Reverend Sun Myung Moon
Belvedere, Tarrytown, NY USA
April 2, 1989
Translated by Col. Han
Unofficial Notes
Father has written the title for this morning's talk, it translates to "let us live well" or "let us live happily together". Within the word "us", we can include man and woman as a family and that family as a center of the society, that society as a center of the nation, that nation as a center of the world, and the world as a center of the universe. Is this simple or complicated? When we hear the word "us", the first thing that comes into our mind is "me". For example, a woman centered on herself wants to live well. That woman will try to collect diamonds, or she will try to find a nice man that other women will envy. She wants to be thought of as being smart. That is her idea of living well!
What about a woman who wants to serve God? Would she want to live on top of God or at his feet? A beautiful woman and an ugly woman both want to live well. Which do you think would wear more makeup? According to reason the beautiful woman would only need to put on some lipstick while the ugly woman needs a lot more, but actually we find that it is the other way around. So what does it mean; to live well?
Does air live well? Yes it does. But what is your definition of living well in order for you to say that? If there is a big hole in the ground, would air refuse to go inside it, wanting to live higher up in the atmosphere instead? Would the air near the hole say, "The air from up in the clouds should go in the hole, so I can move higher up"? No, air fights to get into the hole first. The two biggest life supporting elements are air and water. Water flows down to the lowest point. Is it better to exist in the mainstream or the side of the river? In the mainstream the water has to really struggle. The water on the top moves along quickly and easily. Compare that to a man who lives under the "mainstream" of society. How many scars and struggles he must have had all his life! Does the water underneath want to be on top? Water just flows, filling in all the gaps quickly. It does not try to fight it's way back or try to keep other water from coming in.
The character of water is that it fills in everything. In a crevice it can go up too, a capillary action. This is an ideal characteristic. This is why water is able to support life. This precious element water can say, "I occupy a glorious position in the universe, also the hardest, most misunderstood position."
We wash with water. Does water mind washing away dirty things? It is capable of cleansing anything without complaint. It can evaporate into a cloud and travel around. It does the hardest, dirtiest work at times and then becomes a cloud and travels around the world sightseeing. We can cherish clouds thinking they do so many good things for me. We like the top of the mountain, but animals living in that area will prefer the valley. Even the insects will live down below and the birds will build their nests there. All the sediments wash down into the valley where it is smelly. All the bad stuff flows down into the valley. But with that as fertilizer all the big trees grow there instead of on the mountain. This is the phenomena of the creation. Without exception all things form subject and object relationship with no struggle. When we see this we feel good.
We all have minds, right? Where does the mind want to go and live forever? Would the mind want to live in the country, in the universe or where? The mind would say to go to the castle or the top of the mountain. Even to God if it can. It wants to live in the nicest place. What about the body? The body wants to live in the valley where all things are, the lower place. Your mind and body cannot separate though, so for the body to go up we have to build a ladder. The body never wants to be tired.
If Father gives out money, his mind will feel good. Even if he gives out $10 million his mind will not want to stop there, but it will want to keep giving out, doing more and more good. How could you manage yourself like that? The idea of one living well is that one is capable of giving. Is it just giving and giving with no end? Is that living well? Giving and giving is very tiring. If it is tiring then it cannot be living well. So the body applies a brake on the mind. Other wise it will just continue to go. There is a very important point here. Everything has two sides like a coin. One force goes this way and the other force goes that way to create a balance.
Men and women are quite different. Their shape is distinctly different. Women are indented and men are protruding. How do women laugh? They laugh from high to low. Men laugh low to high [Father then demonstrates]
Which sex is greater? If you say man is, then should men just live together? How about Mr. Universe and the second place Mr. Universe, would they look beautiful together? Which is a better combination, the two Mr. Universes or Mr. Universe and the ugliest woman? Of course you know the answer.
Between men and women, which is more stable? Is an indented shape more stable or a protruding shape? Women have no problem moving all over when they walk, but men have something to protect, they walk straight. It is true! Sometimes you have to think about these things seriously. Women have nothing to worry about, but a man always has something to be concerned about. But what does he protect this precious thing for? For a woman. When a woman gets married, what is the most important thing in her husband? A nice face? You may not be conscious of it, but at the end of your life look back and see!
To have an ugly goiter is bad because it is unusual. No one likes to be unusual. But if there is a princess who insists on marrying a man with a nice goiter, then all the world would like a man with a goiter! This is life. Sometimes things that are unhappy become happy. The man who thinks he is ugly need not worry about it. He may be an ugly man, but there is a woman who loved her father who looked like this ugly man. So she will love him too. That woman will insist on marrying that man, even if he is ugly. This is a true example. So we should not complain about the way we look or the way we are. These things can bring you unexpected love. It happens all the time.
