in and out
There's another method to support you because at the beginning
when we don't have that habit yet our minds will
just running and running and running just like the horse
The horse is always going on the same track right
Keep going back to the old track
Our mind is the same
Keep going back to the old habit
That's how the mind works
And so When you breathe in you can also count
one
Silently
Breathe out
Count 1 silently
In 2 out 2 in 3 out 3 in 4
out 4 in 5 out 5 and then start from
11 to 66
And then start from 11 to 77
Start again from 11 to 88 11 to 99 and
11 to 10:10 and then reset from 11 to 55
again
OK
Let us try that
OK let me count focus OK Breathe in count one
One 2 2 4 4
You still focus wow
You get what's going on here I skip 3
It means We are not mindful That's why you miscount
And when you miscount you have to start again from
11 to 55 again
Until you get it right
OK
Keep that in mind because this mind
It will get bored very quickly when you just sit
in there and then breathe in and breathe out because
the monkey likes to jump
OK
So now that you add one more job to the
mind breeding counting 2 jobs for the mind a little
bit more fun to it
So it will be better to concentrate
So this practice is to help us to concentrate on
this present moment right now in here
That is how we have peace for ourselves just like
the monks walk 90 days
At the beginning there are people just stood there on
the road and looked at the monks with tears
There are people driving and then when they saw the
monks walk they pull over and they get out of
their car
Walk towards the monk stand there and look at the
monks
And pay respect to the monk or just simply just
look at the monk on each and every step they
make
That is the time when They slow down they take
a moment of break they stop from doing everything just
to come back within
That is when they touch their heart that why do
I have to rush every day Why do I have
to run so quickly every day And now that I've
seen something in front of me
Which is the monk walking
Peacefully mindfully with each and every steps
That is when it touched our heart
That is when it reminds us to slow down
It reminds us to practice mindfulness instead of heading heading
out there every single second every single time
When you cannot have peace for yourself there will be
no peace for your family
And guess what The family is always the problem for
us
We could be really nice to our friends and to
the people outside
But we always react to our parents and to our
family members
Is that right Why is that Because we have we
give ourselves a right
We gave ourselves the right that My parents they are
my parents they are my brother and sister they are
my husband and wife
They should know me better
They should know my personality
I'm like this I'm like that
So they shouldn't say things like that
They shouldn't do things like that
We always give ourselves that right
But when you go out with your friends and the
people outside When they hurt you when they say something
to you you didn't react that way
So is that right or wrong That shouldn't be because
your parents are the one who gave you this life
Your family if anyone in this world can leave you
Can hurt you but I don't think your parents and
your family would
is always out from out of love that they say
something they do something is to show us how they
care
Right So we should be mindful in our family first
and practice this every day when you practice to have
peace
Your family will be at peace as well because they
don't have to see you this uh stressed out
They don't have to see your frustration face
Then they will smile they will be at peace as
well
And then every morning When we wake up Please remember
my statement
That you have to write this down
With a pen and a paper
Today is going to be my peaceful day
Just write that down even you have listened to my
talk for the last 90 days
It's OK
Just write it down because this is very powerful when
you use your hand and your head at the same
time
It will remind you
A lot better So right now today is going to
be my peaceful day
And then read it over and over with our eyes
Read it out loud to the universe to tell the
universe that today is going to be my peaceful day
so that no one in this world can mess it
up
Except our show
We are the only one who can mess our days
up
No one else
Regardless of what they say or what they do
If you don't let it Your day will be peaceful
And we what we've been doing is just let people
control us
Let people play around with us just like a doll
Whenever they say something we act right away
Whenever they do something we act right away
We encounter into many fights already verbally and physically
And then 3 places for us to go which is
hospital
Jail And funeral
After we encounter a fight
We shouldn't be
Right So every day we should purify our mind just
like Who's in here that have a mirror in your
