True Happiness (poem)

Most happy is the one who
Make a chaste life hers,
With unquenched desires
And wanton passion
Conquered through perseverance.

Child-like innocence
Helps in the discovery
Of the life divine
Which resists all temptation
In the name of the Buddha.

Even though she is alone,
The most happy one
Meditates upon the truth
That the Pure Mind be
Achieved through mindful practice.

Be like that small child
Who alone sits quietly,
In meditation,
Remembering the Buddha
Through careful recitation.

With each call, not alone is
She who does recite
The name of the Buddha 'til
He does call through her,
"Namu Amida Butsu."

Sincerely the child
Does recite the Name-that-calls
As the Buddha calls
Through her until her mind is
Pure and her life left divine.

True happiness is this: the love
that compassion calls
respect for your fellow man,
and the devotion
shown towards a Buddhist friend.

Meditation on Solitude: an Evolution from Living Alone to Oneness in Pure Mind (poem)

I live alone
dwelling in mindfulness,
remembering Buddha,
my heart rubbed raw
by great compassion,
untroubled by human suffering,
swimming in the ocean
of humanity, swept away by desire, lust, passion...
(written December 27, 2003)

Alone but devoid
of all loneliness, my love
is made pure again
by romantic notions unknown
to the common masses.
(written January 20, 2004)

it is Pure Spirit
that inspires such love,
laying the groundwork
for the Divine Realm.
Thus is it aiki of Ōmoto.
(written January 24, 2004)

Pure Mind only exists.
All other things exist
because Pure Mind cannot stand
to be the only One,
even this humble author
who now may never
realize such a mind,
due to the vanity
existing between the lines.
For humility deepens
awareness of Pure Mind.
(written February 3, 2004)

Aware of Pure Mind,
abandoning pure lust for the world,
the sage can overcome
what the sentient beings
enjoy while frolicking
in this world of Samsara.
(written January 14, 2014)

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Last posted: March 12, 2004 1232h PDT

Divine Wealth

Divine Wealth: "Fearlessness (Abhayam):Among the Divine qualities, Fearlessness stands foremost. Fear is an effect of ignorance. Identification with the body causes fear. Blind attachment to the body, wife, children, house, property etc. is the cause of fear.The sage who has realised the Self is absolutely fearless.
'He who knows the Bliss of Brahman (God) from which words as well as mind turn powerless, fears nothing.' -Taittiriya Upanishad

Fear can be removed by constant thinking of the immortal and all-blissful nature of the Self. If you lead a life of honesty and truthfulness, if you devoutly observe the precepts of the scriptures without doubting, if you lead a life of right conduct, and if you remember God always, you will become fearless."

It is through worship that the mind is focused on good that results from such devotion.

One becomes open-minded and one's heart is softened until a tiny raw edge of fearlessness appears to devour any fears you have. Fearlessness is ravenous in its pursuit of fear, because fear pollutes the stillness of the mind, and prevents the mind from hearing the voice of God.

Once fear is no more, fearlessness moderates bravery by leading one to be hypervigilant against even one thought of cowardice, which is the fear that wants you to retreat from a challenge because you feel unworthy of meeting it.

In having met your challenges, you uncover divine wealth which is worth more than gold itself. For the diamond mind which arises spontaneously due to meditation shines brilliantly and is the result of facing all challenges in life fearlessly.

Even if you are not a Buddhist or a Hindu, then the wealth uncovered by the diamond mind will never fade away as long as you practice meditation.

Such is divine wealth, lasting longer than all riches and material possession. She who realizes its true value early in life shall live a long life!

---

Originally written February 29, 2004 8:17 PM

Being Stoned, Drunk, High or Psychotic

Being stoned while seeking the Divine is like being caught in religious ecstasy where one is in awe of the realization that

1. we are just a tiny insignificant part of the cosmos,
   

2. all the usual trials in life cannot remove that wondrous moment of awe found in that almost spiritual higher state of mind called "divine madness", and
   

3. merrily laugh away all our trouble before that madness quickly fades and is forever forgotten when a tiny voice suddenly cries, "I'm hungry! Let's go eat!!"

Although our physical hunger is barely satisfied while moved by such madness, the origins of that hunger is spiritual, and motivates the sublimation of the libido, which is the root of all human creation. Only with unconditional love are we able to better appreciate this madness, whether its genesis is due to intoxicants or our physical condition. With respect of love's power to transform such madness into that sense of awe of the divine, we seldom fall prey to fear. Once fear is appeased, it no longer perverts our memory of the very first time we were transformed by the state of unity with the Divine itself, be it God or the Absolute Body of the Cosmic Buddha. Thus is being at one with the Divine, be it through madness or religious ecstasy, a vital part of the human condition. For all of us who are born human are especially privileged to don this form and play out our roles in the human realm. "Rare is it to be born a human being and even rarer to have heard the message of the Buddha."

