Why My Life Changed After Visiting Tibet
If there is a sacred land in the world, it must be Tibet. The place closest to the sky, when you come here, you will not only be shocked by the natural scenery—here you'll find the world's highest mountain range, Mount Everest , as well as the world's highest peak.
Beyond the unforgettable scenery, what touched me even more was the purity of this land and the piety of the people who live on it.
Everyone who goes to Tibet is amazed by the Tibetan people's reverence for the divine.
At the Jokhang Temple, the Ramoche Temple, Namtso Lake, along the 318 National Highway, on the Qinghai-Tibet Highway, and generally along the rivers, people wearing hand protectors and knee pads can be seen prostrating themselves every three steps along the road, braving all kinds of hardships to make their pilgrimage to Lhasa. This behavior, in the eyes of tourists like us who have seen many fake beggars, is even questioned as being a performance!
"Are they slacking off? How do they make a living? How long will it take them to get there? Reaching Lhasa is a very long journey, why prostrate themselves like this? Who came up with this idea?"... People who don't understand faith find this behavior very perplexing.
To express their piety to the divine, more than 200 villagers, men, women, and children, set out from their hometown, climbing mountains, crossing rivers, enduring the elements, and performing full-body prostrations all the way to the holy city of Lhasa and the Jokhang Temple to participate in the Saga Dawa festival. A villager named Jicun said that the entire journey would take about three months... Is this what you understand as a performance?
Do you really know what prostrating oneself (kora) is?
A reporter asked a 20-year-old Tibetan girl, "What are you praying for by prostrating yourself here? What is it you seek in your heart?"
The girl replied, "For all sentient beings to be free from suffering and find happiness." The reporter asked again, "Not for yourself?"
The girl replied, "Not for me."
Devout Tibetans can perform up to 100,000 prostrations. If they do it non-stop, 1,000 times a day, it would still take nearly half a year.
Many Tibetans who live outside Lhasa, because of vows made before Buddha, give up all their possessions and prostrate themselves every three steps from their hometown all the way to Lhasa (Jokhang Temple), sometimes taking several years or even ten years. Some of them die during this arduous journey, in the harsh plateau climate, on the long road, while crossing the no-man's-land of Kekexili and climbing the high-altitude Tanggula Mountains...
Many pilgrims do not leave Lhasa after arriving. They either do business or work for others, and over time, they have gradually formed today's Lhasa. Perhaps you will never go to Tibet or Tibetan areas, but you need to know that there is such a group of people who prostrate themselves on their pilgrimage.
"Prostrating oneself" is one of the sincerest ways for Tibetan Buddhist believers to worship Buddha. It is full-body prostration, with the body falling to the ground. When prostrating, the hands are clasped together and extended straight forward. This signifies understanding the Buddha's will and teachings. After each prostration, a mark is made on the ground with the hand. After getting up, they walk forward to the mark and prostrate themselves again, repeating this cycle. Believers believe that in their lifetime of practice, they must prostrate themselves at least 100,000 times, and they must prostrate barefoot to be considered truly devout.
I may not be like them, but their faith deeply touched me and made me realize that there is still such a pure form of devotion in this world.