The Essence of Seicho-No-Ie
The Secret of the True Image and Phenomenon
As parents, we encounter many different problems in this journey we call life. These
problems may be crises of health, finances, or relationships, or the gradual buildup of
anxiety or stress. We seek relief from our distress for the calm of inner peace. In
Seicho-No-Ie there are answers, and they all begin with the central awareness of the true
nature of life. Behind all the events of our daily lives is the awareness that what we see
in the everyday or phenomenal world is a construct of our mind and is just an appearance.
It does not really exist. You may want to stop me right here and object. Common sense
wisdom is based on the evidence of the five senses. We say something exists if we can see
it with our eyes and touch it with our hands. We say that because it has the substance of
matter, it is real. If not, it is always suspect: could it have really happened, if we
didn't see it or touch it?
We are conditioned by a view of the world based on certain ideas that modern physics
has found are no longer true. Where once we thought the world was known, predictable,
solid and dependable like a clock, we are discovering that it is much more malleable than
we believed and that it is influenced by our thoughts. At the smallest level of matter,
atoms with their electrons and nuclei were thought to be the building blocks of
everything. High-energy physics has found more than two hundred particles that make up the
atom. It seems that as you delve further and further into the atom, ultimately there is
nothing there. We cannot stand outside nature and observe what is happening. The very fact
that we are looking is influencing the result. We are participants in all that is. There
is something behind all that we see. There is an intelligence, an energy that animates all
things. We can call this God.
In Seicho-No-Ie we say that the only real existence is God, or we describe this as the
True Image, the real existence. This True Image cannot be seen by the eyes or touched with
the hand but this does not mean it is not there. When we understand that behind all things
is the True Image, our essence, our essential being which is of God, indeed, that we are
children of God, then miracles can occur. This is true for all of us, even the juvenile
delinquent who has committed a crime. When we see his True Image with the eyes of our mind
and worship him with our soul, his inner perfection will appear. This is not a common
sense explanation but it can be perceived by the spiritual sense. When the power of our
spiritual sense is applied, and the delusion that he is a juvenile delinquent is pierced,
the transformation occurs and the child of God emerges. This is the power of the
Seicho-No-Ie teachings. When we clear our mind of the illusion of appearances, people
become as they truly are, as seen from the very depths of our spiritual heart and soul.
The same may be said of disease. In our essence, our True Image, child of God self, we
are perfect and harmonious beings. Disease then, too, is an appearance, a cloud that has
covered the radiance of our inner being. When we realize that disease is an illusion which
has appeared because we have forgotten our true selves, it, too, will disappear. Dr.
Taniguchi teaches us as follows:
The real self that is the child of God, Buddha nature, or the Truth this alone is real.
The false self, the self which is sick, the self with a bad personality and character is a
product of delusion no matter how real it may seem to be, for it is something that has
been conjured up by the mind and projected on the screen of daily life. The result is like
a mirage or a projected image in the sky. It does not exist. If we wish to realize the
perfect life as a true child of God, . . . we have to keep casting aside the old false
self day by day . . .
Like peeling an onion layer by layer, we peel off the skin of the false self and cast
it aside day after day, perhaps hour after hour. If we do this, eventually nothing remains
but the True Image, which is as free as the empty sky. People can hardly be expected to
reach this stage all at once. But if the skin of delusion is peeled off, and we begin to
awaken so that we are at least halfway to the True Image, the frame of mind which is
attained is reflected in circumstances and on the body, and our daily lives become
extremely good. There may be some people who think that religion saves only our souls but
does not help our daily lives. But our daily life is controlled by the mind; therefore, a
religion that cannot heal our daily life cannot be called a living religion. Since the
form is a shadow of the mind, a religion that is able to truly heal the mind must be able
to heal the problems of daily life whether they are of disease or of circumstances.
From our experience, diseases are easy to heal even if they are fairly serious
diseases, but personality and character defects are somewhat more difficult to heal. Human
beings generally have the awareness that a diseased condition is not their true nature,
and that they were at one time healthy persons. On top of that, people usually have a
burning desire to heal their disease. This awareness and burning desire are a great aid in
effecting a healing.
When we bring this awareness into our relationship with our children, we recognize that
the occasional circumstance that arises that is unpleasant is just an appearance it is not
the true existence. It is an opportunity to reflect upon ourselves and discover what is
lacking in our relationship that has allowed this appearance to arise. When we clear our
mind and see with the heart, only love, joy and harmony are truly there.
By Bruce Mallery
