Four Important Things for Spiritual Cultivation

Spiritual cultivation means mending and nurturing your mind and character and correcting your behavior.

Master Cheng Yen said that if you want to fulfill virtuous conduct through your spiritual cultivation, then in your daily life you must remember four important things: speech, conduct, appearance and earnestness.

Every sentence you utter must be meaningful, encourage others to reach higher, and unravel the entanglements in the minds of living beings. Thus when you pay attention to your speech, there is dharma.

Your conduct should be dignified and decorous, and all your actions should be proper. Thus when you pay attention to your conduct, there is virtue.

In dealing with people and things, you must be both steadfast and gentle. Others will then be happy to be with you and will not look down on you. As Confucius said: "Be mild yet stern, be stately but not vicious." At the same time, you must have the virtues of mildness, benevolence, respect, frugality and tolerance. Thus when you pay attention to speech and appearance, both mildness and stateliness is emphasized.

You must be open-minded and earnest, constantly nurture a heart filled with joy, understand what others are thinking, and be enthusiastic in doing good for all people. In this way, everyone will be happy.