Turn Resentment Into Gratitude

Extract from Seminar 3 – Q&A Session 5 April 1986 –

 “Vi-Kien” Meditation Center

Question: Everyone knows the following saying, but no one can do it, which is “Turn Resentment Into Gratitude”. This is truly easy to say, but very difficult to accomplish. Please explain to us.

Answer by Master Vi-Kien

In order to turn resentment into gratitude, you must see the following: 

Whomever you meet, if you believe in God, you should think that God is coming to see you. Only then will you be able to accomplish this. What is God trying to teach me?

They can throw insults at your face. They can pound on the table and shout insults at you. What should you do now under this intense pressure? You must return to your inherent space. What is it? The space of serenity. You already know that your potential is serenity. 

So, you can let them insult you, beat you, pound on you, but you gladly retreat to your serenity. What helps you attain serenity? When you retreat at the most, you will realize that no one can steal your serenity. 

Therefore, you turn resentment into gratitude. Thanks to this person, I can understand spirituality. Thanks to this person, I have understood my own position. Thanks to this person, I have awakened my consciousness. Instead of losing an aggressive friend, I will have a kind friend because of my patience. The more I practice patience, the more I will retreat back to my existing inner soul. You may achieve enlightenment at the moment of your great patience.

When you practice meditation, you also practice patience. You sit cross-legged and practice the exercise of cyclical breathing. So, what is beating on you? The food you ate is currently beating on you. You ate until full, but you did not know how to organize your nutrients, so they will beat on you in revenge! They are currently beating on you, but you always turn resentment into gratitude.

They cause your bellyache. They make you tired. They make you drowsy. But you must be victorious. You must conquer them with your compassion and patience. You must be extremely patient to work with them constructively. Do you see it? From there, you return to your serenity, and you realize that even though these nutrients are beating on you, you must love them. Can you really abandon them?

Tomorrow, you will continue to care for them. Today, they cause your diarrhea and bellyache, but tomorrow, you still love them and don’t abandon them. You have returned to serenity thanks to them. You are very happy to be able to resolve your difficult situation, from suffering a bellyache to being free of pain. 

That guy calls me “barbarian”, but I see that he is sick, and not me.

Why does he insult people like that? If I am in his position, I think I would be a crazy person. I see that my opponent is crazy. But how can I save him? Since we are all brothers and sisters, I should love him and be patient, I should visit him when possible, and I should use my compassion and affection to guide him. Thanks to these people, I have seen what lucidity is. Through my lucidity, I have understood that my opponent is sick.

But I have never learned to be a doctor! Thanks to my serenity, I have understood the sickness of my opponent. Do you see it? I have learned a course in medicine without knowing it. You have learned through your infinite patience.

The same situation happens with husband and wife, or in a family, on this earth. One needs to be extremely patient to love one’s husband, extremely patient to love one’s children, extremely resigned to love one’s wife, otherwise, being quick-tempered will not help. However, you must be willing to be patient and resigned in order to learn from a hot-tempered person who attacks you relentlessly and turn your resentment into gratitude.

For example, you cultivate yourself spiritually, but your wife does not, so she disturbs you, she scolds you, she belittles you. What should you think now? You think about the Lord Buddha Shakyamuni, you think about Mr. Tám and the story of his spiritual practice. Mrs. Tám scolded him, she tormented him in all kinds of manners, but he kept his serenity, because he wanted to save his family. He knew how to learn the lesson of perturbation by his opponent. At the beginning, he found, it was resentment, but in reality, she was his true benefactor. They scold you because they love you too much, they disturb you because they love you too much.

Therefore, we must turn resentment into gratitude. From the worldly point of view, this causes resentment, but in reality, they are our benefactors. They utilize their brains in order to change our views. So, isn’t it true that their love is greater than ours? Isn’t it true that they love their husband very much? Isn’t it true that they love their wife very much? They love them infinitely! Thus, they make an effort to reprimand their partners in this manner because they fear that their husband or wife could become crazy.

But how can a spiritual adept explain it? When our partner is used to agitation, but we have achieved serenity, it is normal that they oppose us. They oppose us, but they are our benefactor, they are the savior in our life, and they will never abandon us. Do you understand? Therefore, we must turn resentment into gratitude.

Therefore, we must learn to turn resentment into gratitude. Our father scolds us, our elder brother scolds us, our younger sibling scolds us, for what mistake? Because we are perfecting ourselves spiritually. Why do we perfect ourselves spiritually? To learn about compassion. Why do we perfect ourselves spiritually? To learn how to dissipate resentment and hatred. Why do we perfect ourselves spiritually? To guide and save humanity. Our mission is grandiose, but humans do not know, so they have the right to scold, this is natural.

Even God is slandered, when He descends on earth, so we are nothing in comparison. Therefore, we should always turn resentment into gratitude in order to measure our own serenity. If you do not know how to turn resentment into gratitude, you can perfect yourselves spiritually for ten lifetimes without making any progress. You have a yardstick but do not know how to utilize it. The person who insults you is a yardstick from Heaven. This is a gauge from Heaven to measure your serenity and spiritual progression. If you don’t know how to use it and fight back, if you want to win at any price, you may win but you will just stagnate. If you lose, you will have the opportunity to march further. Once we advance, we will be able to save people in the future. 

As I often said, many people being chased by a vicious dog run for their life and end up taking refuge in a church and come face-to-face with the image of the Christ. The dog no longer pursues them and does not enter the church to bite them. Why so? This is a place of worship and glory for everyone. When all beings direct their mind there, it can transform people’s hearts. Even a vicious animal can become a docile one. 

Do you see it? This is the value of dignity and serenity. But if we follow the example of the Christ in our spiritual perfection, if we follow the example of the Buddha, once we become enlightened like the Christ or the Buddha, should we abandon the dog? No, we must save it. We must turn resentment into gratitude. The dog is our benefactor, since it helps us return to Heaven. All perturbations in the earthly world are our benefactors to help us achieve liberation of the soul.  

Therefore, we must analyze the subject “Turn Revenge into Gratitude” in this way in order to comprehend its correct meaning.