Polishing Ourselves to Deserve an Ideal Soul Mate - Part 1

Polishing Ourselves to Deserve an Ideal Soul mate - Part 1
By Jeanny Chen

One of the sharpest growing pains that most human beings have to experience is the process of finding an ideal soul mate. Quite a few have found it so heart-breaking and physically exhausting that they try anything they can think of to overcome such pain. In spite of their repeated attempts, they can do nothing to prevent it lingering throughout their lives.

How can one meet the right person at the right time and mutually fall in love and cherish each other? Not really knowing how to deal with all the complicated factors, criteria, and variables of finding the good match for two unique people, even though endless frustration and torment, and struggling through countless trials & errors, leaves most people still at a loss.

To successfully find an ideal soul mate appears to be a goal that is so arduous and hard to reach it seems that the lucky people are only few out of hundreds of thousands. But however scarce the chance, it is relatively bountiful compared to the probability of encountering and embracing the Lotus Sutra. Let’s listen to what Nichiren Daishonin says about this scarce possibility:

‘Thus, encountering this sutra is as rare as the blossoming of the udumbara flower, which occurs but once in three thousand years, or the one eyed turtle finding a floating piece of sandalwood, which happens only once in innumerable, boundless kalpas.’The Daimoku of the Lotus Sutra, WND p. 143

Lo and behold! We as practitioners of Nichiren Buddhism who chant Nam-Myoho-Renge-kyo have already hit this ultimate jackpot.!!!

Nichiren Daishonin thus continues:

“The eighth volume of the Lotus Sutra of the wonderful Law states that one who accepts and upholds the mere name of the Lotus Sutra will enjoy immeasurable good fortune”

There is no question that being practitioners of the Lotus Sutra, we inherit within our lives the immeasurable , all-encompassing good fortune. As long as we make the proper causes we will be able to manifest all the fortune and enjoy it. Thus, if we apply the strategy of the Lotus Sutra into scrupulously polishing our lives, we are preparing ourselves to claim the fortune that’s due to us. Among all those kinds of fortune of finding our ideal soul mate, despite the slim chances.

In the same letter , Nichiren Daishonin also points out :

‘When the Lotus Sutra was preached and the moon of the theoretical teaching came forth, first the bodhisattvas with their two good eyes gained enlightenment, and then the cross-eyed people of the two vehicles. Next the blind eyes of ordinary people were opened Thus, with our eyes opened, the door of Buddha wisdom, the wisdom that is inherent in human life was also opened. In this case, what relationship dilemma is there that we can’t find a solution for, and what maze-like love affair is there that we can’t see the shortest way out of?

Buddhism teaches that all problems and their solutions come from within our own lives.
 

Therefore. If we have been experiencing difficulties in finding the ideal soul mate , we know that we ourselves are the ultimate sources for the answers on how to succeed in this goal.

The first thing we can do for our lives is to sculpt ourselves.

Our minimum goal is to make ourselves become lovable. The ultimate goal is to polish our lives so that we attract ideal candidates like magnets, for all kinds of premium prospects to entrust us with their hearts.

To reach those goals, before anything else, it is recommended that we launch a daimoku campaign to elevate our life state and let wisdom emerge. According to the principle of oneness of life and its environment, unless we lift ourselves from the level where we are at now, we will always be caught up in the same old troublesome environment and disturbing occurrences, which reflect our life state perfectly.

A snake mates with a snake while a human being marries another human being. A person whose basic life condition is in the World of Tranquility would not normally seek a close relationship with a person whose life state is constantly in the World of Animality or Hunger.

Regarding our ideal soul mate, we all have terms & conditions in mind. If we are humble & conservative, we would at least pursue people with a similar quality level as ourselves. Most of us tend to wish for someone who is or potentially will be loftier than us in character, ability, achievement or finance. As human beings , it is natural that we adore, cherish and admire people with higher qualities.

If we want to pursue someone of better traits as our life long companion, the surest way is to develop ourselves so that we live up to the same or higher criteria than that which we expect from our soul mate. Thus we won’t be going after someone, stretching ourselves in vain trying to catch the unreachable. In other words, we had better fix & upgrade our whole being so that we deserve the love of our ideal soul mate. To reach this goal, human revolution is the 1st key.

Are we happy and healthy mentally and physically? Are we positive, confident, active and diligent? What is our strength and what have we achieved in life that deserves others respect, admiration and embracement? Are we putting forth enough effort to bring out our potential in order to advance? Are we changing our shortcomings into good virtues with which we can adorn our lives to make them shine even brighter? Are we the kind of delightful and amiable people that even we ourselves would appreciate and long to be with?

In his writing ‘Letter to the Brothers” Nichiren Daishonin gives a very vivid explanation of the close relationship between husband and wife:

“When a husband is happy, his wife will be fulfilled. If a husband is a thief, his wife will become one too. This is not a matter of this life alone. A husband and wife are as close as a form and shadow, flowers and fruit, or roots and leaves, in every existence of life, insects eat the trees they live in, and fish drink the water in which they swim. If grasses wither, orchids grieve, if pine trees flourish, cypresses rejoice.;
WND p.501

In other words, two people stay together, share their lives or experience their combined karma together but they don’t just get together randomly. They are together based on reasons. Those who have good karma can only share their fortune with people who have the same fortune to enjoy it. Those who have deep karma will only be together with someone whose destiny at least part of it, will be equally dark and heavy. A loving and caring man won’t qualify to play the role of a husband in the life of a woman whose karma is to marry a very abusive man. Instead, he belongs to a woman who has the good karma of enjoying the sweet love of her man.

Therefore, if we are wise enough, before setting out in search of Mr. Right or Mrs. Right, we will eradicate bad karma, and create good karma first. In this way, we become persons of better fortune. It will save us from struggling through much unwanted and avoidable suffering.