Right now I spend every day chasing every connection I can find, running flat out towards next year’s great adventure, the Peking to Paris Motor Challenge.
And into that came word from a dear friend up in Hokkaido: “I’m in Kyoto right now.”
With the power-spot boom and all, plenty of people visit shrines these days, so I wrote back something like “oh, an ordinary trip — lovely!”
He told me this trip was to visit several shrines, and as his shrine reports kept arriving one after another …
Starting from Izumo Taisha in Shimane, the sacred ground of matchmaking
The first report was from Izumo Taisha.
This shrine is said to be Japan’s foremost for the god of matchmaking.
On the grounds there is a Musubi Stone telling the story of how the gods Ōkuninushi and Suseri-hime came to settle at Izumo Taisha — the two of them overcame every kind of trial to grow their love and tie an eternal bond as husband and wife, which is why the shrine is known for the god of matchmaking.
Matchmaking is not only about ties between a man and a woman —it is about tying together every connection that surrounds a person,isn’t it.
The grave of Izumo no Okuni
And right there, a wonderful message arrived.
“Let’s tie Komochan a good connection and make her dream real!”
Oh no — that’s going to make me cry.
Oroshigane Shrine in Kyoto, the finest for money luck in the city
Next came a report from Oroshigane Shrine in Kyoto.
Oroshigane Shrine is apparently one of Kyoto’s leading shrines for money luck, visited by celebrities and stockbrokers and people praying to win the lottery (laughs)!
Even on a weekday, it was packed.
A prayer and a wish made with love — unconditional love
It is perfectly ordinary for anyone to visit a shrine wishing for their own goal to come true.
But the message that came from him said,
“I came to pray that Komochan’s project comes true.”
That — that moved me to tears.
You could fall for that kind of matchmaking, couldn’t you (laughs)?
It turned out that this whole trip of his, from Shimane to Kyoto, was a pilgrimage of prayer he made for me, all the way from Hokkaido.
Praying not for yourself but for someone else — you simply cannot do that without love.
Love with nothing asked in return.
Visiting shrines for someone else’s sake.
A wish made by someone who carries that kind of love could not possibly go unanswered, and having received a feeling this wonderful, I found myself
once again silently vow that I will stake my life on driving
the Peking to Paris Motor Challenge 2023 into reality, whatever it takes.
That is the promise I made to myself, in my heart.