The Power of Spiritual Practice Transcends Professional Techniques
When worldly people who aren't spiritual practitioners, paint, sing or play music, they emit coarse vibrations; though some of their works may also be beautiful in some way. We can feel it. It's because people who don't practice spirituality are often full of troubling and secular thoughts. They can't ascend to the very high realms, and thus can't express the artistic concepts of the superior realms.
On the other hand, we spiritual practitioners who may not have learned certain professional knowledge or skills can still excel in our performance if we want to. Should we wish to understand something, we can also comprehend it clearly. That's why, although the Sixth Patriarch Hui Neng was not a learned person, nor had he read any scriptures, he could instantly understand any scriptures read to him. He could even explain them to people. In contrast, some people are highly educated and have read all the scriptures, and are even able to recite them, yet they can't understand what the scriptures are discussing.
Once when I was playing the piano, a brother initiate said to me, "Master is playing the piano in the modernist style." I said, "I have no style; I never really tried hard to learn it. I only learned a little bit a very long time ago." When I was still living in Germany, I did have a piano as a house decoration. Later, I bought a songbook and flipped through it, and then, "Plink! Plink!..." In this way my piano learning was over in a few days. That's how I acquired all my knowledge -- in the same way that I learned to play the piano.
Then the brother asked me, "Have You ever studied singing? Have You ever studied this or that...?" All these things we can do naturally if we need to. There's virtually no need to learn so much. The more we learn, the more we're confined within "formulas," such as the proper way to paint a picture or coordinate colors, and so on. Time is wasted in working out these formulas. Weeks go by and the painting is still incomplete. After all our effort, when the painting is finally finished, we wonder, "Can this painting be sold? What will people think of it?" Having to worry about so many things, all our inspiration just vanishes!
Without having to think so much, we spiritual practitioners can do things very well. The better our spiritual practice is, the better we can accomplish things. As long as the situation requires it, we can always do our work. However, if we try to show off, we won't be able to do it well. We can do it well only if we do it naturally. If we do it deliberately, trying to demonstrate to people that we're talented, or flaunt ourselves to earn people's praise, we won't be able to do it no matter how much we've practiced spiritually. This indicates that our spiritual practice still isn't good, which is why we have such ideas in mind. If we paint purely because we have the inner urge to paint, because we love to do it, then naturally we can do it quickly and well. When some people paint, superficially it seems as though they're doing so very casually, but actually this isn't true. It's only because they're very adept that they can paint very quickly. When someone is very familiar with a certain job and has gotten used to doing it, he can do it very quickly.
Everything in the world is arranged by Creation; we create nothing so we have nothing to be proud of. If we have any innovative ideas in our field of specialization or in art, or have invented some machine, it's only because we've practiced spiritually so that our mind has greater insight and more inspiration. Our spiritual level has been elevated to a higher realm so that we can access the things there and manifest them in this world. That's all. In fact, while depicting things here that belong to the higher realms, we may sometimes make mistakes. If our spiritual practice isn't good enough and we have insufficient wisdom, we'll write incorrectly or make mistakes. And the end products won't look as nice as those in the higher realms.
