In the glow of Diwali, I am filled with gratitude to each of you for being on this journey of dharma. As we celebrate the triumph of light over darkness, I feel a deep responsibility to honour that light, not only within ourselves but in all beings. Today, I write to you with a heartfelt invitation to consider a path that brings our actions into harmony with ahimsa—the principle of non-violence that lies at the very heart of dharma. This means us lightening the violence we are causing to the animal kingdom and to nature. Go Dharmic distributes food and aid to people in need all over the world, and it is important that we extend the love we feel for other people to include animals and nature too.
Go Dharmic is not just a humanitarian charity. We are a movement and platform for compassion in action. As many esteemed global charitable organisations focus on treating the symptoms, we apply efforts to advocate for peace and address the systemic disease that causes them in the first place: violence. I was personally shocked and upset to see beef being served at important events like COP or even at some major humanitarian charity events. These are supposed to be the leaders of peace and compassion in the world and yet choose to ignore the harm of violence to animals.
Sanatana Dharma calls us to revere every form of life, to ease suffering, and to live in harmony with all beings. The Mahabharata reminds us,
“Ahimsa is the highest dharma. Ahimsa is the best of all teachings(Mahabharata 13.117.37)” We should live gently upon this Earth, to see ourselves in all creatures, and to recognise the interconnected web that binds us all. It is in this spirit that Go Dharmic is a vegan organisation—not just as a dietary choice, but as a profound expression of our values of compassion, non-harming, and respect for the Earth and all her beings. When we serve and receive meals through our distributions or during disasters, when guests visit one of our retreats or join us at one of our centres, it is important that we serve food that does not include animal products.
Krishna says, “Dharma is love for all beings”. And these words are always in my mind and are central for our work and remind me that each being holds within it the same divine spark and the same essence. By choosing veganism as individuals and as a community, we choose to extend our compassion to animals, respecting their inherent right to live free from harm. Our relationship with animals should be one of guardianship, not exploitation. The practice of ahimsa calls us to end the suffering we impose on sentient beings—beings who, like us, seek to live, love, and avoid suffering. By simply choosing to avoid animal products, we choose not to participate in a system that inflicts pain and fear, but to embody the principle of non-violence in a way that honours all life.
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The Rigveda speaks to the sanctity of all life, declaring, “May all beings look at me with a friendly eye, and may I do likewise; may all beings look at each other with a friendly eye” (Rigveda 10.191.4). Justice is not limited to human society alone but extends to all beings who share this Earth. When we choose compassion over consumption, we are not only upholding the rights of animals but affirming the justice that should guide all our relationships. Our ethical responsibility includes treating animals with dignity, acknowledging their suffering, and striving for a more just and kind world. Let us not argue about what people did in the past, whether they consumed meat, or dairy or any specific circumstances as examples but let us look at the tremendous evidence of the suffering of animals, violence to our planet and ourselves. If we apply and engage our ethical or dharmic compass with intelligence we will find that veganism is a very practical and simple solution to heal nature and reduce harm to nature whilst still living well.
Modern science has underscored the urgency of these choices. Research on planetary boundaries, particularly by the Stockholm Resilience Centre, has identified critical thresholds in areas like climate change, deforestation, and biodiversity loss. Animal agriculture, including the dairy industry, is one of the primary drivers pushing us beyond safe boundaries, fuelling deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions, and the depletion of our planet’s natural resources. Many will choose to do nothing about it, but the call to ‘Go Dharmic’, is one for us to take responsibility.
In the Mahabharata, there was a wise merchant Tuladhara who encountered the sage Jajali, who had spent years practising severe austerities, renouncing worldly attachments, and engaging in rigorous sacrifices. Jajali, proud of his accomplishments, believed he had attained the highest form of dharma and purity. Seeking validation, he asked Tuladhara about the merit of his practices. In response, Tuladhara shared a profound lesson on ahimsa and the path of least harm.
Tuladhara says:
“Ahimsa paramo dharmah”
“Non-violence is the highest dharma.”
Tuladhara adds that compassion and empathy are the roots of true spirituality, saying:
“One who truly understands dharma acts with kindness, not out of adherence to rules, but from a heartfelt desire to see all beings at peace. For such a person, all beings are part of their own family.”
He underscores that merely following strict austerities, as Jajali had done, does not embody true dharma. Instead, the essence of dharma lies in recognising the interconnectedness of all life and embodying ahimsa in every thought, word, and action.
This dialogue serves as a powerful reminder to us that the essence of dharma is compassion and non-harm, a teaching that has echoed through the centuries and I believe is one of the core teachings of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism.
Tuladhara taught Jajali that living in harmony with others, showing compassion to all beings—whether human, animal, or nature—is a truer and higher form of dharma than any sacrifice.
