In 2012, a multi-talented and beautiful girl walked out of the college campus, and normally, she will follow her parents' expectations, step by step towards the road of work, marriage, and childbirth like many ordinary girls in society.
But she didn't, but chose to shave and become a monk.
When asked by the reporter how she was different from before after becoming a monk, she replied: I still wasted too much time before, and it would have been better if I had become a monk earlier.
When they saw her before shaving, netizens exploded:
Such a beautiful and delicate girl turned out to be a monk? Is she hurt by love and seen through the red dust? What is the reason for a highly educated female college student to make such a decision?
Next, let's walk into the story of Ma Ying.
The first Buddha's fate
Ma Ying lived with her grandmother when she was a child, and her grandmother often took her to visit the temple, although she didn't understand anything at that time, but it was also a form of origin.
When she was a child, when she sat on the back seat of her bicycle, she would always think involuntarily when she saw the crowd coming and going on the street"Who am I? Why am I? ”These philosophical questions, which seem to be inappropriate for her age, always pop up for no reason.
She loves to think, and her academic performance is also very good, especially in mathematics, physics and chemistry, she has a super talent, and in 2004, she was admitted to the science class of Shandong Experimental Middle School with the first place in admission.
But not long after the start of school, the passion for literature buried deep in her heart became more and more intense, and she resolutely gave up science and literature. In 2007, he was admitted to the College of Liberal Arts of Qingdao University with high scores.
While other girls on the college campus were chasing dramas and falling in love, obsessed with makeup and dressing up, Ma Ying suddenly began to get close to Buddhism in her sophomore year. As soon as she has free time, she soaks in the library to read books about Buddhism, browse the relevant Buddhist altars, and fill a whole brown paper book with notes alone, and also insists on reciting the Lengyan mantra every day.
It is said that "if you read a book a hundred times, you will see its righteousness", in the recitation over and over again, Ma Ying has a lot of insights and growth, but she also gradually found that she just relied on her own reading the scriptures and learning Buddhism, and many doubts in her heart could not be answered.
The fate of life seems to have been arranged in the dark.
In February 2011, Ma Ying, who was full of curiosity about Buddhism, met a teacher by chance, and that year she first visited the Xinlongdongzhi Monastery in Ganzi, Sichuan, a Buddhist institute on a mountain 4,000 meters above sea level, where she began to gradually learn more about Buddhism.
Officially ordained
In July 2012, after graduating from university, Ma Ying went up the mountain for the second timeWhen she stood on the top of the mountain and looked down, as if she saw countless whirlpools, one after another in the earthly world, in this rushing and tumbling whirlpool, at that moment she felt as if she had gone up from the whirlpool to the shore, and a voice in her heart said to her: "I don't want to go down again." ”
At that time, although Ma Ying didn't want to go down the mountain, she was not ready to become a monk, she thought that her heart was not stable enough, and she needed great blessings to become a monk.
At the same time, she made a decision: to stay on the mountain until she was able to become a monk.
Later, she went to her teacher's hometown to learn Tibetan, a simple Tibetan village with a view of the beautiful Yala Snow Mountain every day.
In an interview with reporters, she recalled that when she first went up the mountain, she asked her master if she could become a monk, and she was afraid that her teacher would let her become a monk, and the teacher replied, "Take your time......”
When she confirmed that her mind was settled, she asked the guru again, and this time she was still afraid, but she was afraid that the guru did not agree, but the guru replied, "Oh! Excellent! Excellent! This sentence made him cry with joy.
Along the way, fate seems to have made its own arrangements in the dark, Ma Ying shaved his degree as he wished, and was given the legal name: "Cai Zhen Wangmu".
Life after becoming a monk
From film and television works, we often see that the life of a monk seems to be very simple, every day is to meditate, eat fasting and chant Buddha, but Ma Ying's life as a monk is busy and fulfilling.
In the first year of shaving, she got up at five or six o'clock in the morning, and after each of them finished her morning class, she went to class at eight o'clock to listen to the Fa. Leave class at eleven o'clock and make lunch; In the afternoon, she has to be in charge of teaching Tibetan classes, and in the summer, she is often busy. There were often power outages at night on the mountain, so she would light the lamp for evening classes, or read books and memorize to prepare for the next day's lectures.
In terms of eating, cabbage and potatoes are the main food, and when the vegetables are broken, they eat tsampa and wild vegetables
Winters in Tibet are particularly cold, and one year when all the potatoes in the monastery were frozen, she spent several afternoons peeling them, cutting them into strips, controlling the moisture, and then frying them in a pot to prolong the storage time.
Because the temple is still under construction, she will also do a lot of manual work, such as carrying wood, laying turf, shoveling and transporting soil, etc., as well as making pasta.
As for the previous social circle, she broke off most of the contact due to mental instability when she first became a monk, and later as she improved her studies, she also hoped to share more wisdom, so she resumed social tools such as Weibo and WeChat.
This has also made more and more people begin to understand the Dharma and understand her, and many people say that in their busy lives and trivial matters, sometimes they feel at ease when they think of her practicing peacefully in this pure land.
But at the same time, this practice has also aroused many people's doubts, some people think that since she is a monk, she should not ask about the world, and her behavior is to take the opportunity to hype.
Ma Ying did not explain too much about those who questioned her, she believed that if she could use the Internet to "benefit others", this was also within her "scope of duty".
For her, it no longer matters what is right and what is wrong.
Becoming a monk: "joining the WTO" rather than "misanthropy".
The reason behind her ordination has also aroused the curiosity of many people, and more people still admire her courage.
But Ma Ying said that she didn't need courage to become a monk at all, which was a natural thing. She's not trying to escape reality either.
If she really wanted to give a reason, her answer was: "There is an understanding of the suffering of life and samsara, a desire to remove the suffering of sentient beings, and an exploration of the ultimate reality of the universe." To sum up: I became a monk because the Buddha was right. ”
This is the real voice in her heart.
When the daughter became a monk, the parents not only agreed, but they also studied the Dharma with the daughter.
Ma Ying said that when she was a child, her parents were very busy, and her relationship with them was also very cold, but after she became a monk, her parents also began to study Buddhism, her mother would ask her if she didn't understand Buddhism, and her father would also forward good Buddhist articles to her, and the relationship between the family was closer than ever.
Talking about when it is still vulgar, Ma Ying replied: "When a person is awake, it is impossible to cling to dreams as much as when he is asleep. ”
We don't know if she will return to the world in the future, but what is certain is that every choice she makes is in accordance with her heart, and in her opinion, true happiness can only come from the heart.
Since then, in the mortal world, there is one less "Ma Ying" and one more "Cai Zhen Wangmu".