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【 黎安友專文 l 中國如何看待香港危機 】

美國哥倫比亞大學的資深中國通黎安友（Andrew Nathan）教授最近在《外交事務》（Foreign Affairs）雜誌的專文，值得一看。

黎安友是台灣許多中國研究學者的前輩級老師，小英總統去哥大演講時，正是他積極促成。小英在美國的僑宴，黎安友也是座上賓。

這篇文章的標題是：「中國如何看待香港危機：北京自我克制背後的真正原因」。

文章很長，而且用英文寫，需要花點時間閱讀。大家有空可以看看。

Andrew這篇文章的立論基礎，是來自北京核心圈的匿名說法。以他在學術界的地位，我相信他對消息來源已經做了足夠的事實查核或確認。

這篇文章，是在回答一個疑問：中共為何在香港事件如此自制？有人說是怕西方譴責，有人說是怕損害香港的金融地位。

都不是。這篇文章認為，上述兩者都不是中共的真實顧慮。

無論你多痛恨中共，你都必須真實面對你的敵人。

中共是搞經濟階級鬥爭起家的，當年用階級鬥爭打敗國民黨。而現在，中共正用這樣的思維處理香港議題。

文章有一句話：“China’s response has been rooted not in anxiety but in confidence.” 這句話道盡階級鬥爭的精髓。

中共一點都不焦慮。相反地，中共很有自信，香港的菁英階級及既得利益的收編群體，到最後會支持中共。

這個分化的心理基礎，來自經濟上的利益。

文中還提到，鄧小平當年給香港五十年的一國兩制，就是為了「給香港足夠的時間適應中共的政治系統」。

1997年，香港的GDP佔中國的18%。2018年，這個比例降到2.8%。

今日的香港經濟，在中共的評估，是香港需要中國，而不是中國需要香港。

中共正在在意的，是香港的高房價問題。香港的房價，在過去十年內三倍翻漲。

文章是這樣描述：
“Housing prices have tripled over the past decade; today, the median price of a house is more than 20 times the median gross annual household income. The median rent has increased by nearly 25 percent in the past six years. As many as 250,000 people are waiting for public housing. At the same time, income growth for many Hong Kong residents has fallen below the overall increase in cost of living.”

無論你同不同意這些說法，都請你試圖客觀地看看這篇文章。

有趣的是，黎安友在文章中部分論點引述了他的消息來源（但他並沒有加上個人評論），部分是他自己的觀察。

#護台胖犬劉仕傑
Instagram: old_dog_chasing_ball

新書：《 我在外交部工作 》

**

黎安友原文：

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2019-09-30/how-china-sees-hong-kong-crisis?fbclid=IwAR2PwHns5gWrw0fT0sa5LuO8zgv4PhLmkYfegtBgoOMCD3WJFI3w5NTe0S4

How China Sees the Hong Kong Crisis
The Real Reasons Behind Beijing’s Restraint

By Andrew J. Nathan September 30, 2019

Massive and sometimes violent protests have rocked Hong Kong for over 100 days. Demonstrators have put forward five demands, of which the most radical is a call for free, direct elections of Hong Kong’s chief executive and all members of the territory’s legislature: in other words, a fully democratic system of local rule, one not controlled by Beijing. As this brazen challenge to Chinese sovereignty has played out, Beijing has made a show of amassing paramilitary forces just across the border in Shenzhen. So far, however, China has not deployed force to quell the unrest and top Chinese leaders have refrained from making public threats to do so.

Western observers who remember the violent crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square 30 years ago have been puzzled by Beijing’s forbearance. Some have attributed Beijing’s restraint to a fear of Western condemnation if China uses force. Others have pointed to Beijing’s concern that a crackdown would damage Hong Kong’s role as a financial center for China.

But according to two Chinese scholars who have connections to regime insiders and who requested anonymity to discuss the thinking of policymakers in Beijing, China’s response has been rooted not in anxiety but in confidence. Beijing is convinced that Hong Kong’s elites and a substantial part of the public do not support the demonstrators and that what truly ails the territory are economic problems rather than political ones—in particular, a combination of stagnant incomes and rising rents. Beijing also believes that, despite the appearance of disorder, its grip on Hong Kong society remains firm. The Chinese Communist Party has long cultivated the territory’s business elites (the so-called tycoons) by offering them favorable economic access to the mainland. The party also maintains a long-standing loyal cadre of underground members in the territory. And China has forged ties with the Hong Kong labor movement and some sections of its criminal underground. Finally, Beijing believes that many ordinary citizens are fearful of change and tired of the disruption caused by the demonstrations.