---

Originally posted: May 26, 2010 at 7:08 PM

Why My Buddhism Turned the Devil into a Dharma Protector (Satire)

This morning I am moved to write about religion, both Buddhist and Christian. If you have an aversion to such things, feel free to stop reading right now because the following prose is beyond your comprehension. Otherwise, please be warned: I am writing from the viewpoint of a Japanese Buddhist. All I can add to this, is in my writing, anything is possible. >:)

So I'm going to start with Jesus, because his story gets a lot of press these days.

Suffice it to say, Jesus did these things: feed the poor, clothe the homeless, cure psychosomatic illness.

Not once in the Bible did I read about him saying, "Persecute homosexuals and other sinners." He never diabolized sin to that extent. Rather, this is dogma of church people who mix up the Old Testament stories about Lot with the New Testament.

In fact, he freed sinners from the diabolizing of people that the Jews did to sinners, which led the early Jewish nation to become a tribe of warriors.

IMO Christianity borrowed heavily from pagans such as Plato and Aristotle, so much so that good and evil became personified as god and satan -- as though they were friend and enemy of Christians.

For Christians, good and evil ae extremes; there is no middle ground.

It's stuff like that makes me glad I was born Buddhist, because Buddhism is the middle ground, and good and evil the result of what each sentient being create.

I don't open myself to spiritual attack from demons by meditating because such a thing is ridiculous to a Buddhist -- we are not devil worshippers; we are worshippers of truth.

Yes, I am suggesting that Christians who use the satanism card to diabolize other faiths as pagan are authors of lies, because their lies began with denying the syncretic roots of Christianity.

In contrast, Buddhism was not founded by the Buddha. Rather, it was renamed by Christian and secular scholars alike in the modern age. For it is the Buddhadharma that was founded by the Buddha over 2500 years ago to address the problems of the nascent Hindu religion called Santanadharma, which was renamed Hinduism by modern Western scholars.

Dharma has many meanings to a Buddhist such as law or teaching. Its meditative techniques work, even without the spiritual teachings of the Dharma. However, meditation works more efficiently with those teachings to guide the meditator.

In contrast, the history of Christianity shows the Church declaring Gnostics to be anathema to their cause, solely because Gnosis is not subject to the control and power of Christians e.g. only elite members of the Church are allowed to "know God" so thoroughly that you become a Bishop or even the Pope.

Gnostics were considered enemies of the State to both Byzantium, the Eastern Roman Empire that followed Greek rituals of Christianity, and the Western Roman Empire that followed Roman ones, but mainly to Byzantium. For the Western Roman Empire's enemies were mainly Gothic, Norman and Vandal mercenaries who practiced a heretical form of Christianity.

Suffice it to say that under these conditions, Gnostic meditative practices were forgotten when Byzantine armies crushed them in the Middle East. It is even said that the libraries of Alexandria in Egypt were put to the torch by a Coptic Pope to ensure that Gnosis was never to be freely available to Gnostics, let alone pagans.

Meanwhile in India, wherever the Buddhadharma spread, local gods were subjugated and added to the Buddhist pantheon of divinities who pledged to protect the Buddha. Thus, when Western civilization entered the Dark Ages, the East became enlightened by the Buddhadharma with the Santanadharma advocates making the Buddha one of its many gods, leading to the famous Hindu-Buddhist university of Nalanda and the spread of Santanadharma into Southeast Asia (Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines).

Perhaps, the proto-Polynesians may have took to the sea so that their gods would not be subject to control by invaders.

In any case, by the time the darkness that befell Western civilization was cast off during the Renaissance, religious ignorance forced Galileo to recant and corruption arose within the Papacy to the point where bestiality, incest and murder became part and parcel of intrigues arising from Christianity's inability to control human desire. IMO this was because Christianity considered the world evil and especially the body as a tool of sin.

Yet, if God made the world, then everything in it is his creation, and thus is good. This even includes the human soul, if both it and God exist. Furthermore, sin is not the same as evil. It is alike to evil karma i.e. the fruit of actions associated with the negative emotions and feelings such as anger, fear, lust, and other confusing feelings.

Even ignorance of god does not make a person evil. Only what he creates by what he does and says may cause the rise of confusion due to negative emotions. This is known as "evil passions" to the Buddhists, and also includes the mental calculations a person makes before she acts on them to make it so in the world.

