lotusinthemud: what's at the centre of your life?

Notes by Prasada Caroline Brazier, Buddhist Psychology teacher, author and founder member of the Amida Order, for a talk to young people:

These are some preparatory notes I have made for Los Angeles 2 Feb 2010. I may or may not use these themes, but they help me warm up to possible topics.

What do you put at the centre of your life?

When I was in my teens, my friend Janet and I used to walk home from school together. It took about half an hour, and on the way we used to talk about life and about how we made sense of things. We'd talk about how we got on with other girls in our class. We talked about how we often found ourselves feeling unconfident in comparison with how we saw others to be. In particular we noticed that it was difficult to hold onto our own views when we talked to other people. What we noticed was that whenever we talked to someone else, even if their views were radically different from our own,we frequently felt persuaded by their logic and lost sight of our original reasoning. In fact whatever the other person said seemed to make sense if they were sincere about what they were saying. As a result, we both felt we didn't have much control over what we thought. We felt we were too easily influenced.

Perhaps we were particularly suggestible, but I think in fact most of us, if we are willing to listen to others, and understand where they are coming from, will be likely to start to see things through the other person's eyes. The more we associate with another person or group, the more we become like them in thought. Of course for teenagers this is particularly pronounced, as views are still forming, but it is true for all of us to a degree. In fact, as we get older and gain more control over our circumstances we tend to circumvent to process by choosing to be with people of similar views.

When Janet and I talked about this problem, we realised that there was one solution. We couldn't control the way that we were influenced by others, but we could make sure we chose to be influenced by people of whom we basically thought well of. We called this theory the Bates-Milbank theory of influence. (My surname then was Bates, hers Milbank). Choosing your mind state can be harder than choosing whom you associate with

In fact our theory was not so different from Buddhist ideas of mental formation. First of all, Buddhism talks in terms of conditioning. The mind is conditioned by what it gives attention to. We listen to something, watch something, do something, and that puts us into a certain mind state. So when you look at a film, if it is a romantic film it might make you feel warm hearted or sexy, if you look at an adventure, you may feel energised and excited. If you watch a comedy you might feel relaxed and perhaps a bit silly. People are often concerned that too many violent films make people violent. Of course none of these instances is the whole story. In reality our reactions are conditioned by other factors as well. Just as I am sure Janet and I would not, in fact, have taken up shop-lifting or drugs just because someone told us it was a good idea. We weren't that stupid. But at the same time we do all absorb and incorporate things from those we meet and things we are exposed to without even realising it. People who watch a lot of violence on film or television do become immune to it, at least to a degree.

The Buddha taught about the power of influences of this kind. He advised people to be careful about the company they kept. He talked of kalyana mitra; of the spiritual friend. A spiritual friend is someone who provides a good influence in your life. He or she supports you and influences you in positive directions. Hopefully the friendship is mutual. It is not a friendship that is always easy. A kalyana mitra is not a push-over and will tell you when you are out of line. But hopefully you will bring out the best in each other, supporting each other to be the best you can and working together to understand more deeply what it means to live well. I guess Janet and I were kalyana mitras though we didn't use the word at the time.

What we put at the centre of our lives then is vitally important. Since we are so easily influenced, it is important that we make sure that the relationships and ideas that we surround ourselves with are wholesome. The power of influence means that our minds are not under our own control but are conditioned by what we give attention to. This is why having a spiritual practice is so important. It helps us to put a good influence at the centre of our lives. This is why Amida Buddha is put at the centre for Pureland Buddhists through our nembutsu practice. By focusing our energy and attention on Amida we allow Amida's influence to permeate our lives, gradually transforming them. It is a bit like putting ourselves in the field f a powerful magnet. We gradually become magnetised oursselves under the influence of its powerful field.

Whilst when we talk about Amida Buddha, we may recall teachings we have received from the sutras and from ministers and teachers, discovering Amida's influence is a very personal thing. We need to find our own meaning in the nembutsu path, or more specifically, we need to let Amida Buddha find us. What does this mean? Amida Buddha is called Amida which means without measure. The love which Amida pours into the world is something which we as ordinary beings cannot fully understand. Our minds are too small. Discovering what Amida really is for you is a life journey. It is a journey that involves putting Amida in a central place in your life and seeing how your life is affected, how you become magnetised.

