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Those who do not learn to cook know nothing about life. Learning to cook is one of the few things you can do in life truly for yourself. When you cook, you will eat what you like, you will understand health, and you will know what it truly means. Generally, you should cook for yourself. In the morning, you get up, wash, do your yoga exercises, meditate, and offer a prayer—a big prayer, not a little one, for God might say, "Aha! For everything else you do well, but for prayer, just a little 'please forgive me'?" Then you have breakfast. How nice. There was a priest from the Anglican Church who was also president of the World Vegetarian Society. He said that when he was about twenty-two, he worked as a student in a sausage factory. When he saw what they threw into the mixture, he stopped working there and became a vegetarian from that day. So, you never know what rubbish is going into your food. When someone else cooks for you, you do not know how it is prepared. In yoga, it is said the best cooking is that of your mother. A mother cooks with indescribable love. The second-best cook is your wife; a husband cannot cook with the same depth of love. So, boys, you are free. But when a wife is angry, disappointed, jealous, or sad, then go and tell her, "Please sit down, I will cook today." Otherwise, she is cooking all her anger and jealousy into the food, and you are eating it. Therefore, it is advised that while cooking, you should chant mantras, repeat God's name, recite a beautiful poem, or sing a happy song. That priest described his routine very nicely. He sits at his breakfast table with fresh, homemade yogurt and beautiful strawberries. He cuts the strawberries—they look and smell so fresh. He adds cereals, a little butter, a spoon of yogurt, and a spoon of unheated honey from farmers. He cuts some apples and adds raisins and nuts. It is such a rich, good, and refreshing breakfast you cannot imagine. At lunchtime, he prepares fresh, cleaned vegetables while meditating. He and his wife sit happily together, pray to God for the food, and then eat consciously. Often, people eat while talking. I sometimes do this too, and with spaghetti or noodles, I have to pause as it hangs from my beard. Then the person talking will say, "Sorry, Swāmījī, but you have something in your beard." That is the story of a poor man with a long beard and no time to shave. Eating nice, fresh food is for no one else but yourself—for your body, your prāṇa, your emotions, your mind, your memory, your intellect, your consciousness, your spirituality, and your self-realization. If you can do just one thing for yourself, learn to cook and prepare food at home every day with great love. Eat with thankfulness to God and unite nature with yourself. How nice is that? Every creature wishes to be happy and to live. No one wishes to die. Bird flu is now a problem worldwide. Why? What is its cause? Human greed and pollution—mental pollution—caused this problem. Before that, there was the shark problem. That, too, was caused by human greed. And before that, one or two years prior, what you call mad cow disease. That was also caused by human greed. Day by day, so many diseases arise from human greed. Humans want money. On animal farms, chickens stand unable to move. They are living beings, my dear; they feel pain. They want to stretch their wings, to run a little. So do pigs, cows, and rabbits. Take a fish out of the water. Twice in my life I have seen this, and now whenever I see a fish market, I close my eyes and walk away. You take the fish out of the water; see how it suffers. It opens its mouth as if to say, "Oh man, please put me back in my world." The fish has a beautiful, pink eye. How can you catch it and cut its throat? Or a rabbit, with its beautiful eyes—you catch it and cut its throat. That is the greatest sin a human can commit. Therefore it is said, ahiṃsā paramo dharma—non-violence is the highest principle. And in the testament it is said, "Thou shalt not kill." When people came to Jesus for healing, He said, "You are not eating what you should eat, and you are eating what you should not eat." Eat the vegetables, fruits, nuts, honey, and milk grown in the field; you will be healthy. But we have become slaves of our tongue. We are like narrow-minded sheep, following one another. We must not stop thinking; we must awaken human consciousness and not miss the chance. I have no vegetable shop in Melbourne, so do not think Swāmījī is advertising for his shop. I have no vegetable field. I am simply telling you what is good for us. Some doctors think very narrowly. I remember a story. About twenty years ago, I had a yoga seminar on the beautiful Adriatic coast in what was then Yugoslavia, in a town called Split. Some people were against it and complained to a doctor who was also against yoga and vegetarianism. Before my weekend program began, the doctor published an article in the local newspaper stating, "Vegetarian food is very harmful for the human body, and vegetarians cannot get children." I sent him a telegram (there was no fax or email then): "Dear doctor, I admire your knowledge and your science which says that vegetarians cannot get children; that's why India has overpopulation." That is narrow thinking. There are magazines like Save Earth and organizations like Greenpeace. Millions of people work for this cause, and they have produced extensive research in the Western world about the water problem. They were talking about this pollution and the problems created by large cattle farms thirty years ago. Acid flows into the rivers from these farms, and the land can take ten to twenty years to regenerate. All the forest trees are chipped away for cattle. To be a vegetarian is a moral and ethical principle, as well as a health one. You never know which animal had what health problem, and that enters your body when you eat it. Therefore, if you cannot do anything else for yourself, at least learn to cook. Cook fresh, good food for yourself, your friends, and your family. Your body will be very thankful; it will bless you, and you will suddenly feel at home within your own skin. But the problem is we do not follow this. The torture and suffering inflicted upon animals is not acceptable. There are many stories; if I told you, you would weep. Once, people saw a film where cows and bulls were being carried by a crane by their horns and thrown down. There was one very big, strong bull. When they threw him down, he broke his back leg. If a front leg is broken, an animal can manage to walk on three legs, but not if a back leg is broken. They wanted to move him from one place to another, but he could not. You cannot imagine how they tortured him. He fell down, tried to get up, but could not, writhing in pain. They gave this poor creature an electric shock with an iron rod put into his anus. Finally, a man stuck his fingers into the bull's eyeballs and crushed them so the bull would move one meter. It was a beautiful black bull. His tongue was hanging out, foam was coming from his mouth, one eye was destroyed and bleeding, and from the other eye, I saw tears falling—I had never seen an animal cry like that. Finally, the man took a knife and cut some veins, and blood flowed. The people filming said they could not help. The last thing they could do was give him some water from a mineral water bottle. These animals were being transported alive from Germany to the Middle East because transporting meat requires refrigeration, so it is cheaper to transport live animals. It is a long journey with no food or water. Where there is space for five, they put fifteen. When they opened the container, many had died, and many had broken legs. I said, this suffering, pain, and sin passes to those who will eat this meat. If we do not eat, no one will produce these things. If there are consumers, there will be manufacturers. If you do not consume, they will not manufacture. So, if you cannot do anything else in your life, please do this one thing. It does not matter if you meditate or pray; that is your karma. But you can do this as a human being with a heart that feels the pain and suffering of other creatures. Therefore, food is very important. Humans are not merely part of "nature eats nature." It is said in Sanskrit: jīva jīva bhakṣate—life eats life. But you, as a human, are above these animals. You have a better intellect, and with it, you have the power to decide. So, learn to cook nicely. Of course, you have human rights. I do not want to tell you to stop, but I will request you in the name of millions and billions of suffering creatures: if you stop, there will definitely be some relief. If you cannot do a better thing in this world, then make people vegetarian. That would be the greatest work you could do. Thank you. And I am sorry to have told you so much about this. Recording location: Australia, Melbourne, Australian Tour