Inspiration
Love is the Language of Our Souls
In a hospital, we witness the different stages of life, including birth, aging, illness and death as manifestations of suffering. These can be valuable life lessons for everyone. I underwent a unique volunteer experience at the Tzu Chi Medical Center...
Returning to Our Spiritual Home
Prior to this year’s TIMA conference, a few of us (medical volunteers) flew to Taiwan earlier to spend some time volunteering at Jing Si Abode and the Tzu Chi Medical Center, both located in Hualien. Those two weeks spent in Taiwan were one of the best...
Life Is so Vulnerable, yet It Can Be Meaningful, Too
Life can be so vulnerable and fragile. Yet, the beauty of a cultivated person can be so touching and dearly missed. My acquaintance with Sister Bi Lian began many years ago, but I only got to know her in 2011, when Tzu Chi Singapore started its first...
TIMA Convention 2019 : “We Are Connected Like One Big Family”
Even though we may speak different languages and come from different backgrounds, we all share the common goal of serving humanity with the spirit of Great Love. And that is what makes us whole.
My Journey in “Wisdom at Dawn”
What reason would convince you to wake up in the wee hours of every morning? If I tell you that there is a group of people in Singapore who voluntarily get up at such an unearthly hour every day to listen to a Dharma talk, what would your first...
My 8-Week Internship at Tzu Chi as a 17-Year-Old
More than a month has passed since I completed my summer internship at Tzu Chi. Although I am already up to my neck in schoolwork, club activities, etc., the lessons that I had learned while serving as an intern in Tzu Chi are still as fresh on my mind...
An Inspiring and Fulfilling Journey with Tzu Chi
During the latest Tzu Chi medical aid mission in Laos, I was asked to share my volunteering experience with Tzu Chi, and how I have tried to put my understanding of the Buddha’s teachings into practice. I hope that this sharing would encourage those who..
What I Have Learned from My Street Fundraising Experience
Many people do have compassionate hearts, and there is a need to create more opportunities to get those hearts into action! Volunteering in a street fundraiser is a meaningful way to realise this aspiration.
I’m My Daddy’s Eyes
They uprooted their lives, fled Syria, and entered Turkey illegally so that their children could have a brighter future.
Six Lessons in Prison
How do you convince prison inmates who have had a rough journey in life that there is indeed spring at the end of a cold winter?
What Witnessing Suffering Taught Me
“It’s been around 20 years since I last saw my only child; he should be more than 20 years old by now…” said a Tzu Chi dialysis beneficiary. Volunteers lent him a listening ear as he grieved over his unhappy past…
Good News, Bad News - The Fort McMurray Wildfire
“So-o-o, the good news is that you can have some free cushion covers, but the bad news is…” She burst into laughter and, picking up where I had left off, said, “I don’t have a chair!”
A Big Hug
It’s been over ten years, but I still clearly remember the tight hug Arbar gave me that evening when I was leaving Bam, Iran.
Soundless Cry
“Through dedicating ourselves to serving others, we witness the value and dignity of life.” This is a teaching (from Dharma Master Cheng Yen) that I always bear in mind when I do home care visits.
Protect Mother Earth for Our Very Own Future
"As inhabitants of the Earth, we are nourished and sustained by Mother Earth who provides us our food and all the resources for life. If she is healthy and well, we will be healthy and well. Our fates are intertwined." — Dharma Master Cheng Yen
Witnessing Truth, Beauty, and Goodness at the Festive Charity Fair
I was also touched by the efforts of the recycling volunteers at the Charity Fair. I saw a quiet dignity in them and in the invaluable work they were doing to protect our environment and planet.
Agony Up Close
Love is the most powerful antidote to the suffering in the world. As I witnessed Tzu Chi volunteers treating distribution recipients respectfully, I knew that the boundaries between religions and ethnicities can be dissolved and that the peoples of the wo
What Would I Do?
The six people in her own family lived with close to 20 such fellow Burmese. They all lived on one salary, the 900 ringgits that her husband brought home every month. Refugees had to pay their own way at public hospitals, so she cried when she saw...
