My Gentle Heart

For a bad child like Māra Pāpīyas, the Master, while scolding him, also patted his head and touched his shoulder, telling him to be obedient and behave, that he too would become a Buddha in the future, and not to make trouble anymore. For the sake of the fact that all sentient beings can become Buddhas, for the sake of the suffering of sentient beings, the bodhisattva displays a fierce and stern appearance while being full of loving-kindness, with a heart of a thousand tender turns.

A bodhisattva who has cultivated a mind of compassion, upon seeing the disruptive and unruly appearances of sentient beings, sighs and pities their ignorance on the one hand, while on the other hand embracing everything with a mind like empty space. The inner mind is not only vast and boundless, but also exceptionally soft and gentle. Now my mind is incomparably gentle, and I am also very fond of mischievous troublemakers, because since childhood I have dealt with those naughty little rascals, and I do not dislike them.

Moreover, a bodhisattva should have some realization, knowing that all dharmas are manifestations of the tathāgatagarbha; in reality there are no all dharmas—they are all the emptiness-mark and emptiness (śūnyatā) of the tathāgatagarbha. Hiding within the tathāgatagarbha and enjoying coolness and tranquility—how free and comfortable that would be! Just these past two days, a disciple said: quickly find the tathāgatagarbha, then hide within the tathāgatagarbha and enjoy its coolness and stillness, with no appearances of conflicts or disturbances in the mind at all. This disciple is very wise; we should learn from him.

The Sūtra on the Non-Practice of All Dharmas (Zhufa Wuxing Jing): "xing" (行) means the movement and operation that appears; in fact, all dharmas have no real existence and no operation. Why is this so? All dharmas are the mark of nirvāṇa—tranquil and without action, neither arising nor ceasing, without bondage or fetters, and also without liberation, ever abiding in tranquility like empty space.

All dharmas are the mark of the tathāgatagarbha. When one sees the tathāgatagarbha, one does not see all dharmas—this is hiding within the tathāgatagarbha. What dharma is not the tathāgatagarbha? All are the emptiness (śūnyatā) of the tathāgatagarbha. Therefore there is no worldly dharma-mark of the three realms, no marks of wholesome and unwholesome, no marks of disruption and disorder, no marks of opposition. The bodhisattva constantly roams in ultimate emptiness, the mind constantly abiding in meditative concentration (samādhi) without attachment. If there is attachment, then one is not a bodhisattva; if one sees marks of good and bad in all dharmas, then one is not a bodhisattva.

Therefore my mind is gentle, soft to the utmost, beyond words.