Translated and Edited by TBF Translation Team

(continued from issue 467)

I know as well of many, many people who are afraid of being alone, who prefer to stay with their [painful] feelings to avoid the loneliness, to escape from the loneliness and helplessness of being alone.

For these people, every one is unconscious and, moreover, unconscious without even knowing it, locked within their feelings without even knowing why.

In my lifetime, I may have the True Buddha within, but my heart is heavily weighed down by the feelings from my memories of the past, always present in my mind, quietly existing in a rhythmic pulse. They are like a padlock which holds me firmly in captivity.

The highly achieved, highly respected cultivator with great wisdom would say:

Attachment to love brings suffering when later separated.

When there is gathering, there must be parting.

There is never a party that does not come to an end, when all must depart.

All feelings, in the long run, eventually become empty. A cultivator should not be trapped within feelings, and must learn to be reasonable, must learn to be truly calm, must learn to be purified, must learn to be without self. How can [one who is] without self have feelings?

It is all right when love comes.

It is all right when love goes.

[We] should have ability and wisdom, to never be locked by our feelings easily. Great is the wisdom of the Buddha! [It] keeps us from losing our direction, providing us with refreshing new space and freedom. Never be locked by the padlock of feelings.

(the end)

《本文譯自真佛報第440期頭版師尊「真佛論劍」文章「『情』是一把鎖」》