20191215福慧圓滿人間路A Path of Blessings and Wisdom for Our World
Time helps us accomplish things. For the past 50 plus years, Tzu Chi has been continuously spreading seeds of goodness. For people in a prosperous and abundant society, it is even more important for them to have spiritual riches. To be spiritual rich, we need to be grateful and content. Only when people are content will they harbor gratitude.
We are all blessed people. I hope everyone understand that Buddhism is not only about bowing to the Buddha status at temples, we have to awaken our innate Buddha nature to connect with the Buddha. We are to pay respect to our innate Buddha nature when we bow to the Buddha statue.
In fact, the Buddha is beyond form and appearance. The Buddha came to this world was not to have people worship him. No. Neither did the Buddha want people to come to him and ask him for blessings. No. His sudden enlightenment came after a long journey of his spiritual cultivation. First, he quieted his mind and remained undefiled, which was to have a tranquil state of mind. He left the prosperous and busy community and gave up wealth and status in order to search for life’s meaning.
Where does life come from? And where do we go after death? What is the meaning behind life and death; ordinary beings have no clues why they come to this world and spend their lives idly. After accumulating ignorance and creating a lot of bad karma, they leave this world again; life after life, the accumulation of karma and its retribution goes on endlessly.
Time and the world, the world is the continuation of time, which is like a long river. In Buddhism, it is called “kalpa”. A very, very long period of time is call kalpa. In this very long, infinite length of time, people undergo the cycle of life and death.
Spiritual cultivators turn their consciousnesses, which were accumulated from their past lifetimes, into wisdom; they will not be lured by worldly things such as fame and fortune. They need to be very certain of their direction, and be clear about their direction.
Therefore, for the Dharma to be in the world, there must be people who spread the Dharma, which are the male and female monastic practitioners and the male and female lay cultivators; these four groups of Buddhists are to spread the Dharma.
There is a saying “lay cultivators nurture their wisdom well.” This is because lay cultivators interact with a diverse group of people in society. Life’s value is calculated by the deeds that we’ve done that are truly meaningful. This is the big data on life. Presently, what I most urgently want to do is to create the big data on Tzu Chi: recalling and recording events by the year, stories of our volunteers, and their aspirations.
When people serve with Tzu Chi, some people come and go, and as life is impermanent, perhaps, with a thought of slacking off, they stopped serving, and never had a chance to serve again, because life is impermanent. So, let us cherish the opportunity to serve.
Why would people stop serving? It is because they sis not devote themselves to serving; if they did, they would never want to stop as they had discovered the value of life. Though life is impermanent, wisdom-life is everlasting; with our wisdom-life, this affinity of ours will be a good affinity that lasts lifetime after lifetime.
If we are not careful and go astray, such affinity will bring a bad affinity that lasts many lifetimes. Hence, let us seize our opportunities well.
Environmental protection is very important; we enjoy modern convenience casually and toss things at whim, which create disasters for our children and grandchildren; as we all live under the same sky and on the same earth, when faced with climate change, man cannot conquer nature. Yet, with one thought, we can care for Mother Nature; this one thought can bring together good affinities, and violet winds can be transformed into a gentle breeze. This requires everyone to inspire numerous others to have the same thought. This is very important.
A seed can produce innumerable seeds. We can use our power to spread love by telling people about Tzu Chi to whoever we see at wherever we are. Everyone needs to walk the Bodhisattva Path. Only the Bodhisattva Path can transform violence into peace. I hope everyone can truly foster an atmosphere of harmony.
Cultivating sincerity, uprightness, faith, and honesty nature the land. Serving with loving-kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity form a gentle breeze. Using wisdom and wondrous Dharma generate clean water. Cultivating diligently and earnestly give off sunshine. Nature’s four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind need to be balanced in order for the world to be safe.
To help or not to help our world hinges on our thought. The thought of serving as living bodhisattvas can bring balance and peace to this world. Do you understand this? Yes. That’s right. We’ve aspired to bring pure land to this world. We need to transform this filthy land with a lot of impurities into a pure land. Can we do this? Yes, we can. Our mind can create anything.
Remember, every volunteer has the responsibility to pass on our Dharma lineage and spread seeds of goodness on the Tzu Chi Path. We follow the Jing Si Dharma lineage by cultivating diligently and walk the Tzu Chi Path in the world. Don’t slack off, and cultivate diligently and earnestly. May everyone cultivate both blessings and wisdom and step by step, make progress on the Tzu Chi Path in the world.
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