Part 2: Will My Problems Ever Go Away?

From SGI USA, I'm Cassidy Bradford and this is bootability.

The weekly series where I talk with Buddhists from all walks of life about the power we each

have to change our lives and the world around us.

You wake up to the sound of your alarm and instinctually grab your phone.

Rubbing your eyes, you look through a slew of notifications.

Some cute pictures of your baby's cousin.

The latest update on a war across the ocean.

A work email asking you to redo your presentation and a reminder for your upcoming dentist appointment.

All these, but not a single text from your crush.

The problems in our life come in all shapes and sizes.

Sometimes the global ones knock us down so hard.

We barely have the energy to move on a small one.

The Buddhist philosopher, Diceco-Caites, said.

Some people say that the prevailing mood in the world today is one of powerlessness.

Decisions about political, economic, and environmental issues all seem to be made somewhere beyond

our reach.

What can the individual accomplish in the face of the huge institutions that run our world?

This feeling of powerlessness fuels a vicious cycle that only worsens the situation and

people sense a futility.

At the opposite extreme of this sense of powerlessness lies the Lotus Sutra's philosophy that the

inner determination of one individual can transform everything.

It is a teaching that gives ultimate expression to the infinite potential and dignity inherent

in the life of each human being.

This month, we're doing a three-part series on how to put the power back in your hands.

Each week we'll talk about an empowering Buddhist concept and then hear about someone who's

put it into practice because Buddhism isn't just a nice philosophy.

It's something we can take action on every single day.

When everything can seem so inconsequential, what's the point in making any determined efforts

right?

Buddhism says the opposite.

There is nothing that is inconsequential.

Every single effort we make, no matter how small it may seem, changes our lives.

Our thoughts, actions, and words have far-reaching power.

We just need to decide.

That brings us to the theme for this episode, which is the power of simply deciding.

Dr. Daisakuiketa said,

When your determination changes, everything will begin to move in the direction you desire.

The moment you resolve to be victorious, every nerve and fiber in your being will immediately

orient itself toward your success.

On the other hand, if you think this is never going to work out, then at that instant,

every cell in your being will be deflated and give up the fight, then everything really

will move in the direction of failure.

So why is that true?

It's the Buddhist theory that backs this up.

I'm going to break down a key Buddhist concept here.

It's a complex one, so I'm going to give you more of the spark notes.

The concept is called three thousand realms in a single moment of life.

On bootability, we talk about the limitless potential of our lives.

The courage, compassion, and wisdom that already exist inside us, and that we can tap

into in an instant through chanting nam-yo-ho-de-ngay-kyo.

Three thousand realms in a single moment of life is an explanation of how that limitless

potential is manifested instantly in our lives.

So there are three components to this concept.

The first is the principle of the ten worlds, which describes the various states of inner

life.

We can think about these as ways that we experience our life.

Some of these lower life states include hell, which is a state of misery and suffering,

and hunger, a state of relentless craving.

The higher life states are characterized by partial enlightenment while the highest

life state is Buddhahood.

The Lotus Sutra, which is practiced by S.G.I. Neetron Buddhists, is distinct from other

Buddhist teachings because it teaches that each of the ten worlds encompasses all the

other worlds.

So what this means is that our lives aren't fixed in just one of these ten worlds.

But because these worlds all encompass each other, it's also possible for us to change

our life state.

So although we might be in the world of hell, for example, the other nine worlds are present,

even if they're dormant at the time.

This means that anyone has the potential to manifest Buddhahood at any moment.

Attaining the life state of Buddhahood doesn't mean eliminating the other nine worlds, though.

It means that under the influence of Buddhahood, the positive aspects of each world can manifest

and contribute to our happiness.

The next component, paired with the ten worlds and their mutual possession, is the ten factors

of life.

While the ten worlds describe our inner life, the ten factors describe how those life states

are expressed in our life and environment.

When we're in the world of hell, it's probably expressed on our face, and it's also the

lens that we see ourselves and the world through.

And the last component is the three realms of existence.

It represents three different standpoints of life, the individual, society, and the

environment of our daily lives.

They're present in our actual world and describe everything we deal with, ourselves, our relationships

with others, and with our environment.

These three components together describe all aspects of life and their functions.

Dr. Akeda says, this principle of three thousand realms in a single moment of life hold that

each life moment is endowed with three thousand different functions, which influence not

only our own lives, but those of all around us.

They also influence society, our natural environment, and the earth.

They encompass the entire universe.

Therefore, once you have decided to do something, the three thousand functions and your entire

being start working to help you reach your goal.

The entire universe also starts moving toward the fulfillment of your goal.

