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FACE TO FACE | EASTERN HORIZON 43

Receiving certificate of appreciation from President Tsai Ing-wen on With colleagues (Ms Hsieh and Mr Lin) and patient Mr Wei after TFRD
behalf of Taiwan Foundation for Rare Disorders for being an excellent Virtual Medical Conference on 27th Nov 2021
social welfare organisation. (29th Dec 2021)

causes of karmic creation; secondly, cultivating to pessimistic. I was fortunate enough to have encountered
uproot the very essence of karmic obstacles which are the book ‘LiaoFan’s Four Lessons’ (了凡四訓) and was
greed, hatred, and delusion; and thirdly, cultivating to inspired by the Buddha’s teachings. Therefore, I vowed
prevent the manifestation of karma, or in other words, to take refuge in the Triple Gem.
do not follow the karmic flow created in the present.
To engage the world with the continuous cultivation of Burning Mind - The Lonely and Challenging Road of
renunciation is indeed the challenge of my journey as a Rare Diseases
human being.
Bearing the inevitable risk of random gene selection
The Ignorant Path - Not Knowing Impermanence in evolution, I was stepping into a lonely, challenging,
and The Law of Cause and Effect and helpless stage of my life. I had to confront the

eight causes of dukkha, which caused a lot of pain and
As a teacher’s daughter, I did not learn about suffering. Ignorance was my response. These days,
impermanence and the law of cause and effect. My I always have very deep introspective experience
ability was modest, and I was not an ambitious girl. whenever I read the Heart Sūtra which states that
I always cut corners while doing homework, and the ‘Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva, while contemplating
only things I cared were eating, sleeping, and looking deeply the Prajñāpāramitā, realized the five aggregates
beautiful. After graduating from the university, I just are empty and was liberated from all suffering and
wanted an ordinary job, and then I married a civil hardship.’ Only by looking deeply and reflecting
servant so that I could have a stable and peaceful life. regularly, we can understand the interdependence and
In fact, I think my dream came true. Not only did I impermanence of the five aggregates, so that we do not
get married, I also had two intelligent and adorable get attached to them and therefore achieving freedom
boys and I was very happy with that. Until one day, I in our lives. On a deeper level, the Diamond Sūtra reads
found out that our youngest child has suffered from ‘All forms are illusory. If you see that all forms are not
an unusual disease. This was the beginning of a totally forms, then you see the Tathāgata.’ By using the sword
different life for me. of ‘all forms are not forms’, we can cut through the
attachment towards self, Dharma and emptiness. Ven.
As the mother of a rare metabolic disorder patient, I Master Sheng Yen’s (聖嚴法師, Dharma Drum Mountain)
not only had to endure the pain of seeing my son suffer teaching about ‘facing it, accepting it, dealing with it and
but also the burden of marriage, work, and financial letting it go’ also gives me a lot of inspirations. These
instability. Was these all because of my bad karma? teachings have taught me to embrace and handle with
Nonetheless, I knew I could not stay depressed and courage the karmic fruits in my current life.