Beijing therefore thinks that its local allies will stand firm and that the demonstrations will gradually lose public support and eventually die out. As the demonstrations shrink, some frustrated activists will engage in further violence, and that in turn will accelerate the movement’s decline. Meanwhile, Beijing is turning its attention to economic development projects that it believes will address some of the underlying grievances that led many people to take to the streets in the first place.

This view of the situation is held by those at the very top of the regime in Beijing, as evidenced by recent remarks made by Chinese President Xi Jinping, some of which have not been previously reported. In a speech Xi delivered in early September to a new class of rising political stars at the Central Party School in Beijing, he rejected the suggestion of some officials that China should declare a state of emergency in Hong Kong and send in the People’s Liberation Army. “That would be going down a political road of no return,” Xi said. “The central government will exercise the most patience and restraint and allow the [regional government] and the local police force to resolve the crisis.” In separate remarks that Xi made around the same time, he spelled out what he sees as the proper way to proceed: “Economic development is the only golden key to resolving all sorts of problems facing Hong Kong today.”

ONE COUNTRY, TWO SYSTEMS, MANY QUESTIONS

Chinese decision-makers are hardly surprised that Hong Kong is chafing under their rule. Beijing believes it has treated Hong Kong with a light hand and has supported the territory’s economy in many ways, especially by granting it special access to the mainland’s stocks and currency markets, exempting it from the taxes and fees that other Chinese provinces and municipalities pay the central government, and guaranteeing a reliable supply of water, electricity, gas, and food. Even so, Beijing considers disaffection among Hong Kong’s residents a natural outgrowth of the territory’s colonial British past and also a result of the continuing influence of Western values. Indeed, during the 1984 negotiations between China and the United Kingdom over Hong Kong’s future, the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping suggested following the approach of “one country, two systems” for 50 years precisely to give people in Hong Kong plenty of time to get used to the Chinese political system.

But “one country, two systems” was never intended to result in Hong Kong spinning out of China’s control. Under the Basic Law that China crafted as Hong Kong’s “mini-constitution,” Beijing retained the right to prevent any challenge to what it considered its core security interests. The law empowered Beijing to determine if and when Hong Kongers could directly elect the territory’s leadership, allowed Beijing to veto laws passed by the Hong Kong Legislative Council, and granted China the right to make final interpretations of the Basic Law. And there would be no question about who had a monopoly of force. During the negotiations with the United Kingdom, Deng publicly rebuked a top Chinese defense official—General Geng Biao, who at the time was a patron of a rising young official named Xi Jinping—for suggesting that there might not be any need to put troops in Hong Kong. Deng insisted that a Chinese garrison was necessary to symbolize Chinese sovereignty.

Statements made by U.S. politicians in support of the recent demonstrations only confirm Beijing’s belief that Washington seeks to inflame radical sentiments in Hong Kong.

At first, Hong Kongers seemed to accept their new role as citizens of a rising China. In 1997, in a tracking poll of Hong Kong residents regularly conducted by researchers at the University of Hong Kong, 47 percent of respondents identified themselves as “proud” citizens of China. But things went downhill from there. In 2012, the Hong Kong government tried to introduce “patriotic education” in elementary and middle schools, but the proposed curriculum ran into a storm of local opposition and had to be withdrawn. In 2014, the 79-day Umbrella Movement brought hundreds of thousands of citizens into the streets to protest Beijing’s refusal to allow direct elections for the chief executive. And as authoritarianism has intensified under Xi’s rule, events such as the 2015 kidnapping of five Hong Kong–based publishers to stand trial in the mainland further soured Hong Kong opinion. By this past June, only 27 percent of respondents to the tracking poll described themselves as “proud” to be citizens of China. This year’s demonstrations started as a protest against a proposed law that would have allowed Hong Kongers suspected of criminal wrongdoing to be extradited to the mainland but then developed into a broad-based expression of discontent over the lack of democratic accountability, police brutality, and, most fundamentally, what was perceived as a mainland assault on Hong Kong’s unique identity.

Still, Chinese leaders do not blame themselves for these shifts in public opinion. Rather, they believe that Western powers, especially the United States, have sought to drive a wedge between Hong Kong and the mainland. Statements made by U.S. politicians in support of the recent demonstrations only confirm Beijing’s belief that Washington seeks to inflame radical sentiments in Hong Kong. As Xi explained in his speech in September:
As extreme elements in Hong Kong turn more and more violent, Western forces, especially the United States, have been increasingly open in their involvement. Some extreme anti-China forces in the United States are trying to turn Hong Kong into the battleground for U.S.-Chinese rivalry…. They want to turn Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy into de facto independence, with the ultimate objective to contain China's rise and prevent the revival of the great Chinese nation.

