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Greatness Is Following Your Ideals

No. 729
Date: 2001.04.18,21,25
Place: Florida Center, U.S.A.
Occasion: Group Meditation
Language: English

Subtitles: Aulacese, Bulgarian, Chinese-S, Chinese-T, Croatian, Dutch, English, Filipino, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Norwegian, Sinhalese, Spanish, Thai, Turkish(21).

Highlights

When I was in Ireland, to go around preaching, you know, a taxi driver, I asked him, I said: "Long time I didn't eat Christmas pudding. I miss it very much. Do you know if there is anywhere we can have Christmas pudding and tea?" And he took me in the middle of the park somewhere next to Dublin, Oh, I eat 3, 4 heaps and he paid for them all. Yeah, but of course, I gave him tip more generous to cover it. Wow! That was the best Christmas pudding that I ever ate in my whole life. It was a cold day, and I traveled alone and hungry, and I haven't eaten it for years and it was a real Christmas pudding and it was not on Christmas, that was the best thing about it. And afterwards he said, "Are you the Master Ching Hai?" He should have asked me before that because I ate four heaps of Christmas pudding. And I was enjoying my anonymity. Let my hair down, Eat the way I should and drink three cups of tea. So, anyway, I don't say anything any more but I feel so embarrassed. He must have sit there, watching me in all amusement. Look at that Supreme Master, the way she eats her Christmas pudding like a hungry ghost!

Master has many dreams and aspirations, but there are not enough people with the same noble ideals. She has these encouraging words to share with us: As long as we stand firmly by our ideals, we can be great. That is the way with all great people, whose greatness comes from their firm adherence to their ideals, original goals and aspirations. If we do not pursue our goals to the very end, then we will achieve nothing. We can be great if we work with steady dedication.