Alternative Silent Prayers for Independent Nichiren Buddhists - 1

Silent Prayers
Chant extended (hiki) Daimoku: Namu-Myoho-Renge-Kyo
(ring bell five times)
(chant Sansho)


First Prayer
Offering to Protective Forces
I sincerely pray to the protective forces that are born from the harmonizing effect of the practice of the One Vehicle. I pray that I might add to those protective forces to protect anyone that practices this teaching.
(insert individual prayer here)

(chant Sansho)

Second Prayer
Offering to the Law
I express my sincere devotion to the Gohonzon. The True Object of Devotion for the Observation of the Mind and the only Depiction of the Triple Bodied Tathâgata in the Fifth Five Hundred Years Period after the Tathâgata’s Passing over to Nirvana.
(chant Sansho)
(insert individual prayer here)


Third Prayer
Offering to the Lineage

I offer my devotion to the Buddha, the first 25 lineage holders, Kumarajiva, Nanyueh, T’ien-t’ai, Changan, Miaolo, Dengyo, and Nichiren.
(chant Sansho)
(insert individual prayer here)


Fourth Prayer
Offering for Peace and Practitioner

I sincerely pray for the Great Aspiration of the Buddha, the peace of the land brought about through the purification of the mind.
(chant Sansho)
I pray to eradicate negative karma in my life, and to continually purify and deepen my faith and practice so that I may attain enlightenment in this body.
(insert Personal Prayers)
(chant Sansho)


Fifth Prayer
Offering to the Deceased and all of Existence

I pray that all my deceased relatives, all
deceased Nichiren believers, and all others
who have departed this life may attain
Buddhahood through the power of MyohoRenge-Kyo.
(offer special memorial prayers while
sounding the bell continuously)
(chant Sansho)May the impartial benefits of MyohoRenge-Kyo penetrate the far reaches of the
Universe to allow all life to experience the silence and illumination of the Seat of the Law.
(ring bell three times and chant extended (hiki) Daimoku)

Sharing Abundance With Others

The Buddha encourages us to be generous. It's part of the practice of any follower - to give, to be generous, to assist the poor. He even goes to far as listing what should be given:

The basic requirements are:

1. Food
2. Clothing
3. Dwelling places
4. Medicine

Secondary objects:

1. Vehicles
2. Books
3. Utensils, lights, seats etc.

In giving food, especially, one is giving life. He has said that if we all knew about the myriad benefits of sharing our food, we would share our food every day.

When we share our food with others, we are replenishing them, giving life, strength and allowing their minds to function more optimally. We are assisting them in being in a better position to change their karma.

Recently, I have made the acquaintance of several homeless men: Young Lucas, Old Lucas, Madala, Isaac and Desmond. It has been humbling to discover how simple their desires are compared with my own: food, clothing, shelter, a job, and in the case of Old Lucas, a Bible and books to read. These are all things I take for granted every single day.

These are also the people we walk past every single day without a single nice thought. We usually think, "They should get a job" or "I worked hard for my money. They don't. They just beg."

The reality is that we have no idea what life circumstances led them to live life on the streets. It could so easily be any one of us out there.

When I bring food to Old Lucas, he doesn't hesitate to share what I have given him with Madala and Isaac, no matter how little it is. Which is more than what we, who have more food than we know what to do with, are willing to do.  (Watch this video: CLICK HERE.)

How is it then, that homeless people are more generous with each other than we are, who have so much more? If we haven't been in the situation homeless people find themselves, it's easier to not see them as human and walk on by.

The truth is we are all human. One of us is not less human than the other. We all deserve compassion and love.

 The Buddha tells us we are all One. The teacher Jesus tells us that "who among you does this for the least of these people, does it for me". (To paraphrase - it's been a long time since I read a Bible)

Basically, everyone around us is a reflection of ourselves, of The Buddha, or The Christ, or Krishna, or God.

Anyway. The point of this was to relate what happened when I donated an old pair of shoes and a T-shirt to Desmond.

A friend generously gave me the shoes and T-shirt, which I passed on to Desmond. I saw him the next day, wearing the T-shirt, but not the shoes. He told me he didn't want to wear the shoes while standing in the rain because they were really nice shoes and he didn't want to ruin them.

To the friend, these were old running shoes that no longer served a purpose. To Desmond, these were really nice shoes that he didn't want to ruin.

The old stuff that you don't use  can be used by someone else.

I am collecting old clothes for these guys: shoes, socks, shirts, trousers, caps - anything. I am also collecting items such as soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes and razors for shaving. Books for Old Lucas to read. Food items too.

If you are willing to donate and be part of making a difference in at least one person's life, please get in touch.

A Letter to the Editor

Dear Unnamed Editor of Unnamed Magazine

Doing your sub editing and proof reading has made me lose my will to live. Not only because all you send me is mindless, poorly written drivel from untrained writers, but because you have absolutely no clue how to actually run a magazine (and make no effort to learn).