Jajali, who was humbled realised that while he had lived with great austerity, he had missed the essence of dharma: living with compassion and walking a path of gentleness, choosing actions that brought peace rather than harm. Through his story, Tuladhara shows us that the greatest spiritual strength lies not in conquering oneself through rigid discipline or rituals, but in nurturing a heart that is gentle, kind, and mindful of the well-being of all creation.He says:
“One should walk the path that causes the least harm to all beings, for in sparing others, one preserves their own purity and the world’s balance.”
A long long time ago, long before you or I, or our great grandparents, were born, the world was ruled by a powerful witch called Ermendrud.
Ermendrud was respected and feared because she saw everything and punished those who disobeyed her law. There was only one. For a whole millennium only one was needed. No one broke it. Well, one or two did, at the beginning, but when people saw what happened to them, they were careful, very very careful, not to make the same mistake. So life in those days was very harmonious. There were no wars. There was no murder. There was no stealing. There was only co-operation, and kindness, and health and happiness.
After a thousand years of being quite content to live alone, Ermendrud decided she wanted baby. So she went out into the poppy field to look for the tallest poppy. She found two that were very tall, more than a head taller than the rest. A red one and a yellow one. She watched them for several minutes but it was impossible to be sure which was the tallest, swaying in the wind as they were. Finally she settled on the red one, for red was her favourite colour. She placed a lock of her hair inside it, folded the petals on top and sealed it with a kiss.
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The following morning, as soon as the sun rose, Ermendrud hurried back to the poppy field where she found not one, but two babies. They were both girls. One had bright red hair, the other’s was golden yellow. Ermendrud realised that some of her hair must have blown onto the yellow poppy after she left, and she was very happy it had.
She bent down to kiss the red haired baby. “Welcome to the world baby Bertha,” she said. Then she kissed the yellow haired baby. “Welcome to the world baby Brynja.”
The little witch twins grew up happy and strong until, on their sixteenth birthday, their mother called them to her. “This world is yours now, my loves,” she told them, “watch it carefully and remember the spell. My time is done.” Tears pricked their eyes but they didn’t argue. They knew that if their mother said something was true, then it was. Ermendrud faded away in her sleep that night, leaving nothing behind but a handful of poppy seeds.
Autumn came and went. Winter settled in and seemed to last forever. The young witches, mired in grief, were not keeping an eye on the world. One day they were both hit with a short sharp pain between the eyes.
“Aaaagh!” Bertha rubbed her finger over the skin above her nose, “What was that?”
“The sharp pain!” yelled Brynja, jumping to her feet, “someone’s broken the law!”
“Oh no! What do we do?”
“The spell! Mother said we have to do the spell!”
“But we’ve never done it before! I thought we’d be able to watch Mother do it …”
“Well no one broke the law while Mother was here, but now she’s gone they think they can get away with it. We’ve got to show them they can’t!”
“I don’t know …”
“Yes you do! She taught us a hundred times! We have to do it! If we don’t do it in the next four minutes it’ll be too late.”
Brynja rushed to her mother’s room for the ingredients. Bertha waited. Brynja went to the stream behind the house. Bertha followed. Brynja sprinkled lavender into the water, held a seed of Black-eyed Susan in each hand, and recited the spell.
“There is one who did not heed The law of good and of good deed. They broke the law, did something bad, Selfish, cruel or making sad. So find the one who did offend And make their ill deed twist and bend Back on them so they will feel it, What they gave they now receive it.”
Brynja dropped the seeds into the water and looked at Bertha. “Did it work? D’you think it worked?”
Bertha scanned the sky. “I can’t see a rainbow.” She turned back to Brynja and shook her head.
Three and a half minutes had passed since the pain.
“Your hair!” Bertha pointed frantically, “you forgot your hair!” She grabbed the scissors from her apron pocket and passed them to Brynja.
Brynja cut a curl from her beautiful yellow hair and dropped it into the stream. A rainbow formed over the water for a few seconds, and then dissolved.
“You did it!” cried Bertha.
Brynja’s face flushed and she closed her eyes. She felt vibrant. Full of energy. Wide awake.
She smiled at her sister. “Yes I did.”
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Story continues tomorrow but if you don’t want to wait you can read the whole fairy tale here now 😀
This is amazing – diver rescues baby dolphin trapped in the rocks, only to discover that the baby was trying to get help for her mum who was caught in a fishing net.
Until we, the human collective, fully awaken–from within our hearts–to acknowledge the Absolute Truth that we are One with ALL Life, ONLY then can we ensure the survival of Mother Earth and her Universal Family.
To evolve to the inner consciousness of ONENESS means living with the full understanding that ALL Life is sacred and must be treated that way.
ONLY then can we bring our normalized violence–which separates and targets any being, human or nonhuman, deemed “NOT LIKE US” and therefore, “LESS THAN US” – to an end.
ONLY then can sustainable social change take place – in our outer world – to ensure that institutionally oppressed INDIVIDUAL lives matter. To transform systematic racism, sexism, heterosexism, speciesism, transphobia, etc., we, the human collective, must now awaken within us a new COMPASSION for ALL that will reflect an inclusive culture, honouring the interconnectedness of life.
