I met Nichiren Buddhism in 1972 when I started going out with a pretty girl called Sharon who was already practising it, and I started chanting in April 1973. I received my Gohonzon in November that year. I was 24 years old at the time and a postgraduate student.

If anyone would have told me then that I would go on to achieve all the things I have, I wouldn’t have believed them! In my forty-seven years of Buddhist practice, I have been able to discover new levels of confidence and happiness.

I graduated with a teaching qualification and began teaching, and Sharon and I got married.

My first year of teaching was very challenging. I was full of doubt about my ability and capabilities. Difficult and challenging kids and colleagues could sometimes make the job hellish to the point I believed I had made a mistake in career choice. I was encouraged by my fellow members in SGI-UK to chant with determination.

By the end of the year, I had turned things around. I felt more confident, and was making real progress with my pupils. I went on to have a fulfilling career for more than forty years before I retired.

When Sharon became pregnant with our first child in 1976, we were told by the doctor that the embryo was lodged in the fallopian tube, making it an ectopic pregnancy, and was highly likely not to survive.

We chanted with strong and clear determination and absolutely did our best to change this situation, despite the prognosis. We chanted in the manner that Nichiren Daishonin describes in his writings: ‘…as earnestly as though to produce fire from damp wood, or to obtain water from parched ground’.1

Remarkably our prayers were answered and the embryo moved! A very healthy Laura was born. She is now grown up and has created her own family. Years later, we had Alex without any complications.

When they were still young, we moved in to a wonderful, spacious flat with a ridiculously low rent for London! It would have been completely perfect if it hadn’t been for the grumpy man who lived in the downstairs flat. He seemed to have made it his mission to make our lives miserable and difficult. He was rude, abusive and volatile. I initially chanted for him to go away.

I harboured the doubt that this situation might be too big for my Buddhist practice to resolve. Maybe we would have to give up and move. After a bit of floundering and a lot of encouragement from my fellow Buddhists, I seriously upped the ante with my chanting and practice. As a result, for the first time, I was able to see him as a human being and a fundamentally unhappy man. This was a significant shift in my heart that my chanting helped bring about.

I came home from work one day to find him with Sharon in the hallway. He had his arm around her and my first thought was that it had turned nastier and become physical. But he was, in fact, apologising to her and wanted to show his affection. Just prior to my arrival, she had challenged his bullying and it had broken the tension. She had changed, I had changed and he had changed.

He gave me a hug, saying that he was sorry and asked if we could be friends. Sharon and I were completely surprised by this turn of events. He invited us in to his flat and made us tea, then he told us the story of his life. He was lonely, anxious and felt abandoned with no one to turn to. It was a deluge of unhappiness.

We listened and did our best to respond, and he kept saying how sorry he was. Afterwards, he insisted on coming up to our flat to look at our Gohonzon and he asked if he could chant with us so we taught him how to say Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. He left smiling and happy, and thanking us for our friendship.

Over the years that followed, I met challenging people in various guises and situations, but my experience with my neighbour pushed me to forge a much closer bond of trust with my Buddhist practice. I have been able to navigate some choppy waters and transform many relationships.

I have experienced health challenges, overcoming cancerous tumours in my bladder on two different occasions. Each occasion has enabled me to discover something new about the power of faith and practice, which sustained me and I am now in good health.

Sharon and I have faced financial challenges and won through all of them by never giving in or giving up. In 2018, she became ill and subsequently passed away in April 2021. What was thought to be initially a mobility issue with pain in one hip and leg, turned out to be an aggressive cancer. Before we knew any of this, we had booked an amazing trip to Japan and Malaysia, which we thoroughly enjoyed together.

Paul with his wife, Sharon (second right) and their friends from Malaysia.

She remained a fighter throughout her whole life, fearless and strong in heart and faith. She taught me so much. It was a privilege to practise Buddhism by her side for the forty-eight years that we were together.

My activities and the Soka family have never let me down. I have always been encouraged by my fellow members and together with SGI President Daisaku Ikeda’s guidance, which has always been a lifeline.

I have been able to choose hope over despair

If I have to distil my forty-seven years of chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo down to one thing – it would be confidence in the fact that whatever life throws at me, it would be no match for my Buddhahood. ●

References
  1. Nichiren Daishonin, ‘Rebuking Slander of the Law’ (WND-1, p. 444).