Shinjin is not mind-created

-fragment from a letter to a friend-

Shinjin is just a simple faith, a simple entrusting to Amida Buddha in the matter of your rebirth in the Pure Land. It is not a mind-created intellectual system or a certain imposed state of mind. So please, do not force your mind and heart into always thinking the right thought, or to feel the right feeling…. You are who you are, an ordinary person with ups and downs, with moments of joy, and moments of sadness or depression. Indeed, there is not easy to be an unenlightened person, and no one leads an easy life here in samsara. But what you must never forget is that you are accepted as you are by Amida Buddha and that your birth in his Pure Land is assured at the end of your physical body. No matter how you live or how you die, you will surely go there, if you simply entrust yourself to Amida.