Thought Essays ⁽¹³⁷⁾

Every morning at three or four I rise and, in the dead quiet, read alone in the living room to start the day. Around six I prepare breakfast for the family; after breakfast I see my wife to the shuttle bus stop, then stop by…

Today my child started school. After breakfast, I cycled with him to the school gate, only to be told parents were not allowed in. My son scanned his health code and went in, so I took the opportunity to drop by the National Library. I…

The Qixi Festival, when everyone shows off their love, also happens to be my mother's birthday. The date is so special that I could not forget it even if I tried. Every Qixi, I miss my mother deeply, her image filling my mind. Although she…

Zen Master Hakuin was the restorer of the Rinzai school in Japan. Near the temple where Hakuin practiced lived a family with a young unmarried daughter who had an illicit affair and bore a child. This enraged her parents, and her father pressed her to…

I love reading Jin Yong's novels because the characters Mr. Jin Yong portrays are very real. The human world is a jianghu, but in the end this jianghu originates within our own hearts. If there are no waves in our hearts, however great the storms…

A homeless monk who has cut off desire and cast aside love, who understands his own mind-source and comprehends the profound principle of the Buddha, awakening to the law of non-action: within, he has nothing to attain; without, he has nothing to seek. His mind…

There is an ancient Chinese saying: "The highest physician governs the nation, the middle physician governs people, and the lowest physician treats disease." It means that a first-rate physician can govern the nation and bring peace to the people, a second-rate physician "governs people," and…

I was among the earliest batch of Chinese netizens; I started going online in 1998. I once had three five-digit QQ numbers, and the QQ number I still use today is still five-digit — all of which prove that I am a "veteran-level" netizen. I…

Understanding others and understanding oneself are neither easy things; there are not many people in this world who have self-awareness. Anthropologists hold that people tend to believe the civilization of their own society is the most advanced in the world; even backward cannibals believe their…

Lately I have come to understand the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove of the Wei-Jin period. Their characters and behavior seemed absurd to the world, but when one goes deep into their inner lives, one feels deep respect and sympathy for them.In such an…