..續本文上一頁huge mountains pressing down on them heavily until they cannot cope, and, as a result, they are not able to enjoy any comfort, joy, or happiness.

　　For that reason, I feel sorry for children. As they grow up they have to endure greater stress. Not long ago, in my home town, when a group of sixth-grade primary school students graduated, they became very excited and said: “We no longer need to queue up; we can now move on to higher schools.” I smiled at them and joked gently: “The more you grow and the further you progress, the more you will feel the pressure ahead.” Indeed, as an adult, although you do not need to study books like when you were in school, and do not need to line up, the fierce competition in society means that the stress you are under is much greater than before.

　　In March 2010, Xiao Kang Magazine joined forces with Tsinghua University and surveyed the health of China”s civil servants and white-collar urban population groups. The outcome of the survey showed that more than 88% of people think they are in or close to a “burned out” state, suffering from depression, feeling agitated, and lacking a sense of happiness and satisfaction. This suggests that even though outwardly many people may appear to be leading entirely meaningful and comfortable lives, when they subject their lives to investigation, they actually find that they are plagued with mental and emotional suffering, are miserable and exhausted.

　　As we can see, at the moment, most people living in cities are mentally and physically unhealthy. The reasons for this are, first, overwork; second, strong desire; and third, an unhealthy lifestyle. With these trends, there are now more and more people suffering from mental illness. According to one figure, one out of every six people suffers from some form of mental illness, and two hundred thousand people commit suicide in China every year because of this illness. This data is really quite worrying.

　　III How Buddhists Maintain a Healthy Body and Mind

　　1. The importance of faith

　　Of course, medical treatment is one of the important remedies to these problems; however, as I said before, in my view, spiritual development provides long lasting effects compared to other solutions. Although one can survive without a faith or belief, it is still better to have one. In fact, to treat these psychological problems, it is important to have some kind of faith or belief. The University of Toronto Medical School has found in its research that those who have firm faith and beliefs have less stress, are able to socialise actively, have a healthy diet, and are thus psychologically and physically healthier. In contrast, those who have no faith or belief have poorer health.

　　The psychologist Carl Jung also noted that the increase of psychological disorders in the modern population is closely related to the decline of religious beliefs. He wrote, in Modern Man in Search of a Soul, that in this era where science is so highly developed, humans are psychologically unhealthy and so need a religion or faith. He saw that of all the religions, Buddhism has the most profound method to heal the unhealthy mind. Including meditation, prayer, chanting sutras, reciting mantras, and other practices, these are recognized as the most effective methods for healing psychological problems and so are being adopted by psychotherapy.

　　Therefore, for today, our discussion will focus on using Buddhism to ease and cure the present sufferings of human beings. Without this, even if you have wealth, fame, and a successful career, physical exhaustion still increases every day, and the mind keeps filling with anxieties, discontentment, and dissatisfaction. In this context, wealth has no significant value.

　　Some of you here have always followed and believed in Bu…

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