HARMONY-December 2014

DEAR MEMBERS AND FRIENDS OF SGI,

This month we look at Earthly Desires and how, when viewed correctly, they can help us become happy.

“When we chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, our problems and sufferings all turn into energy for our happiness, into fuel for our enlightenment.”

Growing up in the US, my exposure to Buddhism was limited and shaped by what I saw on TV, in the movies, and what little I read. I thought that “being a Buddhist” meant you had to change your diet, how you dress, live a monastic lifestyle, and give up all worldly possessions and desires. But after I started to practice and study Nichiren Buddhism, I came to realize that this common view was incorrect. It is possible to be a Buddhist and want things in life. We are, after all, human. I can’t tell you the number of times that someone has said to me “funny, you don’t look like a Buddhist”.

As President Ikeda mentions:

“Buddhism teaches the principle that ‘earthly desires are enlightenment.’ To explain this very simply, ‘earthly desires’ refers to suffering and to the desires and cravings that cause suffering, while ‘enlightenment’ refers to attaining a vast and expansive state of absolute happiness.

“Normally, one would assume that earthly desires and enlightenment are separate and distinct-especially since suffering would seem to be the exact opposite of happiness. But this is not the case in Nichiren Buddhism, which teaches that only by igniting the firewood of earthly desires can the flame of happiness be attained.

“As a result, our lives are infused with the light and energy of happiness. Through chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, we burn the firewood of our earthly desires.”

It is important that we really grasp and understand this principal.

Nichiren Daishonin wrote a letter titled “Earthly Desires Are Enlightenment” in order to emphasize the importance of this core principle to all of us and to ensure that, through strong faith, we are able to view Earthly Desires in the correct light and lead lives of absolute happiness and freedom based on this awareness.

We hope you enjoy this issue of Harmony.

Skip Williams

Quotes of the Month:

“Prayer is the courage to persevere. It is the struggle to overcome our own weakness and lack of confidence in ourselves. It is the act of impressing in the very depths of our being the conviction that we can change the situation without fail.” –www.ikedaquotes.org