My first Buddhist meeting in the realm of the warm Soka atmosphere sealed my heart of faith forever. It was a unique model of human harmony. I sensed genuine warmth and heartfelt compassion in the hearts of those gathered that day. I knew, I wanted to be part of this. Something churned within and I felt the sun of hope rising in my heart. When the sun shines, darkness is dispelled. Likewise, Faith became the invigorating, guiding life force to dispel darkness in my life. I took to it like fish takes to water.
This was a simple philosophy of humanism – the crux of it lying in the concept of ‘human revolution’ or self-transformation which begins from respecting each individual for who and what they are. Now this is easier said than done. But this is like returning to the basics. Thus began my inner journey, certainly an uphill task – respecting someone I had come to despise. It was (and still is) a daily struggle battling my inner negativities. But this is what it is about – defeating the demon within.
With time and practice this became a lot simpler to the point where my hatred gradually melted and turned to compassion. I could forgive and move on – it felt as if a huge burden had lifted off my heart. For the first time I felt an awakening to my ‘higher self’ breaking the shackles of my limited, self centred, egoistic ‘lower self’. It was a joyful feeling, one that I cannot express in words. The poison of hatred slowly turned to the medicine of love. My heart grew and expanded. It learnt to love more and hate less. Within my heart I could encompass those I had left out earlier. This was the first hurdle that I had crossed.
The next very important lesson that I learnt in my journey of faith, is to take responsibility for everything in my life – the good and the bad. Human beings are complex creatures. We like to take credit for all the good things in life but blame it on someone else for everything that goes wrong. This is a convenient option because then we don’t have to work on ourselves; an escapist route to say the least. This tendency starts at an early stage and then goes unchecked – I did well in my maths test because I studied very hard; I didn’t do well this time because the teacher finished the syllabus in a hurry and didn’t explain well. (Not because I didn’t study hard enough) Sometimes we don’t even own up our mistakes to ourselves. It is not about owning it up to others.
I was blaming my unhappiness on someone else and of course taking credit for everything that was going well (my education and career). Faith gave me a clearer perspective. I self-reflected and realised that I had to take up responsibility for everything that I was facing. This realisation brought with it a great sense of empowerment. Now I didn’t have to be at the mercy of external Gods. I had to mend myself to mend my situation; Simple formula which is not so easy to apply, but guarantees victory, happiness or whatever you might like to call it in the end. Earlier, I would wallow in self-pity and grief. Now I felt empowered and liberated. The change in my heart never failed to reflect in other people’s behaviour.
This wasn’t a solitary struggle. I had friends who stood by like a pillar of support all along. They were by my side to encourage every time I failed. They renewed my conviction in myself every time I began to doubt my own potential. These people I refer to as ‘friends’ are my fellow members in the organisation (Soka Gakkai: http://www.bharatsokagakkai.org/) they became friends much later. Initially they were complete strangers who would call once in a while, drop by to my place sometimes and offer words of encouragement. They gave me a patient hearing, a pat on the back and guidance from the point of view of faith. They were ordinary people racing against time, juggling between their many responsibilities. They had demanding jobs, families to take care of and their own set of challenges and problems. But they never failed to show up when I needed them. In fact they were there even before I could call them. Their smiling faces reassured me. I was touched by their love, care and concern. I looked forward to being in their company.
In spite of their goodness, I was doubtful of their intentions at first. A whole volley of questions was at the back of my mind - why were these strangers being so nice to me? What did they stand to gain by giving so much of their valuable time to me? Why were they doing this? For themselves? For me? For who? I needed these answers to trust them completely so I asked directly.
And this is what one of my ‘friend’ said: “I am doing this for you and for myself. For you because I want you to be happy; for myself, because making you happy, brings back happiness in my life. “I don’t think I could fathom what she said at that point. I didn’t have the heart to grasp its full meaning. I was just impressed by the high sounding words. It sounded cool. As I became regular with the meetings, my understanding of the faith deepened. Slowly I found myself changing. I had come out of my shell. My interaction with so many people opened up my heart. Now I could look beyond my personal problems which seemed to overpower me till now. I wanted to extend a helping hand to those suffering around. I did that. The few words of encouragement that I offered a friend helped her turn around her life. And it brought back immeasurable joy in my life. I felt on top of the world and extremely happy. Happiness of the kind I had never experienced before; Happiness that came when my heart grew to love more and hate less.
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