Whilst talking about Amida Buddha may help us understand the vastness of the love and compassion in the universe, we can glimpse that same love in our ordinary everyday interactions with others, albeit in smaller quantities. Meeting others we are taken out of our small world and, if we create good friendships which give us the sort of spiritual care we have been talking about, those meetings give us a taste of the bigger love. We learn to be more open, more caring and more tuned in to others needs, and in doing so we tap into a far bigger source of love than either of us imagined.

I would like to talk to you a little about the we way that we practice Buddhism in my group, which is called Amida Trust. In Amida Trust we have many members who are interested in the sort of questions I have been talking about. In particular though we are interested in finding ways to put good things at the centres of our lives and the lives of others. Our group was started in 1996 and one of the things which motivated us was a sense that Buddhism talked a lot about compassion and so we wanted to find practical ways to express compassion through various social projects.

What we soon learned, though, was that helping others is a far more complicated business than you might think. If you set out to help, there is often a chance that things do not turn out the way you intend. It is easy when helping to get too caught up in 'being the helper' and not concerned enough with the real people you are helping. Its a nice idea, but it can easily become just another way of feeling important. So we thought about what we are doing and realised that actually the best situations we were involved in were not really those where we went out and delivered a service, but rather one in which we went out to meet people, who often happened to live in difficult circumstances, and get to know them; a situation where we became spiritual friends.

From this understanding we developed what we call the friendship model of helping. We meet others without necessarily knowing what we can do for them. We talk and build a relationship. We even create community with them. As we do so, practical possibilities become apparent. We realise that there are things we can do for one another. Usually the feeling is mutual. Even when it doesn't seem to be, perhaps because the people we are befriending are much poorer than ourselves, the reality is that we both gain from the relationship. Our friends' gains may be practical but ours are often understanding, kindness and inspiration.

We go into this sort of work with an open mind, willing to be surprised but also to be of use in the situation. We want to be Amida's hands and feet if this does not sound too grandiose. Our understanding develops through a process in which we act, then reflect. After we have been active in the field we come together to share our experiences and reflect on the events which have unfolded and our feelings and impressions that emerged from them. Finally we move into a learning phase in which we discuss what we have understood as a result of the work and draw any conclusions about how to proceed or about generalities which arise from it.

This sort of socially engaged work can provide a journey to faith and to Amida. Through meeting others and experiencing the depth of love that emerges, we grow in our understanding of Amida's love. More than this though, we become increasingly aware of how much we receive which is completely unexpected and unasked for. We become more appreciative. We appreciate the generosity of others who often have little. We appreciate the privileges which we have. We appreciate the warmth of human connection. We appreciate the way things often work out quite miraculously. So, in helping others we develop a sense of the grace which allows us to live life fully. We become fully alive. When we practice in this way, our work becomes nembutsu. It becomes a way in which we reach out to Amida. It becomes a way in which we show our gratitude.

When we do socially engaged work with this attitude, we no longer need to be the expert or the perfect provider. We meet people on a more egalitarian level and reach out in simple human concern. This means that we are offering friendship from a position of equality. If the other person is in trouble, we know we have been in trouble in the past. If they are struggling to make ends meet and are bending the rules a bit, we know how it might feel to be in that position because we have reflected on our own tendency to cover up and not be truthful. In Pureland we talk about our ordinary, bombu nature. Recognising this bombu nature provides a platform from which we can reach out. When we get involved with disadvantaged people we may find all sorts of things are going on which, if we took a strong moralistic position we might want to condemn. Perhaps someone has travelled on false papers because they are a refugee. Perhaps they have given bribes or even accepted them because it is the only way to get on in their culture. Perhaps they have stolen or given sexual favours to get food for their family. Perhaps they have got involved in killing during a time of war. From the position of bombu, although we may never have been forced to act in these ways, we know that, if positions had been reversed, we might have done. We feel grateful that it has never been necessary for us to do so.

As we involve ourselves with others in these ways, we find ourselves again and again touched by the way that events can unfold. Moments of human warmth affect us deeply. Miraculous synchronicities occur and surprise us. We observe courage and fortitude in the most difficult circumstances and growth in the most unexpected places. All of these support our faith. We come to trust others, to trust the life process and to trust Amida.

Pureland Buddhism offers us a path which is based on putting the influence of Amida Buddha at the centre of our lives. In taking this path, we allow our ordinary, unenlightened, and sometimes stupid, minds to be influenced by the best that is available in the universe. In our ordinary human state, we open ourselves to the love that is unconditional, the positive energy which is always available to us if we just open up to it. In our silly, easily influenced state, this is the best we can do. We can let Amida do the rest.