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Everyone wants to be happy, and there is a strong energy in us pushing us toward what we think will make us happy. But we may suffer a lot because of this. We need the insight that position, revenge, wealth, fame, or possessions are, more often than not, obstacles to our happiness. We need to cultivate the wish to be free of these things so we can enjoy the wonders of life that are always available — the blue sky, the trees, our beautiful children.
We always try to accumulate more and more, and we think these “cows” are essential for our existence. In fact, they may be the obstacles that prevent us from being happy. Release your cows and become a free person. Release your cows so you can be truly happy.
The food of consciousness is the fourth of the four kinds of food. There are two kinds of consciousness: the collective and the individual.
we should not spend time close to or in a community that has a great deal of hatred and despair.
Like the political culture of America 2022, especially social media and the media in general.
If you practice mindful walking and deep listening all day long, that is the Four Noble Truths in action.
Confucius said, “At thirty, I was able to stand on my own feet. At forty, I had no more doubts. At fifty, I knew the mandate of Earth and Sky. At sixty, I could do what I wanted without going against the path.” The last of the ten ox herding pictures in the Zen tradition is called “Entering the Marketplace with Open Hands.” You are free to come and go as you please. This is the action of non-action. Suffering no longer arises. This stage is not something you can imitate. You have to reach this stage of realization within yourself.
At the third stage of the Second Noble Truth, you only have to be yourself. The form is not important. But be careful! First there has to be genuine insight, genuine freedom.
Practicing mindfulness helps us learn to appreciate the well-being that is already there. With mindfulness, we treasure our happiness and can make it last longer. I
The cessation of suffering — well-being — is available if you know how to enjoy the precious jewels you already have. You have eyes that can see, lungs that can breathe, legs that can walk, and lips that can smile. When you are suffering, look deeply at your situation and find the conditions for happiness that are already there, already available.
The first turning of the Third Noble Truth is the “Recognition” of the possibility of the absence of suffering and the presence of peace.
The second turning is to “Encourage” ourselves to find peace and joy. If you want to garden, you have to bend down and touch the soil. Gardening is a practice, not an idea. To practice the Four Noble Truths, you yourself have to touch deeply the things that bring you peace and joy. When you do, you realize that walking on the Earth is a miracle, washing the dishes is a miracle, and practicing with a community of friends is a miracle. The greatest miracle is to be alive. We can put an end to our suffering just by realizing that our suffering is not worth suffering for! How many people kill
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Buddhas and bodhisattvas suffer, too. The difference between them and us is that they know how to transform their suffering into joy and compassion. Like good organic gardeners, they do not discriminate in favor of the flowers or against the garbage. They know how to transform garbage into flowers. Don’t throw away your suffering. Touch your suffering. Face it directly, and your joy will become deeper. You know that suffering and joy are both impermanent. Learn the art of cultivating joy.
The Fourth Noble Truth is the way out of suffering.
the Fourth Noble Truth, we “Recognize” that the Eightfold Path — Right View, Right Thinking, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Diligence, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration — can lead us out of suffering, but we do not yet know how to practice it. In the second turning, we “Encourage” ourselves to practice this path.
If learning is not followed by reflecting and practicing, it is not true learning.
In this stage, we see that the path has everything to do with our real difficulties in life. A practice that does not concern our real suffering is not a path we need.
In the second stage of the path, there is an increase in freedom every day. The path becomes real as we put into practice what we have learned.
The third turning of the wheel of the Fourth Noble Truth is the “Realization” that we are practicing this path.
Interbeing is an important characteristic of all the Buddha’s teachings. When you touch one, you touch all.
It is important to understand the interbeing nature of the Four Noble Truths. When we look deeply into any one of the Four Truths, we see the other three.
The Four Noble Truths are one.
We need suffering in order to see the path.
Let us reframe the Four Noble Truths. “Cessation,” the Third Noble Truth, means the absence of suffering, which is the presence of well-being. Instead of saying “cessation,” we can simply say “well-being.” If we do that, we can call the Fourth Noble Truth “the Noble Eightfold Path That Leads to Well-Being.”
We might like to renumber the Four Noble Truths, as follows, for the benefit of the people of our time: (1) Well-Being (traditionally number three, “cessation of suffering”); (2) Noble Eightfold Path That Leads to Well-Being (traditionally number four); (3) Suffering (traditionally number one); and (4) Ignoble Eightfold Path That Leads to Suffering (traditionally number two, “arising of suffering”).
