The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men.
I'm now nearly 79. At 16 I took responsibility for Tibet and lost my freedom. At 24 I lost my country and became a refugee. I've met difficulties, but as the saying goes: 'Wherever you're happy, you can call home, and whoever is kind to you is like your parents.' I've been happy and at home in the world at large. Living a meaningful life isn't just a matter of money; it's about dedicating your life to helping others.
If one wanted to crush and destroy a man entirely, to mete out to him the most terrible punishment, all one would have to do would be to make him do work that was completely and utterly devoid of usefulness and meaning.
The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men.
The real issue is not whether baking biscuits is meaningful, but the extent to which the activity can seem to be so after it has been continuously stretched and subdivided across five thousand lives.
Each one of us is responsible for the whole of humankind. We need to think of each other really as brothers and sisters and to be concerned for each other’s welfare. Rather than working solely to acquire wealth, we need to do something meaningful, something directed seriously towards the welfare of humanity as a whole.
One of the most meaningful things that's happened to me since I've been the governor - the president - governor - president. Oops. Ex-governor. I went to Bethesda Naval Hospital to give a fellow a Purple Heart, and at the same moment I watched him-get a Purple Heart for action in Iraq - and at that same - right after I gave him the Purple Heart, he was sworn in as a citizen of the United States - a Mexican citizen, now a United States citizen.
I don't discuss my family with the press; I discuss my family with my family. If you notice, when you hear something sensational in the press about me, I don't respond to it publicly, because a lot of things are put out there simply for the attention. Things that are meaningful, you don't need to talk about.
You want to make decisions that are meaningful to you, and that are going to continue to enhance you being who you really are and what your message to the world is, and everybody has one. The real important thing is to know what that message is and how you want to carry that forward.
What is important is to see how we can best lead a meaningful everyday life, how we can bring about peace and harmony in our minds, how we can help contribute to society.