Have Courage

06 Oct 2012 Leave a comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , , , , ,

Have CourageWe all have choices to make in life. Everything from whether to take tea or coffee to the major life-changing decisions regarding money, relationships, children and careers. Whatever the choice you have to make, make it with wisdom, courage and compassion.

If you summon your courage to challenge something, you will never regret it. It would be so sad to spend your life wishing, “If only I had a little more courage.”

Whatever the outcome, the important thing is to take a step forward on the path that you believe is right.

Do not worry too much about what others may think. It is your life. Be true to yourself.

It Takes All Sorts

03 Oct 2012 1 Comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , , , ,

It Takes All SortsYou know the saying about taking the rough with the smooth? Well life generally consists of a mixture of good times and bad times, happiness and sadness, health as well as sickness. In general, it is the ratio of these opposites that makes us feel that life is going well, or going badly.

Buddhism teaches us that human life is endowed simultaneously with both good and evil. The human mind is interpreted as partaking of ten different conditions, or states, the Ten Worlds, including, at one end of the scale, hell, which is filled with suffering; hunger, dominated by greed; and animality, characterized by fear of the strong and contempt for the weak.

At the other end are the worlds of Bodhisattva and Buddhahood – states of mind in which people strive to help others by eliminating suffering and imparting happiness. Buddhism further teaches us that it is the nature of life for good and evil to be essentially inseparable.

As we have seen previously, all ten worlds contain, and are contained within the other worlds. This explains how we can be flying high one second and down in the dumps the next, generally at the whim of some external cause.

By realising that the worlds are so interconnected, we can learn to exercise more control over our changing life-states, or mood swings as they are commonly known. The result of greater self-awareness, brought about by the self-improvement that our practice brings, is that we can maintain a more stable, happier state of mind, and isn’t that the whole point?

Trying Not To Listen

26 Sep 2012 Leave a comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , , ,

My Dark PassengerThe Dark Passenger is being rather vocal at the moment. My decision to deal with the current situation by letting things lie is giving him plenty of scope to come up with all manner of unhelpful thoughts.

I’m giving him as good as I’m getting, but the chap is just so very inventive. Last night he had the brilliant idea of putting a song in my head, and now I just can’t stop humming, whistling or singing it.

What is more annoying, is that it’s probably one of my favourite songs, and very, very well known.

Remember this? …

Hello darkness, my old friend
I’ve come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
‘Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence

“Fools”, said I, “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed
In the wells of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said, “The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls”
And whispered in the sounds of silence

If things don’t improve, I may have to arrange an appointment to see Cecilia, though on second thoughts, remembering her lyrics, I can’t see it helping much. Back to the chanting me thinks.

An Outpouring

21 Aug 2012 Leave a comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , , ,

Mental IllnessI’m busy writing a story. It’s about a boy, Tom, and the strange events that unfurl when he and his mate Eden encounter a spirit entity that resides at the bottom of a long disused well, in the grounds of a derelict asylum.

It’s all fiction, all that is apart from the asylum itself, High Royds in West Yorkshire, which allegedly still echoes to the sounds of the long departed patients. Victorian mental hospitals were, and still are, very daunting places. They were built in an age where there was little, if any, understanding of the illnesses the poor souls who were incarcerated within their walls.

Today, there is still much we can learn about mental illness, although treatments are now far more humane than they were in our fore-fathers day. But there is still a stigma attached to diseases of the mind and many people are still locked away to protect them, and us, from the damaging effects the diseases can cause.

The story is the outpouring of my thoughts about possible supernatural events that are the result of the history of the hospital, but writing down these thoughts has made me aware of my own feelings towards these poor people.

Mental illness is a terrible thing, for those affected and those around them. With the cases of depression and stress related illness rising as a result of economic pressures, we must be even more aware of our own feelings. We must show compassion towards the victims, they do not chose to be affected and fully deserve our sympathy and help. Who knows, one day it may be us who need that compassion.

Ichinen – Making It Happen

03 Feb 2012 Leave a comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , , , ,

DeterminationThe Japanese word Ichinen means, among other things, determination. Here is the definition from the SGI dictionary of Buddhism …

ichinen

[一念] (Jpn; Chin i-nien )


A single moment of life, one instant of thought, or the mind or life at a single moment. Also, life-moment, thought-moment, or simply a single moment or instant. Ichinen has various meanings in Buddhism: (1) A moment, or an extremely short period comparable to the Sanskrit term kshana. The Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom defines one kshana or moment as a sixtieth of the time it takes to snap one’s fingers. (2) The functioning of the mind for one moment. The “Distinctions in Benefits” (seventeenth) chapter of the Lotus Sutra speaks of a single moment of belief and understanding. (3) To focus one’s mind on meditating on a Buddha; Shan-tao (613-681), a patriarch of the Chinese Pure Land school, defined ichinen (one instant of thought) as chanting Amida Buddha’s name once. (4) T’ient’ai (538-597) philosophically interprets ichinen in his doctrine of three thousand realms in a single moment of life ( Jpn ichinen–sanze Chin i-nien san-ch’ien ). In this doctrine, ichinen indicates the mind of an ordinary person, which at each moment is endowed with the potential of three thousand realms; its characteristics are: (a) it pervades the entire universe; (b) it includes both body and mind; (c) it includes both self and environment; (d) it gives rise to good and evil; and (e) it encom-passes cause and effect simultaneously. Nichiren (1222-1282) embodied this philosophical framework in the form of a mandala known as the Gohonzon. By this he aimed to establish a practical way for ordinary people to manifest Buddhahood from among the Ten Worlds of their own lives. SGI Dictionary Online

Being good or being a success at something isn’t just about talent, it’s about having the desire, the determination, deep in your heart, to settle for nothing less than victory.

If you have a strong ichinen, you are far more likely to reach your goal. You still have to put in the effort and in fact, the more talent you have, the more effort is needed, because your end result might be far more exacting than a less talented person.

If you think you will fail, you will. You must embrace your goals, your targets, with every fibre of your being. Strive with all your might, night and day towards that goal and you are far more likely to succeed. Remember, you only fail when you decide to stop trying.

Success takes focus, desire, effort, hard work, determination and perseverance.

Ichinen covers them all, and chanting for what you want to achieve, makes your ichinen stronger and stronger.

Fate, God, Or Self Determination?

21 Jan 2012 Leave a comment

by Anupadin in Buddhism Tags: , ,

Two Headed CoinOnce upon a time, there was a general who was leading his army into battle against an enemy ten times the size of his own.

Along the way to the battle field, the troops stopped by a small temple to pray for victory.

The general held up a coin and told his troops, “I am going to implore the gods to help us crush our enemy. If this coin lands with the heads on top, we’ll win. If it’s tails, we’ll lose. Our fate is in the hands of the gods. Let’s pray wholeheartedly.”

After a short prayer, the general tossed the coin high into the air. It landed with the heads on top. The troops were overjoyed and went into the battle in high spirits.

Just as the coin predicted, the smaller army won the battle.

The soldiers were exalted, “It’s good to have the gods on our side! No one can change what they have determined.”

“Really?” asked the general, and showed them the coin … there was a head on both sides.

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