All of these things are points of living well. What kind of idea do you have? Do you want to live in one place or move all around? If something goes around it is always in motion. If we go straight, there is always a limit. You can go so far and then no more. But if you move around there is no limit. In the future do you need a house or not? How nice if you could have a house like a rubber balloon and it could move from place to place. You can get tired of even the nicest house. It is nice to move around to different houses. Women like to live in all different colors and kinds of houses. Today many things are manufactured out of plastic, umbrellas, etc. What about a house? Father thinks that in time there will be plastic houses. There are new types of insulation available now for homes and clothes so we never have to feel cold even while outside. We can even have a portable house! Father thinks that these kinds of things will exist in the future.
Think of East Garden, it is a big stone house. Which is more convenient, East Garden or a portable house? For less trouble, which is easier? A smaller, portable house. It is all relative. If we say that moving from place to place is best, then we do not want a big house. You cannot build big houses everywhere you go. Kwon Jin Nim prefers to live in a tent. He likes them much better than the house, even if it is only a small tent. Father watches him and wonders what makes him prefer that? He would live in a tent if Father would let him. So even at East Garden, Kwon Jin Nim's idea of living well is life in a tent. That is where he is most comfortable. Recently we have been entertaining people at East Garden. Kwon Jin Nim was served nice bulgogi a few days in a row. Then he wants to go out and eat hamburgers. Father cannot understand him!
We can conclude that living well is bringing the best of everything in the world and then harmonizing with it. From all four directions, bring everything good into one area and harmonize with it.
Two days ago Father went to a shopping mall where members have a business. It was a nice mall. In one corner there was a house made out of tin, decorated with tin cans. Father wondered about the kind of variety that people like. Americans like antiques, old beat up things. In Korea people do not like old things because everything is old! Here in America everything is new, so people cherish things over a hundred years old. They even make things to look like they are 1000 years old! That is an important point of living well. Have something old and something new, something from all four corners of the world. Then harmonize and live together with it.
Let's say that your face decided it wants to live well. The eyes are open but the ears are tired so they close. Is this ideal for the face? But when the eyes are open and the ears stay open each one is competing with the other to provide information. Everything should come together to focus on the same point. That is living well. When the mouth wants to taste something, the eyes see it and the hand grabs it. All parts work together. That's what dancing is all about-- everything moving together in harmony. That is living well.
What is necessary in order for a religion to live well? Should just one church or sect get together to do something excluding everyone else? Is that the best idea? No. Should they embrace everybody? Yes, but to unite is the most difficult thing. Which is the most complicated religion? Unification.
Which is the better church, the one that has good fund raisers or bad? You get up early in the morning and go out fund raising. The cold air greets you but you can say, "Soon it will be warm." For the sake of the goal, work hard and fund raise all day. You might ask, "Why does the air have to be so cold? God wants to rough me up and help me to overcome complaining." Comfortable and not comfortable will harmonize and make a good life.
Do we all like Father? Yes, when he speaks to us sweetly! When he speaks to us sweetly, our branches are growing. When he speaks to us strongly our roots are growing. Everyone likes branches because they can see them, but the root is most important. How beautiful roots are!
Is it good for us to be opposed by other churches? You can become a wonderful harmonizer by embracing those who oppose you. This can be a beautiful accident.
Father is a great man. Did he grow through welcome or by being rejected? He has grown through being opposed and rejected. No one can take that away. That will always belong to Reverend Moon. And to us if we can go through it. In this perspective which is living well? It is better to be persecuted and grow.
If someone slaps you on the face you immediately start thinking, "Why did they do that?" We need some room inside ourselves to think about it. Others have no room, they will hit back or yell. We have to understand this. Sometimes we might meet someone who treats us harshly, but if we can love them back, we can win their respect. Sometimes you receive so much pain it is like a needle in your heart, but you can become greater through that experience. We must think like this and we can live well.
Let's say we there is a couple. The man is a dull person and the wife is a hysterical half crazy woman. If the man becomes hysterical he cannot live. One is extremely sensitive and hysterical and the other extremely insensitive and dull. They cannot stand each other. But eventually after twenty or thirty years they will come to love each other. This is living well.
People have different ideas of what living well is. If you want to see saw which is better, a little movement or a lot? A lot of action is best.
