Challenges or Sufferings Make One a Better Human Being
AN202112-01Nurture our virtues regardless of the external situation being good or bad
塞翁失马焉知非福 脚踏实地 勤修心德 That which is good turns bad, that which is bad turns good - we do not know the future. Be down to earth and work hard on developing virtues in our mind.
The cyclist taught me that regardless of what is defined as a "positive" and "negative" situation in life we always have a choice on how we want to look at it and deal with it. For example the cyclist can choose to sulk, and grumble that doing good to others does not lead to good rewards for oneself - like 好人没好报, or curse heaven or deities, or blame the persons and situations leading to his accident, or blame the housemate for being a burden. But he chose to do otherwise, which shows he is steadfast in his adherence to virtues and goodness. Because if we are not steadfast and true in our virtue and goodness, negative situation such as this will cause us to despair, get frustrated, angry and brew lots of resentment inside us, and we forget all about being kind to people anymore or wanting to help others anymore. Only in negative situations and suffering can we know whether our "goodness" and "virtues" are for real.
The cyclist's situation also reminds me of the story of the Man who lost his horse 塞翁失马 - 焉知非福. We should not despair when meet with negative situations and rouse our spirits, nothing is for certain and perhaps due to the cyclist's unfortunate situation - it will eventually lead him to a fortunate situation in the future. I know a neighbour who have work very hard and live in poverty his whole life, he rely on labour job, cycle instead of take public transport and also donations by relatives to support himself, because of his situation, someone came along and offer to renovate his entire flat for free. Things happen in a continuous never ending chain and one thing will always lead to another, so we should not be short sighted and view the current positive or negative situation as permanent and be fixated with our own success or sufferings. Instead we can take every success or suffering in life to nurture our virtue. For example, we can nurture the virtue of humility, compassion, equanimity etc. when we are doing well, and nurture the virtues of patience, courage, faith, calmness, acceptance etc when we are down and out.
SilentContemplation
