the scriptures in a calm mood, I was finally awakened. My obsessive emphasis on gaining personal fame and my eagerness to outdo others in whatever I did had put my mind in turmoil, which eventually resulted in me contracting cancer.
While in the Temple, I was not given a comfortable room to live in, out of consideration for my illness and old age. Instead, I rented a dilapidated hut from a beekeeper. It was close to the Dharma Cave, where the founder of Zen Buddhism faced a wall in meditation for nine full years. From that time on, I started to practice Buddhism in the real sense. Every day, after reading The Tripitaka, I went to the Dharma Cave for meditation. Being very fragile, I climbed the mountain path on hands and knees. At first, my gown was soaked with sweat each time I had climbed the first one or two meters. I continued climbing until I was totally exhausted, then I sat, or even lay on the ground, weeping. I did this every day without fail.
I returned to the Temple again after chemotherapy. Having taken medicine every day, I was repulsed by the smell of food. The chemotherapy made it difficult for my intestines to operate properly, and I could only live on gruel. However, the biggest change in me was that I gained some vitality, and I knew I could make it. While maintaining a peaceful state of mind, I persevered in practicing Bodhidharma Yi Jin Jing, Ba Duan Jin (a 700-year-old qigong practice consisting of eight simple movements) and breathing exercises each day. As a result, my health improved with each passing day. Nearly 20 years have passed since I was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 1996, but I am still healthy and full of life.
During this 20 year span, I have combined the ideas of Buddhism and traditional Chinese medicine and have accumulated some experience in treating illnesses and preserving health. I introduced it to my anguished, illness-ridden friends, who found it quite effective. Later, I thought others might benefit from these insights as well. Many people were agitated, unhappy, or even depressed over various small troubles in life, common diseases, or even seemingly for no reason at all.
I am a “talkative” monk. I keep myself busy giving lectures, treating patients, and sharing my experience both inside and outside the Temple. Through my work, many patients have fully recovered and many depressed visitors have been cheered. In hopes of helping more people avoid illness and enable them to have a healthy, happy life, I have put together my reflections on life and my understanding of Buddhist wisdom, effective methods of Zen medicine, and proven recipes, recording them in this book. I sincerely hope that this book will be a gateway to a healthier, happier life.
Shi Xinggui
November 29, 2015
Chapter I
Curing Mental Anxiety to Prevent Physical Disease
In the early years of my medical practice, I was involved in the building of many rehabilitation centers in the US, Germany, and Canada. My pursuit of fame and wealth reached its peak when I was invited to give lectures there. My vanity grew immensely when I saw the large audiences that gathered.
Only after my gradual recovery from cancer did I begin to realize that position and wealth do not belong to us, no matter how much they seem to. When one’s life ends, what can he bring with him? We are but passing visitors in this world, and our journey lasts just dozens of years. There is no reason for stubbornness. We must let go. We can only have all these things when the heart is empty enough to hold all.
According to modern scientific research, one’s health is determined by many factors, such as heredity, food and drink, emotion, medical care, balance between work and rest, and one’s living environment. Among these, heredity makes up 15%, food 10%, emotion 60%, medical care 10%, and others 5%. Obviously, emotion, or state of mind, is key to our health.
This is in line with pulse-taking in traditional Chinese medicine, in which changes in one’s emotional state, however small, affect the vital energy and state of the blood, which is displayed in the condition of the pulse. This proves that human emotions and psychology are closely related to disease, as many diseases come from inside. Therefore, one who is mentally ill is physically ill as well. That’s why we often hear of someone who falls sick due to anger, anxiety, worry, or annoyance.
One’s state of mind affects his health as much as any medical treatment. All diseases are due to one’s mental state, and they will be cured once the mental state is properly aligned. According to traditional Chinese medicine, a disease is cured more through general healthcare than through medical treatment, and the key to general healthcare is adjusting the patient’s state of mind. In many people’s eyes, cancer is incurable. While it is true that many cancer patients die one to two months after a diagnosis is made, there are also many who continue to live a normal life. The moment I was diagnosed with cancer, I thought I should diligently fight it, but I later discovered that I was wrong. Instead of beating my brains out to kill the cancer cells in my body, I assumed a calm, fearless attitude toward the disease. I let it be and kept myself happy and carefree. In this way, my state of mind improved, and so did health.
1. Maintaining Good Spirits
According to traditional Chinese medicine, the essence of life, vital energy, and spirit represent the three aspects of life respectively, i.e. the principle and material basis, the dynamics and energy movement, and the dominator and external symptoms. Being closely linked, even indispensable, to life, they are invaluable to human beings, as they are the prime mover of one’s life, the basis for one’s health, and the prerequisite for one’s career development. Consider whether you have ever seen a successful person looking listless or sighing in despair in public. Of course not! When you are in good spirits, you naturally look sunny and positive, and this mental state will also affect others, such as your business partner, and will pave the way for fruitful conversation. By contrast, a lagging spirit is often associated with negativity, which will attract other negative things, including disease.
How then, can we maintain a good spirit? The most important thing is to present our best state of mind to others. When I was seriously ill, I was all skin and bones and had little physical strength. However, when there were visitors, I did not hold back when receiving them. Even though I often wept at the afflictions afterwards, I told myself not to impose my own pains and troubles on others.
The second thing one must do to maintain good spirits is to get moving. The human body consists of two kinds of energy, i.e. yin and yang. If we stay inert in the daytime, the yang energy will not be generated. How can we be strong and healthy then? If we keep active at night, the yang energy will not change into the yin energy, and how can we fall asleep that state? Look at the children around you. They scamper around in the day and sleep like a log at night, falling asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillows. Some children don’t wake up even if they fall from the bed. This is a perfect example of the balance between yin and yang.
Receiving others with vigor and spirit benefits our body and soul. It also prepares us for a brighter future.
2. Not Enslaved by Material Gain
Mr. Liu, a wealthy lay Buddhist, was diagnosed with liver cancer. He asked me, “I’ve converted to Buddhism for five or six years now and have chanted Buddhist scriptures each day for about half an hour. How have I contracted cancer? Does Buddha really exist?”
I knew that he was walking the same path I once walked. What he felt was exactly what I felt. I believed that he might have pondered over these questions for some time. When I was in good condition, I devoted myself wholeheartedly to winning personal fame and material comforts everywhere I went, but when I came down with cancer and was confined to bed, I was awakened to the fact that money could not save my life, no matter how much of it I had.
Why