bathroom Everybody have a mural right You've seen yourself every
day every morning at nighttime
In that mirror Are you checking your pimples or what
We can see ourselves in that mirror
But who's in here That after you wash your face
after you brush your teeth And all those spots water
and toothpaste on that mirror
How many of us actually use a paper or a
towel to wipe it off right away Please raise your
hand
Well not many people
About 20 people out of 1,000s
So how many of us wait for a week How
many of us will wait for a month and then
clean Well either 1 week 2 weeks or a month
month
Let me tell you something
When that those spots water and toothpaste stick on your
that mirror you can clean it right off very easy
and quickly right But if you don't want for most
of us we don't want to do that
We want to wait
I will do it later
It's OK
It gets my mirror my bathroom
And then days after days you cannot see yourself clearly
anymore
Now that you have to try hard to clean it
off
Now that you have to go to Home Depot Walmart
and Lowe's to get chemicals and wipes
Spend some money right there and how much effort that
I want to ask you how much effort that you
need to put into clean that mirror at that time
A lot more Way a lot more effort
Those spots are just like greedy mind delusion mind hatred
anger all those things happening in our life that is
not desirable that is not happy
All those things
Those are those what I call spots
And we recorded it in our mind
We left it there
It adds up every single day
And we don't want to clean it But super easy
when it come to you
All you need to do just let it go right
away
They won't bother you anymore but no you don't want
to do that
You want to hold on into it
Because you're afraid when you let go you have nothing
to hold
When you let go of something you have nothing else
to hold that's what you're afraid of
But The more you hold it tight the tighter and
the chauffeur you are
And now that the monks are walking to remind you
There's so many things within our heads now
It's time to purify it
It's time to clean it
Now that we need to spend a lot of effort
to clean those spots
Is that right So we need time to change ourselves
Just like you do in the garden
How many of us here have a garden a beautiful
one Is there any weed Probably a lot of weeds
If you see a weeds pop up
It's OK
I will take care of later
And then one after another grow
Later the whole garden you don't see any flowers left
but weeds
Just like our mind our practice
If we don't If we have not if we are
not mindful enough to see all those wheat to pick
it up we let it grow soon
Our mind we will live with all kinds of sufferings
all kinds of unwholesome things
But all those wholesome things
They cannot survive within our mind
Because all those weeds already covered the whole garden
So today In front of all of you
I respectfully ask
All of us will take this seriously
Into action And some of us right now are sidetracked
with something up there
Is that right We are that easy to be sidetracked
If you listen to me right now the eyes cannot
see up there but when you see up there you
cannot listen to me
That is how our mind works OK So we already
spent hours to come out here
Shouldn't waste our time
OK
Be mindful be mindful with it
And now after you tell the universe that today is
going to be my peaceful day
Now we have to work on it
Every day please be mindful on every little thing you
do eating drinking changing sweeping cleaning cooking anything just one
thing at a time
Do not multitask yourself anymore
Who's on here that multitask
All of us
We multitask ourselves and that's why we have no concentration
Because our minds like this right Cannot focus on one
thing
So please practice on that
Do not multitask anymore and liberate your lover for as
much as you can
I mean your cell phone
Let them go as much as you possible lock her
and he or him up and put them in the
Draw or something
OK you have to
And please don't take them into the bathroom and talk
Why when I say this and you are laughing so
loud and because all of us are doing that
We are doing this every single day
The bathroom is something that is
Private for yourself and your lovers
You just bring your lover into it and whispering the
whole time while people shivering waiting for his or her
turn out there
And when you're not mindful you drop your lover in
that boat
And now you have to get a new lover
You waste a lot of money
So don't Don't live with your lovers way too much
Even if you have to check on Walk for Peace
it's OK
You can do that later
OK
At nighttime one hour before bed
No lovers
Whatsoever no lover one hour before bed
This is very important
Because when you check on your lover and live with
your lovers all those defilement mice will stay with you
you probably cannot go to sleep
And if anything happened Within your lover you'll be stressed
You cannot go go to sleep
In the middle of the night when you wake up
