Kaspalita contrasts Western ideas of progress with Pure Land Buddhist teachings, arguing that the Nembutsu offers acceptance by the Buddha regardless of failure or broken vows. Gratitude becomes a remedy for despair when progress stops mattering.
Namaste. So I was thinking a little bit about failure or defeat this morning, and I moved back then so I could get a better view of everybody, and everyone else moved back. Yeah, I was thinking a little bit about about failure and defeat this morning, and about what brings us out of that experience. And I think for lots of people it is feeling like they're part of a bigger story. So having a sense that there is a project or a narrative that's greater than you, that means you get out of the gutter and take the next step. Forward. So for some people, that might be their family. They think, actually, I need to progress for the sake of my children. Or for some people, it's their work. I really want to produce a good paper for the conference, and even though everything's a mess now, I'm just going to start again in the morning. If you feel like there's something that you get your meaning from that's bigger than yourself, that can be enough to pull you out of that position of defeat or failure. And even in Buddhism, you know, we have the sense of hooking into a bigger story of being part of the work of the Buddha in creating pure lands, in spreading the Dharma, in compassionate for the sake of all beings. You know, in the Bodhisattva vows, we recited, "Innumerable are sentient beings, I vow to save them all." That's a bigger story. That's something that you can get up in the morning for, even if yesterday didn't go so well. But sometimes that's not enough, because actually you fail again and again, because there's something you can't work out, or the circumstances are too difficult, and even having a bigger story isn't enough to make you feel feel better about the work you're engaged in. It isn't enough to get you out of bed in the morning. And this is the real wisdom of Pure Land Buddhism. This is what Pure Land Buddhism offers that's distinct, perhaps, to other forms of Buddhism. It's that sense that even when the failure is too difficult, and even when you can't hook into a bigger story, even when you can't decide, "Right, today I'm really going to practice the Bodhisattva vows," you're still loved. We're so used to the idea of progress in the West, partly to do with the ideas around, you know, what's called the Enlightenment that happened in the Renaissance times when suddenly people really got interested in science and the idea that if you put technology in place, then things are going to get better for everybody. And then, you know, even in the '50s there were all these newspaper reports about how everybody was going to work less, robots were going to become our servants, and we were going to fly to the moon, and everything was just going to be nice and easy. And that's the idea that we can sort of saved by progress or by technology. And despite the experience that that isn't true, it's very hard not to think, 'Oh, but if I just try harder, if I just do X, if I just get this technique, if I just get that piece of,' you know, whatever it is, 'then I'll be back on track.' We put it down to a sort of a failure of us to engage with the technique somehow, rather than a failure of the idea of progress as a saving grace. Pure Land Buddhism is a game changer. It says you don't need to worry about progress. You know, I guess part of the desperation around wanting to do better comes out of insecurity, an idea that things aren't okay, that we are not okay just as we are. And what Pure Land Buddhism says is despite the suffering in the world, despite the sort of traumas in your own life, you are okay just as you are. You are lovable just as you are. There is something somewhere that can embrace and envelop you without you needing to do anything. You don't need to progress to get to the Pure Land. How far you've progressed might make a difference to, you know, whether your lotus flower's open or closed once you get there, but you do get there. You are still loved regardless of how well you keep the bodhisattva vows, regardless of whether you manage to get out of bed in the morning. And of course, paradoxically, that does often lead to progress. And the danger there is that we suddenly, you know, we get a bit of progress and then actually we just think, "Oh, I've got the technique now," and then we just slip back into the old way of thinking. So it is a sort of revolution, it is a revolutionary way of thinking. It does take a little while to get your head around if you're used to the idea that when I put this in place, things will be okay. When I do this, when I do that, when I say the Nembutsu. You know, this is why it says in the Summary of Faith and Practice that it's not a meditation. Although, you know, as Dogen says, meditation practiced in the right way is in the same spirit of Nembutsu practice in the right way. It's not for anything. Just to be grateful that we are loved is enough. Everything else is gravy, to quote Raymond Carver. And if it gets in the way, as I said a couple of weeks ago, if everything else gets in the way of being grateful for being loved by the Buddha, then, you know, just pause and remember what the Nembutsu is really about. Connect with the Buddha before anything else. Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
