So here we are again, the weekend is upon us and there is a spring in the step of people as they leave the office for a couple of days of well earned relaxation. Some are talking of shopping expeditions, others have Christmas trees to decorate, so much excitement.
Sadly, many people, myself included, are still trying to fight off this nasty little cough and cold combination that has been doing the rounds. Not for me, the crowds of shoppers, the festooned arcades of consumerist delights.
With luck, I should be able to spend a good fifty percent of the next couple of days in bed. Plans to visit the Girls in Bristol have again been scuppered, I have no wish to spread this dreaded lurgy amongst my daughters or their families.
If it’s really cold, as they are promising it may be, I might even stay in bed to chant. I’m not sure what Nichiren would have made of horizontal daimoku, but I can’t imagine him being too worried, he was never too concerned with rules.
Sometimes we become involved in other people’s problems, whether we want to be, or not. At times like this, Wisdom, Courage and Compassion are needed, but in a slightly different way than when we have problems of our own.
If you allow the passing of time to let you forget the lofty vows of your youth, you stand to block the source of your own boundless good fortune and sever the roots of limitless prosperity for your family and loved ones as well.
It’s no great secret, but today was my birthday. 21 again, for the umpteenth time, making me officially 58, although I certainly don’t feel it, whatever that might mean. Time sneaks by, almost unnoticed and suddenly another year has passed.
I can’t remember the first time I watched the Service of Remembrance on TV, but it must be the best part of fifty years ago now. It has always been a family event, with my Mom and Dad and my brothers. And although, sadly, my Dad is no longer with us, and the family is spread across the globe, watching it again tonight brought back poignant memories, as always.
In one of his writings, renowned microbiologist René Dubos, stated. “History teaches that man without effort is sure to deteriorate; man cannot progress without effort, and man cannot be happy without effort.” This is indisputable.
Sometimes situations seem so painful, and we have so little control, that there is a real chance of losing hope. In the past, before I found Nichiren Buddhism, I might have struggled to cope with the pain and anguish that Charlotte has been suffering this past week.
Charlotte is not having a good time with this surgery at all. She is in a lot of pain, has tubes coming out of her, so can’t even get into a comfortable position, and is on a ward with other women who are also suffering post operative discomfort in various forms.
With my thoughts being dominated by Charlotte, and her slow and painful recovery from the latest surgery, whilst remembering that she is but one of my three children, I was reminded of this explanation, by Daisaku Ikeda, of a relevant parable from the Lotus Sutra.
Spending the majority of the day waiting for news regarding Charlotte’s latest, and hopefully last operation, on her path to defeating cancer, puts life’s priorities into proper order. The reconstruction procedure sounds almost barbaric, and worse even than the operation to remove the cancerous tissues in the first place.
The Search For Enlightenment 
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