If you pray, this is how I want to be, and continue to work toward your dream.

You will gradually realize the future you have envisaged.

Through the lens of this concept, we can understand that there are limitless ways our lives

and environment can act in each moment.

Through changing our own thoughts, words, and actions in every moment, we're directly

affecting everything around us.

The great power of chanting nam-yul-ho-den-gay-kyo is that we're bringing out the life state of

Buddhahood in that moment, creating a wave of transformation in our lives.

Whether we see it immediately or not, Buddhism teaches us that our lives at a very deep

level have limitless power.

When we make a determination, though, it can be easy to waver.

Maybe we didn't reach our goal, or the deadline is ticking, and we haven't made any progress.

Christopher Robin of Denver, Colorado, felt that way too.

He had many dreams, ranging from working as a professional actor to becoming a father.

He grew up in an unstable family situation, moving around a lot, and even tried to take

his life when he was only 20 years old.

Several years later, he was introduced to Buddhism, but he didn't have much belief in his life.

After chanting for a few years, he could really start to feel hope.

It was then that he revisited the goals he had made when he was 20.

When I had attempted suicide, I had quite a few goals that I had kind of given up on,

and over the course of those years of chanting, those inner goals were starting to finally

come back out.

Yeah, wait, what do I want to do?

What do I want to accomplish?

Because I think I'd like to try to make it happen, and so I made a list, and I kind of looked

back like, what were the things I wanted to accomplish when I almost gave up?

And then I looked at that list, and none of them had come true yet.

I still had not made any of them come true, and then I decided, what if I tried to use

chanting to make some of these things happen?

What would that look like?

So that's how I said about it.

I had my list of goals, and I just decided to go for it.

That's when Christopher started to study Buddhism more, and he stumbled across an article

with the core message, decide, chant, act.

So it's like, okay, so decide the goal that I want to achieve, and then chant, Namio

Ho Ringekyo, to my heart's content, however much I want to challenge that, and then act,

take some sort of action, and it doesn't have to be like a car that goes to zero to 100

in a second, but just start to build momentum towards the goals that I'm coming up with.

And so that's what I did.

I decided I was going to become a professional actor, and then I chanted with the determination

I am going to become a professional actor, and then I had no idea what action to take.

And so the next day I decided again, and I chanted again, and then I realized I'm like,

well, wait a second, if I want to be an actor, then I'm probably going to have to audition

for a show.

That's usually how that works.

Christopher landed an audition for a master class, and started taking acting classes.

He wasn't immediately landing some high-profile gig.

We live in a real world that oftentimes requires we make a lot of effort to get the things

we're going for.

But when we decide, the universe responds and things are shifting under the surface.

While Christopher was making strides with his acting career, he was also working as a

pharmacy tech.

It was around this time that his niece suddenly and tragically passed away, shaking him to

his core.

She went into a hospital to get something on her heart checked out, and unfortunately

they found this infection.

They had to do emergency surgery, and unfortunately, she passed away.

And that was really heartbreaking at the time, and it was very devastating, and I felt completely

like, there's nothing I can do.

I was powerless.

I really felt powerless.

It's nine years now that I've been chanting, and I think the reason why I continue to do

so is because I can chant, however I am, exactly at that moment, without pretending to be

someone else or pretending to feel anything other than what I'm feeling at that moment.

And of course, I can chant with a determination that this is how I want to feel, but I don't

lie to myself now when I'm chanting.

This is what I'm feeling, so I chanted, I cried while chanting, so much chanting for

my niece, and my Buddhist friend came over and chanted with me and just really encouraged

me, you can chant for anyone's happiness, including people who have passed away, and

that this is the Buddhism of pro-activity, when you chant, you can proactively forge your

relationship with anybody, past, present, or future, rather than waiting for a relationship

to strengthen, you get to be that protagonist to transform it, or to change it, or to strengthen

it.

He really encouraged me to continue to chant for my niece's happiness, so I did, and

I decided that I wanted to switch to hospital pharmacy work at that point.

I think there was a part of me that was like, man, if there was anything I could do to

prevent that situation happening, I would love to do that.

I didn't really want to become a doctor or anything like that.

I still had no degree, I still wanted to do arts and all of these things, but I decided

I'm still a pharmacy technician, I'd like to try doing it at a hospital and contribute

to people's health in that way, so I decided that whole decide chant act.

That's exactly what he did.

Soon after, he landed a hospital job, and then would face a moment that helped him see

the true power of his life.

I was being tasked with many different responsibilities.

Some days I would actually be mixing and making chemotherapy.

Some days I was making the IV medications for cancer patients, new borns, like babies

born premature, and I think this really pointed to my prayer towards my niece.