Please don't pick up your lovers
Try to go to sleep or get something to read
until you go to sleep
Or you breed And in the morning when you wake
up please no lovers either
Instead just get a piece of paper and a pen
out and write that statement down
Today is going to be my peaceful day
Take care of your bed
Fold all that bed sheet and everything nice and neat
This is very important to train yourself
OK
Make it look beautiful nice and neat like before you
go to bed
And now you have to go to the toilet but
without lover because you need to brush your teeth right
And then when you go to the toilet to brush
your teeth please wipe it off all those toothpaste and
water on the mirror so you can see yourself better
Reflects Right Got out from that toilet still no lovers
Practice breeding
Practice breathing and then exercise and breakfast
Now you can have your lover's back
But limited
That's all we need to do every day to create
peace for ourselves and for our family
Let us all stay together one time
Today is going to be my peaceful day OK After
I count to 3
Say it out loud to tell the universe that 1
23
You you hear that it's so beautiful for me it's
so so beautiful
You know each and every one of us every single
day when we wake up we just do that one
thing and be mindful with throughout your day
If all the people in this country and around the
world doing the same thing to spread that message to
the universe instead of hate instead of anger instead of
greedy instead of delusion all kind of that all kind
instead
We just only spread that message to the universe
That universe will receive it and shower back down with
all love and kindness and compassion and peace so this
world will be a better place for our future generation
and for ourselves to live
That is how we change this world altogether
Not anyone not a single person nor our venerable monks
can do this but every single one of us will
be the history maker
Can we all do that Thank you so much
May you all be well be happy and be peaceful
One last thing that I would like to request
But I have to tell you you're very beautiful
You know why I was thinking about when we walk
from uh the lunch place you here
You're awesome because you're not trying to pass the monk
and walk on the side of the monks
You walk behind us that is so beautiful
The reason why we don't want any walkers to join
us because so many problems going on
First secondly when you walk there are thousands and thousands
of people patiently lining up on two sides of the
road
They all they needed to to see the monks walk
by so they can offer us and they can pay
respect and to support the venerable monks on this mission
It means they wholeheartedly Pay attention to the monks
And when we walk side by side with the monks
because we walk you walk you rush through the crowd
you break that atmosphere
The environment is not calm anymore so that will ruin
everything because this is walk for peace
It's not any type of concert or anything like that
but walk for peace
So everything must be calm
and peaceful to support every single one
Not just ourselves OK This is how we live together
and this is how the world should be
So please be mindful in every little thing we do
and when you go home After this moment when you
go home this is a test
Your piece will be very easy to be fragile
Because now you have to rush home because of the
weather
Now that you have to rush cross through so many
people there are some pushing
Be mindful with your peace
Be mindful with when you walk when you drive
Otherwise your day will no longer a peaceful day
Like that
Today is my peaceful day that sign right there with
the sunflower
It will not be your peaceful day anymore if you
fail this mission when you walk out of this area
OK
Thank you so much everyone
Thank you so much
Thank you Monte
Before we conclude this peace gathering
I know Many of you are waiting for blessing strings
But weather is getting bad
So All of us want to go from here very
soon
Therefore I would like to request venerable monks
To Do a group blessing rather than individual blessing OK
OK
The pole sagayan dewada no eww
Sayazozagalebalabanda pole
Nogabani deaginaagina nigadawanalabanda
bawatu zapa manalang lagandozaadewatazababoan
Bazaldozawazawenazadaodozawazaba
Farnazadao
In uh our tradition when we receive the blessing or
do any type of wholesome things we always rejoice with
the meritorious deed
So by saying Sahuwiam S A D H U
S A D H U
OK that's means satu
I rejoice with this meritory lease with the venerable monks
That's how we get the same benefits with the venerable
monks after walking 91 days
So let us all put our hands together to say
satu 3 times so that we can get that benefits
and all the beings around us as well
Let us all share this merit to all of them
son
Thank you everyone
Thank you everyone for being here and now
Let's go home and stay warm and remember today is
our peaceful day
Thank you all
Hey let's go