-Good morning! I'm feeling really Zen today
because we're learning about Buddhism.
We're gonna meet Erica, who's a new Buddhist,
and all that I know about Buddhism
is Lisa Simpson's a Buddhist
and Richard Gere is a Buddhist and everyone we talked to,
when we asked them what religion they wanted to learn about,
they said Buddhism.
So, I'm gonna be -- I'm gonna be chill today,
because I think that's what it's all about --
being chill and realizing the potential in yourself.
So, I'm not even gonna end this with a joke.
I'm just gonna be quiet.
Beautiful day.
-How are you? -Fantastic!
How are you? -Pretty good.
Nice to meet you. -Nice to meet you, too.
I feel like our colors kind of work together.
-I feel like that, too. -It's going well.
I'm glad we're both, you know, like, on the same page.
-Yeah, yeah. No, absolutely.
-So, I guess let's go learn about Buddhism.
-Sounds like a good idea.
-Awesome. -Come on this way.
-Can I get to know you a little bit...
-Sure. Let's do that. -...now that it's being filmed?
-Yeah. That's the natural way to get to know people.
-So, you're a comedy writer.
-Yeah. I write stuff, and then hopefully it's funny.
-So, comedy and Buddhism, like, as far as energy level,
don't really seem like they would match up.
Like, I always think of Buddhism as a Zen thing...
-Right. -...and improv as, like,
"Wah! Hey! Oh, we got this hat! Oh, look! Oh!"
And it's like, "Only questions."
So, how does that -- how does that work?
-Yeah, well, Zen Buddhism
is, like, very meditative and removed from society.
But that's the other wonderful thing
about this kind of Buddhism
is that it exists in the middle of society.
A lot of it is about getting out of your own head
and realizing our connection to other people.
So, it's actually very improv-y related.
Enlightenment is not necessarily attained, you know,
after centuries on a mountain by yourself.
Enlightenment is attained in everyday life,
interacting with everybody else.
-So, Buddhism is a relatively new thing for you, right?
-Yeah. Since I moved to L.A. Two and a half years.
-Were you religious at all before that?
-Well, I went to Catholic high school.
My family's Catholic.
-How was that? -It was okay.
When I was a teenager, um...
realized that I didn't really buy into religion that much.
-So, what made you re-buy into the idea of religion?
-When I was 30,
I started having pretty bad anxiety attacks,
and I went to a million doctors.
I went to Eastern medicine, Western medicine,
and the consensus was, "You have too much anxiety.
You're stressed out."
And I was like, "Well, how do you fix that?" You know?
I mean, I was in great shape 'cause I was exercising.
I was going to therapy twice a week and trying everything.
But I did get a job next to a woman who was a Buddhist.
And she said, "I chant. I'm a Buddhist, and I chant."
And I thought, "Well, gee.
That seems like a good way to get anxiety out,
you know, to yell."
They said, "Just do this for a month and it'll fix you.
Just five minutes in the morning,
five minutes at night, chant to be better."
-So, what does it entail when you're chanting to be better?
Do you chant about specific things?
Like, "I'd like to be better at time management!"
-Yes, yes! It's that specific.
I have, like, notebooks filled with things.
Like, the first thing they'll say
is write down 10 things that you want.
It could be anything -- a car, a new bag,
whatever, goals -- things that you chant for.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
-So, what has chanting brought you?
-I'm a writer, so I was -- I went to the Austin Film Festival
and I pitched my movie, like, before I started chanting.
And I was sweating and I was --
So, you know, sitting in the room was -- It was hell.
But then, after chanting for a year, I went back,
and I was like -- chanted a bunch --
I just went in, and I did it very naturally.
So, it changed my nerves. It gives me more confidence.
-Is it all about asking for what you want?
-It's a good way to start, because you'll see it work,
and then you'll be like -- like I was, "Oh, sh-t."
And then you'll keep doing it.
Buddhism -- The chanting is the first thing
I found that really connects your heart to your mind
and makes your feelings change, makes your attitude change.
But what it's really about is spreading the philosophy
that we're all God, right?
And that we're all capable of this enlightened state
of complete compassion for one another.
It's a philosophy of absolute equality.
The main goals are that the point of life is to be happy.
It's why we're here.
The way to be happy is to understand this philosophy
that we are all capable of Buddha-hood,
every single one of us.
So, all the struggles that we go through --
We're here to overcome them
and then use our victory over them to encourage other people.
-So, what is it -- What's the first step
to becoming a Buddhist?
-You would chant. So, we chant, "Nam-myoho-renge-kyo."
