It’s always nice to receive the accolades and the awards for the music. But when I’m receiving an award of this work I’m doing with children in foster care, and youth in foster care, I got to honestly admit that it’s something a lot more special because I think it goes to the core of why we are all here on this planet. It’s to be of service to other people – people who are less fortunate, people who might need our help, people who may only need a gentle gesture or a smile; and those that need even more, that need families, that need loving, that need nurturing. There’s something very special about that for me.

Halo, soulful viewers, and welcome to Vegetarian Elite, here on Supreme Master Television. This week we continue our special feature on Grammy-nominated musician, singer-songwriter, record producer, and humanitarian, Kashif. The inspirational artist talks to us about his faith, his vegan lifestyle, and his charitable work with foster children.

Has your faith as a Muslim given you strength in your life and in your endeavours?

The truth of the matter is that moving from home to home to home I practiced different religions depending upon what the reality was in that home. (Yes.) Pentecostal, Baptist, Catholicism – went through all of those in the various homes.

And then when I got to B. T. Express, one of the leads of the band was a Muslim. I really looked up to him, his discipline, how he carried himself. He gave me a book of Islamic names and I looked in the book and found the name, Kashif Saleem, and that is how I became Kashif Saleem. My spiritual life is essential to all of my actions, subconsciously and consciously. I try to walk a path that is reflective of what I learned from being involved with all those spiritual practices.

On the first part of our program, Kashif shared with us his recent journey to becoming vegan.

So do you feel that by removing the flesh and the by-products of dead animals from your diet, and that has enabled you to focus more on your spiritual growth?

Absolutely. Absolutely, because part of the spiritual growth has to do with your physiological existence. And the more in tune you are with that, the more potential that you can grow spiritually. It’s hard to grow spiritually if you’re in pain and if you’re in discomfort. Not impossible, but one tends to focus on the physical discomforts rather than the lofty aspirations of spiritual growth. So yes!

And also knowing that eating animal products and the processing of animal products and how it pollutes the Earth is important to me. Because we only have one Earth, and if we don’t respect the Earth, then we’ll have less and less, and less and less. Then we won’t have one that can support life in the way that we desire.

Do you think that there are benefits to following a vegan lifestyle on a wider scale, perhaps on a planetary scale and for a wiser humanity?

Absolutely. When you think about it, the amount of the food that we grow and distribute to feed animals, why couldn’t that food be going to feed kids in Darfur? Why couldn’t it be going to the people of Haiti? Why couldn’t that energy that we use to grow this food, feed the animals and transport the animals and transport the meat after they’ve been slaughtered – why couldn’t that energy have been used to help the people in Katrina, sooner? So when you think about it, how efficiently are we really running the planet and how efficient are we being at taking care of one another?

Widely respected for his work with children, Kashif has enriched countless lives and has earned accolades and recognition for his selfless dedication and willingness to wholeheartedly share the fruits of his success and God-given talents to help those less fortunate. His own early childhood experiences play a vital role in shaping his philosophy of service and charitable interests.

Placed into foster care at the tender age of four months, Kashif grew up never knowing his real parents, in eight different foster homes in Brooklyn, New York, USA. Having experienced first-hand the difficulties of a childhood spent in the foster care system, he is now devoted to ensuring that these children have the nurturing support and opportunities they need to flourish and prosper with purpose and direction in their lives. We asked Kashif to tell us about his work with his founded charity “Team iCare.”

Yeah, that’s my favorite subject. Team iCare is a foundation where we advocate the children in foster care. We’ve been around formally since 2006, but myself and a group of my friends, we’ve been doing this work probably for about 28 years now. Our mission and my mission in life is I like to call my dharma, Eastern philosophy, what I was put on this world, on this planet to do, is to make sure that every child has a loving home.

In America, every day there are 524,000 youth who are accessing the foster care system. That means that these children don’t have their biological parents. They’ve been removed from their homes for various reasons. And if you imagine that life, it’s one fraught with uncertainty and danger, and some kids by the age 15 maybe have experienced 15 or 20, and 25 homes. And so we do a number of things.

We do the Walk for Foster Care at the Rose Bowl Stadium, and our goal with that event is to recruit our new foster parents, new mentors, and new adoptive parents. We’re very happy doing that, and it’s a very exciting event. The next thing that we do every year is called our Mentorship Dinner Cruise. We take 200 kids and youth in foster on a cruise with 175 business men and women from various industries, and those professionals become mentors to these young people and help them find a forward motion, a forward inertia in their lives.

Just recently we opened Kashif University, which is a summer camp and an after school program of enrichment activities. So we offer music, dance, basketball, yoga, martial arts, culinary arts program, graphic arts, literary arts, reading, writing, and math to youth who are in foster care. If you ask me specifically what my life’s goal is, that’s it right there – Kashif University. Because as an after school program we get these kids 40 weeks out of the year, and kids get to come back year after year after year.

