Let’s talk about another scripture passage:
There are a lot of people in the world who do good deeds because they hope that the newspapers will publish about it and let everyone know that they have done good deeds. This is “doing something for a reason”, whereas us cultivators are “doing something without a reason”.
“Doing something for a reason”, one can also ascend to the heavens. It is not that doing so is wrong, but the blessings from doing so are shorter, not unlimited, merely limited blessings only.
Of course, we all need these good roots to be reborn in the Western Pure Land, but these good deeds should not be for the sake of heavenly blessings, but for pure blessings—completely clean blessings—to be reborn in the Western Pure Land.
Many people actually do good deeds just for fame. When we do good deeds, act with bodhicitta, don’t let the mind arise with attachment to anything. Don’t do things only with a specific purpose, it is not as good this way. Without intentions, solely wholeheartedly, totally pure blessings, this is then true Pure Land blessings.
Master Lianzhu said tonight, “He who stays near vermillion gets stained red, and he who stays near ink gets stained black.” This is identical to the principles in “The Buddha Speaks of Amitabha Sutra” that we talked about tonight.
If your hands touch dirty things, in a very short time, your body would be smelly too.
We are cultivating here, so when we return home our bodies are fragrant.
Therefore, in every single thing that we do, we should have restraint.
Confucius said before, we should know how to have a happy life, but not overstep the boundaries, meaning not to break the rules.
Like drinking alcohol, it is a very happy thing, but when drinking, one must not get drunk; getting drunk means suffering.
You can go to a nightclub to dance. It’s not a problem, just a form of exercise, but other than exercising, if there are other activities, that is going beyond the rules.
In America, hugging is a form of politeness, whereas for Eastern people our politeness goes as far as handshakes only. But whether it is a hug or handshake, one must be able to have self-restraint and not go beyond the rules.
Therefore a lot of things are like this, if we can self-restrain it is good, if we cannot control ourselves it becomes evil.
We cultivators are the same, if we can exercise self-restraint, our cultivation will not go astray. If we cannot control ourselves, it is very dangerous. It’s not that the Buddha is wrong, but that our thoughts are wrong.
There was once a person who cultivated Avalokiteshvara as his Principal Deity. Avalokiteshvara is originally very dignified and often protects him, but because he became too close to Avalokiteshvara, his thoughts went astray. In the end, he said that Avalokiteshvara came down to kiss him! This is because his thoughts were not upright, and the final result, of course, was that he was sent to a mental hospital. Therefore, our cultivation is about cultivating our thoughts to be completely pure and bright, without any bad thoughts.
In addition, Grandmaster had said in the past, when making offerings, one should offer to the Garuda, a very large bird that flies through space and that eats dragons. However, one disciple had impure thoughts, he imagined shooting the bird with an arrow while it was flying. He couldn’t stop these thoughts, and what was meant to be an offering to the Garuda turned into a killing of the bird every time he did the visualization. I believe many people have this kind of problem in their visualizations, the best solution is to stop this offering altogether.
Because the thoughts in a person’s mind are from countless past lifetimes and deeply stored within the subconscious, they usually do not easily reveal themselves. But when one becomes quiet and still, they begin to surface.
When sitting in meditation, one may discover that the subconscious mind is filled with thoughts of scolding others. At such a moment, one should divert your thoughts and replace those thoughts with something completely pure, diverting away the bad thoughts.
Pure is something that is very clean, think of another very pure, very beautiful thing to divert away the thought of scolding others in your heart.
Grandmaster has encountered many similar experiences before, there was once a very beautiful young woman who was a psychiatric patient. When she had an episode, the vulgar language she uttered in the hospital was so offensive that no one dared to listen. However, her parents said that in her normal state, she was very refined and could not tolerate hearing even a single swear word.
After having mental illness, why were all the things she said so offensive?
Actually Grandmaster knows that these are all her thoughts from her subconscious. Just that during normal times, these bad thoughts are completely suppressed.
Our cultivation is to completely replace and transform these bad thoughts from our past lives, our bad karma, by using beautiful thoughts and by visualizing majestic buddhas and bodhisattvas. This is a deeper and more subtle method of cultivation. That’s all for today.
Om Mani Padme Hum