One has to find a balance. I don't say that when you leave it you forget all about the dharma or practice, but there have to be times when you throw yourself into it, and then there are times when you just relax and realize that wherever you go, you cannot get out of the dharma.

Obviously the dharma is every breath we take, every thought we think, every word we speak, if we do it with awareness and an open, caring heart.

The thing to do in this lifetime is to create more merit.

It's very important to realize that every person that you meet, everything that you do, with the right attitude and a little awareness and skillful means - we can transform everything - all our joys and sorrows.

Basically, I feel to spend the rest of my life doing retreat.

I think, for East and West, the first thing we need is a good grounding in basic Buddhadharma.

Each of us has something to do in this lifetime. We all have negative emotions to be purified and positive emotions to be cultivated. All of us need to reconnect to our source and drop our personal stories, don't we? Men, women, old, young, from here, from there - it is the same. All you can do is your practice. There is nothing else. Don't get caught up. Don't stop. We have to learn how to get out or our own way. Because ultimately, the only thing standing in our way is ourselves.