Whether you have come here to attend a recitation session, a Chan session, a Guanyin session, or an Earth Store Bodhisattva session, you should not advertise how nice the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas is. We don’t want people outside to know the nice things about the City. Here at the City, we work quietly. People here immerse themselves in their own work and cultivate earnestly. We don’t care about advertising ourselves to the outside world. If you feel this is a good place, you can come again; if you feel this place is not so good, then you can stop coming. This is the City’s principle.
As guidelines for cultivation, the City has established Six Guidelines. They are: no fighting, no greed, no seeking, no selfishness, no pursuit of self-benefit, and no lying. If you can understand the true meaning of these guidelines, you have not come here in vain.
Ordinary people like fame, but the City doesn’t need it. At the City the ideal is to cut off the five desires, that is, the desires for wealth, sex, fame, food and sleep. These five desires are the five roots of hell. Ordinary people take pleasure in them, but we at the City want to sever our relationship with them. The City doesn’t crave a famous reputation or seek any benefits. We only use our real skills to propagate the Buddhadharma and continue the Buddha’s wisdom life. That is how things are at the City.
