As Qingming approaches, spiritual beings become especially active, moving about everywhere. If you’re not vigilant and don’t cultivate properly, you’ll quickly invite trouble and misfortune. Matters of the spirit world are very serious—they’re no joking matter. Once a spirit takes hold of you, you become like someone suffering from mental illness, completely controlled by that spirit.
Today, I want to talk about “non-offence and blessings.” What does this mean? Committing evil creates karmic offences—when you do bad things, you accumulate negative karma. Doing good brings blessings—when you regularly perform kind acts, you earn positive rewards. But doing wrong doesn’t change your inherent nature, just as doing good and gaining karmic rewards doesn’t change your true nature either. Let me clarify this first. You might ask: “Doesn’t doing good or bad affect our inherent nature? Doesn’t it have some bearing on it?” The principle is this: our inherent nature, in its original state, carries neither karmic offence nor blessings.
Take a sheet of white paper. If you scribble black marks on it, can you say the paper was originally black? If you paint it red, can you say it was originally red? Of course not. Our inherent nature is originally pure and kind. Its essence never changes. It’s only through the karma we create in the external world that we take on different “colours.” When you do many good deeds, you receive karmic rewards. But in truth, those rewards are used up as they are received. For example, that same white paper can be painted into a beautiful picture that people admire and even pay money for—that’s your good deed bringing karmic reward. Yet underneath, it’s still just white paper. Creating a beautiful picture doesn’t change the fact it was originally white. On the other hand, if you paint something filthy or malicious, you’ve committed negative karma. If the police see it—say, it contains slander—and track you down and punish you, isn’t it still true that the paper itself remains white? The karmic offences are what you added, not the paper itself. Human nature is always inherently good.
So why do Bodhisattvas descend to save people? Because they see that, at the core, the inherent nature of human beings is still good. But some people have layered so much filth over themselves that it’s nearly impossible to clean off. So who cleans it? Officials of the Underworld. Let me explain in simple terms. In the Human Realm, police and judges correct your wrongs. As a child, your parents discipline you; at school, your teachers guide you. If you reach the end of your life still uncleansed, then when you die, the King of Hell takes over. And if even then it can’t be cleaned? It’s simple: the paper gets torn up or burned. That means when you fall into Hell, your inherent nature—your original spirit—is destroyed. The paper is discarded because it’s too tainted.
If you do good deeds, the karmic rewards will come before you pass away—that’s what “good deeds bring good rewards” means. These karmic rewards will always arrive, but they are repaid in this lifetime; they don’t carry over into the next. Only merit and virtue can be taken with you into future lives. I hope you understand this. Every Dharma talk you attend is one fewer chance you’ll have left in future. So the more you listen, the more wisdom you gain, the more your heart and mind are cleansed. If you don’t listen, you miss out on so much. This is spiritual nourishment—something not just anyone can give you. You could attend a social event tonight, but would you gain any benefit from it? No. But by listening to my Dharma talk, you receive benefit right away. A listener from Hong Kong once said that every time he listened to my radio program, his whole body would feel warm and he couldn’t sleep—that’s energy. When you attend my Dharma talk, you are receiving the energy I share with you. Even if there’s something urgent at home, you must find a way to overcome it. That’s what discipline is about. Remember, what I teach you is the Buddha-Dharma. At its core, the human inherent nature carries neither offence nor blessing. That’s why we say: only when a person is free of offence can they truly receive blessings—this is what we call “blessings without offence.”
Today, I want to explain why you must cultivate compassion to help others. The most important thing is to develop a compassionate heart. If you try to help someone without understanding that their original spirit—their true nature—is pure, you won’t be able to help them. Instead, you might feel hatred or disgust, seeing only the black marks on the page. But when you realise, “Oh, this paper was originally white—it just got stained, what a pity,” your attitude changes. It’s like a beautiful piece of clothing that has been dirtied. Would you throw it away? No—you would wash it clean. Many people around you are covered in “ink” and dirt, but you should help clean them, recognising that they are originally good. Why not help them now? You have the “cleaning agent”—the Dharma Door, the Buddhist teachings. Others don’t. So why not use it to help and awaken them? That way of thinking is what enables you to truly help others. My teachings stand out because I use analogies and plain-language Dharma that anyone can understand. If someone was originally good, you can forgive their mistakes. That’s also the approach of many educators: when they see a “bad” child, their first thought is that this child was once innocent and pure.
