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He asked seriously and humbly.
"They are all acts of charity, and of course they will accumulate merits." The old abbot nodded.
"That's good." Wu An breathed a sigh of relief.
In his company, funds are set aside every month for charity.
The original intention of doing charity is to make the company have a positive image in the society, and it is also to respond to the country’s call - let the rich lead the poor.
However, that was done in the name of the company, using money from the company's account.
Wu An was thinking, when the time comes, he would form a team and use his own property as a fund for charity, then that would be considered doing good deeds, right?
Just when he breathed a sigh of relief, the old abbot's serious cough interrupted Wu An's naive guess.
He said, "The boss is warning you, Mr. Wu, that if you want to do good deeds, you'd better do it yourself. If you let others do it for you, it would be dishonest and you may end up with nothing."
Wu An: “…”
The old abbot immediately put an end to what Wu An had just thought of, making Wu An feel embarrassed.
However, I must thank the old abbot for his reminder.
If he had not mentioned that Wu An was looking for someone to help with charity, then this charity would only have social significance and could not be considered as doing good deeds for him.
So Wu An thanked him, "Thank you for the reminder, Abbot."
The old abbot nodded and said generously, "Donor Wu, you have a connection with our Qingshan Guanyin Zen Temple. It is my duty to help you resolve the disaster."
"However, as for doing good deeds and accumulating virtue to avoid disasters, it all depends on the luck of Donor Wu."
"I can only help you up to this point."
"If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me."
Wu An put his hands together to show respect.
"Then I'll trouble the abbot next."
Wu An had many questions he wanted to ask the abbot, and what he wanted to know most was what he should do to accumulate the most merit.
The old abbot will not directly tell him how to do it, but he can determine whether Wu An's approach can accumulate merit.
Wu An thought of many ways:
Go to the mountains personally to sponsor some children, establish a supporting relationship with them, and help them grow as much as possible.
I have also thought about helping some needy families in the city, helping them overcome difficulties and integrate into society.
Or you could invest in building schools or roads to alleviate poverty in a place.
……
The old abbot gave suggestions on his ideas.
Wu An gradually understood what to do next.
After a while, Wu An couldn't think of any other way.
It is impossible for people to have inspiration all the time. Wu An can only wait until he has an idea and then ask the abbot.
That’s all about how to accumulate merit.
The next question comes again:
"Excuse me, Master Abbot, how much merit do I need to accumulate to offset the disaster that is about to come?"
The abbot said: "Merit is something that cannot be quantified. Whenever you, Mr. Wu, keep doing good deeds, you will have merit."
"If you, the donor, do good deeds for the sake of gain, then it is not doing good deeds to accumulate virtue."
Wu An nodded: "Thank you for your guidance, Abbot."
He took a sip of tea and asked again: "Then may I ask the abbot, I see that in this world, there are many people who often do good deeds and accumulate virtues, but they still die in an untimely way. Can't their merits protect against disasters?"
Abbot: "Disasters cannot be avoided. If disasters come, you cannot rely on your merits. You, the donor, must also avoid them and be careful."
“And the person who does good may not really be doing good. He may do good out of duty, or he may do it for profit.”
The abbot paused and said, "What I said may not be reasonable, because I cannot determine the affairs of the world. Even for you, Mr. Wu, the disaster, I can only see the outline."
"When disaster strikes, it is best for you, the donor, to be careful."
Wu An: “…”
It turns out that doing good deeds and accumulating virtue may not necessarily protect against disasters.
According to the old abbot, merit is just a means to resist disasters. If a disaster is really going to happen, it will be up to Wu An and Li Yuhua to avoid it themselves.
However, you can't lie down either.
If you want to commit suicide and cause something unexpected to happen to yourself, you will not be able to avoid disaster.
So, be careful next time.
Later, Wu Na and the abbot discussed some metaphysical matters such as when would be the best time for them to get married, and the abbot gave some so-called good days.
Then, it was getting late, so Wu An and Li Yuhua went back.
