Good Thoughts Words and Deeds: The Shaolin Arts and Daily Life PART 1
In this article I will discuss one of Grandmaster Wong Kiew Kit’
's most profound teachings on daily life, to have Good Thoughts, Words and Deeds. The article goes on to discuss other aspects of Shaolin Wahnam philosophy and their application in daily life.
Good Thoughts
The most important part of the 3 principles is to have good thoughts.
Grandmaster Wong tells us:
As thoughts can become reality, we must have good thoughts all the time. What a person thinks is the most important of the three factors shaping his karma, the other two being speech and action. The Buddha teaches that karma is caused by thought, speech and action -- in that order of importance.
As thoughts initiate the karmic process it is most important to have good thoughts, as they will lead to good words and actions.
We can adopt a few practices to ensure that our thoughts are good. Firstly good thoughts can be divided between those for yourself and your life and those for other people and their lives.
A fantastic way to have good thoughts is to practice Gratitude every day. Sifu Anthony Korahais explains:
Practice gratitude. Again, this may seem difficult, but I recommend that you try it anyway. Before, during, or after your chi kung practice, or at any time during the day, take a minute to practice gratitude. Pick something -- anything -- to be grateful for. It can be a person, an object, a place, a pet, anything. During this exercise, don't let yourself get distracted by negative thoughts. If your mind wanders, gently bring it back and focus on the feeling of gratitude. If the feeling is minimal, give it time. This is a skill, and it will get better with practice.
This is a deeply powerful practice.
We can find inspiration in the 10 Shaolin Laws for having good thoughts:
1. Required to respect the master, honour the Moral Way and love fellow disciples as brothers and sisters.
We can think good thoughts for our Master, Lineage and Shaolin Family.
3. Required to be filial to parents, be respectful to the elderly, and protective of the young.
We can think good thoughts for our parents and family, and for other people we meet day to day.
9. Obliged to be humane, compassionate and spread love, and to realize everlasting peace and happiness for all people.
Our thoughts should be filled with love and compassion from an open heart.
As well as practicing gratitude for our lives we can gently visualize or have a gentle thought on how we wish our lives to be. Grandmaster Wong gives us good advice on this practice in "Chi Kung For Health and Vitality" when he describes creative visualisation. If we have not been trained in these practices then it is best to just have a gentle thought such as "this meeting will go well, I will play tennis to the best of my abilities" etc. We can think good thoughts about any activity or event we are going to undertake.
Another practice to help in the cultivation of good thoughts is as follows: Let go physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually and smile from your heart. Then enjoy, in a relaxed manner, whatever you are currently doing. This may be enjoying walking or eating, the sound of the wind in the trees, listening to a loved one, beautiful music or whatever you are doing at some time. Practicing this daily in conjunction with exercises like Gratitude bring wondrous results.
One of the most important aspects to having good thoughts is learning what to do when bad thoughts arise. Grandmaster Wong teaches us two options to deal with negative thoughts. We can either replace them with good thoughts, thus neutralising the thought. Or we can smile from the heart and let go of the thought, using the skills we develop in our Shaolin practices.
Choosing to use these two methods on a daily basis can literally change one's life. These practices really help to manifest the spirit of Shaolin, and act as invaluable tools for enhancing our lives and cultivating spiritually.
When we have predominantly Good thoughts we achieve wondrous effects such as good fortune, better results in our work and play, opening our hearts, spiritual cultivation, emotional and mental stability to mention but a few. Here are two more quotes from Grandmaster Wong that are relevant to this subject:
Meanwhile, think of good thoughts and do good deeds whenever you can. Good energy is simply incompatible with minds and deeds that are evil. "Luck" here is not "mere chance" but "good fortune as a result of previous good thoughts, words or deeds".
You are right to say that nothing is based on chance. Everything is based on cause and effect, called karma in Buddhist terms. Basically, good cause begets good effect, and evil cause begets evil effect. This is a great cosmic truth, so simple that many people find it hard to believe. The principle is simple but the workings and manifestations can be very far-reaching and profound.
Gautama Buddha teaches us:
All that we are is the result of what we have thought.
If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought -pain follows him.
If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.
The wise one fashions speech with their thoughts- sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve.
The mind is everything, what we think we become.
The Venerable Hui Neng from the Platform Sutra:
A single light can eliminate the darkness of millennia; a single piece of wisdom can dispel the ignorance of a million years. Do not worry about your past, always think of your future, and for your future always think good thoughts
Part 2 of this article will be available 7th November 2007
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