Cling to nothing and gain everything

In reality, ownership is an important attribute of human beings and the law also recognises it, giving everyone rights of ownership so that society can divide up roles and manage itself. For example, this house and this plot of land are granted to this landowner; that house and that plot are granted to that person... In this way the whole country is divided into many parts so that it can be managed in a stable way. But if we say that nothing is ours, that everything is held in common, that this person's house can be lived in by another, that this person's field can be planted by another, then society would fall into chaos at once.

Personal ownership has a very formidable power: only when something is theirs do people take great responsibility, care, and look after and maintain it. Although to some extent personal ownership also brings economic benefit and benefit for the management of society, for spiritual practice towards liberation it is extremely harmful.

So, following society and the law, we have no choice but to speak like everyone else: this is my house, my land, my property... managed by me. However, the disciple of the Buddha must quietly, in the mind, not cling to these things. When someone asks: “Whose house is this?” we also answer: “My house.” Another person answers in exactly the same way, but the minds of the two are different. When that person says “my house” they would defend it to the death, truly seeing it as “mine.” But although we say it with our mouth, in our mind we know that it is not “mine.”

It is like when asked: “Whose temple is this?” the teacher also answers: “My temple,” because on paper and in legal procedure that is how it is. But in his heart the teacher truly does not see the temple as his own; it belongs to the Buddhas, to the donors and benefactors, and he, through some affinity, was entrusted by heaven, the Buddha, the Buddhist Association and the lay Buddhists to be the abbot, to look after the temple, as a place for beings to rely on and practise. He still says “my temple,” just as the world does, but his mind is not at all the same as the world's. And we must be the same. Living in the midst of life, we also say “my family,” “my wife,” “my children”... like everyone else, but in our hearts we let go and do not cling.

One very strange thing is that when our mind lets go, heaven and the Buddha naturally entrust us with greater and greater things. But if we cling tightly to what we hold, it gets smaller and smaller, until finally we are empty-handed with nothing left. Whatever we cling to most, we will lose first. For example, a person who has money and holds on to it tightly, not daring to share it with anyone, is a person who will one day go bankrupt and see their wealth vanish. Or a person who clings to beauty, who sees themselves as beautiful and longs to stay beautiful for ever, will lose their looks very quickly.

There was once an actress who was regarded as a beauty queen, but she was not satisfied with her beauty and wanted to be even more beautiful. She tried every way to alter her looks. After each change she was still not satisfied and wanted to be more beautiful, so she altered again, and again... until the day her face was completely disfigured, so much so that she no longer dared to go out into the street and did not dare let anyone see her terrible appearance. The more we busy ourselves trying to build up and alter our outward appearance, the more we lose the merit of beauty.

Conversely, there are people who do not cling to beauty, who regard themselves as dust and as nothing, who quietly practise day and night and live for the Dharma and for beings, and yet their faces grow ever more radiant and beautiful, and their features ever more auspicious. So the more we cling to something, the faster it slips out of our hands. If we let go and regard everything only as a means to live, without clinging, then heaven and earth give us something greater in return.