To a Buddhist, a god being a Dharma protector of the Buddha is the protector of the Buddhadharma. Thus such a divine being is a friend of the Buddha, much as Jesus is a friend of Christians, whose angels protect them from birth. The only difference is, the bodhisattvas, gods and other Dharma protectors all protect the Buddhadharma. A wise Buddhist knows that they do not exist in this reality and that he would thus be foolish to worship any one of them including the Buddha.

If the cosmology of Buddhism actually exists, then it is not in the real world but in the mind of fervent worshippers who may not grasp the symbolism but worship them out of respect for all things divine, especially the Buddhadharma which enshrine the Four Noble Truths.

Such respect is sometimes mistaken by Christians as blind worship akin to paganism, due to their ignorance about Buddhism, which sadly is due to their sole reliance on the Bible. More enlightened Christians have studied Buddhism and have compared it to the Protestant form of Christianity called Methodism minus Jesus.

Indeed, in most Asian countries where Christianity is preached, the word "God" is often replaced with that Asian nation's most often worshipped god, e.g. in Chinese Taoism with the lesser gods being akin to angels and saints. Though, in Japan, Christianity is not as easy to sell because of the Japanese myth that their people are born of the gods.

Thus many of the New Religions in Japan have a corrupted form of God speaking through the founder and even his edicts are made through spirit writing, which predates Pentacostalism's corruption by occultism when they added shamanistic practices to their worship. Of course, most Pentacostals will deny occultism and shamanism in their religious practice, because Christians deny that their religion is of this world.

Yet most of the successful Protestant sects borrow heavily from worldly sources e.g. Billy Graham and other televangelists. Though, Mr. Graham's Christianity is his own, and is thus non-denominational. He actually believes in an immortal soul which is derived from neo-Platonism (a form of paganism developed before the Dark Ages which was revived during the Renaissance. It's not Biblical though, because the New Testament only mentioned "everlasting life", which has nothing to do with immortality, which is more associated with alchemy (an occult art) than with religion.

In Buddhism, the closest one gets to immortality is reincarnation, which has nothing to do with souls reincarnating because Buddhism denies the existence of a soul. Therefore, reincarnation is not about immortality of a soul but it is about karma. For only one's actions are affected by time itself: the karma (actions) I created in the past affect my present condition and my present actions (karma) affect my future (destiny). Indeed, there is no fixed point in time as far as karma goes.

Today, I am a Buddhist, quite possibly due to past karma, both in my lifetime and in the lifetimes of previous incarnations. I might have been a god, a demon, a man or woman, an animal, a hungry ghost or even a hell being. When I die, I am sure to be reborn in the Pure Land. But for now, just sitting is enough for me.

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Being human: the divine connection

"To err is human, to forgive divine" — Alexander Pope


It is possible for a person to be both human, prone to error, and determined to be spiritually pure of mind.

All that's required is to have the childlike nature for spontaneity.

When I make errors of omission that's what I'm speaking about - since it requires me to think ahead. Yet the errors are also forgivable ones that do not harm others, are easily corrected, and help me to learn from my mistakes.

It's one thing to realize your errors; but it's even more remarkable to learn from them.

That's where the pure mind comes in. It is unchanged by our human errors. Only our ability to blind ourselves to the spiritual interconnectedness of life stands in the way of seeing the divine connection between the pure mind and the human condition.

Indeed, the pure mind helps us to forgive ourselves for our trespasses, the errors that the human condition inevitably bring.

The key to reconciling the human condition with the pure mind is to be like a child, forgetting slights, admitting one's errors, and moving on with humility.

Never forget that the pure mind is the repository of love and compassion.

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An Essay on Criticism: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/An_Essay_on_Criticism

With Effort, All Things Are Possible

If you have only effort, you have all Dharmas,
But if you have only laziness you do not know any Dharmas. — Geshe Kelsang Gyatso


With effort, anything is possible. Although one may be limited by physical strength, with mindful practice the mind is capable of anything.

Last night I went out to visit Vancouver. Since my habit is to take pictures with my smartphone camera, most of my night was spent taking pictures of my trip into Vancouver and of the city itself.

First I went down to English Bay. Then I returned to Robson Street and Howe Street, near Chapters Book.

At Chapters, I looked around until I found the Rubaiyat by Omar Khayyam, which I got for a bargain: $2!

This is the fifth edition of the Rubaiyat.

Contrary to popular opinion, the Rubaiyat is not about drinking wine. What wine represents in the verses is the Divine and is akin to the Holy Spirit in Christianity.

Returning to the Buddhist quote regarding effort, "Dharmas" refers to phenomena. For the phenomena that effort brings is inspiration.