Father has taken one hour to level the ground. That is his introduction, but you know the conclusion already.
Is God a high and lofty Being or a low one? Man has a desire to become higher. Do you think that God would be excited by even the smallest man who wants to become like Him? He is very excited! Especially when we are low we want to be higher all the more. That is the way the universe is. If you are high, you have to come down. If your are low, you have to move up. God is up high but He wants to come down sometimes. The balancing point goes around and around in eternal motion. If God comes down, He is happy we are going up.
Women cannot be happy in a mediocre situation. They want excitement. This is not a laughing matter. If there is a woman who gives birth to many children and they all come to express their love at the same time, she can get very dizzy. But it is happy. Love is there. How can you handle it all at the same time? How about money? Do you think it is good to have a lot of money? Would you prefer to be the best mother or a bad mother? The best! Who is the best mother? The one with ten children or 100 children? The mother with 100 children is the best. How about 1,000? It is the same principle. She would have regret because she cannot love them all. That is the most precious mind. Is it better to have many or a few children?
Father recently found out why American women are so hysterical (not historical, hysterical!). They do not have an anchor. They are drifting without direction. Each child is an anchor line to make her stable. Hysterical women give birth to inferior children. God desires us to have more than three children. With a small amount of children, you only come to know one season. Mother has so many children. They are a textbook of herself--she represents all seasons. She can relate to all people because of the base she has through her children. She has a complete reference through them. If she meets someone new they will remind her of one of her children who is similar. A mother who has reared many children has no bad in her.
Handling even one child is so difficult. You are always tired. There is no time to rest your mind or your body. Do you think this is happy though? The smile of such a mother reflects twelve different worlds. It is very rich. A woman who never married may smile, but compared to a mother with twelve children their smiles are as different as heaven and earth.
Can you imagine a black person with all black eyes? Even a black person has a flash of white. Father has always been fascinated by this. You cannot find it in the white or oriental world. It is very beautiful. Black absorbs all shades and colors. After absorbing them, it can emanate them so strongly. This is fantastic! White people are reflecting, but always kind of fuzzy. Black and yellow are always sharp. In talking about attractiveness everyone is equal. No one is inferior.
White women have a lot of hair on their arms. Orientals call this chicken skin. Oriental women have no hair. Even if they are big and fat their skin is smooth. A brother in Alaska who has a Korean wife was boasting to all his brothers who are married to only American women. He told them how it is to be married to an oriental woman. She has the softest touch in the world.
Where would you prefer to live? Just white people living all together? Let's all live together, all colors equal. How wonderful to live a life digesting and harmonizing all difficulty. It is painful but at the end we can laugh and smile. Even the man who does not have money but lives with this heart is so much happier than the rich person who does not have this understanding. Where does happiness lie? It is everywhere, but it all depends on how we respond. It depends on us.
Before we can become kings and queens we have to accept all children and admire them. It is a big job, a hard job, but a good job. It is not easy to become the king of kings.
Father is greatly concerned about how to lead the second and third generations. After ten generations he does not have to worry . But for the next three generations, Father is thinking about how he can let them go over the hill. In the future even if two white people make up a couple they will still have black in them from a few generations back. Until then there is still all different blood.
Whites need help. They cannot help themselves. They need blacks. The Puritans met the Indians who saved them. If the Indians had treated them harshly they would have had no chance of survival. America is really on the verge of perishing and they cannot help themselves. So Father has come to save the white people.
Inside America whites are fighting each other. Now Reverend Moon is here helping. American whites think they are living well., but we suffer to help them and we think we are living well. From a universal point of view we are. Because we are going over difficulty, harmonizing and digesting them.
What do you think God is like? God does not express so much. He is not hysterical. [Father used a Korean word "chu yong".] This means right in the middle with no extreme.
Things can be good sometimes and bad sometimes. Things are not always the same. You should always leave something in reserve. Father's purse is always hungry. Is being in debt good or bad? Father owes a lot of money for the sake of heaven and earth. That is the only way for the universe to be preserved. So debt is not always bad.
Today Father spent time with the True Children speaking about living well. Everything is following after Reverend Moon so you know he must be living well. America is like the day. Father came and introduced night. Nobody likes night. But only by harmonizing day and night can things go on. Is America rich or poor? Should America should help the world or should the world help America? Should America help Reverend Moon or should Reverend Moon help America? America should help Father. [Father hops across the stage] That is one way of moving, but walking with both feet moving is better. That way you can move a heavy load.
