I’d like to talk about mentor-disciple, how I’ve come to understand mentor-disciple
and maybe some of the difficulties I’ve had coming to understand it.
When I think back, I’ve had experience with mentor-disciple in my life,
never really thinking of it that way.
A basketball coach that I had while I played as an undergraduate, and he coached the whole
person and was genuinely a mentor for us not just as basketball players but as individuals
and students and worked really closely with us and was interested in us becoming the best
people we could be, as well as the best basketball player.
That’s not common, and when I look back he was genuinely a mentor to me,
a mentor in the sense of how we speak of Daisaku Ikeda in the Soka Gakkai.
I grew up in the 50s and 60s in Canada, which is a culture
where mentors are not prevalent and not necessarily respected.
So it took me a long time within the Gakkai to come to understand Daisaku Ikeda’s role
and why he singularly would have a unique role in the Soka Gakkai, and I really did
struggle with it for decades.
It was only after being able to listen and see Daisaku Ikeda in monthly videos that we’ve
been able to listen to in the last few years that I’ve come to really feel his spirit.
But as late as 2007, I was asking questions of senior leaders.
“Why is Daisaku Ikeda the mentor for the whole of the Soka Gakkai?
Why is it only one person?”
And the answer would come back, “Who else?”
And when you understand the history of the Soka Gakkai and you understand the role that
Daisaku Ikeda’s played since the late 40s, you can really understand that the answer
to that question makes sense, “Who else?” because he has been the person establishing
a way forward for the Gakkai in the twenty-first century.
Now as a result of really accepting Daisaku Ikeda as a mentor in my life he’s had and
is having a big influence on my life.
First of all his guidance is so positive and supportive and humanistic and forward looking
and wise, you can see that.
And when you try and apply it you can see the effect. How Daisaku Ikeda treats people,
he puts things in the positive, he’s not negative with us, he supports, he praises,
he appreciates, and that, I’m trying to make that my personal style
when I deal with people.
Also, Daisaku Ikeda is a courageous person and you see that in his history, you see that
in how he’s acting now.
As you move forward in an organization that is interested in really fundamentally changing
society, you come upon obstacles.
Those obstacles were met with great courage by Daisaku Ikeda, over and over and over again.
And that courage is something that I want in my life.
I identify with that as something that I want, because I lack that, I don’t put myself
at the forefront of struggles easily, and his influence has helped me do that in a number
of instances in my life.
I want to help others shine and act as a mentor, like he is acting as a mentor to me now.
And the amazing thing about Daisaku Ikeda is that he’s in his eighties and he is working
as hard as he ever has in trying to reach members like me as a mentor.
I say to my friends Daisaku Ikeda is the real deal, and it took me a long time to get to
that point and now it’s one of the greatest treasures in my life, certainly.