Flipping through Jing Si Aphorisms one day early in his fight against cancer, Liu Zi Xian caught sight of a line that read, “We have to cultivate our own blessings and dissolve our own bad karma.” These words couldn’t have come at a more opportune moment.

Why me? I don’t smoke and I don’t drink. I’ve lived my life according to the books. How can I possibly have cancer?” Liu Zi Xian (劉子賢) couldn’t believe what the doctor had just told him. The news, which came in early December 2003, plunged him into a deep abyss of hopelessness. He had been hospitalized for violent coughing, but tests had confirmed his cancer.

So young and at the height of his profession—a TV news anchor in Malaysia—he refused to accept the verdict, but the reality, so terrifying and unexpected, would not relent. In his confusion and fright, he even thought of jumping out of his hospital room window. In despair, he took out and flipped through Jing Si Aphorisms, a collection of maxims by Master Cheng Yen. Through the tears in his eyes, a line in the book jumped out at him: “We have to cultivate our own blessings and dissolve our own bad karma.”

Just as the diagnosis was sudden and devastating, that line from Master Cheng Yen was immediate and enlightening. Liu realized that he himself had to face his illness and settle the karmic score in this, not a future, lifetime. He decided to actively seek treatment.

A life-saving book

He left his news anchor job and started his arduous attempt to climb out of what must have felt like a bottomless pit of treatment, agony, and discomfort. The glamour of his celebrity status was history, replaced by the often unbearable treatment regimen and its horrible aftereffects. He was 39 years old at the time.

Liu acknowledged that he had shed many tears during the chemotherapy. “I couldn’t hold down any food. I would get sick after a meal. Then I would throw up brownish-yellow bile followed by blood. It was a horrific experience. I often felt like someone was stabbing a dagger into my innards and dragging it every which way.”

He vomited blood for three months. “When the going was the toughest, it was books by the Master that kept me company. She saved my life,” Liu said. He meant books like Jing Si Aphorisms and At Ease With Life and Death. He saw the wisdom behind statements such as “When you die, you can take nothing along except your karma” and “Life and death are only separated by a breath.” These thoughts would not have been so enlightening to him had he not lived through the trials of life.

As a result of his cancer, Liu started to explore Buddhism. He read the sutras and pondered the wisdom of the Buddha. “When you get sick, you should be grateful for the chance to start a new chapter in your life. I thank heaven’s grace for giving me unlimited courage and wisdom so that I can overcome the adversity of physical afflictions and mental obstacles.”

He firmly believes that “With death comes a new start.” This aphorism from Master Cheng Yen has put him totally at ease with death, which is now no longer a source of horror or fear to him. He has diligently practiced Buddhism, adjusted his lifestyle, and even become a vegetarian. He knows that life is impermanent and that it is rare in the cycle of reincarnation both to be born as a human being and to encounter Buddhism, and so he must make the most of his time in this life by doing good deeds and serving others.

A life-long commitment to do good

The illness also helped him realize how he had failed to be a good son. He said that before he got ill, he had not been a good child—far from it. When his mother underwent surgery and his father went for kidney dialyses, he didn’t go home to help them. “I only sent some money home. I thought… I thought that was, uh, filial piety,” Liu said with apparent remorse.

Even so, his parents have helped him overcome his cancer. They have been behind him every step of the way through his treatment. Liu then knew that was parental love, and now he wants to repay them with his filial love. “I am really fortunate that my parents are still around to receive my love,” he said.

Now his cancer is in remission, and he is in another line of work. In his spare time, he goes with Tzu Chi volunteers and helps in whatever way he can. He volunteers at hospitals, pays visits to needy families or the elderly, and he also frequently shares his cancer experience with others, especially those who are in the thick of their treatment.

“You can’t take any of your worldly wealth with you when you die. Therefore, you should strive to be wealthy in wisdom. No matter how short your life is, you should make good use of it by devoting yourself to benefiting the world,” Liu concludes. “I’m grateful to Master Cheng Yen for her Jing Si Aphorisms. The book has given me wisdom to live on.”

Source: Tzu Chi Quarterly (Winter 2009)