Cool drops of water: Inspiration and insight from The Path of Life

[Jiegang]

Extracted from Volume two of The Path of Life:
 
Chapter - Keep on creating and destroying mankind
 
“… At the end of the day, truth is still truth, why should I deceive you?  You should calm yourself down and think about it!  You and I were strangers, we had never had any rancour or enmities before, why would I deceive you, or embarrass you?  Even I wanted to deceive you, why should I compile such a great lie?  And if you look at the example of the history of mankind, there has always been a master in a family, there has always been a king in a country; by inference, in the deep universe, whether nether world or divinity or some super natural power, there has always existed a Master of the universe as well.  If these were lies compiled by me, then did not I commit a crime of offending!  Can I still be pestering you all the time and carrying on telling lies?  What would be the benefit to you or to me of doing all of this? …”

[Michael]

It seems kind of ironic that Pan Gu created such a complex and difficult world, full of so many deceptions created by humans and others, not to mention conditions of limited knowledge like Pan Gu 26 thinking he created everything, and then Pan Gu the Great would ask why he might lie. The purpose of deceiving is similar to the purpose of creating an extremely complex world: to make people believe so they will put forth effort of their own free will. The Path of Life says the final purpose of it all is The Future Human World. We'll just have to keep going (putting in effort) until then.

[Saber]

These beautiful philosophical points are always informed by our best attempts to understand the broad arc of our life experience.  This forum is quite interesting in that the contributors are from different cultural, religious, ethnic, and language settings.  Naturally, one thing we share in common in our desire to understand in our minds and our hearts the essence of the Master Ou's teaching.  I believe that most of us consider Master Ou's insights as informed by direct experience of the spirit of PanGu the 26th.  As we all read The Path of Life, we read a series experiences and questions that resonate with our own lives.  For me, not all of the issues are resolved, but the central themes, even those difficult to accept, ring true.  With respect to the Future Human World, I carry two points of view.  First, if we are not living a heavenly existence "now" it must be in the future. Second, since PanGu indicates that our generation may soon live to enter this new world, let me refer to a famous passage attribute to the early Christian disciple, St. Thomas, he said that when, one day, the disciples asked the Savior, "When will the Kingdom come?" Jesus answered: "It will not come by expectation; they will not say: 'See here,' or 'See there.' But the Kingdom of the Father is spread upon the earth, and men do not see it" (Logion 113)." (Campbell, Joseph. 1988. Historical Atlas of World Mythology, Volume II, The Way of the Seeded Earth, Part 1, The Sacrifice. Page 111.)  Thus, our spiritual efforts (free will) both remove us from suffering (deceptions) and cultivate (temper)the ground for love and compassion. 

[Michael]

Hi Saber, I agree with your post.    Just a small thing, but you mention Pan Gu the 26th and the English version of The Path of Life (and I assume the original Chinese version is the same on this point) does not mention any direct contact between Pan Gu 26 and Master Ou, it only has contact between Master Ou and Pan Gu the Great.

These beautiful philosophical points are always informed by our best attempts to understand the broad arc of our life experience.  This forum is quite interesting in that the contributors are from different cultural, religious, ethnic, and language settings.

I often think of how The Path of Life was a conversation between The Creator and a particular young man, from a particular culture, at a particular point in time, and I wonder how much of a cultural barrier there might be in The Future Human World between different people when they first come there. I think that culture can not be discounted or waved away, it is an integral part of us as much as our dual nature of both good and evil. Since The Path of Life is describing The Future Human World in terms of the culture of Master Ou, do you have any thoughts about how the culture barrier may be resolved for people from around the world to participate, at least in the beginning stages, of moving on from this world to the next?

The Path of Life does describe a transition period near to the end of this world where national boundaries will disappear and great deeds of evil will not be permitted, but I still doubt a kind of immediate, homogenous, cultural transformation into the next world. Perhaps there will be gradual stages of entry or concentration for various groups into one population, which is hinted at in another passage from the book that mentions non-humans later coming to visit or join the Future Human World.

Best,
Michael

[Beautifulice]

I have read the Chinese version of The Path of Life at least 15 times.  Nevertheless, when I read it again, I often found something new, and I often found that I misunderstood some very important plots and main points.  Even though The Path of Life was written in easy-to-understand Chinese words, which is my first language, it took me quite a few times of reading to get the main idea yet still not grasp some other underlying meanings.  I knew that some Chinese readers had similar experience with me.  

I always wondered why this happened to me.  

