Chapter I: Part 3 – The Event

For now I am calling this section The Event, I may come up with a better title later on. To write this section presented me with not only the challenge of the name but I’ve also had to tackle the problem of what to suggest to you for your exploration. I knew what questions I was answering for myself, I simply was not sure, or confident about, what they might be for others. In this case, my strategy for moving forward relied on the creation of the visual expression, or making art. In Chapter I, with the Buddha seated in meditation, and the folks in the congregation all waiting in anticipation suddenly various phenomena occur. There is a beam of light which is emitted from the brow of the Buddha, there is the earth quaking, mandarava flowers begin raining down. As if the beam of light emitting from the head of the Buddha isn’t enough, this beam of light enabled people in the Saha World to see people in other worlds and the Buddhist and Bodhisattva practices they engaged in. Naturally this causes many in the crowd to be curious as to what was going on, what might happen next, how should these things be interpreted, and many more. My original idea was to suggest exploring the idea of phenomena when you decided to make a commitment to practice the Lotus Sutra. This section of this chapter always reminds me of the night I decided to begin practicing the Lotus Sutra. There were so many memorable emotions at the time making it a powerful memory. That first night the room we were meeting in, the living room of a Marine and his wife in the base housing at Millington, TN. There were about 30 Marines there all chanting strongly, energetically, and intently. Simply being in a room with crammed with that many guys with all that 20-year old testosterone would have it’s own energy. As I am writing this, I realize that perhaps there were not exactly 30, so let’s consider it a figurative number. After the chanting was over, various guys got up and explained some general Buddhist concepts. Some got up and shared some of the things going on in their lives and how their Buddhist practice was working. Recall if you will, that this was a low point in my emotional life. Just hours before I had no hope, I saw no future, and I felt powerless. Now I was in a room with guys my age, practicing Buddhism, something I was keenly interested for many years. Earlier in the evening before arriving, I was sad, depressed, and even lonely. Now, here were all these guys seemingly happy, surviving the collective hell of the Marine Corps, and all expressing hope and dreams for the future. This was a stark change in emotional landscapes. All of this would be memorable enough, yet it was in this context I decided to give Buddhism, or to give this group of guys a chance to help me change my life. Thinking about this it would be easy to assume I was merely attracted to the positive energy or emotions of the meeting. It might be thought of the two options sadness or happiness it would be a clear choice, easy to make. I suppose there is some truth to that, yet for me it was more than that. In fact, I’m not sure before this writing I had ever articulated the contrasting emotional places. What I do remember is the feeling of ‘rightness.’ The concepts they explained made perfect sense and were things I intuitively had felt for most of my life. The ideas, while bearing foreign labels, were not foreign concepts. There was no different thing for me to do fundamentally, other than beginning to practice chanting the sutra and the Odaimoku or sacred title. I also recall vividly walking back to my barracks that evening with my Omandala tucked securely under my shirt. It was around 10 PM on an early cold December evening. The colors of the night were almost electric, bright, and surreal. The sky above was clear, and the stars shown brightly and seemingly within in arms reach. Now was that exactly how it was, I don’t know. This is my memory of the historical event. I do believe it is close to how it was, yet we can ever know the degree to which our emotions or feelings influence our memory and interpretation of events. The idea of this exercise is to begin to understand this and open up to cherishing these memories and becoming familiar with them so we can share with others the Lotus Sutra as it occurs in our lives. That’s my story, now what about yours? My challenge here is not everyone will have such a stark contrasting memory of the moment of decision or commitment. Right now there are two high school students attending the temple services. For them, should they continue to practice for a long time into the future, their memory may be less dramatic. Their memory may be they simply eased into and then before long it simply was their life. For some, the memory may be in stages of first experimentally trying, then saying what the heck let’s do this thing. Some may still be in the trying or experimenting phase after numerous years. Even in these circumstances, there are points of demarcation. There is always a point which can be used for reference. In my telling, I could talk about beginning to do the daily service in my space in the barracks and how awkward that was doing it by flashlight soundlessly so as not to disturb the other guys. I could also share how in the face of being threatened with loss of security clearance I had to make a choice between going to Vietnam immediately for not quitting my practice or the easy path of not being challenged because of my religious beliefs. Those and several others required of me to more concretely express and live according to my beliefs. For this, I chose the night I brought my Omandala home. In your experience of practicing the Lotus Sutra is there a demarcation point, a point of reference, a point of a before and after? It need not be dramatic though it may be. Perhaps there was a spectacular occurrence, and you’ve never thought about it. Or you may have never given any thought to this at all. From my experience talking with people over the years, many people simply did not notice or even think much about it at all. What I’m inviting you to do is to find a point, it can be any point in your continually evolving practice. Also, that point may change in the future, yet it is still a point, among many which are important to become aware of. Mindlessly we can occupy space ticking off the seconds and then die. Or we can say, wow, some really neat stuff has happened, I’ve done some cool things, and I want to remember them. Yea, we will also realize some crappy things as well, and we survived. How has your earth quaked? What has the beam of light of the Lotus Sutra illuminated in your life? If the Buddha were you, what would you tell? The ground for the art piece is page 35 from The Threefold Lotus Sutra published by Weatherhill/Kosei. I’m using the gatha section describing the mandarava flowers; the delight everyone felt in body and mind, and the coloring of all with gold. For this, I used collage, acrylic paint, and ink. You will see a dark blue sky overhead filled with stars. The Buddha ink drawing which doesn’t look much like a Buddha is probably a subconscious combination of the Gunnery Sargent, who invited me to my first meeting and the Buddha, yea let’s go with that. Over the image of the Buddha/not-Buddha written in gold is the portion I just shared. On the left edge is a group of guys, well they really are Buddhist priest reciting sutras. And as it mentions in the sutra all of this occurs from the Avichi Hells to the highest of heavens. So quite naturally I’ve got hell in there. Also, that night was a movement from hell to heaven without denying or avoiding the suffering of the hell of the Marine Corps. Over the top of everything, there is gold paint ‘illuminating’. Sadly sparkle and shiny don’t photograph well, so you miss out on that. I hope you have fun and remain curious as you consider this exercise. I welcome you comments and questions and sharing of your discovery.