That's what we say. -What does it mean?
-It's the enlightened nature of the universe.
-Okay. -You're gonna chant later.
-I'll chant later. -At the center.
-But I should probably pre-chant. -You want to practice?
-Can we run chant lines together?
-[ Laughs ] Well, you know what's kind of helpful?
Like, when I started, there's a card that says the words,
'cause you'll forget the words.
So, you want to have it in front of you when you're chanting.
-Nam-myo...
-Ho-renge-kyo." -...ho-renge-kyo.
-Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.
-Generally, we would get together,
and we would begin every gathering by chanting,
because that's what we do.
And we chant, "Nam-myoho-renge-kyo."
And then, generally,
for the sake of anyone who is new,
we would explain a little bit
about how the practice works -- just the basics.
-Well, that is my question. How does it work?
I know it works with an individual,
but as a group, how is it different?
-As a group, we kind of focus on bigger things
because we are all part of the world,
and the things that are going on in the world
that cause suffering --
You know, we feel like,
as a conglomerate, we are working on that.
-Who has chanted their way
to getting action from the opposite sex?
[ Laughter ]
-Nice to meet you. I'm the Big Chocolate.
-You're the Big Chocolate?
-'Cause, you know, I got all this going on.
-Is that on your birth certificate?
-My mom just called me B.C. for short.
-Nice!
-I was raised in Israel as a Jew, but a secular way,
like, you know, Catholics who don't practice.
I guess that would be a good analogy.
You know, am I a Jew-Bu or a Bu-Jew or -- I don't know.
I'm just a person. -A "Jewdha."
-A "Jewdha." Okay. Yeah. -[ Laughs ]
-So, what spoke to you about Buddhism
that you didn't get out of Judaism?
-What spoke to me is coming to meetings
and meeting the people,
seeing the diversity or the members.
-But, you know, the greatest thing
is basically understanding this crazy world.
It seems like evil's beating good out,
and I really didn't like that.
So, my hope went down real, real low, right?
But ever since I've been a Buddhist,
now, oh, it's getting better, and I got hope for the world.
I can't wait to wake up the next day.
-For me, from what I've seen, it's probably the most diverse,
you know, group of people you will ever meet.
You know, you go to any meeting, and you see, like,
every culture represented, practically,
and that's really -- -Every age.
-Every age, every culture, and that's really the --
-Every profession. -Every station of society.
-Yeah, that's really the beauty, to me,
about this practice is the diversity.
-Do Buddhists worship anything?
-No. Um, it's actually --
We say that the Gohonzon
that we're chanting to is like a mirror,
and when you're chanting, you're polishing the mirror.
So, because we don't believe in anything
besides the internal state of Buddha-hood
that we already have, it's more revealing it.
-To me, it's like, you know, you're born in this,
like, bubble -- this glass bubble.
And as you get older and older,
you have all this paint thrown on the bubble --
doubt and fear and, you know -- and trying to be like your mom
or trying to be like your mom's mom and all this stuff.
And so, all of a sudden, this glass bubble
basically has all this paint on it.
And so, when you start chanting,
it's like you get a little razor blade
and you start scraping the paint off.
Then you finally find out what's really inside.
And when everybody finds out what's inside their bubble,
it's easy to get along with each other.
It's easy to root for you, want your dreams to happen,
want her dreams to happen, you know, want mine.
You know, 'cause you get a clear picture
of what the world is instead of...
When you have all that paint, you can't see outside,
so you don't really know what the world's supposed to be
or what you're supposed to be.
-Yeah, I like to just, like, break down all religions
into things that I could get from the Home Depot.
So that was perfect.
[ Laughter ]
What do you think ultimate enlightenment is?
-I think ultimate enlightenment is being able to really see
that the real reason we're here is to help other people.
And not only is it the only reason that we're here,
it's the only way for us, personally,
to attain real happiness.
Like, the only lasting form
of actual fulfillment and happiness
is giving back to the people around us
and helping them and using our own lives for that purpose.
-That's a beautiful answer.
I don't know what to say to that.
That's perfect. I can just go now.
-"Cut." -I can go.
So, today, I met some really wonderful people
that Buddhism has helped tremendously.
And Erica's fantastic and really funny
and also standing right over there.
Uh, hi! -Hi! You better say that.
-And, uh, what I've learned about Buddhism
is that there's a Buddha already inside of me.
I've just got to do a bunch of chanting to bring him out
and be the best, most Buddha-ful version of myself.
Life is Buddha-ful. That's what I've learned.