Tag: faith

Movie Review: Amour

A few days ago, I watched a movie with my family called Amour. I had checked it out at the library a few months ago, but never got around to watching it. I finally decided I wanted to watch the movie. The movie took a while to get into, to be honest, and I had to get up and take multiple bathroom breaks (mostly because I woke up at an early hour and didn’t get much sleep) but I think by the end it became pretty suspenseful and I got more into it. If you haven’t seen the movie, it is about an elderly music teacher named Anne who suffers from a stroke and her husband, Georges, has to take care of her. Over the course of the time Georges is taking care of her, Anne’s declining health takes a toll on both her and Georges, to the point where Anne doesn’t have the will to go on living and Georges doesn’t want her to suffer anymore. It’s easy for me to think that I’m young and that illness and death are far away, but watching this film reminded me that illness and death is a reality for everyone, and it is painful to watch loved ones go through suffering. I think studying about life and death from a Buddhist perspective helped me have a deeper appreciation for life than I did before. At first, I just thought life was a waste and wondered what the point of my existence was, especially because at the time I had fallen in love with someone, and they were with someone else. I remember falling into deep despair at that time and wondering if I could go on with life if I could never be in a relationship with this person. But I remember reading a book called The Wisdom for Creating Happiness and Peace by the late Buddhist philosopher and author, Daisaku Ikeda, and he has a chapter called “Facing Illness.” He talks about the four sufferings in Buddhism: birth, aging, sickness and death, and how, through Buddhist practice, we can create meaning from these sufferings. He says that we should take practical measures to take care of our health, but he also says that health is not solely limited to the absence of illness. It’s really about how we can create value in our lives. He also says that even if someone has illness, their life is still worthy of respect. In a society that tends to shy away from talking about illness and death, this for me was a new perspective through which I could examine illness and death, because while we celebrate life and youth, illness and death are seen as things to be feared. Of course, it is incredibly painful when a loved one gets ill and dies, and going through the process of grief feels like a living hell most times. But as a young person, I think studying about life and death has been a huge benefit of my Buddhist practice because I have started to reflect on how I want to live my life. I was very jaded and cynical about life after experiencing heartbreak these past few years, but after practicing Buddhism I think that my perspective on life has changed. I want to appreciate every moment that I am alive, because I realize that life is precious, and I shouldn’t take it for granted.

Seeing Anne suffer from illness was pretty painful, and it was also painful for Georges. Him smothering her to death with a pillow was incredibly disturbing, but it just showed me that he also was starting to experience a lot of despair because his wife was in so much pain that she didn’t want to go on living. She had spent so much of her life as a pianist, but now that she is paralyzed on one side of her body, she can’t play it much anymore. So, when her student visits the house and leaves her a note expressing his sympathy to her, she feels sad because he gets to continue his art while she cannot continue to play. It reminded me of this movie I saw called Me Before You, because it’s about a young man named Will who becomes a quadriplegic after a seriously traumatic accident. When he becomes paralyzed, he loses his joy for life and starts to think about ending his life. He remembers that before he was quadriplegic, he could do all sorts of fun things with his life, especially traveling around the world. But he can’t do those things anymore, so he loses hope. And it’s painful for the young woman who is taking care of him, because she has this zest for life and to see this young man feeling hopeless and losing the will to live is painful for her. It is also hard for their grown-up daughter to see her mother suffering. When their daughter, Eva, tries to see her mom, Georges closes the door and prevents her from seeing Anne. When Eva finally sees Anne’s condition, she is in a lot of emotional pain. She tries to convince Georges to send Anne to a hospital, but Georges refuses because Anne doesn’t want to go to a hospital. This reminded me of this book I read called Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. My mother had recommended the book to me a couple of years ago. I read it and it was quite eye-opening to read about how we treat aging and death in American society. I had been learning about illness and death from a religious perspective, but I didn’t know much about how the elderly are actually treated in society. It addresses end-of-life care and how doctors can provide more support for patients approaching death. At first, it was an emotional challenge to read the book, because I have tried to avoid the topic of death for so long. But after so many of my close acquaintances and loved ones passed away from aging and illness, I began to want to learn more about illness and death and how to prepare for them. I don’t know if anything will ever fully prepare me for losing a loved one. I will still go through those stages of grief just like everyone else, but by having a deeper understanding of death, I have learned to embrace the process of grieving and understand that grief is not just something I cry about one day and get over the next. After my mentor, Daisaku Ikeda, passed away at 95, I was very, very sad and so was the rest of my Buddhist community. I still miss him so much, but I still read his writings because they give me courage, especially his book Discussions on Youth. I remember last year when a dear friend of mine passed away, I experienced tremendous grief. She was elderly, but she had such a vibrant spirit, and she always encouraged me to never give up. Experiencing grief reminds me of my own mortality and how I can better spend my time on this earth. Watching Amour presented an honest and real look at aging and dying and how challenging it can be for people to navigate these stages of life. It took me patience to get into the film, but I am still glad that I saw the film because it helped me understand that even though I am young, I need to appreciate the elderly people in my life before they pass away.

Amour. 2012. 127 minutes. Rated PG-13.

The article that changed how I think about the world

I was emailing a friend this week and they told me they were observing Yom Kippur. I remembered I had read a book on Judaism recently and I was interested to know more about Yom Kippur, and in particular what to say to people who observe Yom Kippur. This Friday I came across this excellent piece by Matthew Rozsa called “Yom Kippur is a reminder to Americans that humility is good for your health.”

