In plain words
A new year has come, and you wait to see what news it will bring. The year does not bring our good and bad. We bring our good and bad on ourselves. Our own conduct takes shape as our good and bad. We ourselves must decide our good and bad. We must nurture the good. We must cast off the bad.
There are many secrets of God. Not recognising this, people think, "Why does Swami do this? Swami is not speaking to us!" Each thing has its own secret. All these are the good and bad within you, not a fault of God. In everything we must inquire within ourselves. That is self enquiry.
Keeping the name of good students is the gratitude owed to Swami
Students! Do not grow hatred towards anyone. First examine your own feelings: ‘With what feeling are we here?’ We must not be one way in front and another behind. We must keep our promise. Keep it even if life itself goes. The path is one! Enter the divine path. You will become leaders for the whole world. I have set a mountain of hope on you, that our students will become such leaders. We must honour our parents in the right way. We must show society the truth it needs. We must show the whole country this kind of ideal. So that they become such children, I give three quarters of My time to them alone. But the children do not understand this. They go on seeing only their own selfishness and their own gain. No, no. Broad, broad. Do the work Swami has told you. Earn a good name. Pass your studies well. Show an ideal to the world outside. For having been in our educational institution all this time, keep up the name ‘So-and-so, a student of the Sri Sathya Sai educational institution’. Keeping that name is the gratitude owed to Swami. I ask nothing of you.