Your magazine is meant to come out four times a year. So far, there has been only one issue. ONE. In February. You promised to send me copy to sub in March for your winter edition. I didn't hear from you until September when you began putting together the spring edition, which became the summer edition. You tell me you'll send me articles to look at on a specific day. I get them three weeks later from you, if I am lucky. In the case of the supposed May edition, I was promised articles in the beginning of March. You sent them at the end of September and told me we were now magically working on the October edition. (Which, incidentally, has not actually been printed yet.)

What the fuck are you playing at? You have a day job, I get that. Then what the fuck are you doing with a magazine? It's a full time job, woman. And it requires an editor, not an event planner and part time whatever, to edit it. What the fuck were you THINKING?

I work at a seriously cut-rate price. Less than half of what I should be charging, as a favour to you because you are 'just starting out'. Seriously? It's not worth having a new arsehole chewed by you because I take THREE extra days to sub and proof articles (which you sent me four weeks after you said you would) because I had been to a funeral and had to take care of urgent work for a client. If you'd actually sent me the articles when you said you would, perhaps you could have had them subbed and proofed in good time.

I am tired of you chasing me with the: "The magazine is going to print on Tuesday next week, so I need these subbed by tomorrow morning" only to find out that no, nothing went to print. Nothing since FEBRUARY, in fact. So what was that about? Some make believe magazine?

So I give you my middle fingered salute, Unnamed Editor. I am tired of begging you for months to pay me the pittance I've worked for. I am tired of your attitude towards your writers: "They must be happy because it's a privelege to be published" (on not paying writers)*. I am gatvol for waiting for articles to come, which only materialise months later. I am not your bitch. Go find someone else you can fuck over.

Enclosed, please find a pineapple. It is my hope that you will fuck yourself sideways with it.

Yours suicidally

T



* My response was: "It's a privelege to be a publisher who has writers willing to write for your magazine for free."

Not All Buddhists Are Vegetarian

I officially became a Nichiren Buddhist on 8 October 2005. I was quite surprised when I was told that it was not obligatory to become vegetarian in order to practice this Buddhism. I'd believed that ALL Buddhists, regardless of the school, were vegetarian.

Turns out, not so much.

Nichiren Buddhism is part of the Mahayana, or Great Vehicle, branch of Buddhism. (The other two branches are Theravada and Vajrayana, in case you're interested. We're not going to go into the various branches of Buddhism today, though. We'll save that for another time.) It appears that the Japanese Kamakura schools of Buddhism, like Zen and Nichiren Buddhism, have relaxed the rules a bit, and view vegetarianism as more of a choice than absolutely necessary.

To begin with, Buddhist monks and nuns were not vegetarian. They travelled around the country, teaching, and receiving alms from others. If they were given meat in their food bowl, they didn't refuse it. They could only refuse if they knew with absolute certainty that the animal had been slaughtered in their honour. Otherwise, they were permitted to eat the meat.

The Theravada schools allow the eating of meat, with the prohibition of eating certain meats - including human and elephant. Vajrayana schools permit the eating of meat. Mahayana schools on the whole believe that a vegetarian diet should be pursued as part of the Bodhisattva way. Some sects even prohibit the consumption of root vegetables as this is seen as the living part of a plant and to eat it, would mean the death of the plant.

Not so much Nichiren Buddhism and other Japanese schools, though. Nichiren himself, apparently, was a vegetarian, and there is some debate as to whether The Buddha (Siddharta Gautama) was actually vegetarian.

In any case, Nichiren states, in his letter to Akimoto, "One who kills a mere ant will fall into hell, to say nothing of those who kill fish or birds." -  (WND V1 P1019). Nichiren Buddhism, particularly the Soka-Gakkai, call their followers Bodhisattvas of the Earth. It is common for those involved in Bodhisattva practice to avoid eating meat as the practice involves showing compassion and loving kindness to all sentient beings.

Am I a vegetarian? Not now. I became vegetarian during my conversion to Nichiren Buddhism and remained a vegetarian for about two years. Upon my return to South Africa in 2007, I experienced a migraine, after which I was meat crazy. I ended up raiding the fridge and ate all the cold chicken and salami there was. I've eaten meat since.

There is a strong belief in New Age circles that eating meat dulls one's third eye and causes aggression in the meat eater. This is something worth exploring for one's self. In early 2011, a friend and I embarked on an experiement to see if we could live on a vegan diet. Both of us lasted 22 days. I did feel calmer and more centred on the diet, it has to be said.

Can You Pass The Rorschach Test?

Hermann Rorschach, celebrated today in the Google Doodle, is the creator of the controversial psychological assessment test known as the Ink Blot or Rorshach Test. I pootled over to the wikipedia page to take a look at these ink blots, which you can too, here, and while I was at it, I decided to take the test myself.

The results, my dear friends, I share with you below. They are very far from the more common answers listed on the wikipedia page. It only confirms what I've known all along: I am batshit crazy and there is no cure.

Read on at your own peril.

Two giant dogs tearing the head off a mutant praying mantis. See how its hands are raised, trying to feel for its lost head?