Chinese leaders do not fear that a crackdown on Hong Kong would inspire Western antagonism. Rather, they take such antagonism as a preexisting reality—one that goes a long way toward explaining why the disorder in Hong Kong broke out in the first place. In Beijing’s eyes, Western hostility is rooted in the mere fact of China’s rise, and thus there is no use in tailoring China’s Hong Kong strategy to influence how Western powers would respond.

IT’S NOT ABOUT THE BENJAMINS

The view that Xi has not deployed troops because of Hong Kong’s economic importance to the mainland is also misguided, and relies on an outdated view of the balance of economic power. In 1997, Hong Kong’s GDP was equivalent to 18 percent of the mainland’s. Most of China’s foreign trade was conducted through Hong Kong, providing China with badly needed hard currencies. Chinese companies raised most of their capital on the Hong Kong stock exchange. Today, things are vastly different. In 2018, Hong Kong’s GDP was equal to only 2.7 percent of the mainland’s. Shenzhen alone has overtaken Hong Kong in terms of GDP. Less than 12 percent of China’s exports now flow through Hong Kong. The combined market value of China’s domestic stock exchanges in Shanghai and Shenzhen far surpasses that of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, and Chinese companies can also list in Frankfurt, London, New York, and elsewhere.

Although Hong Kong remains the largest offshore clearing center for renminbi, that role could easily be filled by London or Singapore, if Chinese leaders so desired.
Investment flowing into and out of China still tends to pass through financial holding vehicles set up in Hong Kong, in order to benefit from the region’s legal protections. But China’s new foreign investment law (which will take effect on January 1, 2020) and other recent policy changes mean that such investment will soon be able to bypass Hong Kong. And although Hong Kong remains the largest offshore clearing center for renminbi, that role could easily be filled by London or Singapore, if Chinese leaders so desired.

Wrecking Hong Kong’s economy by using military force to impose emergency rule would not be a good thing for China. But the negative effect on the mainland’s prosperity would not be strong enough to prevent Beijing from doing whatever it believes is necessary to maintain control over the territory.

CAN’T BUY ME LOVE?

As it waits out the current crisis, Beijing has already started tackling the economic problems that it believes are the source of much of the anger among Hong Kongers. Housing prices have tripled over the past decade; today, the median price of a house is more than 20 times the median gross annual household income. The median rent has increased by nearly 25 percent in the past six years. As many as 250,000 people are waiting for public housing. At the same time, income growth for many Hong Kong residents has fallen below the overall increase in cost of living.

【賭上靈魂的女人】

青竹蛇兒口，黃蜂尾上針，兩者皆不毒，最毒婦人心。

I have a Bazi client, who has been a social escort for over a decade.

She didn't tell me the truth at the start. In fact, she "challenged" me to use my 6th sense and offered her Bazi.

I do not need your Bazi to read you inside out. Also, Bazi analysis is a highly methodological and scientific method to understand a person's past, present and future Destiny. I'm no medium. There is no 6th sense needed.

Over the many short messages before our meeting, she expressed her shock that I could read so much from merely her words.

I didn't have her birth details at that time, nor had I seen a single photo of hers.

With the internet era, a competent Metaphysics practitioner must have the ability to dissect a person's true character and intention, even from a simple "Hi".

Impossible? Too judgmental? You just haven't met a seasoned human scanner in real life. Or you don't know the true you well enough to see the rock hard truth in our words.

While messaging me questions about a (legitimate) business of hers, I replied with a verse written by my Grandmaster, Living Buddha Lian Sheng:

"君子愛財，取之有道。
不義之財雖到手，
無限後患跟著來。"

(While wealth is covetable, a gentleman makes his wealth through just and ethical means.
Ill gotten wealth, though in your hands, will elicit endless troubles pouring your way.)

She was astounded and asked, "Do you actually know what my job is? This is shocking..."

I guess I passed her challenge with flying colours.

.

She wasn't a sex worker, due to harsh circumstances like severe poverty or mountains of heavy medical bills for her family.

A drunk gang rape incident in her uni days changed her views on men and she wanted to take revenge on men. She lived a life of drugs and alcohol in between her lectures.

The way I see it, is her obsession for money that caused her downfall.