After reading the Rubaiyat, I felt inspired to write the poem preceding this article, We are All One.

As well, inspiration helped with the effort to create my newest music video to post on Youtube using pictures I took last night.

With effort, you could have anything,
Be it peace of mind or happiness.
All it takes is faith in the Buddha,
and belief that Buddha Nature is Emptiness.

---

The Rubaiyat: http://classics.mit.edu/Khayyam/rubaiyat.html
Analysis of Rubaiyat: http://www.peejeshare.com/essays/analysis-rubaiyat-omar-khayyam-8825

The Spark Divine (poem)

Though we doubt existence
of God, no one knows how
birds know when to sing.
When a poor fool attributes
all of this to some divine spark,
he's derided for his simple answer
by others still in the dark.

While we know exactly
when the sun may set,
few of us can explain why
some sunsets are rosy
while others are drab and gray.

A generation may pass
before a wisened scientist
steps up to hypothesize that
in all life, there is a spark divine.
In response to his hypothesis,
the whole world might jeer:
"We knew that all along!"

Meditation on The Divine Nature of Everything

Even though everything is of divine origin, 1/2 of humankind are skeptical about it but are willing to keep an open mind about it; but of the other half, 1/4 is fully awakened and deeply spiritual, and 1/4 totally unawakened and materialistic.

Once awakened to this truth that everything is of divine origin, it does no good to share it with the world openly. For the skeptics and the materialists will at first doubt it; and the materialists will be dead-set against this truth.

However, a person who is open to the truth will be able to convince a few of the skeptics with the help of the deeply spiritual who are fully awakened.

It depends on how willing one is to carry on in her spiritual practice quietly without making a fuss about the spiritual truth that everything is of divine origin.

Nor could one state "everything is of divine origin", and then add that about one billion people believe this to be true.

For both the skeptics and the materialists will dispute this statement. They will also claim that most of those people mindlessly believe anything their religious leaders state.

Indeed, the statement "everything is of divine origin" needs to be looked at within context of the religion from whence it came.

Through the theistic lens, a higher power created everything. This higher power is thus given unspeakable divine rights over all of its creation.

When the believer sees everything as of divine origin, one respects all living beings. He also respects his family and community, following both tradition and social norms according to his customs.

However, through the humanist lens, one would be very doubtful that a higher power created everything. Furthermore, a materialistic explanation could be given which denies the divine origin of everything.

IMHO I don't think the theists, the humanists, the skeptics and the materialist are right or wrong about their respective beliefs about the matter.

Belief and faith is not about being right about spiritual matters. Whatever you have faith in, that's based on years of doubt about what you don't have faith in. Whatever you believe, you just believe. In this way, one is living the religious life.

Thus, the statement "everything is of divine origin" is more of a philosophy about life that shapes the social and cultural lens through which people see themselves and the world.

An Unconventional View of Shinjin

"If, when I attain Buddhahood, sentient beings in the lands of the ten quarters who sincerely and joyfully entrust themselves to me, desire to be born in my land, and call my Name, even ten times, should not be born there, may I not attain perfect Enlightenment. Excluded, however, are those who commit the five gravest offences and abuse the right Dharma." - the 18th Vow of bodhisattva Dharmakara

Of the 48 Vows that Amida Buddha fulfilled, the 18th Vow is most precious to Pure Land followers.

In Shin Buddhism it is known as the Primal Vow.

Shinran, the founder of Jodo Shinshu, the Japanese Buddhist school which evolved into the post-modern form of Shin Buddhism, advocated that birth in the Pure Land is settled in the midst of life.

As a Shin Buddhist, my birth in the Pure Land is settled in my lifetime. When I entrust myself to Amida Buddha, birth there is settled at that moment.

In my present life, my spiritual journey consists of Shinjin, which is faith, belief, devotion and godliness. The Shin Buddhist concept of Shinjin in English may be limited by the devotee's understanding of the definitions for the term:

1. Faith
2. Belief
3. Devotion
4. Clear heartmind

By saying the Nembutsu out of sincere gratitude, I place my faith in Amida's Primal Vow. For belief in both Amida Buddha and my rebirth in the Pure Land of Bliss is based on that Vow. Thus am I devoted to the Buddha.

For the essence of the first three definitions for Shinjin is expressed succinctly in the Name-that-calls.

Within the context of the Buddhist concept of no-self, clear heartmind refers to humility. Hence the concept of the Name-that-calls, which consists of saying the Nembutsu out of sincere gratitude with the belief that it is Amida Buddha calling. This is known as Buddha Remembrance.