If we live according to the Noble Eightfold Path, we cultivate well-being and our life will be filled with joy, ease, and wonder. But if our path is not noble, if there is craving, hatred, ignorance, and fear in the way we live our daily life, if we practice the ignoble eightfold path, suffering will naturally be the outcome. The practice is to face our suffering and transform it in order to bring about well-being.
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Ar ya ashtangika marga (“a noble path of eight limbs”) suggests the interbeing nature of these eight elements of the path. Each limb contains all the other seven. Please use your intelligence to apply the elements of the Noble Eightfold Path in your daily life.
The Buddha said that Right View is to have faith and confidence that there are people who have been able to transform their suffering.
The practice of mindfulness helps us identify all the seeds in our store consciousness2 and water the ones that are the most wholesome.
When we become aware of the seeds in our storehouse, we will not be surprised by our own behavior or the behavior of others.
The seed of Buddhahood, the capacity to wake up and understand things as they are, is also present in each of us.
Good definition of Buddhahood, and enlightenment in general
Right View is to recognize which seeds are wholesome and to encourage those seeds to be watered. This is called “selective touching.”
the base of our views are our perceptions (samjña).
“Where there is perception, there is deception.”4
Our perceptions carry with them all the errors of subjectivity. Then we praise, blame, condemn, or complain depending on our perceptions.
We have an idea of happiness. We believe that only certain conditions will make us happy. But it is often our very idea of happiness that prevents us from being happy. We have to look deeply into our perceptions in order to become free of them. Then, what has been a perception becomes an insight, a realization of the path. This is neither perception nor nonperception. It is a clear vision, seeing things as they are.
Right View is not an ideology, a system, or even a path. It is the insight we have into the reality of life, a living insight that fills us with understanding, peace, and love.
All we can do is to stimulate the seeds of Right View in them, and then later, in a difficult moment, they may benefit from our guidance.
“Train up a child in the way they should go…” etc. from the Book of Proverbs.
We have to learn how to water the wholesome seeds that are in us so they will bloom into the flowers of Right View. The instrument for watering wholesome seeds is mindful living — mindful breathing, mindful walking, living each moment of our day in mindfulness.
“Image teaching” uses words and ideas. “Substance teaching” communicates by the way you live.
Your concept or perception of reality is not reality. When you are caught in your perceptions and ideas, you lose reality.
So the popular notion, often used is psychotherapy, that (one’s) “perception is reality” is false.
To practice is to go beyond ideas, so you can arrive at the suchness of things. “No idea” is the path of nonconception. As long as there is an idea, there is no reality, no truth. “No idea” means no wrong idea, no wrong conception. It does not mean no mindfulness. Because of mindfulness, when something is right, we know it’s right, and when something is wrong, we know it’s wrong.
That is Right Mindfulness already. Rightness or wrongness is not objective. It is subjective.
Relatively speaking, there are right views and there are wrong views. But if we look more deeply, we see that all views are wrong views. No view can ever be the truth. It is just from one point; that is why it is called a “point of view.” If we go to another point, we will see things differently and realize that our first view was not entirely right. Buddhism is not a collection of views. It is a practice to help us eliminate wrong views. The quality of our views can always be improved. From the viewpoint of ultimate reality, Right View is the absence of all views.
The seeds of Right View, the seed of Buddhahood, are in us, but they are obscured by so many layers of ignorance, sorrow, and disappointment. We have to put our views into practice. In the process of learning, reflecting, and practicing, our view becomes increasingly wise, based on our real experience. When we practice Right Mindfulness, we see the seed of Buddhahood in everyone, including ourselves. This is Right View.
The eight practices of the Noble Eightfold Path nourish each other.
Right View is both a cause and an effect of all the other elements of the path.
Thinking is the speech of our mind. Right Thinking makes our speech clear and beneficial.
When Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am,” he meant that we can prove our existence by the fact that our thinking exists. He concluded that because we are thinking, we are really there, existing. I would conclude the opposite: “I think, therefore I am not.” As long as mind and body are not together, we get lost and we cannot really say that we are here.
A good contrast between East and West viewpoints.
Thinking has two parts — initial thought (vitarka) and developing thought (vichara).
