When you first come across Buddhism, it is common to wonder how it can make a difference to life. How can you find solutions to problems in daily life through the practice of Buddhism? The answer lies firstly in engaging with the fundamental truth or the Law of life and secondly in realising that this Law is affecting your inner life and your outer life.
Until now we have probably had a very western 'dualistic view' of how life works, thinking that one's mind is in some way separate from one's body, and one body is separate from its surroundings.
Eastern philosophy, and Buddhism in particular, teaches the absolute opposite of this: Buddhism sees our mind and body, and our body and our environment as aspects of the whole, which are deeply related, originating from the same source of life, and are mutually dependent.
Quite simply this means that change in one immediately effects a change in the other. Therefore, if you can bring about a change in your mind, it will affect your physical body, likewise a changed person will effect a change in their environment. This means seeing changes in your family, in your workplace and in your society.
Nichiren Daishonin decribes it in this way:"... if the minds of living beings are impure, their land is also impure, but if their minds are pure, so is their land. These are not two lands, pure or impure themselves. The difference lies solely in the good or evil of our minds."
Chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo immediately makes improvements in your inner life. That means you find you can start to be able to view life more positively, and hopefully, you can view things from different perspectives, you have new thoughts and courage about your life.
What you are doing through chanting is 'changing your mind' ~ this means changing your thoughts, which results in a change to your actions ~ thoughts of what you do and what you say. This is called changing karma ~ changing thoughts, words and deeds.
As this change takes place, the effect can be clearly felt by you and seen by others as you start to behave differently and go about your life in a different way, often with renewed vigour, hope and courage. Your changing life shows itself in your day-to-day living, affecting everything you do. Because we are not separate from, but deeply connected to everything, the powerful transformation that takes place inside ourselves spreads outwards and brings about change in our environment. This is how the practice actually works.
As SGI President Daisaku Ikeda said: Nichiren Buddhism enables us to transform the place where we are now into a 'land of Eternally Tranquil Light' and there construct a palace of happiness. To that end, you have to change the karma that makes you suffer... There is no other way than to dramatically transform your own life-condition. When you change your state of life, your environment will naturally changing as well. This is the principle of the oneness of life and its environment. A grand palace of happiness exists within your own heart. Faith is the key that opens the door to that palace.
Until now we have probably had a very western 'dualistic view' of how life works, thinking that one's mind is in some way separate from one's body, and one body is separate from its surroundings.
Eastern philosophy, and Buddhism in particular, teaches the absolute opposite of this: Buddhism sees our mind and body, and our body and our environment as aspects of the whole, which are deeply related, originating from the same source of life, and are mutually dependent.
Quite simply this means that change in one immediately effects a change in the other. Therefore, if you can bring about a change in your mind, it will affect your physical body, likewise a changed person will effect a change in their environment. This means seeing changes in your family, in your workplace and in your society.
Nichiren Daishonin decribes it in this way:"... if the minds of living beings are impure, their land is also impure, but if their minds are pure, so is their land. These are not two lands, pure or impure themselves. The difference lies solely in the good or evil of our minds."
Chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo immediately makes improvements in your inner life. That means you find you can start to be able to view life more positively, and hopefully, you can view things from different perspectives, you have new thoughts and courage about your life.
What you are doing through chanting is 'changing your mind' ~ this means changing your thoughts, which results in a change to your actions ~ thoughts of what you do and what you say. This is called changing karma ~ changing thoughts, words and deeds.
As this change takes place, the effect can be clearly felt by you and seen by others as you start to behave differently and go about your life in a different way, often with renewed vigour, hope and courage. Your changing life shows itself in your day-to-day living, affecting everything you do. Because we are not separate from, but deeply connected to everything, the powerful transformation that takes place inside ourselves spreads outwards and brings about change in our environment. This is how the practice actually works.
As SGI President Daisaku Ikeda said: Nichiren Buddhism enables us to transform the place where we are now into a 'land of Eternally Tranquil Light' and there construct a palace of happiness. To that end, you have to change the karma that makes you suffer... There is no other way than to dramatically transform your own life-condition. When you change your state of life, your environment will naturally changing as well. This is the principle of the oneness of life and its environment. A grand palace of happiness exists within your own heart. Faith is the key that opens the door to that palace.