On one hot summer day in 2006, she answered a social escort advertisement. She was barely 21 and was influenced by what she read online.

The "Mama-san" who looked her over told her she needed to put on weight.

She was surprised. Wasn't it easier to earn money with a slim figure?

The Mama-san snapped, "Nonsense. Most men dislike a woman who is too slim. They prefer those with some flesh."

She silently made a promise to herself to swallow more burgers.

Her first client was an Arabic businessman. She was paid US500 for one hour.

That virgin taste of easy money lured her deeper and deeper into the abyss.

Clients of powerful backgrounds, Singapore and overseas, single and married, private and government sectors...one-on-one, multiple players, mass orgies...

She lived like a bird freed from her cage. Suddenly she could buy anything she desired, just by sweet talking and giving lusty men access to her nubile body. She was in and out of hotels, as frequently as 5 times a day.

The carefree lifestyle, the freedom of not answering to any boss and those money that poured from the sky was her drug.

In her own words, she was "the woman that all wives curse and fear".

She referred to herself as the woman the wife will loathe to find traces of existence, when the wife checks her husband's handphone with trembling hands.

It was as if she took pride in that.

How did her cause of seeking revenge on men become a twisted path of demolishing other women's marriages?

.

It didn't take her long to accumulate 6-figures in her bank account.

The more money she had, however, the more insecure she became.

She worried about losing it all. She deeply craved the warmth of love to complete her soul.

She was only 22. The client was manly, handsome and charming. He gave her $20K for her company.

She badly wanted him for her own. To be his wife.

With $100,000 withdrawn, she gave it all to her 2nd Mama-san. She decided she would use black magic to lock his heart. And soul.

But it was a fraud. The Mama-san started exhorting from her.

She was desperate and down to her last $2. She began stealing from her family and lying to feed the incessant demands and threats from her Mama-san.

She gradually realised this was her retribution of selling her body for quick money.

However, this new realisation didn't change her a bit.

She met a new client, Dave. He was a married man. It was love at first sight for her.

The initial joy she had from the money and attention he showered her blinded her wisdom to the extramarital affair.

She stayed in one of Hong Kong's expensive apartments at a prime district. But it soon became an soulless shell of loneliness that prompted her suicide attempts.

Dave coldly dumped her like a hot potato, as he didn't wish to handle an emotionally volatile woman.

.

Ken told her she bore an uncanny resemblance to his first love. She fell hard for his sweet words and gentle demeanour.

He weaved a forlorn tale of an emotionally abusive and lonely marriage, and how it was impossible for him not to to be attracted to her.

They travelled greatly and dined at expensive restaurants.

To have a married man giving his heart to her, was like tasting the forbidden apple. That first juicy bite satiated her craving to be desired. And to win another woman.

This time, she decided she would use black magic again to break up his marriage. She coveted that role of his wife. A permanent and lasting relationship, finally.

Black magic uses the dark forces of ghosts to carry out the client's wishes. She paid a good US$10,000 for a famous sorcerer and another US$4000 for her Thai amulet and mud puppet.

Did she capture Ken in the end?

They got into physical fights crazily. The amulet that controlled the ghosts backfired, and her sanity was devoured by the ghosts.

.

Her craziness drove her to swallow 200 sleeping pills and cut her wrists. ANYTHING to have him stay with her. Ken was horrified and visited her daily at the hospital. She felt triumphant. Finally, he was at her beck and call.

The happiness was short-lived. After her discharge, he broke up with her when he was on an overseas stint.

She went absolutely berserk and grabbed a knife to her throat. It felt that the ghosts wielded full control of her mind and body. Her mum kept yelling at her.

The realisation of truth came too late for her: A man, who lied to his wife and had an affair, will never be honest with her. Once a liar, always a liar.

She was warded into the high-dependancy unit at the mental hospital. Everyday, she was surrounded by suicidal and high-risk patients. They were bounded at their feet and hands. It was a petrifying sight. Was this the end of her life? She wasn't even 28. How did she allowed a man to destroy her prime years?

She sought to understand love and karma. She delved into Buddhist books, wanting to know what caused her to lose her mind. She started to have deep regret about taking short cuts in life and her laziness in earning money the ethical way. She saw, on her hands, the fresh blood of people's happiness that she had killed.

But the greed and anxiety in her couldn't be satisfied with a regular job. Or a single man who doesn't make enough to provide for her.

She was needy, attention-seeking and quarrelsome. I had called her a yoyo. I had spent many hours over a few months, replying to her messages.

