Spiritual Development
by Master Lee Feng San Shifu
Translated by Sophia Lui
Edited by Ric Meyers
What is spiritual development? What is the essence of spirituality? If a person does not have a charitable heart, can he be regarded as spiritual?
Nowadays people often speak of “Mind, Body and Soul Development.” Someone asked: “To train our body we practice Pingshuai, to train the mind we practice Shifu’s mind cultivation techniques, but as for spiritual growth, what should we do about it?”
Spiritual growth begins with making a resolve. Each person should resolve to “serve the good of the whole.” Some people fall ill and have difficulty recovering despite the treatments they receive. However, once the patient resolves to help others, their health condition improves — seemingly by itself.
Therefore, having a charitable heart is the key to spiritual development. Nonetheless, human beings have a debilitating habit of mind called selfishness. For some people, the mere mention of doing charitable work can stop them in their tracks. Certain people become schizophrenic, mentally ill, suicidal, or even homicidal because of selfishness.
I believe that, for many people, thoughts of forsaking the world and entering the monastery, or killing themselves, might have crossed their mind. However, once they begin to think of their kids, family or students, they change their mind about any stupid act they are about to commit.
There are also others who are completely obsessed with themselves, their health, finances, what went wrong or may go wrong, and therefore create unnecessary problems for themselves.
Some people may protest and say: “We are just ordinary everyday citizens and so should we not set our minds on doing something more realistic and attainable, instead of making a resolve to help the whole world? That seems too farfetched!”
The truth is, we just need to take the first step. Resolving to perform 10,000 charitable deeds may seem daunting to us. However, if we just do one thing at a time, then slowly our good works will build up.
Taking action is the best way to realize our charitable goals. When we have done our best, we can let go of the outcome and leave it to the heavens. In this way, we make progress in our spiritual development.
“Qi Gong practice is to develop the body; cultivation of the mind is to grow in wisdom; doing charitable works is to grow spiritually.”— Lee Feng San Shifu