It was because I am not broad-minded and calm enough and the level of my heart and soul is so low.  In another word, I am not kind enough and I cannot fully understand and put in action to practice “Take kindness and benevolence as basis, take frankness and friendliness to heart”―that is exactly the most import central theme of The Path of Life.  Master Ou especially seriously stated “Take kindness and benevolence as basis, take frankness and friendliness to heart” right in the beginning page of the book.  
Indeed, when my heart and soul level is so low and I am not broad-minded enough, even though iron-like fact is in front of me, I still cannot see it.  In addition, I insisted on my own wrong understanding because of being ego-centered, and in the meanwhile I only emphasize some very minor details.  

I finally understood that after so many years.  In the past, I always hoped to understand more about The Path of Life especially when I was a teenager.  Later I found despite I gained an undergraduate degree in Science and a master degree in education; I still couldn’t get much more from The Path of Life as I wished.  I questioned and I often listened to Master Ou’s lectures.  I eventually understood why he always emphasized that we need to be more calm and peaceful, need to be more humble, and need to be more broad-minded, and I found that one of the most important themes in all of his lectures was “Take kindness and benevolence as basis, take frankness and friendliness to heart.”  I came to realize why I couldn’t get most out of The Path of Life.  It was because I couldn’t calm down my self to read it with a peaceful and humble mindset, and my heart and soul was not open to what it told me.  I was sorry that after so many years, my heart and soul level was not raised to a level which could receive all what The Path of Life told me.  I understood that it had all the answers of all my questions, just in front of my eyes when I was reading it, but I just couldn’t see it.  I gradually understood why Master Ou didn’t answer some of my questions directly but guided me in a different way.  Because even though he told me directly, I couldn’t get it but trashed it in my mind automatically―my heart and soul level was not high enough to understand!  

The Path of Life clearly told us the relationship between Master Ou and Pan Gu the Great and the relationship between Pan Gu 26 and Pan Gu the Great in the first two volumes of The Path of Life.  I knew that some students were very lucky to read the 1st draft of English translation.  But I understand that it would be difficult to get all the meanings from the first draft of the lousy English translation for the 1st and 2nd volumes of The Path of Life. (Only the well-translated 3rd volume was in published.  We may urge Robert Anderson to complete the fine-translation of the 1st and 2nd volume. ) But I choose not to tell you guys the truth here.    That is the same as why I agree with Olivia not to explain the answer about 26 here in the forum.  Because it took the whole book to explain, if we simply use a few paragraph to summarize, then we would ruin the answer and ruin the book and ruin your reading experience.    So please be patient to read the whole book before we ask a question or answer a question.  

However, one thing that is very clear to me, and I believe most readers would agree that the essence of The Path of Life is about what is true kindness and what is true love and how import true kindness and true love is to this human world.  I believe if all people in this world know what is true kindness and true love and they conduct themselves in this way, then, where is the culture barrier?  It reminds me one of Master Ou’s song “Sentiment and Poetry of the Ocean.” http://www.oumelody.com/english/songs/haideqinghui.html
“The azure ocean waters contain the colors of all people harmoniously,
Washing away manmade discrimination that should never have been;
……
Oceans naturally have no borders between them;
Among peoples, however, are many barriers.
Why not enter the ocean’s bosom,
Enjoy the freedom of no separation?”

Hi Saber,
I admire that you can grasp the essence of The Path of Life and Pan Gu Shengong practice right away and practice it in your life.  You are such a knowledgeable and yet humble person!  I learned a lot from you in the trip to Mexico and your posts in the forum.  I look forward to meeting with you again in this upcoming training event in January and we can talk more about The Path of Life  !

[Michael]

It happened to me, too. Every time I read The Path of Life I found there were small points, large sections, or even entire chapters that I had not really understood at all the previous times that I read them. The main reason was exactly what you said, not being open-minded enough, but also I found that I could narrow down causes for not being able to focus my mind on the material right in front of me. In my experience, the Non-moving Form helped me the most to make it obvious to myself that I was having trouble focusing, so what I mean is that even though I was reading the pages of the book, my mind was wandering to other places. There had always been clues that I did this too much, but I really started to notice it and improve a little bit with the Non-moving Form.

Letting your mind jump around to a different topic frequently becomes a habit that you are so accustomed to you don't even notice. My habit of doing this probably started very young from watching television. It was practicing PGSG that helped me to notice the problem and improve it a little. I discovered that focusing my mind when practicing PGSG, which just means not "flipping channels" in my head every five seconds, greatly increased the benefit from the time of practice and helped me relax quite a bit. Funny how that works.

If people knew how difficult it is to translate between English and Chinese and the condition of the original English translation, which was basically Chinese to Chinglish, they would be even more amazed with Robert's work and the people who helped him. It takes more time to translate from Chinglish to English than from Chinese to English, and may even be more difficult!