The cycle of rebirth within the six realms is not the rebirth of your true nature. You all know that people have a true nature, don’t you? That true nature is the most original, pure essence. So within the six realms, is it really your true nature that undergoes rebirth? In reality, what is being punished are the karmic obstacles you carry, and what is being rewarded are the good deeds you’ve done. Think of your true nature as a mirror. On its surface there may be black stains and red marks. If you slowly wipe away the black stains, doesn’t the mirror shine again? The red marks represent good deeds, and they too will eventually be repaid—it’s not that they remain untouched. The black stains must be cleaned away. Who does the cleaning? Police, teachers, parents, or other authority figures are “wiping off” the dirt you’ve accumulated. Even spirits and deities can drag your soul down into the Underworld for punishment. Muscle cramps, nightmares, or sudden fear can also be punishments from the spiritual realm. So remember: only when this mirror is clean can your true nature remain pure. Good causes (the red marks) bring good rewards; bad causes (the black stains) bring bad consequences. But your true nature? It remains a clear mirror. What cycles through the six realms is the soul, weighed down by karma—not your true nature.
Here’s another example. Imagine a stainless-steel mirror, nice and shiny. But if its surface is completely covered in dirt, people will say, “So dirty!” and throw it straight into the rubbish. That’s like being cast into the Underworld or even Hell. But if the mirror’s surface is adorned with beautiful images, it might be placed in a museum—that is its good reward. So the cycle of rebirth within the six realms is simply the karmic consequences of your actions, not punishment of your inherent nature. Our inherent nature is Buddha-nature, so how could Buddha-nature itself ever be punished? What I’m teaching you is that although your inherent nature may appear to be touched by blessings or karmic offences, they don’t stick to it permanently. When you receive blessings, your inherent nature hasn’t increased in any way. When you undergo punishment, your inherent nature hasn’t been diminished. Think of a kind child who does something wrong—do you call them a bad kid? Do you send them to the police? Of course not. And when a child does something good, you praise them, don’t you? That doesn’t change their inherent nature either. All good and bad karma is just like decorations or dust on the surface of your inherent nature.
Our inherent nature is empty—it is without a fixed substance. What does “empty” mean? It’s not something you can hold or measure—it doesn’t exist in a physical sense. If you cultivate well, you see everything clearly; if you don’t cultivate, you see nothing at all. It’s the same with being human. If you have education and knowledge, you become a person of refinement. Refinement itself is invisible, yet it guides you—you know what can and cannot be done. Without cultivation, you’re like a blind person with open eyes, ignorant of the Dharma and easily led astray. Now that you are studying Buddhism, you avoid creating negative karma. But if you don’t know the Dharma, you’ll just keep accumulating karmic offences. When death comes, weighed down by a lifetime of karma, you’ll be terrified—but by then it’s too late. Your true nature is empty, without a fixed substance. It is pure, tranquil, and still. The inherent nature of a person is extremely clean, quiet, and pure. “Stillness” means a quiet peace, gradually fading into a state as if it were not there. When a person dies, their life journey is complete—they enter this stillness. In Buddhism, this is called nirvāṇa—a perfect and peaceful stillness, a complete passing away. But is there such a thing as “bad stillness”? Yes. Things like burning to death, being crushed, or dying in pain—those are all forms of negative stillness.
So how can blessings or offences be added to the true nature? Many people think: “If I keep adding blessings into my inherent nature, won’t it become better?” In fact, you can’t add anything to it. The amount of merit and virtue you accumulate determines the reward you reap—nothing more. For example, suppose I hold a balloon in my hand. This balloon represents a spirit, a body of energy. Can you attach anything to the gas inside the balloon? No—it’s empty. Just like a breath of air you exhale—can you add something onto it? No. Good things won’t stick, and bad things won’t stick either. The gas inside is empty, right? What surrounds it is only the rubber skin. If the balloon is faulty, it bursts or falls when too heavy—that’s like being dragged down by karmic burdens. But if it’s a good balloon, it rises upward—that’s like ascending to the heavens. Still, even a hydrogen balloon reaches a point where it can’t rise further. If you force it higher, it bursts because of the intense atmospheric pressure.
Your soul is like what’s inside a balloon. When you commit too many wrongdoings, it’s as though the balloon is wrapped in iron—if it’s dropped from a plane, it will crash straight down. A life without heavy karmic obstacles is like a balloon rising upward, able to reach realms such as the First Dhyāna Heaven or the Trāyastriṃśa Heaven. Up there, it seems wonderful, but eventually it too will burst with a “bang.” Why? Because when you reach the highest states—beyond the Three Realms and outside the Five Elements—there is no longer even a form to hold onto. Everything dissolves into a supernatural state. At that level, even a hydrogen balloon can’t rise any higher, because hydrogen is still “gas.” Beyond the Three Realms, that “gas” can take form if it wishes, or remain formless if it doesn’t. That is the highest level of spiritual practice. I want you to perfect your cultivation so well that you don’t even need the “hydrogen balloon.” This “hydrogen” represents your very essence in this lifetime. Only this pure energy can rise to the heavens; it can never descend to the earth, because hydrogen always rises, while foul and polluted air sinks downward. Your truest nature is the purest, most pristine essence, always able to remain in the heavens. What you’re really cultivating is your kind heart—a heart that is formless, shapeless, colourless, without taste, and beyond ordinary knowing. This is exactly what I explained earlier: “emptiness”—it is without a fixed substance.