That's why I wanted to get into hospital pharmacy was that somehow I was going to help save

a life.

I think that felt like I might be in a position somewhere where I can more clearly contribute

to that sort of kind of life-saving measure.

Again, I'm a pharmacy technician, so I didn't know specifically what that would look like,

but my prayer was I wanted to be ready if something happened, I wanted to help.

One day at the hospital, I was working, and it's a huge hospital.

It's almost like an entire city block, and so we have tube stations that run throughout

the hospital, we'll get a medication, we'll tube it, it'll go to ten floors and two buildings

away, basically, but there was a code that was announced over the intercom is called

Mass Profusion Protocol, and I had to ask, what does that mean?

My pharmacist said, basically, it means that someone is losing a lot of blood very quickly.

Immediately I thought back to what had happened with my niece.

She essentially died from the same thing, and she was losing blood.

They were giving her profusion after profusion, so giving her more and more blood in her body

was just too weak, it couldn't keep the blood in, so she had died on an operating table,

and I realized in that moment, now, two years later, where I was working at the hospital,

and they had the code, Mass Profusion Protocol, ICU, and I realized that's exactly the same

code that they would have called in Portland, Oregon when my niece was at that crucial moment

in her life.

I really felt at that moment that this was my chance, that responding to this patient

was a way that I could respond to my niece, and so I just jumped in.

My chanting had prepared me for that moment.

I was serious, I was ready.

The IV room was making medications as quickly as they could, medication was sent out, and

there were tubing things left and right, but there was this one medication that they

were wondering how long it was going to take, they were making it as quickly as they

could, I had a pharmacist who was saying, be ready, when that medication comes out, please

tube it as soon as possible, and I said, yes, wait, and then I said no, I'm going to hand

deliver it to the ICU myself.

And as soon as the medication came out, I put it, and as quickly as I could get to the ICU,

to go to this patient's room, I passed by the tube station, and in that tube station,

there were medications that we had already tubed.

I knew that if I had tubed that medication, they wouldn't have gotten it yet, they already

hadn't gotten these ones we had already tubed.

So I pulled those medications, put them into my basket as well, I walked straight up to

that ICU patient's room, there's like a scene out of a movie, there were at least six

nurses and a doctor in that room, and as soon as I walked into that room, the doctor

turned to me, looked me in the eye, and then looked down, and saw my basket, pointed

to the medication, and said, I need that now.

And I said, yes, and I pulled it up, and I handed it to a nurse, and then the nurse gave

it straight to him.

The nurse of her was told to head back to the main pharmacy in case they needed anything

else.

Then he waited, no news, no clue how things ended, so he went home, and he chanted.

I knew that person's name, and I'd seen them in the patient's room, but I knew nothing

else about this person, but I just remembered their name, and I just chanted for their

happiness.

And at the same time, memories of my niece was coming up, and so I was starting to cry,

but I just decided, I kept my eyes open as hard as it was, and I was chanting, Namyo

Horengi Kyo, just in the midst of tears, and I just really challenged myself to chant,

and you know, and then I went to bed, and I went to work the next day, and the first

thing I asked was, how's that patient, and that patient was recovering.

I later found out that that patient was discharged, and he survived.

You know, that was really powerful to me, because you know, I walked away from that feeling

absolutely confident that I had become someone new, like I'd become someone that, rather

than waiting for things to happen, felt confident enough that I could actually make a difference,

and that I could be proactive.

In that moment, I felt that I had tapped into some courage and compassion and wisdom

that I had not experienced, and it wasn't like this, we feeling of happiness.

It was more of a deeper, grounded sense of, I matter, and so does that patient, and

so does everyone, and I'm going to continue to live my life serious, and joyful, and challenge

myself more than ever now.

I will continue to make those dreams come true, and so it was a really profound experience

for me, and a real turning point in my life.

Christopher had become someone who would act without hesitation, a person who doesn't passively

wait for things to happen.

He decides he's going to do something, and then he makes it happen.

From that point on, his list of goals were checked off one by one.

He married his wife, and they wrote and produced their own musical, winning an honorable mention

from the New York movie awards.

He was cast in an indie film, became a teaching artist, bought a home, had a child, and graduated

with an associate's of arts degree.

This didn't happen overnight.

It takes time and sustained effort to make our big dreams come true, but it all starts

with the decision to make it happen, no matter what.

Next week, we're going to dig into problems.

We all have them, and Buddhists actually like them.

Well, most of the time, I mean, we're human after all.

If you'd like to get connected with your local bootability community, reach out to us

anytime at connect at bootability.org.

Until next time, thanks for listening.