People beginning to practice Nichiren Buddhism generally start by chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo (also known as "daimoku") for a few minutes, morning and evening if possible.
Buddhism is practical, and beginners are often encouraged to try chanting for a certain period of time, to get a feel for the practice and see what changes they notice, such as increased hope or energy, or improved relations with others. It is helpful to have support from a friend, or a local SGI group, in order to find answers to questions that arise.
How long to chant for is a matter of personal choice. When people first start to practice often they begin by chanting for 5 or 10 minutes at a time. The most important thing is to try to make this a regular part of one's daily routine, if possible, morning and evening. Continuing is a constant challenge but one that reaps positive rewards. Often when facing obstacles, people will chant in a fully focused way in order to see themselves and their situation clearly.
Chanting has been likened to charging a battery, so the more highly charged it is, the more energy one has to expend. It is important to remember however that chanting is not magic. It fills us with hope, strength and energy so that we can take the right action to resolve our problems. It is natural to chant for people we know who are suffering from illness or other problems in life.
Study and SGI Meetings
Lisa Hollis
Daily study is also vital to getting the most out of one's Buddhist practice. The study material available on this website provides a good beginning. People starting to practice are encouraged to join local SGI meetings in order to ask questions and receive support and encouragement from others who have more experience of applying Buddhism to the challenges of daily life.
The SGI Directory provides lists of national level websites from which local contacts can be established, as well as a list of SGI centers around the world which can be visited.
SGI President Daisaku Ikeda on chanting daimoku:
"Being human, it's quite natural for our minds to wander, for all sorts of thoughts and memories to surface. [. . .] There is no set form or pattern for how we should pray. Buddhism emphasizes being natural. Therefore, simply chant earnestly without pretense or artifice, just as you are. In time, as your faith develops, you'll naturally find it easier to focus your mind when you chant.
"It's natural for prayers to center on your own desires and dreams. [. . .] By chanting very naturally, without affectation or reservation, for what you seek most of all, you'll gradually come to develop a higher and more expansive life-condition. Of course, it's perfectly fine as well to chant with the resolve to become a bigger-hearted person or for the welfare of your friends and for kosen-rufu-the happiness and flourishing of all humankind."
ATTACHENTS AND LIBERATION
"It is impossible to live in the world without attachments, or indeed to eradicate them. Our affections for others, the desire to succeed in our endeavors, our interests and passions, our love of life itself--all of these are attachments and potential sources of disappointment or suffering, but they are the substance of our humanity and the elements of engaged and fulfilled lives.
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Buddhism is a teaching of liberation, aimed at freeing people from the inevitable sufferings of life. To this end, early Buddhist teachings focused on the impermanence of all things. The Buddha realized that nothing in this world stays the same; everything is in a constant state of change. Pleasurable conditions, favorable circumstances, our relationships with those we hold dear, our health and well-being--any sense of comfort and security we derive from these things is continually threatened by life's flux and uncertainty, and ultimately by death, the most profound change of all.
The Buddha saw that people's ignorance of the nature of change was the cause of suffering. We desire to hold on to what we value, and we suffer when life's inevitable process of change separates us from those things. Liberation from suffering comes, he taught, when we are able to sever our attachments to the transient things of this world.
Buddhist practice, in this perspective, is oriented away from the world: life is suffering, the world is a place of uncertainty; liberation lies in freeing oneself from attachment to worldly things and concerns, attaining a transcendent enlightenment.
The Lotus Sutra, upon which Nichiren Buddhism is based, is revolutionary in that it reverses this orientation, overturning the basic premises of the Buddha's earlier teachings and focusing people's attention instead on the infinite possibilities of life and the joy of living in the world.
Where other teachings had regarded enlightenment, or the final liberation of Buddhahood, as a goal to be attained at some future point in time, in the teachings of the Lotus Sutra each person is inherently and originally a Buddha. Through Buddhist practice we develop our enlightened qualities and exercise them in the world here and now for the sake of others and for the purpose of positively transforming society. The true nature of our lives at this moment is one of expansive freedom and possibility.
This dramatic reorientation effected by the Lotus Sutra is distilled in the key and seemingly paradoxical concepts of Nichiren Buddhism that "earthly desires are enlightenment" and "the sufferings of birth and death are nirvana." The image of the pure lotus flower blossoming in the muddy swamp is a metaphor that encapsulates this perspective--freedom, liberation, enlightenment are forged and expressed in the very midst of the murky swamp of life with its problems, pains and contradictions.
It is impossible to live in the world without attachments, or indeed to eradicate them. Our affections for others, the desire to succeed in our endeavors, our interests and passions, our love of life itself--all of these are attachments and potential sources of disappointment or suffering, but they are the substance of our humanity and the elements of engaged and fulfilled lives.
The challenge is not to rid oneself of attachments but, in the words of Nichiren, to become enlightened concerning them. The teachings of Nichiren thus stress the transformation, rather than the elimination, of desire. Desires and attachments fuel the quest for enlightenment. As he wrote: "Now Nichiren and others who chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo . . . burn the firewood of earthly desires and behold the fire of enlightened wisdom..."
In their proper perspective--when we can see them clearly and master them rather than being mastered by them--desires and attachments enable us to lead interesting and significant lives. As SGI President Daisaku Ikeda says, "Our Buddhist practice enables us to discern their true nature and utilize them as the driving force to become happy."
It is our small ego, our "lesser self," that makes us slaves to our desires and causes us to suffer. Buddhist practice enables us to break out of the shell of our lesser self and awaken to the "greater self" of our inherent Buddha nature.
This expanded sense of self is based on a clear awareness of the interconnected fabric of life which we are part of and which sustains us. When awakened to the reality of our relatedness to all life, we can overcome the fear of change and experience the deeper continuities beyond and beneath the ceaseless flow of change.
The basic character of our greater self is compassion. Ultimate freedom is experienced when we develop the ability to channel the full energy of our attachments into compassionate concern and action on behalf of others.
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