Years ago I spent a moment with the Amway people. They seemed harmless enough, though their products were expensive, and their pyramids unstable, the principles of positive thinking and posibility thinking were principles that were resonating with me at the time and which it took me a while to internalize in my own way. I kind of sucked at Amway. Anyway, even though I sucked at it, I learned a lot from the group. One thing I learned is that it is not enough to talk about positive thinking. You have to apply the buddhist principle of thought, word and deed. At the time I thought that the combination of chanting daimoku and Amway would make me rich. It wasn't to be that easy.
The basic principle here was "what you can conceive, if you can believe, you can make real." This principle is behind religion, behind any kind of successeful effort, and the difference between success and failure. When Nichiren Daishonin (the founder of Nichiren Buddhism) is depicted talking about Buddhism being about "victory and defeat" he is talking about this ability to envision a correct outcome and make it a real outcome. Victory doesn't always mean killing or destroying an enemy. Sometimes it is something far more powerful. It is about conceiving productive, producible, "realistic" dreams, and then making them reality.
When people start chanting in Nichiren Buddhism a seed is planted. This seed is the possibility that "hey I can succeed at something." What is that something? That something is the notion that "hey I can be happy!" If people can conceive it, and believe it, then it can become real. However, where the mistake is is in the notion that some magician is going to wave a wand and a magic city will appear for them. Actually the magician waves his wand, and the people believing in the city to be built come and build the city. To make something real one has to build a foundation, walls, roof, etceteras... All that is very real work. It is not easy and it is easy to tear down. The magic didn't come from the magician after all, it came from the architects, engineers, technicians and laborers who travelled with him and built a magical city with the labor of their backs.
If we are the architects of our own lives, then we don't have to build the things that others tell us we have to build and live in. The same effort that constructs a prison constructs a warehouse or a box-store. The same creativity that goes into designing a Predator drone can build wonderful little toys that teach little kids to do wonderful things. Human life is change-able -- and that is a good thing. All things die, but in giving their lives creatively they ensure that life can be a joyous and beautiful thing. This is the "value creation" that Makiguchi used to talk about. It is the creative life that American Philosophical Architects like Dewey talked about. There is no need to accept a dark and ugly vision when a bright and shiny alternative is available.
That is why lately I've been seeking to 'redeem' the religions of my childhood and have been studying once again the Judeo-Christian heritage. It is posible to redeem these myths and beliefs from the people who claim to own them. We redeem these things by acquiring them back. We reclaim religion and politics and say "What you are saying is a lie" to the false architects, the funeral directors and executioners who claim to own them now. We talk truth to power in the way that the little girl Pollyanna does -- with sincerity and appreciation. Everyone has a Buddha nature. This means that the local preacher, minister, and Rabbi can be redeemed too. They don't have to be stuck in dark dreams with dark fears controlling their every move.
Some of them understand this instinctively. How many Christian preachers preach the talk of Positive thinking, Amway and American Exceptionalism? What they are missing is the connecting concept of realism. America is only exceptional if it is built that way. A person has to build his "line" one rock at a time. It is not enough to talk about how exceptional America is. This talk is important. One has to both "talk the talk" and "walk the walk" however to make it reality. Those who do this are indeed exceptional.
Chris
Posted by cholte at July 20, 2006 09:03 PM