20200103身能載道鋪路行 Walking and Paving the Path with Our Actions
Time truly passes by quickly; it takes away our life and our minutes and seconds; such is how everything occurs through subtle changes, and this change is truly subtle. Time passes by without making a sound. The cells in our body go through metabolism; old cells are replaced by new ones. For every femtosecond, in our body, new cells replace old cells, nonstop, not even for a femtosecond.
In our world, all things go through formation, continuation, destruction, and annihilation; it is hard for Earth’s environment not to change. The temperatures keep rising, because our air and our atmosphere are being pollutes without stop.
The Buddha taught us about the five turbidities in our world, such as the delusion of people’s minds, diminishing life span, afflictions, etc. The greed in people becomes the turbidity of afflictions, which leads to the continuous manufacture of goods, conflicts, the harming of Mother Nature, and a lot of garbage is produced.
Thirty years ago, I began urging people to cherish material life, as I am saddened to see resources of on Earth being wasted. Let us take care of our things, so they can function for a long time. Let us keep using them and protect them forever; the life of human also has useful functions.
I’m grateful to all the Tzu Chi volunteers who raise awareness on recycling and other concepts of environmental protection, so more and more recycling volunteers have come out to serve. With their wisdom, Tzu Chi volunteers take action after they know and understand these concepts; they know Mother Nature has been damaged.
When we know and can tell apart the various kinds of recyclables and resources, we collect them, and know how to sort them. We know them, and can tell them apart, and take action to sort them. With this knowledge and reorganization ability, we can use our wisdom to create great uses out of useless items. By manufacturing things from recycled materials, there are various ways for them to be used again in our daily life. This is wisdom.
Recyclables are not trash when people recycle them. How do we give them a new purpose? Such are material objects. The same can be applied to humans. As humans, our lifestyles, views, and habits have existed in the past.
There are conflicts between people, domestic violence, violence in society, etc. many kinds of chaos could be expressed through a single thought. We tend to think that we are right and other people are wrong. We are always right. We always think from our perspective and what is best for us. We do not think about benefiting other living beings. This is what we used to be like.
The Dharma is to purity people’s hearts. While I am on tour, every day, I listen to my previous Dharma talks. Every night, I watch the TV program “Life Wisdom” and “Wisdom at Dawn”, and listen to my own Dharma talks. In the Life Wisdom program, it shows how people who have lost their way now walk the path of awakening. Life Wisdom shows the suffering of the world, guides people to get rid of their afflictions, change their ignorance, and correct their wayward conduct.
So, I often hear stories of people who have transformed themselves. I’m comforted by this. By just listening to my words or reading short passage of my teachings in articles, they are able to change their mindset. I’m comforted by this. On this tour, I keep hearing about volunteers work in unity and harmony with love and do many things that benefit people and living beings.
This made me feel that the Bodhisattva Way taught by the Buddha is being actualized in this century by Tzu Chi volunteers. We are very grateful to the Buddha for coming to this world to teach us. After we’ve awakened, we work to create a Bodhisattva Path with the Dharma and pave it smooth so that people who will walk on the path after us can walk more steadily.
I’m very grateful. Without the strength of you volunteers, how can we do this? Thus, I want to express my gratitude to everyone. What we do is in line with the teachings of the Four Noble Truths, the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination, and the Six Paramitas.
You have personally practiced the Six Paramitas and gained insights and experiences. Don’t say, “Master, I listen to Dharma talks, I am certified, and I also do good deeds often, why is it I have such a situation in my family? Why is my body suffering like this?”
I want to ask everyone have I not done good deeds? You have. I have. Although I have not personally carried out the work, I pass on the Buddha’s teachings to everyone. Since I was young, I’ve suffered from an illness. Through all these years, while carrying out Tzu Chi’s work, to this day I am still living with illnesses. Now, I’m again confirming that aging and illness is the law of nature.
Thus, I want to tell everyone there is no one who does not die. No material things are permanent in this world. Yet, we can make good use of them. We need to make even more precious use of our body. Letting life go by idly is wasting our life. After we make a conscious of our life and have made good use of our body, we will have no regrets.
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