20210124天地人間諸病息Treating the Ills of People and of the Earth
I feel really happy, really joyful; on my tour, I’m always the happiest at the Dalin Tzu Chi Hospital. It is truly like home, one that is cozy and warm. Though I made the tour this year, I don’t know whether I can make it next year. Indeed, time goes truly fast within a lifetime, especially when one gets to be my age; there is a feeling that I don’t have much time, so, I cherish everything. I truly cherish them.
Coming to the Dalin Tzu Chi Hospital this time, I am so grateful. We heard many doctors sharing their insights; sure enough, in the medical field, there will always be someone more able than us, but when it comes to loving hearts, that might not be the case.
I was wondering, what did we really bring to Chaiyi when we took Dalin’s medical services there? Besides going there with a heart of gratitude, what we want to do the most is that, aside from treating diseases, we also want to give love to patients and extend that care even to their family.
I want to bring that to our clinics there, and recreate that there. Of course, for our clinics to run smoothly in Chaiyi, and keep on running so, It’ll take the efforts of doctors, nurses, staff, and volunteers to make it happen. So, I think, this is a right thing to do; I only have two hands, and I need help from more people. Only with many people’s efforts, can we do this right thing.
Hearing the sharing from doctors and seeing our nurses, I feel gratitude from the bottom of my heart. I am moved, and I am grateful. I am moved immensely. This sentiment of being grateful and moved reminds me of our Year-End Blessings Ceremony here. As the eyes can see, we might describe it just as small and delicate, because the venue really isn’t big. Actually, it is quite small.
We couldn’t use the auditorium at the hospital, so we used a space located in the dormitory basement. I really praised the staff of the general affairs department for acting so swiftly in such a short time in setting up the venue when it was changed three times. I could imagine the staff of general affairs department immediately mobilized as the venue changed again and again.
The space was not big, but it was very clean and neat. Outside of the space is the basement parking lot. Yet, the space was set up nicely; one couldn’t tell that it was a parking lot. It is indeed nicely done; I praised them for this. Also, I heard the sharing. For the past two to three days, I’ve heard the sharing from the doctors of our Dalin Tzu Chi Hospital that each department has worked in unity and harmony with one another.
People all praised others. Each time people shared, they didn’t talk about themselves, instead, they said, it was so and so…It was them…It is our department, but they did this…The medical staff did not claim the credit, rather, they gave praise to others. People who can praise others have virtues. Hearing our doctors praising others, we know that they have virtues within themselves. This is truly remarkable.
I truly hope that with Mother Nature when people look up to the sky they realize they need favorable weather and rely on the earth for the food we eat. So, I often say that we should raise our heads to repent, for we have produced a lot of pollution which contaminates the air. Whenever we give rise to a thought, our desire has led us to generate a lot of destruction. So, we should be repentant.
Every one of us should feel grateful. We should feel grateful every day. To remain physically healthy, we rely on the earth to sustain us; be it medicine or the nutritious crops, they are all supplied by our earth. Living in the world, we look up to the sky and repent and bow our heads, being grateful.
So, hearing the staff here at Dalin working so harmoniously, and that they are grateful to one another, interact and cooperate well with one another, if they can additionally harbor gratitude and be repentant, they’ll come to learn how fresh air comes about and how the land sustains everyone’s lives. If we study these in depth, we’ll find important principles in them.
The Buddha is called the Awakened One of the Cosmos, which he is true to the name. Every day, I’m grateful to the Buddha for his kindness of nurturing our wisdom-life and helping us understand a lot of life’s principles. So, we need to be grateful to the Buddha. We also need to be grateful to our parents and, more importantly, be grateful to all living beings.
When we treat patients and take care of people, people are part of living beings. When we love and safeguard patients, we are being grateful and are repaying the kindness of living beings. If our parents have passed away, we care for other elderly people like we would care for our own parents. We should continue being filial and doing good. Whether our parents are alive or not, we use the body that our parents gave us to do things that benefit people, and dedicate the merits we gained to our parents. This is being filial.
This is repaying the kindness of our parents and also that of the Buddha. The Buddha teaches us to walk the Bodhisattva Path and to reach out to living beings in suffering. This is being a person with enlightened love. Doctors are great healers. The Buddha came to this world to cure the ills of living beings. Living beings have a lot of illnesses which require the remedy of Dharma.
So, let us be grateful to the Buddha, to our parents, and to all living beings. Patients can also be our teachers. Among people, we can always learn from one another. I’m grateful to all the doctors and nurses for your power of love. Yesterday, I had truly felt the truth, beauty, and goodness at the Year-End Blessings Ceremony.
All in all, I truly cherished the ceremony yesterday, and I’m also grateful for today. Let us be grateful all the time, and let us cherish one another. I’m grateful to our doctors, hospital staff, and volunteers, thank you.