So there is some positive modeling in their lives and a place that they can go all the time, no matter if they’re moving from home to home to home, this is one thing that they can have in common that can help them migrate that path to being a contributing, law abiding, and positive citizen. So that’s my life’s dream.

At a recent fundraising performance hosted by the Children’s Trust Fund and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, Kashif joined with friends and performers in entertaining the audience with a moving rendition of “We are the World” before humbly accepting an award for his leadership and services to foster children. The award was presented by event sponsor and passionate advocate for the children of Los Angeles County, Supervisor Mr. Michael Antonovich.

They dominated the R&B charts, selling over 70 million records worldwide. He has produced successful smash hits for Whitney Houston, Kenny G, George Benson, and Barry White, just to mention a few. But his greatest accomplishment, and the one closest to his heart, is being the CEO and founder of “I Care,” a non-profit committed to changing the image of foster care and improving the quality and life for these children so they do have an opportunity to be successful. He’s been a mentor to countless foster children, and served as a spokesman for the Casey Family Programs, and so let us present a proclamation to him for his leadership at this time.

Halo, wonderful people. (Halo.) Halo, wonderful people! (Halo!) It’s really an honor and it’s very humbling for me to stand before you tonight and being honored by Michael Antonovich, Trish Ploehn, Maria Melton, and all the wonderful people that DCFS who work really hard to make sure that America’s most vulnerable children have a chance at normalcy, have a chance to grow up, and lead contributing citizens lives. That’s really important to me.

And I know firsthand what it means to feel invisible. I know firsthand what it feels like to not belong to anyone, or anywhere. I really do know how that feels, and so that’s my motivation, that’s my passion. I feel like God put me on this planet, he gave me all of these talents and all of these things that I know how to do and I’ve won all types of awards and made all types of money and wonderful things have happened.

But nothing compares to the passion that I have for this work that I do for youth and foster care, America’s most vulnerable youth. I’m here to tell you that that is the true path to happiness. And so here are my young people, we came up with a name for this group of young people. We’re calling it “Kashif Featuring…” What are we calling it? “The League of Unforgotten Children.”

Put your hands together for “The League of Unforgotten Children.” So, here is that song that we wrote, I’m so excited.

Paint a picture in your head
A life could be Hungry everyday
Never have enough to eat
I wish for change But change never comes
I pray to God He sends someone
I wish that you could understand
And you could see that so much pain and grief lives inside of me
I’m on a journey Not sure where I’m going
But I know that I’m going to show them

I’m gonna be somebody I’m gonna make it someday
Spread my wings and get higher and higher
I’m gonna be somebody I’m gonna make it someday
Spread my wings and get higher and higher

Pictures in my head For you to recognize the vision
Struggle when happiness is going at a collision
Try to tell my friends, But none of them ever listen
Have money but love is clearly what I’m missing
Family aim low and I’m trying to aim higher
Road of my life I just hope that I’m the driver
Honestly I think I’m in the back Just relaxing
Because all that’s in my head is Lights, camera, action
Could this be my passion
Don’t tell me, I’m just asking
Do I keep the faith, and if struggle keep on clapping I work hard
But pain is what I’m earning
And I’m trying to teach the kids
I’m the one that needs to learn

I’m gonna be somebody I’m gonna make it someday
Spread my wings and get higher and higher
I’m gonna be somebody I’m gonna make it someday
Spread my wings and get higher and higher

Painted pictures in my head Now you can see
I’m on my ground Heading for my destiny
I pray for change The change did come
I’m finding out I’ve always been someone
I hope that you could understand me
When I say I got my doubters I do things my way
I’m on my journey I know where I’m going
Don’t matter haters ‘Cause I’m going to show them
I’m gonna be somebody I’m gonna make it some day
Spread my wings and get higher and higher

I’m lucky too, because when I go to bed at night, I feel like I live such an abundant existence, and it’s not because of the money that I earn or the cars I drive or the house I live in. It’s really about going to sleep and just smiling about these kids who when I first meet them, some of them are very withdrawn, very angry and they won’t communicate. And then within two or three days of going through our programs they’re chasing me down a hall. “Come here Kashif, I need a hug!” You know, that to me represents the true abundance of my universe because that’s all that really matters for me.

Kashif, you are a blessing indeed not only for the musical gifts and creativity you have offered us, but also for the inspiration you give to all who aspire to live their dreams to the fullest and fulfill their highest mission in life. May your music career and charitable works prosper with ever-greater success to bring more smiles of warmth and happiness.

Thank you cordial viewers for your company today on Vegetarian Elite.

That concludes our two-part series on big-hearted vegan singer-songwriter and musician extraordinaire, Kashif. Coming up next is Between Master and Disciples. Please stay tuned to Supreme Master Television. May your day be blessed with Heavenly joy and Divine love.