Dharma Master Heng Sure in Singapore

Finally had a chance to see him in person, Ven. Heng Sure was invited by Buddhist Union to give Dharma Talks in S'pore on 19-21 Nov 2010.

Attended his 20 Nov session, not disappointing to the audience, he slanged his Mandarin, played his guitar and sang Buddhist hymns.
Addressing the topic: he related Dukka to stress and gave brief illustrations on the 8 modes of stress.
Contentment was cited as one way to cope with stress as being able to wait and be patient, one's heart will be in peace.
" One who knows contentment is always happy, one who learns patience always know peace"

For those who loves his songs, he recommended the web: http://www.dharmaradio.org/,
click on Paramita/Acts of kindness and find out how to download his album for free.
Alternatively, you may pay & download from iTunes via search for his name. :-)

He also has his own blog: http://paramita.typepad.com/ (Dharma Forest)

For the parents....

A Food for thought...from an email received ...

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Pencil: I'm sorry
Eraser: For what? You didn't do anything wrong.

Pencil: I'm sorry because you get hurt because of me. Whenever I made a mistake, you're always there to erase it. But as you make my mistakes vanish, you lose a part of yourself. You get smaller and smaller each time.

Eraser: That's true. But I don't really mind. You see, I was made to do this. I was made to help you whenever you do something wrong. Even though one day, I know I'll be gone and you'll replace me with a new one, I'm actually happy with my job. So please, stop worrying. I hate seeing you sad.
I found this conversation between the pencil and the eraser very inspirational. Parents are like the eraser whereas their children are the pencil. They're always there for their children, cleaning up their mistakes.
Sometimes along the way, they get hurt, and become smaller / older, and eventually pass on. Though their children will eventually find someone new (spouse), but parents are still happy with what they do for their children, and will always hate seeing their precious ones worrying,
or sad.

All my life, I've been the pencil. And it pains me to see the eraser that is my parents getting smaller and smaller each day. For I know that one day, all that I'm left with would be eraser shavings and memories of what I used to have.

This is to all the parents out there.

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Robe Offering Event 2010 at Foo Hai Monastery

Rejoicing to see the compassionate Venerable Hai Tao again at the Robe offering event held at Foo Hai Monastery. Caught a picture of him sitting beside the pillar with inscriptions of what I deemed as right description of his acts. Arrived late just in time after joining bro Benny's life liberation event at Marina Bay before Venerable is to give a Dharma talk on benefits of robe offering. The event is to allow devotee participation to offer 7500 robes to Venerables to India, Sri Lanka etc places.

Interested parties could still contact Buddhist Life Mission at 6836 9088 (after 12 pm) for more information.

Aspiration

I wonder if I have some karmic obstacles, I always fall ill when I took leave for the recent retreats.
The most recent one is a real test.
The nite before the retreat, I even developed high fever of 38.99 degree,
I think my heat tolerance was rather high:P,
However, deciding that I should not waste my hard-earned leave and recalling a recent article that our Willpower can overcome illness with positive mental thoughts, decided to give it a trial.

I took my favourite Chinese herbal cold remedy , Ge Gen Tang, & make sure I took lots of water as advised by friend, I went to bed recordly early but I decided to do some meditation which I had lazed on, yes, the meditation on the count of Amitabha Buddha.
I realised that maybe because when I am sick, my mind will be less active & more focused, meditation can be performed better.

Being mindful of the Buddha really helps, the breathe naturally gets regulated and is a natural healing remedy. If possible, also visualise warm lights radiate from the Buddha, from the 3 saints towards one and the universe to all those who are also suffering from illness.
I guess throughout the nite, when I sleep, my mind is still mindful of the Buddha.

Forcing myself to wake up every 2 hours or so, to take water to detox and repeating the meditation exercise before I sleep. I found my temperature dropping fast and by morning, I recovered to 37 degree. And despite constant waking up over the nite, I felt fresh.

I decided to continue with my original plan to attend the retreat and to break-off should my condition relapse.
Surprisingly, I felt good throughout the morning. During the lunch-break, I retook temperature, and everything is normal. Even after sneaking out from the retreat place during the long lunch-break & back, I was feeling fine but perhaps being in & out of the heat does play a part, and too much exercise for the day after recovering from illness, near the end of the day's retreat, I felt inflammation of the throat and lost my voice. :P
Other than the small discomfort, I am still fine but when I reach home, my headache arose and retaking my temperature shown it rising close to 38 degree. Okay, an early nite again and similar exercise and with blessing of Amitabha Buddha, it is normal again by the morning.

However, despite recovering, this imbalance of heat of the body does cause some mild side-effects of discomfort and my voice had not fully discovered. So, I decided to take it easy in the morning to skip the morning session to rest more and run some errands.

Meditation method on mindfulness of the Buddha does really help to regulate one's breath and recover. I was able to participate in last section of the retreat & fever did not come back in the evening.
However, as I did not watch my diet as I had some fried stuff, my voice did not recover well.
I repeat similar exercise though did not as frequent and I awoke early on 3rd day for my final retreat but a storm formed as a test of my determination, I gave way to stay at home to avoid getting drenched and falling sick again as despite mind over body won, I could feel the illness does cost one low immunity tolerance. I stayed at home to do some meditation to build up my immunity instead.
After a delicious home-cooked miso soup lunch, ensuring that temperature is right, I returned to the retreat. And having had a good rest and wanting to compensate what I had missed in morning, i was able to concentrate better and repent more.

As per Venerable's closing speech, taking good care of our body without attachment to it is really important for our daily lives and retreats.
This illness obstacles is a good learning lesson and 1 Aspiration arose:

May All Beings Who Wish to attend Dharma Retreats to be free from all discomforts and obstacles to attend the retreats wholeheartedly. :-)


I am thankful to my boss who allows me to take leave despite tight work schedule.
I believe if I had remained at work, i would likely have 2 days' MC for the high fever.
By having a short-break, despite weak in body, at least now mentally I am more able to return to the work challenges awaiting me...
感恩.
Amituofo.