The Beauty and Benefits of Tzu Chi Uniforms

A previous version of this post was published in Tzu Chi USA Journal.

From a stranger’s perspective, the volunteer uniform of Tzu Chi must seem like an anachronistic, culturally awkward anomaly. When you first hear of them, you may think, "You’ve got to be joking me. Uniforms? In America? I just want to let you know that this is not Taiwan! This is not Communist China, comrade! What about our individuality? Our ability to express ourselves? Uniforms are for people working at McDonald’s or the military. Not that there's anything wrong with those places..."

So the complaints begin, and then people see the uniform. At that point they start to sputter, "What kind of uniform is this? White pants, white collars, buttoned up all the way, with belts and white shoes? Women tie their hair back, boys cut their hair down. This is like the military. I’m not here to join the military. Plus the color white is impractical! It’ll get dirty in two seconds!"

As the complaints come, you can feel the anxiety, the sense of the loss of control. Young people seeking to be fashionable, be warned. You may need to compromise your insistence on doing your own thing. Joining an organization does require—oh my goodness—at times doing things in unison with others.

But like everything in Tzu Chi, there are reasons, and although you may have concerns initially, with careful examination and reflection, your worries should subside. Indeed, there are rational reasons for (most of) "the way things are done" in Tzu Chi. The Buddha always told his followers to question everything, to never just accept anything just because he was the Buddha, a sage, or someone wise. This applies to uniforms and other "rules" as well. If it makes sense, accept it, and if it does not, just forget about it (fugeddabout it).

Uniforms eliminate, for one, a number of physical barriers that fashionable clothing creates. Fashion creates a feeling of haves and have-nots. I have the money to buy pretty clothes and jewelry, and you do not. But when choices of individual clothing are eliminated, so too are the tensions that come between social classes: no more status, no more who is wealthier than who.

More importantly, as volunteers, we need to be professional. Yes, it is true that if you volunteer at a hospital, the Red Cross, or work with Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts, or even work at the department store or McDonald’s, you will observe that uniforms create a sense of professionalism and unity. This requires that we not only dress alike so that people can recognize us, but also that the way we dress is neat and clean, not disheveled and messy.

Third, uniforms build community recognition, like a name-brand. As volunteers we represent the organization. By wearing the uniform, we are building up a presence so that strangers can recognize us. In some countries where Tzu Chi volunteers are long-recognized for their reliability and efficiency, Tzu Chi volunteers are called "the blue angels," donning the blue and white uniform. In those places, uniforms are lucrative. Everybody wants to wear the uniform and they are sometimes imitated, worn by pretenders seeking to collect money for their own purposes.

There is a fourth reason which I only recently understood and which is the most esoteric but possibly the most important: The uniform changes our mindset. No, I am not talking about “magic” or anything like that. I am talking pure psychology. There have been recent research that shows that students perform better and are perceived to be performing better, when they are dressed formally rather than casually. What does this mean? It means that our clothes – this superficial piece of thing covering our body – changes our mindsets. The psychologists called it "enclothed cognition."

It is in this changed mindset that Tzu Chi volunteers not only wear the uniform, but the Tzu Chi face, the smile, the genuine warmth and care. By wearing the uniform, you need to remember the entire uniform, not just merely the clothes—the warm smiling face, the hair nearly combed, shirt tucked in, shoes clean, and so on. This is why the uniform is called “the garment of gentleness and tolerance” (柔和忍辱衣).

Thus, most images of buddhas and bodhisattvas are dressed most elegantly – sometimes simply and sometimes extravagantly. The clothes that we wear and the appearance that we present give off a feeling to ourselves and to others. This feeling can change our minds. When wearing a very expensive piece of jewelry or beautiful fine clothes, we are more mindful and careful. In the same way, when we wear nice clothing, our minds too are also sharpened to be more careful.