Every day, she fought hard against the temptation to take up another escort job

.

「捨邪歸正」

I lost count how many Masters she sought advice from before she found me online.

She read my posts and was amazed by my tenacity to take failures.

She watched my video on suicide and became aware of the Hell that all suicide victims go to. To repeat that act of killing themselves every day at the same time they died.

Among the many things I said at our consultation, I could tell her the age range she sold herself and that it was a elder lady who gave her the chance. She was surprised at my accuracy.

I told her the only way out was to sincerely repent for her past misdeeds. Blind listening to Buddhist chants and sutras would do nothing to change her fate. That is passive. Being active is to recite it and abide by the precepts.

I instructed her to write out her story in as much details as possible, to lead other sex workers, or wannabes, suicidal people and men with affairs to the Right Path.

This was one of the fastest ways I know that can change a disastrous life around.

All the Thai amulets, crystals and pendants she stashed in her room MUST go. She spoke of their decreasing power over time, and it seemed like a never-ending black hole as she kept on buying more and more to help her legitimate business.

She asked whether she would be able to get a publisher to buy her story.

I told her to forget about making money from her book. Give it for free. Post it online. Somehow, somewhere, everywhere. Get the story out. Fast.

When her boyfriend left her a sum of money, I insisted that she returned it. Don't take money that you didn't earn it rightfully. She said that was her breakup fee. I put my feet down, and said it was a proper relationship between two singles, and she caused the breakup. Why would she need money for loving a man who had loved her?

She promised she would write her story.

But she lied to me. Just like how she lied of making the $49 donation the next day, before seeking a Bazi consultation with me.

She went to the Guan Yin Temple at Waterloo Street, and sought a divination stick. It was her favourite activity whenever she was troubled or at a dilemma.

Right after she left the temple, she messaged and questioned why she received a 下簽 (bad lot) for my recommendation.

I asked for the number of the divination lot and the actual question she posed.

"I want to write a story about my life to encourage women not to sell their bodies and for married men not to have affairs. I may be hurt or sabotaged by people, so please protect me."

That didn't sound like a question. But the Bodhisattva had a way in teaching sentient beings.

I was dumbfounded at the Bodhisattva's omnipresent accuracy and foresight, when I saw the divination number.

It was a bad lot indeed, but not because of the solution I gave to my client.

.

「莊子試妻」

Zhuangzi was a famous and well-respected Chinese philosopher of the Warring States Period.

One day at the mountains, he walked past a new grave and saw a woman kneeling over the freshly turned soil, hurriedly fanning it.

Not understanding the woman's behaviour, Zhuangzi asked for her intention.

The woman replied, that her husband lied beneath the soil. Before he died, he had said she could only remarry, when the soil of his grave dried. It was the rainy season at that time, hence her fervent fanning, so that she could quickly seek a new man.

Zhuangzi shook his head, when he heard of her heartlessness.

Unknown to many, Zhuangzi was an accomplished Taoist practitioner. With his supernatural powers, he helped the woman to dry the soil almost immediately. Thrilled at the dried grave, the widow gave her fan to Zhuangzi and hurried down the mountain.

Zhuangzi returned home, singing and waving the fan. His wife, Tian, questioned where he got the fan from. When she heard of the widow, Tian was so angry that she tore the fan into pieces and called the widow shameless.

Zhuangzi pacified his wife and said he had faith in her chastity.

A few days later, he fell very sick and died. Tian was saddened at her husband's sudden death and wept in sorrow

At his funeral, a very handsome young man showed up with his old servant. He said he was Zhuangzi's student, and a son of an important government official.

He wanted to perform the rites of a dutiful student, and helped in his teacher's funeral, by watching vigil for three years.

His good looks caught the eye of the newly minted widow, Tian. She sought to know more his eligibility from the old servant.

Within 20 days, they got married.

On the night of their wedding, the young man was struck with an ear-shattering migraine. Tian anxiously asked the old servant for help. The old servant said his young master had this strange illness since birth. The only cure was to consume the brain of a human. Back in his hometown, the father would take the brain from the prisoners sentenced for death for his son.

But in this remote countryside, where could they find a human brain as medicine?

Tian thought of her dead husband. She promptly took an axe and hacked open his coffin.

Zhuangzi leapt out from the coffin and mused this now-famous Chinese verse, "青竹蛇兒口，黃蜂尾上針，兩者皆不毒，最毒婦人心。"

Tian proclaimed that she heard noises in her coffin and wanted to see if Zhuangzi was alive.

