Sometimes going in circles can be a really good thing.
Frequently people make assessments about the success of a particular activity by how quickly they can move on to another set of activities. Just as on shopping day you set out to first go to store “A” then to store “B” and so on until you compete all of your shopping and then are able to return home. In other words, they measure the effectiveness of their actions linearly, am I progressing along a trajectory that somehow is serving as a model for determining success. Yet not all things can or should be measured in such a way.
Imagine if you will someone approaches you and wants to determine the effectiveness of your actions. They begin to examine the things you do on a day to day basis trying to determine what is effective. Finally after they have completed their analysis they approach you and ask; “Is there something about praying that you do, I notice you do it over and over, is something about it that isn’t working that causes you to have to continually do it over and over?”
Prayer is not like this, it isn’t necessarily something that over a period of time needs to produce a result so that we no longer need to do it.
Going in circles, or repeating something over and over is not the same thing as going nowhere. Instead, prayer in this instance is about ever deepening our relationship with our faith. Yes, it is true that while we may have specific prayers for things we wish to change or overcome, on a more fundamental level prayer is about enabling us to delve ever deeper into our relationship with the Eternal Buddha and the teachings of the Lotus Sutra. The repetition of prayer on a daily basis or on a several times a day basis allows us the space to get in touch or the opportunity to become ever deeper in touch with the ultimate truth contained within the Sutra.
When we pray in Nichiren Shu we chant out loud passages from the Sutra, the actual teachings of the Buddha, we also recite the sacred title of the Lotus Sutra, Odaimoku. We spend a portion of our prayer time repeating over and over the sacred title, chanting Odaimoku. Our attitude during this activity is one of great joy, one of praise, for when we pray we are fundamentally praising the great teaching and the benefit to be obtained by embracing the Lotus Sutra with our lives.
These are not hollow words that we repeat mindlessly.
Words, sounds have great power. Sound like smell has the ability to transport us to places. Think about when you hear a favorite song from your past, how upon hearing it you are taken back to another time and place in your life. One example for me is whenever I hear the Beatles song “Hey Jude” I am instantly taken back to my early days in college back in 1968 when I was a waiter in a little hamburger and soda shop in the small college town of Hammond Louisiana. I recall wearing a favorite sweater which I really liked wearing even though it had milkshake splatter all over the front of it. I even recall the juke box off to the side blaring out the words and music to ‘Hey Jude”. Great memories! Smell can do the same thing. We may smell something baking and are instantly transported back in time to perhaps a family meal, or coming home to find our mother baking some food that causes us fond memories. Or even sadly the smell of firecracker gunpowder and the sounds of the explosions may bring back terrible memories of war for some.
All of these things can be triggered just by a simple sound or smell. How powerful those two senses are!
How powerful are words of hate or love! Long after they have been released their effect can linger a lifetime, even when we may wish we could take them back, we can not.
And so it is when we vocalize our prayers. When we recite out loud portions of the Lotus Sutra or chant the Odaimoku we are in effect creating a powerful force, that coupled with our focused mind concentrating on those sounds puts into play an intense energy a force with the potential for great effect. The vocalization of these prayers causes a transcendence of the moment, one that is not accomplished on the same level as merely thinking about it.
When we recite out loud and with great joy the sutra or the Odaimoku we are connecting our bones to our soles. We are connecting our mind with our body and in a unifying moment concentrating our lives both material and spiritual into the great act of praising the teachings of the Buddha, something that is not accomplished to the same degree as if we merely thought about it. We are also connecting our lives to the life of the Buddha to the life of the universe in both a material and spiritual way.
Hopefully the next time as you sit down to do your recitation of the sutra or to chant Odaimoku you will, with great joy, harmonize your mind and your body, your thoughts and your voice, your life and the universe to enable you to manifest your inherent Buddhahood.