Yet the purpose of wearing Tzu Chi uniform’s and other "spiritual garments" are entirely different from that of secular clothes. Whereas in most situations people “dress to impress” others and to make themselves feel attractive through their clothes, in Tzu Chi the reasons for wearing the uniform are quite different. The clothes should make us feel more humble, more dignified, with the purpose of benefiting others, not to aggrandize oneself. 

Once, when I was chanting a prayer and as I was making mental and physical offerings of incense, flowers, fine garments, beautiful houses, everything in the universe, at that point I realized that even the clothes that we wear are an offering to others—we offer others our bodies and with it our garments to others.

When we have given others our bodies, what use to us is our own clothes? As a friend and fellow volunteer Isaac once recounted to me in person when he visited Afghanistan in 2002 on a relief trip with Tzu Chi, he could not help but give away nearly everything he had on him—gloves, scarf, etc.

So, too, has Shantideva, the eighth century Indian scholar of Nalanda University, taught in his truly wonderful Bodhicaryavatara, one of my most favorite books, particularly in the third chapter on adopting the spirit of awakening:

Surrendering everything is nirvana, 

and my mind seeks nirvana. 

If I must surrender everything, 

it is better that I give it to sentient beings.

It is with this attitude, too, that I have also become more comfortable in wearing anything, not only Tzu Chi uniforms, but "fancy clothes." I wear not the attitude of "look how nice I look," but rather "I wear this for the benefit of others."

But if you wear the uniform – or any piece of clothing or qipao (a beautiful traditional Chinese-style garment) – and you feel a morsel of pride or arrogance on your physical beauty (or alternatively you gripe about your perceived ugliness), then, alas, you've totally missed the point. The clothes are not about "you" or however you perceive "you." It is quite the contrary. 

When Master Cheng Yen established Tzu Chi Foundation in 1966, she immediately knew that volunteers ought to have a uniform for the above four (if not more) reasons — equality among volunteers, professionalism, community recognition, its capacity to transform our minds. Up to this point, most will agree, but many may still protest against the white pants and white shoes. Is this really necessary, some ask, to have white clothing? Don’t you think it will get dirty quickly?

Actually, when Master Cheng Yen was creating the uniform, she knew to draw on symbols, as does much of Buddhist and Chinese culture (which are, by the way, separate and distinct). The blue top represents the sky, the white pants represent the clouds. (Actually, I’m not sure what the white collar represents.) In sum the actual uniform represents the vast expanse of the sky, which should be our attitude towards all sentient beings, enveloping and embracing everyone.

Several decades ago, when Master Cheng Yen went to visit the poor with other volunteers, as they left the wet area, everyone’s shoes were covered in mud—except for Master Cheng Yen’s, which were without even a speck of dirt. People were amazed. How did she do that?

I was mindful, she said, no doubt very matter-of-factly. (Just do it!)

Thus the uniform not only reminds us to be professional and efficient in the organizational sense, but reminds us to uphold the practices of Tzu Chi—mindfulness, attention, and care (a critical "skilful means" in Buddhist language). In many ways the uniform is like a protecting shield, armor against our wild inattention. When we wear the uniform, we should be acutely aware that we represent tens of thousands of Tzu Chi volunteers around the world. Master Cheng Yen. Gratitude. Great love. Mindfulness. Sentient beings.

So, you see, there’s much more to the uniform than you’d first think. The uniform is not just about ME, MYSELF, and I. Step back a moment, realize that individuality is just a Western concept of your identity. Take a breath and remember why you joined Tzu Chi. You joined because you wanted to help people. In fact, you were inspired that so many people had the heart to help people. People. That’s right. People not just yourself. And by people, we in Tzu Chi mean, all sentient beings. Yes, including that mosquito buzzing in your ear that just bit you.

In the world of Tzu Chi, if you listen and observe so carefully to that point that you can listen with your eyes and watch with your ears, you discover a whole new world of much greater meaning that you had ever imagined. I invite all Tzu Chi volunteers, old and new, to just open your eyes and ears, to absorb and reflect more mindfully this world and Tzu Chi’s place in it. I know we’ll discover more than we never knew before.