Wisdom from Shaolin: Talking is silver, being quite is gold

Credit to: Shaolin Temple Europe

Life wisdom from Shaolin. Watch an excerpt from my talk with Shi Heng Yi and Shi Heng Zong from the Shaolin Temple Europe located in Otterberg (Kaiserslautern) / Germany.

In our world where the talkers are praised how important is the ability to listen?
Talking is silver, being quite is gold.

Many of us are hiding behind our social masks. We are afraid to reveal our insecurities and shortcomings. How important is to open up to connect to others?
Our ability to connect to others  is one of the highest things you can develop yourself in. Why? Because in our tradition we talk about letting go of the ego.  What means letting go of the ego? it means that if you are thirsty and I am thirsty and we only have one cup of drink then if I have a very, very high ego then I would say "This is my cup". And you can suffer. But this is not the way to go. The way is even to say not only that "Let's share this cup", but even to be in a way selfless and say "Go ahead and drink it". This means I somehow can feel that you need something, that you are maybe suffering from something, even if you are not me but I feel the connection. And we think that this type of connection is something very, very high that you can have not only to people which are around you, that you know, but especially for the people that you just sometimes meet for the first time in life, that you have this openness and feel connected to them.

Read and watch more Shaolin wisdom on how to embrace change here, how to find balance here, how self-observation can prevent you from making mistakes here and how to become the master of your emotions here