Zhuangzi questioned the red finery on her and the red decor in the house. Tian argued that she wanted to welcome him. So she donned on the wedding finery to get married with him again.

The young man and his servant walked in. They were actually manifestations of Zhuangzi's supernatural powers.

Tian was so ashamed of her heartless and deciteful act that she eventually hung herself.

.

Every divination lot comes with a poem and a background story. This was the background story on my client's divination lot.

The poem states:

因名喪德如何事 卻恐吉中變化凶
酒醉不知何處去 青松影里夢朦朧

Virtues are destroyed in pursuit of self gain. Fear that the auspicious will morph into bad.

The drunkard knows nowhere to go. In the green forest a shadow lingers in a dreamy haze.

.

It is common to encounter clients that lack faith in my recommendations.

Some will ask many questions after our session, wanting to know why my solutions will help them or how I derive my solutions. There are also emotional clients who would flare up and lose all their manners, when they can't get an answer that they like from me.

I don't ask my doctor what ingredient goes into the making of my cough syrup and how it works scientifically in my body.

I take action by drinking it as prescribed. Because based on past experience, I trust that his medicine will work to help my predicament. I don't drink, I continue to be sick, I don't see results.

My suggestions don't require my clients to consume unknown medical liquids into their bodies. Yet few clients take action, when it comes to their Destiny.

Despite me being recommended by their friend who experienced positive results with my help, and have genuine testimonials to justify my fees.

That divination lot was Bodhisattva telling me: My client will not write her story, for she does not sincerely regret her past acts.

It was also a grave reprimand to her to mend her ways before it was too late.

But she didn't see the divination lot in the same manner as I did.

Not only does she lack faith in my words, she distrusted the holy words of the Bodhisattva too.

.

Give money, buy love, buy fame, buy business, buy wealth and buy that. No need hard work.

Such is the sexy appeal of many ghostly amulets. They appeal to people who want many things in life but refuse to follow the Law of Karma, to sow seeds the right way.

I see one client bidded for a Thai amulet from a Facebook Live. Another wanted to buy a multi-coloured bracelet, because "so pretty! Got power some more!" Luckily, his Wife who had learned some Buddhism from me stopped him.

.

In March 2017, this client sent me a message:

"Hi Ji Qian, hope you are well. Good luck for your Home Fengshui For A Happy Marriage tomorrow.

I was looking thru our past convos where we first started speaking online. Yes, Im a spoilt brat and Im a yoyo porcupine. I look at a sentence that is poignant - "the day you stop relying on men is the day you become prosperous". I wonder if that day will ever come. I I finally understand that my Facebook Adverts getting disabled is due to my past karma. And I haven't finished writing the repentance story which u instructed me to write in August. I think I know that I'm half-hearted in repentance, that's why I can't bring myself to finish the story. I'm just wondering if I am supposed to survive on my savings till my Facebook Advert Account get reactivated.

I haven't been able to find any new product to sell since XXX (sales also failing miserably). I am weak-willed and too reliant on men. The only thing keeping me from committing suicide is my mum and because I'm reminded by Shifu's words that a suicide victim is doomed to repeat the same act."

菩薩英明。

.

Last year, I had casually asked if I could share her story. She promptly gave me the permission.

Yesterday, one client called me unempathetic towards him. The way he wrote suddenly jolted my memory of this client. I had taken too long to write her story.

I told her to write in English and Chinese, and she did part of it.

The account you read of her past was adapted from her written work. Though there are many grammar and structural mistakes, she does write very well.

The poison in our hearts will eventually consume our souls if we do not purge it out. What joy is there when we resort to brutal force to keep a man by our side? Should he chooses to leave, that does not discount the value of our self worth. A man who isn't interested in you for the right reason isn't attractive.

The same goes for men who cheat or pay for sex. You are ruining another woman's life when you satisfy your lust.

When you inflict suffering on another being, in return, you get pain and suffering on yourself. So don't sow the seed in the first place. Repentance done right over a period of time can prevent your past bad seeds from germinating, and reduce your suffering.

If there is any merit in sharing her story here, I dedicate all of it to my client.

May she have the inner wisdom and stability to lead a virtuous life.

May she always be surrounded by good teachers to show her the way.

May her vile affinities be broken and replaced by good ones.

May her greed and hatred be subdued.

May she repent for her past transgressions in time.

No matter how long it may take, one step forward into the Light is one step away from Darkness.

.

ཨོཾ་མ་ཎི་པདྨེ་ཧཱུྂ༔
Om Ma Ni Peh Me Hom