In Simplicity and Inner Preservation of the Spirit, One Naturally Finds Contentment
Nothing forced is true destiny; only following nature is real. How can storms never cease? The old monk at last enters deep samadhi.
What truly remains of life, after the storms have passed, is only something plain and unadorned. As one goes on living, one comes to understand the importance of inwardly preserving the spirit. The Huangdi Neijing (Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon) says: "If the spirit is preserved within, how can illness arise?" If a person can truly find joy in poverty and follow the Way, and if a family can truly live in peace and contentment, that state is the best of all.
The ancients said: cultivate the self, regulate the family, govern the state, and bring peace to the world. Ordinary mortals like me have no interest in governing the state or bringing peace to the world; I wish only to work at cultivating the self and regulating the family. According to the sequence of the Confucian eight guidelines, to cultivate the self and regulate the family one must first rectify the mind and make the will sincere, and extend knowledge through the investigation of things. Rectifying the mind and making the will sincere means cultivating one's moral character; extending knowledge through the investigation of things means raising one's cognitive ability. The two are indispensable. Only when a person has both character and wisdom can he be outwardly accommodating yet inwardly principled, fair yet rigid without being narrow.
The sixty-four hexagrams of the Yijing (Book of Changes) are all favorable to the great person. The great person is one whose heart is upright and whose will is sincere. That is to say, for a person whose moral standard passes muster, every circumstance of life is actually not worth worrying about, for the philosophers believe that great virtue carries all things: if a person's character passes the test, he can naturally turn danger into safety. If a person's character does not pass, even what he gains will be lost.
The virtues most valued in Chinese culture include two parts: being kind to others and contending with no one. If one harbors no thought of harming others and is always ready to help, one will naturally not make enemies all around; perhaps, through long-standing kindness to others, when hard times come, someone will indeed step forward to lend a hand. To contend with no one and not admire vanity means that the vain outer world will naturally not trouble one's heart. Thus in Cai Gen Tan (Vegetable Roots Discourse) it is said that the true flavor lies in but one word: "plain." Once one is indifferent to fame and gain, the struggles of the fame-and-gain world have nothing to do with us.
Chinese philosophers pursue an attitude to life of "leaving the world yet not abandoning it, entering the dust yet not being defiled by it." This attitude best reconciles the relationship between one's inner heart and the outer world. To put this attitude into practice successfully, one must be sufficiently plain and unadorned and inwardly preserve one's spirit. Only by not valuing the outer world and focusing on one's own heart can one gradually live in the world of dust yet remain apart from it. Otherwise, even dwelling in a deep mountain and an ancient temple, one could not truly find peace.