“The idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that is wrong with the world.” Paul Farmer
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. ” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
ONLY Compassion for ALL Beings can create a culture of Peace on Earth.
Compassion means, literally, “to suffer with.” The State of Being Compassionate involves allowing oneself to be moved by suffering, so that we experience the motivation to help alleviate and prevent it.
Compassion can ONLY be manifested by daily NON-VIOLENT choices and actions. And that includes standing up against ALL Injustice.
In Dr. Will Tuttle’s book, The World Peace Diet, he reveals the invisible attitudes we ingest at every meal by the relentless and routine killing of animals for food. Our inherent wisdom and compassion, he says, is brutally suppressed as our culture’s mentality of violence and disconnectedness is injected into our meal rituals of animal-derived food.
If we, the human collective, continue to live much of our daily lives by rote behaviour passed down through the ages, from parent to child, disconnected from our True Nature as we separate ourselves from the diversity of Life – which includes other human and nonhuman animals alike – and abandoning Mother Earth herself, our compartmentalized existence will NEVER sustain a world worth living in for ALL.
Until we choose to awaken our hearts to the INTENTION of Compassion for ALL who share our Home [Planet], with daily NON-VIOLENT actions aligned to that conviction, ONLY then will our chaotic, violent culture slowly begin to change our current reality.
Therefore, Veganism must be the necessary FIRST step to deprogram ourselves from centuries of archaic human conditioning that has indoctrinated us to believe in, and fully accept, the Paradigm of OPPRESSION in our culture.
“A revolution of the heart,” says Gary L. Francione, is required. “What I mean by that is that we must reject all ideologies of domination and power, whether religious or secular, that allow us to transform sentient beings—human or nonhuman—into the ‘other,’ thereby allowing us to ignore their moral value and to treat them as things. We must embrace nonviolence as a basic normative principle—a principle that we see as reflecting a moral truth.”
Compassion for ALL understands that “Thou Shall Not Kill” means ALL sentient beings, for we are all valued members of Mother Earth’s Universal Family. “FARM” ANIMALS ARE SENTIENT BEINGS. FISH ARE SENTIENT BEINGS. RATS AND MICE ARE SENTIENT BEINGS. PITBULLS and “RACE” HORSES ARE SENTIENT BEINGS. WILDLIFE ARE SENTIENT BEINGS. THE HOMELESS, HUMAN AND NONHUMAN, ARE SENTIENT BEINGS.
And YOU and YOU and YOU across the globe, no matter the body you live in, no matter the skin color, the age, the race, the nation, the culture, the economic class, no matter the sexual orientation, the gender, the physical or mental disability, the spiritual or religious belief. And no matter the species. For here is the diverse beauty of our interconnectedness.
Prepare to be inspired. Prepare to be in awe. Prepare to have your heart lifted and your eyes moistened 🙂
Eight year old Amelia Meyer, who was granted a wish by The Make-a-Wish Foundation because she suffers from brain cancer, wished that she could clean up all the litter in her local park.
“She chose to clean her local Swope Park in Kansas City, Missouri because she wanted it to look nicer for her friends and neighbors. “Another reason is because [litter] can stay dirty and it can get animals sick,” she added.
Fortunately, Make-A-Wish didn’t just hand Amelia a trash bag and wish her well on her endeavors. Instead, the foundation organized hundreds of people to participate in the cleanup, with everyone from local business employees, the Kansas City Fire and Police departments and schoolchildren getting in on the action. Amelia said she was surprised at just how many people showed up to help.
Sly James, the mayor of Kansas City, attended the event at Swope Park to congratulate Amelia on being selfless and an all-around “really neat kid.” He then proclaimed February 27 “Amelia Meyer’s Take Care of the World Day” throughout the city.
Amelia’s story didn’t just motivate people in her own community, but people in other parts of the state and even the world. As word of her wish spread on social media, other people organized cleanups in their own areas, tagging photographs of their efforts with #AmeliasWish.
Though Amelia’s wish is unconventional, it seemed to bring her no less joy than another child’s trip to Disneyland might. Throughout the day, she ran around collecting trash with a big smile on her face. Jill Meyer, Amelia’s mother, said that the night before the cleanup, Amelia expressed she was “so excited” for the litter patrol. When Jill asked her why, she responded, “Because I get to pick up trash!”
It’s hard not to feel inspired by Amelia’s caring attitude. She clearly hasn’t let her age or life-threatening illness stop her from doing her part to make the world a better place. May her selfless wish serve as an inspiration to people who come from more fortunate circumstances.
Meanwhile, my wish is that Amelia overcome her battle with cancer because we absolutely need more people like her in this world.”
Catskill Animal Sanctuary rescues farmed animals, ignites social change to end their exploitation, and champions vegan living. Subscribe to their e-news, Herd Around the Barn: casanctuary.org/herd
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