[Saber]

Thank you Michael and Beautiful Ice for your fine comments, and as you can see, I am certainly capable of imposing my own limited experience into the understanding. Yes, I think you are both correct.  The spirit in The Path of Life is telling Master Ou that he is the embodiment of Pan Gu the Great. Yet at the same time, Emperor Pan Gu the 26th is the current creator of this human world, eventually to be "recombined" with Pan Gu the Great.  This is one of those small but huge issues that I am still working with  . Master Ou’s revelations, Pan Gu the Great, and Pan Gu the 26th,  for me, it is a bit like splitting oxygen from air and breath, or better yet, separating the peanuts in peanut butter from the flavor.  I am certain it can be done, but not by me.  And yes, a fine translation of Volume 1 and 2 would be great.    
To end with another “cool drop” of water:
“Benevolence is the basis for love, love is the embodiment of benevolence.  Benevolence is for love, love is for a happier life!  The reason I said that life in the future human world will be perfect is that all people in the future will possess real, pure, and sincere love” (page 57).

[rliang]

Hi All,

thanks again for sharing your insight.

I also have the same experience with re-reading The Path of Life and always discovering something new that I didn't catch the previous times.  In a way, I think it is natural and meant to happen that way so we are able to gain more knowledge every time – to collect those knowledge bit by bit to help us apply them in our daily lives.  Everyone also has their own paste on everything, if we seek too much too fast, there is a good chance that we would lose them in a flash and back to where we’ve started. 

I believe it is also a way of testing our persistence to learn to be kind and loving to both ourselves, family members, friends, and  people we don’t know of.   

Beautifulice, I think you are a bit too critical of yourself and sometimes that could create a barrier and effect our learning abilities too.  To me, you are one of the kindest people I’ve known and it has been a great pleasure to have known you and call you a friend! Therefore, please don't dewell on "... level of my heart and soul is so low."

So you see, if you need a optimistic dose, I can be some assistance . 

Cheers,
Rachel

[Saber]

I am sure it was just a writing error in a grammar sense, she must be discussing the "past" (change "is" to "was") because, as you suggest, rliang, Beautiful Ice IS one of the kindest people to know.

[Beautifulice]

Thank you very much for your support and your encouragement. 
 
I am not negative or depressed.  I just learn to be rational to observe my shadow.  The Path of Life has many wonderful points (yet not easy to understand or accept in the beginning).  One of them is that we process 50% kindness and 50% evilness in our human nature.  I just gradually try to use “One will be rich by realizing one’s shallowness, make big progress by knowing how to appreciate, and earn real harvest with true contribution” (from Journey of the Heart and Soul III by Master Ou) as a guideline to understand this profound philosophy:  For most people in this world, they have 50% kindness and 50% evilness in their human nature.  I will open a new post to discuss this topic. 

[Michael]

Duality of human nature between good and evil is a great topic for a new thread. Looking forward to reading your comments on it.

[rliang]

I believe that one should be proud of “moving” more points to the “good” side within oneselve.  (Or to the least, recognize that there is something we should improve within ourselves.)   It is not an act of self-indulgence, but a small pad on the shoulder to say, “good job”, and then move on to stretch that improvement a bit further.  More positive re-enforcement is a powerful form of encourgement. Does it make sense?

[Michael]

I think the way you said it makes sense, especially about moving on. Pride is normal, it's normal to feel good about an accomplishment, but how long should it last? The realization that you're moving in a certain direction should probably come and go quickly because that movement is along a continuum that is never-ending. If you stop too long to feel your pride, you're stopping your movement.

[rliang]

Beautifulice, my initial post wasn't suggesting that you are negative or depressed.  I wanted to let you know that you are someone who processes wonderful qualities.  If I sounded harsh in relating that message across, I offer my most sincere apology!   

On a different note, how has the media been covering the H1N1 flu in everyone's community?  There has been a wide spread of coverage over the immunization shot in Canada.  Sadly, a 13 year boy died from the flu over the weekend.  It was a rare case and I think that has fueled more panic.  My husband works at the hospital and we were discussing if he should take the shot too.  Two of his co-workers got very sick just from taking the regular flu shot.  We just don't know about taking something that's just been released and still under observation.  At the end, we decided that we'll wait and see. 

I've never taken the regular flu shot before, and I'm pretty sure I will not take the swine flu one.  I think practicing PGSG is sufficient from preventing the flu.  However, I'll have to spend more time persuading my husband to practice.  A much good-luck is needed  . 

[Robert]

Hi Everyone

I would just like to add what an interesting post this has been! Although I haven't contributed to it until now I've found myself reading every update. I would also like to personally thank Jiegang for the Path of Life excerpts. Any chance of one on the transition period mentioned by Michael?