When we are willing to let go of our wealth, we will gain wealth.  When we give teachings, we will gain wisdom.  When we give fearlessness, we will gain health and long life. 

The law of causality is a reality and as natural as the laws of heaven and earth.  If we perform goodness without expectation of reward, without the wish for prestige, wealth, wisdom, health, or long life, without the wish for anything, then we are bound to uncover everything that is already in our true nature.  Is this not being free and having great contentment?

​

​

​

The first paramita is giving.  For us, this means letting go and helping others.  There are three kinds of giving: the giving of wealth, the giving of teachings, and the giving of fearlessness.  Giving is a karmic cause.  If we want to have wealth, we should practice the giving of wealth.  If we want to be intelligent and wise, we should practice the giving of teachings.  If we wish to have good health and a long life, we should practice the giving of fearlessness.

In the giving of fearlessness, the most important thing is not to harm any being.  In addition to not killing beings, we should not even cause them to have afflictions.  A vegetarian diet is a form of the giving of fearlessness: We do not eat the flesh of animals or cause them to have afflictions.  To be more proactive, we should free captured animals.

​

​

​

The second paramita is abiding by the precepts.  We should observe the precepts and codes of behavior that the Buddha laid out.  The teachings in the sutras that the Buddha earnestly and patiently taught us should be followed too.  We should also abide by the laws and customs of our countries.  If we abandon the precepts, then the practice and upholding of the Buddha's teachings will disappear.

​

​

​

The third paramita is patience.  To accomplish any undertaking, one needs to bear any hardship that one encounters.  In the process of cultivation, one will surely encounter frustration.  The more diligent one is, the greater the amount of frustration one faces.

Why is there so much frustration?  Because of the evil karmas that one has committed over countless kalpas, obstacles from karmic forces are unavoidable. 

The only solution is to tolerate any hardship.  This will decrease karmas.  If one has meditative concentration, it can eliminate karmas.  One should face obstacles with wisdom, resolve them with forbearance, acquiesce, and make diligent progress.  Only with the paramita of patience will one be able to improve.  If one is not patient, one will encounter obstacles.

​

​

​

The fourth paramita is diligence.  The Chinese term for "diligence" is jingjin.  Jing means "pure and unadulterated" and jin means "making progress."  For Bodhisattvas, diligence is the only virtuous root.

Nowadays, many Buddhist practitioners make the mistake of learning too many different things, resulting in a mixture.  Although they make progress every day, their progress is adulterated.  They spend a lot of time and effort but their accomplishment is very limited.

The little achievement I have in this lifetime is due to having a good teacher.  He forbade me to proceed in an unfocused and random way.  I learned from Mr. Li Bingnan in Taichung for ten years.

His teaching method was that even if a student was very smart and had an exceptional capability, he or she could simultaneously only learn two sutras at most.  If the student wanted to learn three sutras [at one time], he would not teach this student.  Students who did not have a good capability learned only one sutra.

Only when Mr. Li considered that a student had learned a sutra well enough would he teach the student a new one.  Otherwise, he would not allow the student to learn a new sutra.  During my ten years with Mr. Li, I learned five sutras, whereas in a Buddhist college, the students study more than five sutras in one semester.

​