My very dear one,
Thank you very much for the news about your daughter. I am so happy to find out that she is very concerned about cows. They have to suffer so much. People use them for meat, as well as for milk and other things. So that means the mother suffers giving birth to the baby calf, and then it has to separate from the calf. There are so many different ways they get killed.

I just want to tell you one story. When I was in Singapore liberating animals the first time, there were three snakes bought the night before the liberation. The next morning, I reached for the reserved water and there were other animals, frogs and other things too.

Three snakes were in a sack and could have run away easily, but they were like intoxicated, maybe due to the heat, I’m not sure. They were fastened there in the sack. At that time I was wondering, if we let the snakes go, then the frogs and mice and many other animals would get eaten.

But if we did not buy the snakes to liberate them, their bodies, which are very long, would get cut in half and they would suffer so much. In the restaurants in China, Taiwan and Singapore they use snake for snake dishes.

So then, that made me think, what to do? There is no other method; the only way is for us to practice Dharma, to actualize the path, the four noble truths. First we must become free from the oceans of samsaric suffering. In that way we become free from samsara and sentient beings do not have to harm us. They don’t have to create negative karma with us, which is one big help.

By revealing Dharma to the sentient beings, they meet the Dharma, actualize the path and become free from the oceans of samsaric suffering. In that way sentient beings don’t have to suffer continuously, and they don’t have to create the cause to harm others. That is an incredible help, freeing them from suffering and the causes of suffering.

And the last thing, the biggest help, is to bring everyone to full enlightenment, sangye, the total elimination of all the obscurations and completion of all the realizations.

So all the time we should engage our life in Dharma practice, particularly trying to actualize the path. That is the solution, for all the benefits to happen. Whether the concern is for cows, or, for example, tigers and so forth, this is my answer.

Please tell your daughter this. I suggest to her that by practicing morality and practicing purification with mantras and so forth, and by collecting extensive merits with many other practices, for life after life we don’t have to harm other sentient beings directly or indirectly. And also sentient beings don’t have to harm us, creating negative karma.

She can chant OM MANI PADME HUM and visualize beams are emitted from Chenrezig, purifying her and the sentient beings—the cows and any beings she is concerned about.

Also, she can recite Vajrasattva mantra. She can visualize Vajrasattva on her crown and at her heart on the moon disk on a lotus are the cows and all sentient beings. Think that they are purified with nectar beams emanating from Vajrasattva. She can do like this, so they can become free from suffering and the causes of suffering , and not only that, they all become enlightened.

Later she can become a nun. Think in this way: if we don’t create the cause to harm sentient beings then sentient beings don’t have to harm us.

With love and prayers ...