Giáng Kiết Tường translates to English  Read in Vietnamese

From unknown specific times, the Far-eastern Asian people, especially the Vietnamese ethnicity, have regarded Tet Nguyen Dan (marking the Lunar New Year and the Arrival of Spring) as one of the most important festivities of the year. Every turn of the year, when swallows appear in the sky notifying us that spring is about to come, or when the forest plum and apricot trees blossom out with bright yellow buds, everyone starts to feel an astonishingly joyous anticipation…

Everyone is about to welcome the new year; families gather; flowers of all colors show their vibrant blooms in street corners; all activities reflect the joy, the happiness, the bustling vivacity, and the effervescent springtime fever. During Tet, everybody tends to put away their worries, indifference, and difficulties of the old year, and embrace the new year with more gracious gentleness and untroubled mind spirit. People visit one another and greet each other with lovely wishes and broad cheerful and friendly smiles, making the temperate spring days even much more pleasant. During the three days of Tet, and especially on the ‘mong mot’ (the First day) everybody watches out carefully for their own actions, for what they say and do, and avoid bad habits, ugly thoughts. For it would bring bad luck all year – whatever one does and says on New Year – people strongly believe – reflects on the bad and the good things that come to them all the year through.

Common folks regard the first day of Tet as the most important day of the year. Likewise, Vietnamese Buddhists revere the first day of New year as the significant celebration of the birth of Maitreya – the Future Buddha; so Tet is the festivities for a New Year, and Tet is also Maitreya Springtime day of commemoration.

In all the statues and pictures in the history of Buddhism, Maitreya is represented and depicted by a simplistic jolly man with a large protruding stomach and a contagious smiley face. There is a singing verse described this cheerful Buddha:

“Large round stomach ready to store away the hardship of people, large smiley face for making light of all burdened tasks that are hard to smile about.”

So the Maitreya smile is a perpetually happy smile – an everlasting smile; and his spirit is immensely generous with no boundaries – a limitless generosity. No one can look at his picture without sensing a calming peaceful effect radiated about.

It wasn’t by random that all the statues and pictures of Maitreya were sculptured and depicted in that manner, but it was the very meaningful genuine aspiration of Buddhism to bring about a constant smile to this ever-suffering world.

It is never hard to smile, it’s not strenuous, nor costs any money. Yet, sometimes it would not be easy to crack a smile – a momentous smile that carries significant effect. Reality shows that there are people who could not find a single reason to smile once all day long, even just a crooked and faked smile. Alas! Poor folks! Sometimes the circumstance in life causes them to be so defeated and desperate, so agonizing and troubled that they loose their ability to smile. They claim: how to smile when there are numerous nuisances and constant worries in life, how to smile when their heart and soul are burdened with sufferings. In another word, one can only smile easily when one has no troublesome worries. It sure is hard to smile in situations of sorrow, sadness, dissatisfaction and loneliness. Because of all of this that often turns life into an unbearable, stressful, and hopeless situation where the smiles are full of tear drops and hurtful crying.

Because life in general is dealt with plenty of misery and misfortune, we really need all the smiles we can gather. Smiles are paths to the heart,; they lead people closer to each other; they extend warm welcome to the lost, lonely, and despair souls; they facilitate understanding among humankind. Lastly, smiles can lessen stress; smiles can alleviate some of your burdens and miseries; smiles can bring tiny bit of joy when you’re in the deepest despair.

Life is a relationship between individual human beings, and between human and other animals and nature. The manner of living of one individual more or less would surely affect those living together with and closed by him/her, as well as the environment and other creatures surrounding him/her. Who could be happy when next to him/her, there is a gloomy and miserable person? Who could enjoy life when someone else constantly yells, gets grouchy, and is always in a bad temper? Even his/her surrounding environment would be down in the dumps as well. On the opposite side, if people learn to always smile, and share with each other those bountiful smiles, life would be a whole lot less stressful and more lackadaisical!

A smile is the warm sunshine of spring; it is the bouquet of flowers embellishing life, giving it a romantic and beautiful aspect, and more meaningful to live. Why not smile and laugh often? Of course there are times when adversities come your way, preventing a complete and perfect smile even when you want to badly… But even then, if you find yourself at the urge to laugh despite all, well… then… just have a hearty reverberating laugh!

How to always have a smile on your face? This can be achieved only when we seriously know to let go of all our troubles, destitute, and long sufferings from our heart; when we learn to appreciate and smile at success and happiness of others; and when we can express a smile and a laugh even at times when it is difficult to do so. The Maitreya Buddha has such an effortless smile; He represents an untroubled mind, an immeasurable generosity for the humankind. Every Spring, when New Year arrives, we celebrate Maitreya’s high spirits and blissful representation of Him in order to frequently remind us that:

“When we still meet let just laugh with each other; life is like a gentle rolling stream; accomplishment, fame, wealth are just like clouds shadowing on the water; only love remains afterwards.”

A human lifetime is mighty short, please live it fully and to its truest meaning. For to live a life to its full extent, you’ve got to learn how to laugh for yourself and share it with others. For a smile is the crucial substance for love; for it is the eternal springtime of the entire humankind.

Giang Kiet Tuong (The Buddhist Translation Group)