Since Amida is the Buddha of the Pure Land, clear heartmind refers to the pure mind that promotes calm insight to perceive the spiritual essence of Buddha Nature.

With calm insight, one is able to see Amida Buddha and the Pure Land as spiritual concepts symbolizing the bodhisattva way, and out of devotion, purify the heartmind through mindful practice with the intent to awaken all sentient beings to Sakyamuni Buddha and his Buddhadharma.

For the devout Shin Buddhist, shinjin as clear heartmind implies one takes faith in Amida Buddha's Primal Vow, believes in Amida Buddha and his birth in the Pure Land, and is devoted to saying the Name-that-calls with sincere gratitude. Yet this clear heartmind is not derived from the concept of man as god but from faith in Amida's Primal Vow that the devotee will be born in the Pure Land.

Due to the Buddhist concept of no-self, clear heartmind is derived from the non-practice of Buddha-Remembrance. By saying the Name-that-calls with sincere gratitude, one calls out to Amida Buddha with the belief that Amida calling to them.

In Buddhist psychology, clear heartmind refers to spiritual qualities of the mind associated with a bodhisattva. With respect to shinjin, clear heartmind is associated with faith, devotion and belief.

Indeed, shinjin as clear heartmind consists of belief in Amida, devotion to Amida and faith in Amida's Primal Vow that one's birth in the Pure Land is fulfilled.

True Love is Unconditional Love (poem)

True love transcends all bounds
when both parties make the effort
to move beyond desire
and all that is human.
To merely indulge
in human love is to restrict
oneself to suffering.
In transcending desire,
unconditional love becomes
the source to help
cross over to the divine.

Our True Nature

"We are stardust, we are golden." -- Joni Mitchell

We are more than just human beings. In us is the echo of the gods, and the legacy of the whole universe.

Because we err, we are human. Yet in forgiveness is the divine, the blessings of angels themselves!

Thus our True Nature rises above our material form.

We are indeed stardust, our minds Golden.

For what are we but a dream of high consciousness? And that is the epitome of divine!

Carpe Diem / Seize the Day (poem)

yeah it really wasn't my business at all,
but i felt that something had to be said
because the myth about sanity needed questioning.

we love to believe these lies we tell ourselves,
pretending that "crazy people", "nutbars" and "psychos"
really exist, that we're normal and they're not.

if the label fits, then we slap it on with gusto,
temporarily forgetting the times that we've been there.
so we don't really seize the day, we seize the moment.

though you wish to believe it to be true,
no one is really crazy - that's just society
afraid of the "other", fearful of its own truth.

I seized this day, to make a point,
and learned how wonderful life is --
and how beautiful it is to be imperfect.

how wonderful it is to live life vigorously!
how beautiful the persistence of willfulness!
nothing truly is fragile save our castles in the sand.

to see love as feeling or to be in love,
neither is how love truly is:
action both beautiful and ugly.

for love in action is like crying aloud
while seeking your beloved,
"carpe diem! life is awesome!"

so thanks for the drama, my friends!
thanks to my enemies, both cultivated and formerly...
you made my day! carpe diem! carpe diem!

Roots of abandonment, roots of independence... the spiritual aspect

I'm reminded of a close personal experience with my father when I was 2 years old.

I woke up one morning, and got out of bed. My dad was in the kitchen finishing breakfast. He talked to me a bit. Then he packed his lunch, and left for work.

I cried and cried, hoping he'd return.

Then my mom came into the kitchen, and told me to go back to bed.

Fast forward to my first hospital visit at 5, the trauma of seeing my parents leave in their car made me cry... Later, an older kid in the hospital reassured me.

This was how the roots of my independence began.

Now that I am an adult, and able to use hindsight, I can see that my abandonment issues might arise during periods of stress.

From experience I have discovered that the few times when I feel abandoned, I may have forgotten about respect for the divine in all things.

During those times, I would doubt that God exists. I might even become antagonistic towards the Christian church.

Even when a person doubts God exists, and thinks that He has abandoned us, God never abandons us.

More accurately, when doubt of a higher power exists, the spiritual significance of life still exists. We might explain it away — even be frightened of it — and mock people who use religion as a crutch. Still, the divine is always there, acting in our lives.

Even a faith in a harmless delusion is better than no faith at all, especially when it inspires the faithful to act on that faith to do the least harm to others.

In my case my faith in Buddhism helps me to appreciate panentheism, the belief that the universe is alive, both metaphorically speaking (e.g. the life cycles of stars) and literally (the Earth as a living organism), and that the universe is divine.

When I feel the urge, I might practice a few qigong exercises or just dance, and let the divine work through me.