Go beyond the norms and be like Ji Gong 济公

No 885 of Living Life Series I

With a very much interconnected world through the world wide web and through ease of travel, it is difficult not to expect cultures to change. 

Cultures will absorb what is popular and meaningful to the young but to replace them is unthinkable. It will never happen and at best the foreign culture will become the forefront but the underlying culture will still be there. 

Asians will be Asians and this is the way it has been for all. For instance, the additional celebration of the solar new year does not replace the lunar new year. 

As there will ever be the underlying basic culture men are brought up with, the world will end up with Western orientated Buddhists, Hindus and Taoists in the Caucasian West and eastern orientated non-Buddhists, non-Taoists and non-Hindus in the East.

This may cause blurring of lines and as such, there will be those who call themselves free thinkers. Mind you, they are not lost to religion or culture. In fact, they may be more open. 

What they do may be what the Buddha and sages expect of men, not just to believe but to understand. There is need for all men to question and to digest what they believe or told to believe, never mind if the beliefs are said to originate from sages and Buddha. 

It is more respectful to the sages if we ask why and not just believe what they taught. We must never be cowed or coerced to believe. 

If we are not, it is also not right to be critical. Just keep an open mind for now and with time and age, we will have mind of our own and be more concrete and less woolly in thinking. Hopefully, this is for the wiser. 

That depends on us and not the sages, least of all another human being however learned, charismatic he may be. This is a reality to contend with though not so simple as it seems.

We must be ourselves but we must also respect others' ways and beliefs. This does not mean we reject or accept blindly. We can learn along the way from others and from life. We must formulate and modify our life strategy as we go along. 

But while we want to be ourselves, we must be with others at the same time. There is no alternative to this. Even Lord Bo Tien 武天菩萨 said that we must learn from one another both the good and not-so-good. We must learn from life and be plugged in to the world we are in.

The problem is how? This depends on the individual but for a start or even at other times along the way of life, it may still be good to follow others and toe the line. Otherwise we may face standing alone and not in touch with the world.

Do be wise though and keep an open mind. Do not be led by the nose. Do not judge and be judge. This does not mean we cannot think and analyse. What is the intellect for if we don't? It is never an issue of not to ask why and to do or die. Sages will never go for this. 

Isn't there such a thing as free-will? But free-will does not mean free-wheeling. We still have to be rational in some way. Even what is right and good for now may not be so right in time to come. 

Otherwise, we will not have sages like the Buddha and Jesus who tagged along the norms of the day but were prepared to go beyond as they knew more. This is called awakening or enlightenment.  

Are we prepared to go beyond the norms of the day? Ji Gong 济公 did and he succeeded but some think he is crazy Ji. He is the living Buddha. 

He had to unlearn what he had learnt from the norms of the day. He did and he chose to drink, ate meat, sang and act merrily which was unbecoming of monks in those days. He was no conformist and showed what matters is the heart. It is the heart that matters and not the outward show to please peers and to conform to the norms when the heart is not in line. What matters is the heart and not what one does and what goes through the gut. This is his axiom.

Many just conform but did not put their hearts into the basis and why they had to do. They make spirituality a matter of outward show and to join the crowd and be with the crowd. There is the instinctive pack mentality of sorts. 

They just follow the norms but lag behind at heart. They just become part of popular religion which limits them their spirituality with the glass ceiling of sorts. 

They end up setting limits to their spirituality. To progress in spirituality they have to breach the glass ceiling and go further up - that is to go beyond popular religion. 

This is not that popular religion is not needed. In fact, without popular religion, how could we reach out to the masses. 

It is just like in upbringing, a child must just be told what to do and may for years of childhood never fully understand why but when he grows up, he needs to know why and decide how he can do it, be it in his own way or in others way. Otherwise though he grow old, he never grows up. 

Popular religion must precede higher spirituality. We need to unlearn and relearn what we learn from popular religion to breach the glass ceiling to go beyond. You can say we need to go beyond the norms of the day to be saint like Ji Gong - Lord Ji 济公. 

Lord Ji 济公