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  hardie karges 4:24 am on July 19, 2024 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Eightfold Path ( 17 ), Hardie Karges ( 240 ), meditation ( 190 ), Right Action ( 2 ), Right Concentration, Right Effort ( 2 ), Right Intention, Right Livelihood, Right Mindfulness ( 2 ), Right Speech ( 5 ), Right View ( 2 )   

  Buddhism 202: To Suffer is to be Human 

  

  The damages you suffer are but the beauty marks on your personality. And that’s good, because we’re not talking about some immutable permanent transcendent self that sees itself as the center of the world in some horrific act of ego incarnate. That’s the evil refrain from gurus-for-hire who know that the killer sales pitch is usually that one that puts ‘you, you, you’ in the central spotlight, even ‘You are God,’ forever enshrined in memory as ‘me, me, me’ for ease of memory and convenient interpretation. And all that rap is but salt in the wound of your condition. But that’s not the point.

  The point is that your suffering is not the end of the world. In fact, it is almost the only certainty in a world confined to matter and mechanics and gravity to boot, such that suffering is nothing to be ashamed of and even a badge of honor in a world where street cred has high value. The need for cessation of suffering is still of utmost importance, though, so don’t get too attached to your afflictions, if you really want to overcome them. Any other approach would certainly be unhealthy, and Buddhism never encourages that.

  Buddhism does encourage healthy habits always, and those are the basis of the Eightfold Path that informs the Buddhist approach to the world: Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration. What could be simpler, right? And that’s the special sauce to mend your suffering, or even plaster those nasty cracks in your exterior façade, to put the lie to any permanent damage, and help to make yourself whole again, despite all the faults of the flesh. We are not perfect, no, and no one is, but at least we are honest, and imperfection can be beautiful.

   

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  hardie karges 5:15 am on July 16, 2023 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Buddhism ( 429 ), control ( 6 ), freedom ( 13 ), Hardie Karges ( 240 ), language ( 145 ), meditation ( 190 ), Right Action (karma) ( 2 ), Right Aspiration, Right Effort ( 2 ), Right Livelihood, Right Mindfulness ( 2 ), Right View ( 2 ), self-control ( 5 )   

  Buddhist Right Speech 

  

  Right speech (samma vaca) is easy, because you really don’t have to say anything. That’s the point. But if you do say something, then, say something nice. Most of Buddhism is that way. You don’t have to promote anything. you don’t have to do anything. But if you do something, then do something good. Say something good. Be something good. Because you don’t know until you try it. 

  I’m referring to the Buddhist Eightfold Path, of course, that final Nobel Truth after the previous three others which showed the suffering of the world, its main cause—craving, and its main treatment—release from craving. The rest are the Eightfold Path, something like the Eight Commandments, in which the sage advices are a bit sager, like Right View, Right Aspiration, Right Action (karma), Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration (meditation).  

  Buddhism is not a controlling religion. If it were, then it would want to control the moments of the day, minute, and hour: prayer at such-and-such a time, meals at such-a-time, etc., as if these were the important thing of religion. But when a Buddhist says that he wants control, then he wants self-control, a measure of forbearance against predatory life and logic that are certain to happen if our flanks are left unguarded. More importantly, this is a freedom FROM, not a freedom TO, and that means all the difference in the world…