Pass Through the Fuzzy Swamp
Xuefeng
March 30, 2020
Yesterday, I proposed that if something is not helpful, then it is harmful; but if it is harmless, then it is beneficial. Then I asked everyone to help verify whether my proposition is true; as a result, there were many different opinions and no consensus.
Where is the problem? It lies in the fuzzy area; that is, it is impossible to determine whether it is or is not, or whether it is right or wrong. The fuzzy zone is more correctly a fuzzy swamp. Your judgement can easily be trapped, which makes you choose wrongly. In fuzzy swamps, it is difficult for us to know what is…
Bright or Dark
Up or Down
Forward or Backward
Correct or Incorrect
Right or Wrong
Beautiful or Ugly
Good or Evil
Dead or Alive
In fuzzy swamps, Taiji thinking loses completely its effectiveness and there are no opposing parties.
It is a fuzzy zone; a state of chaos.
It is like Schrodinger’s cat, impossible to know whether the cat is dead or alive.
It is a roll of the dice, impossible to determine whether it will be heads up or tails up.
It is gambling, impossible to know whether it will win or lose.
It is a Mobius strip, you cannot tell the front side from the back side.
When it is impossible to make a judgement about a phenomenon, a thing, or an event, it shows that we are in a fuzzy swamp in which we either run around blindly or wait patiently.
In human life, when we are faced with a choice, we often enter a dilemma. What should we do?
Should we continue in a relationship or end it categorically?
Should we go abroad or stay put?
Should we keep our secure job or to start a new business?
Is it better to rent a house or to buy one?
Is it better to follow Buddhism or Christianity?
Should we run away from home or stay in the same place where we have always been?
Should we have noodles for dinner or pancakes?
Is it better to wear casual clothes or a suit?
Such situations make it difficult to choose because we are in fuzzy swamps.
There is a period of time between dusk and nightfall which is a fuzzy zone that can also be called a buffer zone or a transition zone. We cannot say that the sky is dark or bright; we can only say that the sky is not quite either. In this vague area, my proposition “if it is not helpful, it will be harmful; if it is harmless, it will be beneficial”, does not hold because we cannot figure out whether certain things, people, opportunities, or viewpoints are harmful or beneficial.
The duration of a fuzzy zone can be as short as a few seconds, such as the rolling of dice, as long as several decades, such as self-cultivating to attain Dao; or even a whole lifetime, such as life and death. These fuzzy zones are swamps. In our lives, it is easy for us to be trapped in them and lose our way which consumes our precious time and energy and ruins our bright futures.
In my opinion, the so-called “all living beings” refers to people who have been trapped in fuzzy swamps all their lives; being busy all their lives and knowing neither where they came from nor where they are going and not knowing the true meaning of their behavior. They can only be like duckweed on a lake, swept up and down by the waves of the times, chasing the wind with confused thinking, and minds as transient illusions or passing clouds; they do not know what they are doing on any day. I have observed these sentient beings in Wechat groups; most of them are confused and are just messing around or being taken advantage of and killing their spare time. I have also observed the articles reposted in the “friends’ moments”. From the articles reposted by anyone, you can see their virtue, sentiment, and cultivation, and know whether or not they are in a fuzzy swamp.
When we are in fuzzy swamps, we need to remain calm and not decide anything, but one thing that we must do is to keep a close eye on the direction to which we are going because when we are in a fuzzy swamp, we will not even know when we can reach our destination. It is just because of this that we are easily confused, slackened off, decadent, taking the wrong direction, or expending energy on goals that are opposite to our direction which will ultimately lead to our failure even on the verge of success.
For example I started to learn English by myself in 1979. My method and direction of learning English was to travel abroad. From then on, I kept studying every day of every month, every year, never missing a single day except for New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. However, I never knew, even if I could go abroad, where my opportunities would be. This continued for more than fourteen years, during which the cynicism and blow to my confidence never ceased, and during this time I was actually in a fuzzy swamp. However, because of my continuous persistence of focusing on my target, I finally passed through the fuzzy swamp in 1993, reached my destination, and realized my wish to go abroad. Along this course, I once changed my direction; I went to study Chinese at Lanzhou Institute of Education, and after one semester, I found that something was very wrong; mastering Chinese was irrelevant to my going abroad, so I decidedly switched from the Chinese Department of Lanzhou Institute of Education to the English Department of Jiuquan Institute of Education and continued to study English. Had I continued with my Chinese studies, the direction and goal that I had set in my heart in 1979 would have fallen through and all my previous efforts would have been in vain. I spent more than fourteen years traversing through a fuzzy swamp!
My purpose of talking about fuzzy swamps is to tell all Chanyuan celestials that your goal after becoming a Chayuan celestial is to become a celestial being, to go to the Thousand-year World, the Ten-thousand-year World, or the Elysium Celestial Islands Continent. Before reaching your destination, you are immersed in fuzzy swamps constantly. Although you have been self-improving and self-refining for several years or even decades, you feel that there is no obvious change, you make no improvement in sublimation, every day seems to be the same as the day before and the day before that, and you still have a lot of difficulty and confusion to overcome before you. At this time, your confidence can be shaken easily and your faith can be blasted heavily, but please remember my example of learning English; it is only by continuous persistence, patience, and hard work to light up the sacred lamp in your heart and with the perseverance of never straying from your path toward reaching heaven that you will pass through the fuzzy swamp and reach your glorious end goal.
In fact, the above principles apply to all people who want to realize their innermost goals. Whenever you are in a dilemma, it is a fuzzy swamp. Just give up your judgement first and make your unremitting effort by biting the bullet and persevering toward your fixed direction and goal. Then, after three years, ten years, or maybe even eighty years or a lifetime, so long as you stick to it, you will be able to cross your personal fuzzy swam and reach the ideal shore.
Man proposes, but the Greatest Creator disposes. As long as you stick to it, rubbing ropes against wooden boards will eventually cut into them.
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