Two Success Stories – Rev. Koji Jeff Ezaki

The following is a sermon given at the Family Service at Haleiwa Jodo Mission by Rev. Koji Jeff Ezaki.

The flickering, fickle mind, difficult to guard, difficult to control, — the wise man straightens as a fletcher, an arrow.
–Dhammapada 18
((typically, he straightens it by binding it together with other arrows, or by confining it between straight guides -xp))

Today, I would like to talk about two success stories. First, I would like to speak about Konosuke Matsushita, the founder of Panasonic. Panasonic products are used all over the world. In Jpan, Matsushita is very famous for his success story. He was a very positive thinker. He insisted that the reason why he succeeded in the business was that he was growing up, he was uneducated, in poor health, and lived in poverty. He said that because he was not educated, he asked everybody humbly and improved. He had a weak body, and he got sick often when he was a little childso he took care of his health condition, not smoking and not drinking in his life. Because his family was poor, he worked diligently to earn money. Usually, people regard these three: uneducated, poor health and poverty as negatives. He, however, changed his perspective and took them as positives.

An example happened when he traveled by ship for a business meeting. when he got off the ship at the harbor, someone pushed him, perhaps because someone was in a rush, and he fell into the water. His secretary and staff members of the company were surprized to see their president fall into the water. They were angry and yelled at the person who pushed Matsushita. Matsushita was pulled out of the water, soothed his members, and said, “I’m lucky because it is a hot summer. My clothes will be dry soon.” But his staff couldn’t calm down, and were still mad. He added, “Even though you are angry, the fact that I fell into the water never changed. Stop being mad and lets go to the client. Otherwise we will be late.” It is said that Matsushita always faced everything that happened to him positively and to his advantage.

Another successor ((This is a mistranslation. The nearest English root we have for the meaning is “winner,” or perhaps in this context the Sanscrit [jina] meaning “victor” would be better. You could write something like “prevailor” and it would be intelligible, while only sounding wierd. “Successor” has another meaning. It means the next person in line, as in “Bush was Clinton’s successor in the presidency.” -xp)). is Thomas Edison who invented the filament of the lamp. Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent prespiration” was his famous saying. Filament is a very important part for the bulbs. Electricity passes through the filament and the bulb lights up. Edison tried to find the kind of material that was good for the filament and tested about 5,000 possible materials. Then, when he had tested 2,000 materials, his wife said, “You should give up because you failed 2,000 times.” Edison, however, answered, “No way. I found 2,000 kinds of unusable materials for the filament. Only 3,000 materials left. I fill find it soon.” The 2,000 tests that failed, were all successes for him. Later he found a material that kept the light on for 40 hours, but his goal was to keep the bulb on longer. He tried and tested another 6,000 materials and finally found the perfect material for the filament. That was bamboo from Kyoto, Japan. He persevered!

((It’s important, I feel, to differentiate between perseverence and blind stubbornness, aka primordial ignorance [avidya]. Edison was persevering on the basis of real insight about the nature of electricity. He also understood the electrical qualities of what he was looking for. That’s quite different from someone who sleeps with 300 women, for example, because his basic belief is that if he finds the “right one,” he will become Enlightened, or at least be happy. This is a hopeless search, because he has misunderstood the nature of his motivation. –xp))

These two people accepted whatever happened to them positively. We always try to consider things that happened from our own viewpoint. We decide if it’s good or not from our perspective. President Matsushita’s staff got angry when their president was pushed and fell into the water. But Matsushita focused on the sunny nice day, the present moment,not what happened in the past. Edison was the same. He concentrated in what he was doing presently and excited about his future invention, not what he did in the past.

In our daily lives, we make many decisions. Like Edison, we may choose to do it or give up. If he gave up testing, he may have never achieved success. In his mind, however, there were no words “give up” or “fail.” Also he could have regarded his 2,000 tests successes or failures. However, he chose success by himself. In Matsushita’s example, he could have chosen success or not. It was also his decision. There were two choices: to be angry or not, and he chose not to be angry. His mind focused only on happiness. According to these stories, I can say that by changing our view points, our lives will be better.

Even though there are uncomfortable or negative things happening to you in your life, you make decisions that you feel are right for you. How we feel towards an event happening around us is not the event itself, but how we accept the event. This means you can choose success or failure, and happiness or unhappiness by yourself. These two “successors” chose “success” by themselves. Like the passage says, it is difficult to control our mind because our emotion is moved by the things that happened around us. But the true “successor’s” mind is stable.* Stable, that is why they succeeded. When you face choices, focus on your mind positively, chose the right side, then, you will find success. I hope everybody selects success in his life and walks the right path.

*stable – My Fo Guang Shan dharma name, Xing Ping [性平］literally means “stability” in the Chinese root. That’s why I call the person who gave it to me, Yi Jiao, then the Abbess of Fo Guang Shan Honolulu, a spiritual genius. Naturally, you do not give such a name, as a working Bodhisattva, to a person who already demonstrates that quality. The name is for the person’s Path, not their presenting reality.

Something else that should be understood with respect to the above discourse, I feel, is that Japanese Buddhism in general undervalues what the Chinese call merit. Ditto Neurolinguistic Programming, which is this individual’s psychological training. Merit is a whole other book that I’m not ready to write, but suffice it to assert, please, that where merit basically comes from is helping others, and it is merit that allows us to be stable. That is, a straightforward attempt to be stable, in and of itself, does not ordinarily produce that quality. We’ve all seen this. It breaks down. The person reacts and reverts. To have enough space inside your mind to stop doing this, you have to give to others. Then they can’t “make” you unstable anymore.

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping