November 10, 2010
Mrs. Taneja
Personal Encounter Paper
Personal Encounter
My experience started out pretty bad while trying to attend the Volusia Buddhist Fellowship ceremony. First of all Diego and I went to the Volusia ceremony only to find out that the place of worship was bought over by a Christian group, so there were no Buddhist worships going on at that site anymore. This was very surprising to me because I called the Fellowship just the day before to make sure I had got the proper information before hand, and they said nothing about there site being changed or bought over by another organization. Furthermore Diego and I finally found out where the new site was, after about 30 minutes of driving in vane …show more content…
The first thing that was poignant to me was how herbal the room smelt it gave the room sense of purification. At the head of the table there was a statue of the Buddhism. Sakyo said that this was put here to remind us of the possibility of what could happen if you put the right time in and right devotion into become enlightened, like the Buddha did. The other significant instruments on the table were one incent and three candles. In other ceremonies there are usually one candle and three incents, but due to the small area three incents would have been strong. The candle is a representation of the enlightenment. The three incents represents the Buddha, Dharma, and the Sangha. The incents also have a greater meaning that was explained by Sakyo. Each ceremony random volunteer brings in the incent signifying an act of generosity to the gathering. The head minister Sakyo had one of the calmest, cool, and collective demeanors I have ever encountered. When he would talk it was like nothing seemed to bother him, everything seemed fabulous. He said that his manner came about because of some of the training he went through, it taught him to put his mind in a state of mind away from anxiety and greed and anything that caused suffering. This was key especially for him because Sakyo wanted to become a Buddhist teacher