Before going back, Wu An paid the old abbot 100,000 yuan in so-called merit money.
Although we don't know whether the old abbot was using rhetoric to persuade them to pay, he was right about doing good deeds.
No matter what, you have to do some good deeds.
According to Wu An's current social status, making money is no longer a problem, and it is time for him to give back to society.
So Wu An decided:
"Tomorrow, we will contact some poor villages and see if we can do something!"
#9 Learn from them
Although the country has carefully governed and led the broad masses of people out of poverty, the standard for "escaping poverty" is not high.
Deep in the mountains, although the children can have enough food to eat and books to read, they cannot enjoy the fun that children of the same age in the city have, nor can they see the development and advancement of big cities.
In the city, there are countless families who are heavily in debt because of the serious illness of the breadwinner.
There are also many students who are forced to give up their studies and return home to take care of their families or are forced to work to earn money due to family changes.
All kinds of sufferings in the world are hidden in the corners of society.
Abbot Huijue told Wu An yesterday: "Helping these people is doing good deeds and accumulating merits."
To help these people, we cannot just give money directly.
Throwing money at something may result in a waste of effort. Teaching a man to fish will gain you more merit than giving him fish.
Wu An set a small goal for himself.
——Perform eighty-one good deeds and accumulate perfect merits.
This number is not made up; it was told to Wu An by the old abbot.
Because ninety-nine eighty-one has the meaning of great perfection in Buddhist teachings.
However, this number is also a mystery.
Because the old abbot didn't even know whether the so-called merits accumulated by Wu An could be quantified by the number of times.
Just like we don’t know whether the so-called disaster will come or not.
Anyway, Wu An believed in this metaphysics for the time being.
Although Wu An is a good young man who believes in science, he has to believe in these metaphysical theories until the unsolved mystery of his and Li Yuhua's body swap is solved.
To take a step back, even if "doing good and accumulating virtue" is useless, Wu An and Li Yuhua did charity in their own name.
As a new-age youth who has achieved financial independence, it is only right to give back to society and pursue self-realization.
But when Wu An was about to do charity himself, he was rejected.
Because...it's not that easy to find someone to help.
Requests for help seen online will soon be followed up by enthusiastic netizens and charitable organizations, as if they were scrambling to take credit.
Otherwise, it is the online beggars who are deliberately playing the victim - those people have hands and feet, but do not rely on their own efforts to work and survive - such people are not worthy of "doing good deeds".
——Wu An, who was eager to "do good", almost gave money to some online beggars.
Fortunately, when Wu An was preparing to transfer the money, he conducted a simple investigation of that person's account.
A lot of questions came up at once:
——That guy doesn’t look poor at all, and seems to be living a very comfortable life.
The so-called poverty is simply because he consumes ahead of time but does not incur debt according to his actual ability.
There is no point in supporting such people!
Wu An decisively ignored this person.
Fortunately, Wu An just opened a small account to do charity, and did not become a laughing stock that would be ridiculed by stupid netizens.
Later, Wu An found a few netizens on the Internet who seemed to need help, but after a simple verification, he found that there were always some scammers among them.
Not reliable.
So, even charity is not easy to do!
——My thoughts were indeed too naive.
"So, it's totally unrealistic to find people to do charity for on the Internet, right?" Wu An rubbed his temple and gave up first.
"I think our approach is wrong," Li Yuhua suggested.
Today, Wu An and Li Yuhua exchanged bodies. Li Yuhua, who was Wu An, sat in front of the computer, wearing a pair of blue light blocking glasses, revealing a serious look that would make girls' hearts beat faster.
"Emmm?" Wu An supported his chin, sat on the sofa, picked up the tablet in his hand and browsed it casually.
Today, Wu An, who is Li Yuhua, just finished a meeting at Li Yuhua's company.
Nowadays, the combination of a white slim-fit shirt and a pencil skirt looks very capable.
However, such slim-fitting clothes are not as comfortable as loose dresses.