Recently, I met a wonderful person whose name is Ludmilla.
Ludmilla is a fellow boddhisattva who lives in The Netherlands.

In the course of our correspondence, Ludmilla has shared with me some fun information, jokes, cartoons, etc.
and because I so enjoy this material I want to share it with you, the viewers of my web pages.

Ludmilla and I hope that you enjoy it too.

The Daimoku Parrot

A guy walks into the pet shop to buy a parrot.
The shopkeeper shows him three parrots -
a one thousand dollar parrot, a two thousand dollar parrot, and a three thousand dollar parrot.
The guy asks, "What is the difference?"
The shopkeeper says, "The one thousand dollar parrot speaks English.
The two thousand dollar parrot speaks eight languages.
The three thousand dollar parrot mumbles something and when he does, you get whatever you want."

The guy buys the most expensive parrot.
He takes him home and removes the cage cover.
The bird starts saying "Myohorengekyo nam-myohorengekyo nam-myohorengekyo..."
An hour later, the guy's girlfriend calls and says "Honey, I miss you. How soon can we get together?"
Two hours later, his boss calls and says, "We are sorry we fired you.
We will give you a raise if you can come back Monday."

Eight hours later, the parrot is still chanting,
so the guy calls the pet store and says "This bird is driving me nuts.
How do I get him to stop saying these words?"
The shopkeeper says "Oh! I forgot to tell you. You gotta ring the bell three times."

So the guy finds the bell and the ringer in the cage and sounds: "Ding, ding, ding."
The parrot slows to a finish with "Myo...ho...renge...kyo."
Then he starts again: "Niji sesson ju san mai..." etc.

A Western Buddhist woman was In india, studying with her teacher.
She was riding with another woman friend in a rickshaw-like carriage,
when they were attacked by a man on the street.

In the end, the attacker only succeeded in frightening the women,
but the Buddhist woman was quite upset by the event and told her teacher so.
She asked him what she should have done - what would have been the appropriate, Buddhist response.

The teacher said very simply,
"You should have very mindfully and with great compassion whacked the attacker over the head with your umbrella."

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Nam-myoho-renge-kyo

Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is a chant or mantra.
A mantra is a powerful phrase that is said with a certain concentration or intent.
A mantra has meaning in and of itself, but the intention or concentration of the person who says it can make a big difference in the effect of the chant.

For example: Have you ever dated someone for a while and you were pretty sure that he or she loved you, and you loved that person too, but you hadn't told each other yet?
You know that feeling? When you say, "I love you," it has the power to change your life in ways you probably can't imagine.
A mantra is like that. When you say it, it can fundamentally change your life.

Some people use "love" very casually. They say "I love this," or "I love it," or "Love ya."
It doesn't have the same weight as when a person considers his or her feelings very seriously before saying "I love you."
Usually, the mantra Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is said over and over again.
Maybe it would sound kind of crazy to chant "I love you I love you I love you" a thousand times a day.

It's not so crazy -- actually it's pretty common these days -- to hear cuss words out of someone's mouth a thousand times a day.
Sometimes, people repeat insults and complaints as if they are mantras.
So, "chants" of one type or another are a part of everyday life.

Have you ever noticed that if you hang out with people who cuss a lot or use a certain phrase, after a while you end up using the same language?
Sometimes it's really hard to break yourself of the habit. This is an unfortunate example of how a phrase can be engraved on a person's consciousness.

It's probably better to get in the habit of saying a phrase that has a more uplifting influence, such as
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
Why chant the same phrase over and over?
Chanters repeat the mantra Nam-myoho-renge-kyo because, as mentioned, repetition engraves it in their consciousness (and their unconscious too.)
Since Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is such a great mantra, you might think that chanting it once or chanting it a thousand times would have the same effect.
Well, not necessarily. If you can say "Nam-myoho-renge-kyo" one time, but say it with profound faith, intention, concentration -- whatever you want to call it -- that one utterance packs a mighty wallop.
But most of us are not at a place in our "spiritual development" where we can summon up such profound faith at any given moment.

When we chant, with each repetition of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, we are rooting ourselves deeper in faith and deeper in the spiritual tradition of the Lotus Sutra.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is the heart and title of the Lotus Sutra. The Lotus Sutra teaches the enlightenment of all living beings. The Lotus Sutra's essence (Nam-myoho-renge-kyo) is the teacher of all Buddhas, past, present and future.
When we chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo we are strengthening our connection to and learning from the teacher of all Buddhas.

A very cool thing is that this great Buddha wisdom lives in each and every person.
It is the essence of life itself. So we are not chanting to some god or imaginary power. We are chanting the name of our innate wisdom, compassion, courage and energy. We are calling it up. We are engraving it on our heart. We are becoming more and more in tune with it.

But why this mantra? In many religious traditions, reciting a mantra is a well-established spiritual practice that has beneficial effects.
There are lots of other mantras aside from Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. "Om mani padme hum" is a famous mantra, for example. Maybe "Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..." also qualifies as a mantra.
Mantras are different in that they have different meanings and create different vibrations.

People have been chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo for centuries and there are lots of ways to explain it. While not everyone agrees on why it works, most chanters agree that it is a worthwhile devotional practice.
The best way to understand it is to chant and see for yourself.

Recently, I became aware of the author of the wonderful piece above. Her name is Lisa Jones. You might want to visit her web site to view more of her enlightened work regarding the wonderful practice of Nichiren Daishonin's Buddhism.
BuddhaJones.com

Chanting

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