Can unhappy people help happy people? It sounds absurd, but that is what we are doing. This is the ideal of living well. When you are struggling look down and you will see that there is always somebody worse off than you. Living life only looking up at what you want you will never learn. We have to try every way to become better.
Is Reverend Moon successful? [Yes!] How can you prove it? [By his result.] What kind of result? He came to America from a country that is not even known and substantially helped people.
Do you like short rivers or long rivers? The river of Reverend Moon has such a long history and he is preparing to go to the ocean. The ocean is spirit world and the river is ancestors. True Parents are the true ancestors, the parents of truth. The Unification Church is from all origins. There are a lot of geniuses and men of talent in the Unification Church. Father is talking about you! When Father goes on to pioneer a way, he is bound to draw the same kind of talented people to follow him.
Father does everything. It is very difficult to find something Father does not do. If God wanted to be a terrorist or in the Mafia, Father would be the champion of it.
Many people pray "Help me, help me" to God. Instead we should pray, "I will help You. God, please come closer to me so I can help you." For the first time in history God would hear a voice calling out to help Him.
Father's faith is that he would believe in Satan's words like they were Gods words. Through following with his whole effort Father can use even Satan's words for the sake of restoration. Father would say, "God, no matter what you do to me, I will believe in You. Satan, no matter what you do or show me I will digest it. I will not go away." Through this Father learned Satan's secret. He also came to know the character of God.
Father is always watching things with great interest. When Father thinks about free sex he hates it. But Father sees there must be some meaning behind what these people are trying to do. They desire something that is 180 degrees different from what they are doing now. Hells Angels can become Heavens Angels. He sees so much wrong in the United States, but he knows there must be something good behind it. Good and evil are not so different. [Father drew a circle representing good. It had a beginning point and went around to that same point joining the circle. The circle representing evil was not complete. The line did not return to the starting point to close it.] Evil does not finish at the same point. There also has to be a stable axis for goodness to occur. The law is a kind of axis. If you accept it, you can follow goodness. If the earth's axis wobbles, things would change and life would not be able to exist. It is the same in our life. Our axis should not change.
Father thought the topic this morning would be especially good for American women. American women are extreme, they extend too much. You have to learn about silence. Those who do not speak much will control those who do. Also, those who laugh sparingly will control those who laugh too much. Silent people are formidable. You have to learn that. God is also quiet, waiting on the mountain top. He is patient. Why should He be frantic when He has absolute power?
The time is truly changing. Soviet and Chinese journalists attended the media conference and sincerely from their heart applauded Father.
Father's forty three year course from 1945 to 1988 was such a painful and long time. But still it was not much to do to restore 4300 years of history. No matter what happens Father decided he cannot complain. Fathers life is never unorganized. It is so complicated in many different ways. In forty three years of life he had to solve everything that had been attempted in the bible, which had failed. This included Adam's family, Abraham's family and all the other failures. If Moses came spiritually right now and stood here on the stage, who would we revere more? Moses or Father? [Father!] What if Jesus came? [Father!] We would revere Father more because of this forty three years of effort he has made. We read in the bible about the great works of Jesus and the disciples on the mountain, but have you ever thought that the time Father speaks here at Belvedere is more valuable? This is serious. You must consider it.
When restoration is done by the son, God cannot teach him anything because he is still in the indirect dominion. The son's role is to reach the direct dominion. Do you think it was simple? The only logical way for Father to accomplish was for him to be more serious and go through more difficulty than God. After a while Satan gave up. He tried to block Father's way, but it was too difficult to tag along.
Who is taking responsibility for history? The people who are capable of taking responsibility are those who are willing to go through more difficulty than what has already occurred in history.
Do not pass the prostitutes on 38th street thinking that they have nothing to do with you. You should be thinking that in ten years you will dominate that area and change those people. Teach them Divine Principle. Think of them as your younger sister or daughter and educate them. Later that woman will say, "Yes, I will become a true daughter (or true sister) to you" and she will teach the Principle to others. We need to live a committed, serious life during these ten years. But this is the serious, well lived life.
Living to make other people happy is better than seeking a happy life for yourself. It is an intensely difficult life. The more intense it is, the better the life we are living. Father has a dream of one American woman pledging to live under the most severe mother in law. That woman's life will become great. It will be a textbook for others to learn from.
Also, volunteer for the worst man to be your husband, then you can re-create him. Reverend Moon has pledged himself to reform Christianity and to solve the youth problem in the United States. You are the ones he has saved. Those who are willing to join in this fight and take responsibility for this country, please raise your hands.
