The Essence of Bushi-Do – Samurai Art

At the end of the day, I always feel grateful that I was able to live through the day. I say in my mind “Ikashite-itadaite arigato gozami-masu. Then again in the morning, I say the same thing for the new day. I am always living the moment being consciously aware about life and death.

I do have a healthy body. In spite of my health, I am strongly conscious about life and death. I think this is my asset and advantage. I believe that being conscious about life and death in every moment is the essence of Bushi-do(武士道), the Art of Samurai.

To attain the skills to fight or kill others is not the purpose of Bushi-do. The true Bushi-do is about realizing the precious life we have in front of us.

The true Bushi-do should be about maintaining a healthy body and to protect the body that is carrying his precious soul.

As in today’s modern world, someone who cares about others, who would drive safely so neither oneself or others would not be injured… He/she is a practitioner of a Bushi-do. Until the Meiji Period (1868~1912), I sense that most of the people had the consciousness to care about oneself and others. Today it had declined.

Those who are in gratitude about their own life know that life is precious and would take care of his/herself as well as others.

When you are practicing the ancestral worship with gratitude, you will start to feel that every moment is valuable. There might be a moment when you feel that everything and everyone feel so dearly close to your heart. Then you are in the right path. You might be showing a lot of emotions in the surface but deep inside you heart is becoming very strong and grounded and no matter what happens, you will be able to remain clam.

It is better to be aware when your body is still healthy. Once you are sick, it is hard to start being grateful.

Going to work with your healthy body is something very valuable and worth thanking for. Don’t allow yourself to wound your heart at work. Look at the problem from a perspective between life and death. As long as you are alive, problems will always start to change and come to an end. This is only possible in this World of Reality.

He or she who could look at a life from the point of life and death will be able to live strong and enjoy fully.

Ikashite-itadaite Arigato-gozaimasu

Thank you for letting us live

Gods are terribly fair

-Imagine you are at the end of your life-

Comment from a reader:
I live outside of Japan and my husband is a foreigner. Keeping one’s maiden name after marriage is quite common in the country where I live, and most homes wouldn’t have any Buddhist or Shinto altar. However, I have registered my last name to be the same as my husband’s and I have made my own memorial to do ancestral worship with gratitude. I would usually put the altar away after a while, but one day, I left it out. And my father-in-law saw it. He said, “What is this?” So I answered, “I send my gratitude everyday to my ancestors.” He said, “Oh! So you will continue to do this even after I am gone”. He seemed very impressed and happy. It made me happy too to see him smile.

Reply to comment:
This is an ideal way for a Japanese woman to be married to a foreign man. In this way, the marriage becomes a true, spiritual marriage. The husband’s family has accepted her spiritually. She even becomes the “special one” who started sending gratitude to her husband's ancestors. I am sure the old man was so joyous to know about this. When one becomes old, he/she would start thinking about his/her own death, worrying about the future of their children or grandchildren. When one knows that one’s children will not forget about him/her and continue to send gratitude “on their own will”, that is most comforting and reassuring. By knowing this, when the time comes, they will be ready to leave this plain.

In the Western part of the world, Christianity is the main religion, and ancestral worship has not been part of their custom. When you were young, your religion may have served you well. But as you are getting closer to the end of your days, even you have been religious all your life, you are still not so sure about god. You think, “I have done some sinful act in the past. When I die do I really get to go to Heaven? Is my family going to forget about me? Am I just going to disappear?” In a real sense, I feel people are worried about these things.

The idea to honor one’s own ancestral spirits is the shortest way to reach Heaven. By worshipping your own ancestral line, and opening the path by "your own effort" is the "safest way" to reach the Kingdom of God. This way, you will be able to reach Heaven as a "true identity".

People tend to look for a powerful figure, such as God, to depend on. But imagine that you are a God. Would you help the ones that ignore their own related family, and lost ancestral spirits?

A selfish act could lead to serving a wrong spirit such as a concealed spirit, or the ones pretending to be a God, but in truth, eats the human souls. Unfortunately, it seems to be a fate to be on such path. But when you realize that you had been selfish, you will still have the chance to save your soul.

Without doubt, the righteous god will come to help for those who are helping the weak. Gods are terribly fair.

"Ikashite-Itadaite Arigato-Gozaimasu." "Thank you for letting us live."

Ancestors need comfort death

It is very difficult for lost souls to elevate on their own because when they were still alive, they had been living in a way which shrank their innate god, which created a negative cycle. The biggest reason why they are in pain and not in comfort is because they are in separation with their own Innate God.

How to elevate lost souls into a peaceful place :

• The lost souls being remembered by the living humans in a good way.
• The lost souls being worshipped (kuyō). The best kuyō is to offer prayer of gratitude.

These will work best for the spirit world.

When a person had done much goodness and has been well respected during his or her physical life, he or she is remembered even after death and receives a lot of gratitude. The reason why “gratitude” is effective in the spirit world comes from the same concept. Even the lost souls who have not done any goodness when they were alive, by sending them gratitude will definitely help them to feel good about themselves.

When you act on the above two ways of elevating the lost souls, the energy will reach to the lost soul’s innate god and make it “fat”. The innate god now has more power to help the lost soul elevate back to the World of Spirit. Once the soul has reached the World of Spirit, it will be in peace. This is the proper place where the innate god and the partner soul should be saying good-bye. In other words, until this happened, they were just separated because of lack of power. The innate god had to simply wait until it could gain power again through a human act in order to complete its duty. Once the duty is accomplished, the innate god returns to the World of God to fuse with its parent god. In the Japanese World of God, the parent god is often Amaterasu-Ohomikami(the Sun Goddess). The innate god is usually the same as one’s own Ubusuna-kami(Birth Place God) or Uji-gami(Regional God).

"Ikashite-Itadaite Arigato-Gozaimasu." "Thank you for letting us live."