Today we are going to look at ways we might be veering off the path of faith and become deadlocked in trying to achieve a goal. For the purposes of discussion lets look at this topic by using the goal of resolving a difficult relationship.
Are You Blaming Another Person?
One of the signs that we are veering off the path is when we are chanting but blaming other people or our environment for the situation. In effect we are saying is the situation is their fault. They should change. This is particularly easy to do when dealing with a difficult relationship.. When we blame other people, we are looking outside of ourselves and avoiding the challenge of tackling our own inner darkness.
In my mid life I was married to a man who couldn’t uphold his end of supporting the family. I blamed him and tried to get him to change. Nothing happened. It was when I decided to take control of my own financial future, do something different myself, everything shifted for me. He never did change, but it didn’t matter. My reality was completely different.
Have You Forgotten Oneness of Self and Environment?
If you are trying to change others, you are forgetting the concept of oneness of self and the environment – that your current circumstances are arising from causes you made in the past and the causes you are making today will create your circumstances in the future. Dwelling on and repeatedly talking about those circumstances you don’t want is setting causes in the present for these conditions to continue in the future. Rather than chant looking at what you don’t want, chant for what you do want in this situation. For example, let’s say you are dealing with a difficult family relationship. Instead of chanting for the other person to change (looking at what you don’t want), instead chant for a harmonious family.
Do You Have Doubts and Disbelief?
Grumbling and complaining gives rise to doubts and disbelief . This means that you don’t really believe that everyone, even difficult people, have the Buddha nature. When doubts and disbelief arise, you don’t really believe the goal is possible, or that you have the power to solve it. You feel disconnected and alone.. This belief arises from fundamental darkness. It’s vital that you resolve doubts. If this behavior continues over time it can act as a brake on your growth. When we forget about doing our human revolution and advancing and improving ourselves, we have closed off our own potential and have fallen into seeking the law outside of ourselves.
Are You Praying to a Transcendental Being?
A third way of veering off the path is looking to have your prayers answered through the transcendental powers of a God or Buddha?
This would be practicing dependent faith and also looking outside of yourself in a different way. When we do this, we avoid looking at the problem, and aren’t making an effort to challenge the situation. Some other being will handle it for us.We are ignoring the fact that we have to change, if circumstances are going to be different. They change from the inside out.
These kinds of outwardly seeking, half-hearted prayer leads us to deadlock. When we look outside of ourselves in this way, our awareness that we are one with the great power of the Mystic Law within ourselves is obscured.
Look within Rather than Without
In this practice we look within to the Mystic Law, not to something outside of ourselves. Here is what Daisaku Ikeda says about the Mystic Law in Life An Enigma, a Precious Jewel.
“In the innermost depths of all beings, there is the primal life-force and it causes living beings to live. The same force supports inorganic matter and works it into the harmonies and rhythms of the great cosmic existence. In Buddhism, it is called the Mystic Law.
When this force manifests itself in the physical world, it appears as the laws governing the inorganic world, which makes possible chemical compounds and control the physical pulsations of the universe. In other words, the laws of physics, chemistry and astronomy are simply particular phenomenal manifestations of the Mystic law of the cosmos. Similarly, the life -force constructs the world of spirit, create intelligence, gives birth to conscience, gives force to urges and instincts, and thus creates all variations of mental and spiritual activity.
It is what is called God in other religions, but it is different from God in that it is perfectly immanent (within) in the cosmos and in human life. It is not a force outside the cosmos. It is the cosmos itself. “
We all have this infinite intelligence within us within our Buddha nature, and have the great power to create our lives as we wish them to be.
What are you giving your attention to, while you are chanting and during the day. Is your attention focused on the problem rather than what you want? Are you focusing on the absence of what you want? If so you are forgetting that in accordance with 3000 realms in a moment of life, what you give your attention to, grows. Give your attention to what you want, not to what you don’t want.
When faced with a challenge we must attack it with everything we’ve got, with all our energy and determination. This doesn’t mean just chanting about it but chanting, while being aware of what we are projecting to the universe, paying attention the ideas that come, and taking action on them.
In summary:
We looked at the ways we might be veering off the correct path of faith.
1. Chanting but blaming others for the situation. Looking outside of ourselves.
2. Forgetting the concept of oneness of self and the environment. The causes we made in the past have created our present and the causes we are making now will determine our future.
3. Doubts and disbelief with everyone has the Buddha nature and that you have the power to change the situation and meet your goal.
4. Praying to a transcendental God or Buddha outside of yourself.
5. Outwardly looking prayer leads to deadlock.
6. In this practice we look inward to the Mystic Law. This is called God in other religions but it is not outside ourselves but rather within us and the cosmos.
7. Then pay attention to what you are focusing on so you create what you want not what you don’t want.
8. Attack a challenge with all our might, chanting intensely and taking action.
Other URL’s
1. Faith slipped? 6 Ways to Get Back on Track https://wp.me/p3V1J9-UA
2. 8 warning signs You Are Manifesting what You don’t want https://wp.me/p3V1J9-Un
3. Know the warning Signs You Are Battling fundamental Darkness https://wp.me/p3V1J9-T8
Video Transcript download: Looking Outside Yourself
Comments:
Keep your comments coming. If you have a response for someone‘s question please post it. We can all learn from one another. I’ll see you in two weeks