A couple of Russian dancers high-fiving after executing a complicated move that ends with them both simultaneously stomping on a lit firework.

A primitive cave painting of two women fighting over a calabash that contains some powerful magic they have cooked up while two small red demons look on and laugh

Praying Mantis Man riding a rad-ass Harley.

Moth Man drags his helpless victims to his lair. Mwahahahaha.

Space Alien vagina

Portrait of a gray alien (Zeta Reticulans) wearing Elizabethan Era attire

A couple sabre-toothed bulls building a totem pole

Two dragons battle for the control of Tokyo

The Mystic Warrior Samurai using his magic to keep the world from collapsing by holding the energies of good and evil in each hand and not allowing them to ever meet


Yup. Crazy in the coconut.

My Dad.

After my father died, I found a letter that was written by my mother to him back in 1975 My dad had gone on a training course and was away for about three months and my mother had written to him to give him an update on how things were at home.

In the letter, she told him how his two year old daughter (me), had been going up to the gate to look out onto the street to wait for him. Apparently, I did this every single day, and as I stood there, I would call out, "Daddy! Daddy!" and wait there for him to come. When I realised he was not coming home, I would stand at the gate and cry. My mother, in the letter, wrote how heart wrenching this act was and she hoped that I would eventually give up and stop looking for him.

I don't know if I gave up looking for him, though. The letter didn't indicate that I did, nor did I find other letters from that time. Rather, I gave up looking through the immense stack of letters exchanged between my parents over the periods of time when my dad was away. After reading two of them, I decided that perhaps it's best I not know anything about their exchanges.

Needless to say, my dad was my favourite parent. I still love him, even though it's been six years since he crossed over. And, like the two year old me, I still sometimes look for him.

Not long after his death, I sat in the lounge in his house and saw him, transparent and wearing his gardening clothes (blue checked shirt with blue shorts) walk from the kitchen, into the dining room, through the dining room table and then vanish.

In 2010, I saw him in a kind of half-dream, half-vision, in which he once again appeared in his gardening clothes (my father loved his garden and he loved gardening) to tell me, "You have work to do."

Even now, if I see an old man in blue shorts and sandals, I check to see if it's my dad. Even now, knowing well and truly that dad is never coming back to this particular life in the form I knew him.

And I miss him. Every day. I miss his advice. I miss his wisdom. I miss talking conspiracy theories and smoking with him while we sip coffee together.

I love you daddy.

September 2006 - four months before he died.

The Unfettered Joy of Being Alive

I am so grateful that I am ME.

There were times in my life when I wasn't. I wanted to be anyone else but me, or, I wanted to rewind my life to the times when I thought the person I was at a specific time was better than the person I was in that particular moment.

Today, though, I am happy to be exactly who I am, where I am, in the skin that I am living in.

This revelation occurred a short time ago, however I only truly acknowledged it this morning. (OK, it realised this just over a week ago, but was unable to enjoy it because I experienced a health challenge that quickly pushed the joy aside and I allowed myself to feel sorry for myself).

I don't live a life without struggle. The Buddha tells us that life is suffering. How we navigate that suffering is what is important. Life is never a constant run of happiness or a constant run of great sorrow. It's usually a mix between the two. Sometimes sorrow, sometimes joy. They are two sides of the same coin.

The Buddha tells us:

"We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves."

This, I think, is what happens when we apply our Buddha Eye to how we view the world.

We all have a comment on the weather. It's either too hot or too cold. Or there's too much rain or none at all. Recently, the clouds gathered over Johannesburg and there was a lot of "Oh no, please don't let it rain. I hate the rain." The rain is necessary. It is neutral, but our feelings are not. Others were overjoyed that the rain was coming. Who was right? No one. The rain is the rain. It is what it is. We cannot change the fact that it rains, but we do have the power to change how we think about the rain.

This analogy can be applied to our lives and how we see ourselves. If we see ourselves through the eyes of Hell, our lives become Hellish. "We become what we think."

I put it down to returning to chanting more regularly.

Joy wasn't something that came easily for me. I was strongly suspicious of it, and if I am honest, then I have to admit that I still am, at times. My mother and grandmother always liked to say, "Happiness is always followed by tears. You laugh now, but later on you'll be crying." I believed them. When I found myself happy for no reason I used to panic, wondering what disaster would strike because I was happy. Somehow, my mother and grandmother's superstition made me think that if I were happy, I would be punished.

We become what we think.

So, of course, some drama or disaster immediately followed my joy. Of course it did. I believed it did. I became what I thought.

Today, though, I am living in this moment of complete unfettered joy of being alive. The joy that I am me and no one else. That I have this life, that I have this breath and that I have this moment on this planet, in this place with these people and circumstances. Even if some of those circumstances are not ideal. Even if there are health challenges and workloads and strained relationships and bills to pay, there is still joy.

I told a friend of mine once that "above the clouds, the sun still shines and above the clouds, we are all Buddhas."

Even when it rains, even when circumstances are less than ideal or even dire, we are all still Buddhas.