Releasing Your Suffering: Start with observing our inner self

When I was in my twenties, several family members passed away.  First, it was my father.  I took care of him when he was in hospital in southern Taiwan. He passed away after he was sick for a while.  I arranged his funeral and everything that needed to be taken care of. Then my sister passed away. Then my mother passed away. In less than 3 months, I lost three family members.  I was in total chaos and suffered incredibly. I had originally planed to have physical check up before these tragedies, but then I lost interest in seeing the doctor altogether.


When I finally did do the check-up, the doctor said that I had some abnormal cells. It was not easy to get medical information 30 years ago. I didn’t know what are abnormal cells were but the doctors said that I could die soon. It was a terrible period of time for me.  Not only did I lose three family members, the doctor also told me that I might die soon.

After that day, I experienced a dramatic life change.  It took about 6 days and 5 nights.  After that, I felt that I finally was alive!

Why I Was Always Thinking of Someone Else?

After the doctor’s appointment, and the prognosis about my life, I went home.  The first thought I had was, “What’s the big deal about death?  There is not so much to live for anyway!” This wasn’t true. It was a thought after all.  When you really face death, all the attachments will show up.

I thought I was not scared of death.  However, the moment I really faced the death, I had that intensive feeling that my life was going to end soon.  This is a very real and intense feeling I never had.  So I started crying, cry desperately, cry for a long, long, long time, but I had no idea what I was crying about, maybe I cried because I was dying. I didn’t know, I had never cried like this before.

When I was crying, thoughts popped up nonstop.  “What’s going to happen to my son if I die?” “What’s going to happen to my money if I die?”  “What’s going to happen to my boyfriend if I die?” I cried and cried, and cried.  I cried from afternoon to night.  When I was lost in crying, suddenly a question hit me, “Why am I only thinking of other people when I am going to die?”  I was confused.  I was totally confused.  Why was I only thinking of others when I was going to die?  Why didn’t I think of myself?



Don’t Waste Your Life to Things

Suddenly, I calmed down.  Suddenly I saw my life.  What occupied my life?  Every day I spent time worrying about my son, about his study and his future; every day I was thinking about my dates with my boyfriend; everyday I was thinking about how much money I had.

It is until that special moment I realized, being just in my twenties that I lived with these thoughts, lived with these attachments; that I always wanted more, always wanted to be better.  But, they were not making happy. Just to the contrary, they made me scared of losing.

Should we live our life like this?  I was shocked!  It was until that special moment that I realized, I never really lived my life!  I was a dead woman walking! After I had all these realizations I started crying again.  How could that be?  A lot of things surfaced up.  I didn’t know what to do and just let them flow.  I never followed any guru.  My sufferings are my guru.

On the sixth day, I cried again. This crying was very fierce, deep, and painful!  It was totally different from the crying from the previous 5 days.  Because this time I saw all the people leading their life like this, my son, my brothers, my families, everyone lives in this delusional world.  Every one lives under the influence of their thoughts. Every one lives with competition.  No one really lives their life!

For the past six days, I cried nonstop.  However, I didn’t feel tired.  On the contrary, I felt energetic.  I didn’t really do anything in these six days.  I just saw how clearly how I had lived my life in the past two decades.  I saw how I have accumulated these pain unconsciously.  It was only until the time I was facing my death, I finally saw how I had lived my life.

Reborn

After all these crying, I became a different person.  The way I looked at life was totally different.  Life has been totally different from that moment on. It is not that I have a free, glamorous life from that moment on. I still experience lots of pain and sufferings.  However, from that day on, I knew they were learning opportunities. I embraced everything flowing into my life!  My temper also changed totally.


When you can try to understand the meaning beneath your suffering, your life becomes different!  It’s a beautiful thing to learn about our life!  It’s a beautiful thing to understand our life!  Don’t be scared to face yourself!


This understanding has to come from your own willingness to learn and know about yourself.  We can’t force ourselves to do things like this. I didn’t talk to anyone in these six days.  No one taught me anything.  It’s very simple and easy that you will know everything when you are willing to face yourself!

The Power of Being Present

When I was young, I felt life was meaningless!  Whatever I did, I felt lonely even when I was together with a crowd.

In my twenty years of life, I was not happy.  I wanted a lot of stuff, however, when I finally got it, I was not really happy.  My boyfriend once bought me a diamond.  I put it on once and was still not happy.  I was not happy and I didn’t know how to be happy until I discovered method of “Releasing Your Suffering”.  After this, I had a totally feeling about life.  Life becomes fresh, beautiful, different!  It’s almost like I had a totally different heart!  I am finally alive!  No guru, no spiritual practice, no meditation, all you need is just simply facing yourself no matter it is ugly or embarrassing!  Just be present with yourself!

You need to be present with yourself to see your truth, the absolute reality of yourself.  When we are able to see our absolute reality, the power, strength, and wisdom will emerge.

by Suzhen Liu; translated by Suzanne Yang