Breakfast with Buddha

by Roland Merullo

“Do not worry so much all the time, my friend, about the other people, what they say. And do not have so many strong opinions, so many strong judgments. What you do matters. And what you think matters. . . . Here is Buddhist prayer,” he said, and he rolled off a few sentences in what must have been Ortyk, then struggling just a bit, translated them. “All that we are is the result of what we have thought: It is built on our thoughts, it is made from our thoughts. If a man speaks or acts with evil thought, pain follows him, just like the wheel follows the foot of the ox that draws the . . . cart. . . . If a person speaks or acts with pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves.” “So you can control your fate, then, to some extent.” “To every extent.” “So is there a life after death, then, in your belief system?” “Not a system,” he said. “But there is what we call an afterlife?” “After this, yes,” he said. “How could there not be?” “Well, plenty of people think it’s obvious how there could not be. You die, your body rots, end of story. Couldn’t that be the way it’s set up?” “Of course.” “You’ve just contradicted yourself. You’re playing Zen games with me. I hate that.” “When your mind is clear you see it, that’s all. You know what is and what is not, what will be and what will not be.” “You sound like my sister.” “I like very much your sister,” he said. “Very, very much.” “But she claims to see the future.” “In some way she does see it. In some way yo...