In the piece Rozsa talks about cultural humility and how Americans can learn a lot about humility from Yom Kippur. According to Rozsa, Yom Kippur involves fasting, praying and focusing entirely on religious observance, and “for the spiritually vigilant, this process requires authentic humility, a quality described by the medieval Jewish philosopher Maimonides as the middle path between pride and shiflut, or “self-abasement.” He says that this process is profoundly spiritual for many Jews observing the religious holiday, but researchers show that being humble has many psychological and mental health benefits. He cites Joshua Hook, author of “Cultural Humility,” who says that when someone is culturally humble, they are more aware of their limitations when it comes to their own cultural perspective and worldview. People who are culturally humble understand that their perspective is just one way of viewing the world, and that it may not be the only right way and that there are many other ways of viewing the world. People who lack cultural humility, however, tend to be rigid in their perspectives and any info that doesn’t work with those perspectives, they tune out.

He also cites Noelany Pelc, who wrote an academic article on psychology and cultural humility, and according to Pelc, “people who embody humility feel more at peace and satisfied with their own sense of self and identity, and are not as motivated to look for approval or admiration from others around them. In other words, humility allows people to remove themselves from harmful social competition and a fragile sense of self-worth or esteem.” When people are humble, they admit that they’re not always right, and in so doing they tend to focus less on themselves and listen to others, and when the situation calls for them to speak up they have the confidence to do so. According to Pelc, “in general, acknowledging that there is much in the world that we simply don’t know, allows us to be open to experiences that are different from our own.”

He also says that, according to David Reiss, the best way to distinguish between confidence and lacking humility is that if you’re confident, you know you’ve obtained the right information and that you’ve examined the situation as objectively as possible. However, humility takes that to another level because the humble person knows that all information is subject to biased viewpoints and that new information may come out that challenges their previously held perspective. Rozsa also recognizes that in some situations, being humble may not be the best thing to be, especially if someone is a situation where they are being abused or disrespected in any way, particularly if they are women or people of color being assertive and standing up for themselves, not being humble, might be the best action to take. Rozsa concludes by saying that humility is particularly helpful in today’s contexts because many people are divided about COVID-19 vaccines, climate change and racial justice, and can’t seem to find anything to agree about. The late John McCain said that “Among its other virtues, humility makes for more productive politics. If it vanishes entirely, we will tear our society apart.” People who are humble care about others even if there’s no immediate benefit to us or even if others aren’t telling us to care about others.

Rozsa concludes that “true humility requires both self-respect, so you can be healthy and happy, and self-awareness, so you will remember your obligations to society and to defer when necessary to people more knowledgeable or skilled. Judaism teaches that every person is collectively responsible for all of humanity’s sins, that the most virtuous person and the most vile share some level of responsibility for one another. While science does not offer moral arguments of any kind, the existing body of knowledge strongly suggests that this attitude toward humility is actually the healthiest one for everyone.” (Rozsa)

Honestly, I needed to read this article because for the past year I had not been the most culturally humble person. I thought my perspectives were the only valid ones, and I remember in particular one time made me realize, Wow, I need to be more humble. I was sitting with my music instructor and I really wanted them to chant nam-myoho-renge-kyo, but they were not comfortable with chanting and wanted to stick with their faith in Christianity. I got so upset because all I wanted them to do was convert to my religion rather than respect their wishes. So I arrogantly asked them, ” well do you think your prayer has any power?” And they paused and told me “yes.” I spent the rest of the lesson sulking because they preferred to not chant. Up to this point I had been reading this Nichiren Buddhist text called The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin and in the book Nichiren is remonstrating against the government because people and the government were propagating Buddhist sutras other than the Lotus Sutra, which taught that everyone has a Buddha nature inside of them and can bring it out just as they are, and that each person is respectworthy because they have the Buddha nature. However, I took this to mean that Buddhist sutras meant other religions instead of remembering the historical context in which Nichiren wrote it.

A year has passed and I can honestly say I appreciate my teacher for having that conversation with me, because I really had to reflect on my own faith. It became a teaching moment where I realized that this person is a Buddha and in the Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, slandering a Buddha is slandering the Lotus Sutra, so by disrespecting this person’s wish to not chant and questioning whether their religion had any power, even when they were respectful to me whenever I talked about Buddhism, I was slandering their Buddha nature. It became an opportunity where the law of cause and effect turned around and asked me, “You asked them if their prayer has power, but you need to actually ask yourself that question. Do you think your own prayer has power? You might need to self-reflect.” So I chanted and I studied the writings of philosopher Daisaku Ikeda, and I found reading his dialogues helpful in understanding how to have better dialogues about religion with people, dialogues in which I could respect the other person’s Buddhahood and embrace their viewpoints on religion and have a heart to heart dialogue rather than try to win them over to my side. Whenever Ikeda has conducted dialogues with people from various religious backgrounds, he talks with them in a respectful way, he comes into the dialogue with an open mind and a willingness to listen and learn. His goal is to foster friendships and have heart-to-heart human dialogues with other people. Ikeda has taught me that I just need to be myself when I have interfaith dialogues with other people, and that everyone, regardless of their religious background, has a role to play in fostering a more peaceful society, one based on the vow for kosen-rufu, or world peace.

Reflecting on this essay made me want to be more culturally humble, and it made me ask myself, What kind of Buddhist do I want to be? I want to be a more open minded Buddhist, someone who can be their most authentic self and feel comfortable having honest dialogues about life and philosophy with others. It also helped me in terms of my audition preparation because I was able to tell myself to stop assuming what the judges want to hear because well, I can’t read minds and so I don’t know what the judges want. It also reminded me that I don’t have to pretend like I know everything, which I sometimes put pressure on myself to do a lot of times. I really want to read the book Cultural Humility because I really want to be a more humble person. I thought being humble meant putting myself down, but it actually means learning from different perspectives while also reflecting on myself and just doing my best as my most authentic self.