Buddhist Belief Blog

As I ended the post last weekend, I commented that the Dalai Lama said on many occasions, “The purpose of life is to be happy.” And the purpose of this blog is to search out how the teachings of Buddhist Belief might be just the information you and I need to find the happiness and life-long inner peace that we all desire. It’s available to every one of us who choose to follow the teachings.

I also spoke briefly to those who feel that they are already happy enough. I’m sure there are many who are reading here that feel that their life is already perfect. That’s wonderful. Enjoy your life. Please know that you’re certainly welcome to stick around here and see if you might pick up a pointer or two to add to your happiness.

I do suspect that there are those of you who are looking for some answers. Perhaps you’re looking for something to help you, for something a little deeper. Is it possible that some of you are looking for something more — something more than what’s in your life today. Do you feel that everything is never quite enough?

Aha! There’s the “Aha” moment that Oprah is always talking about. Therein lies the problem — the things in our life are never quite enough!

Think about this for a moment — do you ever find yourself feeling a little greedy? Do you ever envy something that someone you know has in their lives that you don’t have in yours? Are there things or people in your life that you are completely attached to? Do you ever resist the idea that something in your life may not last forever? Think about it — selfishness, egotism and clinging just don’t work very well, and they’re downright dissatisfying, aren’t they?

So how do we get past this? How do we get free? The teachings of Buddhist Belief show us the way to make it happen. However, we are human beings, after all, so we have to be sure that this stuff is as true today as it was 2500 years ago. This isn’t just for monks living a monastic life, it’s for all of us. And it’s up to us to keep it alive and pass along the teachings through the way we live our own lives. If we live in such a way that we’re being open, generous, loving, and cooperative, our own stress-levels will be greatly diminished, and believe it or not, people will begin to copy you. Eventually, there won’t be anywhere near the amount of conflict and confusion that would usually wear us down.

Over the last posts we’ve talked a little about the Four Noble Truths. We’re going to spend some time in the next posts going into much more detail so you have a better understanding of them. The main gist of them is not that hard to fathom, though — there is suffering in life — that it is caused by our greed, craving, and attachments — and that letting go of this way of life is the way to inner peace and freedom.

A couple more paragraphs on how to live this way, and then we’ll get this writing posted. The things I’m writing about here are to help every one of us to become more positive forces in the world. Complacency won’t work — it never does. I can assure you that we need to completely avoid complacency at these times. This world desperately needs our help in order to survive.

One of the things I’ve always wondered about is whether it’s ever good to be a little tough about these beliefs. One of the Buddhist leaders, Trungpa Rinpoche said in one of his books, “Don’t give in to idiot compassion!” An example of what he meant by that was the example of the biblical story of Jesus and the money-changers in the temple. He threw the bums out! That’s an example of how saying an emphatic “No!” is really the most positive thing you can do. Often times it becomes necessary for us to have to be more emphatic about certain things.

An example that happened to me in my own life comes to mind. I was in the downtown area of Burlington, Vermont leaving a theater rehearsal for a play I was acting in and on my way to my car. It was quite late in the evening and as I walked past a bar, there was a drunk guy outside slapping a woman around. I came up behind him — pinned his arms to his sides — and told the woman to take off while I held the guy. After she got away, I let him go and he took a couple of ineffective swings at me until he suddenly got very white-faced and began to be quite sick. I was able to just walk away.

That was a situation that was forceful, but it was necessary and appropriate. Also, it was not done out of aggression. If I had done that out of anger, the end result could have been much different.

Buddhism is about training our minds, our bodies, and our speech so that we can learn how to act. This doesn’t mean that once you commit to a lifestyle as taught by the Buddhist Belief that you will never feel anger again. You will, but you will also learn how to control it and suppress it. Those awakened teachers, among them Mahatma Gandhi, for example, were true examples of how to live non-aggressive lives. They learned how to turn negativity into positivity. Gandhi literally changed consciousness. He didn’t take up arms, instead he got most of India to walk with him to the sea. The British had to back down against this display of passive resistance.

Out of compassion can come an action that may be forceful, when it’s necessary. The result we’re looking for is peace, not only in the world but also in our hearts.

One final comment about attachment. At this stage of our learning, the type of attachment we need to rid ourselves of in our lives is the attachment to unhealthy things, like drugs, tobacco, unhealthy relationships and alcohol. Turn those attachments into things like healthy foods, meditation and spirituality. Eventually, all attachments will become more subtle. As Buddha said, “(Dharma), Buddhist Belief, is like a raft to cross the raging river of suffering.” Eventually, all rafts will be left behind when we reach the other shore.

Next time we’ll really start to dig into the Second Noble Truth.

I’ve been showing you a series of short 10-minute videos produced by the BBC called “The Life of Buddha.” Last time was Part Two. This time we’ll show you Part Three. I hope you enjoy it. If, for some reason, the video doesn’t play when you press the play button, here’s a link to take you directly to it :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqBY7RM5Cn0

======================================
Always remember ….

Shanti … (A sanscrit word meaning, “Let there be Peace. Peace, beautiful Peace. Peace within, Peace without. Peace in this world. Peace for all beings.”)

Have a peaceful day!! —

Ron Rink

http://www.theleaderinside.com
http://www.wecould2.com
http://www.buddhistbelief.com

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Four Noble Truths, Meditation, Peace

We left our discussion last time talking about the fact that our true nature, the essence of who we are, is the only place where we will always find inner peace. Our true nature will always be there. It won’t die. It won’t go off and leave us. It has always been there and it always will be. It is that part of us which is perfect. It isn’t something that we can go out and buy. It isn’t something that we will find outside of ourselves.

One of the best ways to tap into and rediscover this true essence of who we truly are is through the practice of meditation. Meditation is one of the basics of Buddhist Belief. It is a way of quieting the “mind-chatter” that goes on minute by minute and begin to recognize that satisfying, joyful and most meaningful part of ourselves. It might help to understand that we’re not talking about a religion, or a strict dogma, or a set of rituals that will be needed to find this true self of ours. It’s not about having to join something or becoming a member of some organization. This is about developing a wonderful, intimate relationship with our own true nature. It’s about finding that place within ourselves that is connected to all the other beings on this planet.

The Four Noble Truths of Buddhist Belief are one of the best ways to gain an understanding of Buddhism. When we look carefully at each of them we can then determine how they relate to our own personal life experiences. We can also see if they are, in fact, true. Will they work for us? Will they help us to find that inner peace that we all desire? The one way to find out is to learn about them. What I’m going to do in this article is make a brief mention of each of them and then delve into them in much more detail in the articles to follow.

The First Noble Truth, as we learned in the previous articles, is that all of those things in our life that have been created by us, and have the conditions placed on them that we put there, are ultimately not satisfying. They don’t last. They’re unreliable and uncertain. While some things may seem fine for awhile, they will eventually cause us to become dissatisfied for one reason or another.

The Second Noble Truth tells us what causes of all that dissatisfaction. We need to learn the cause so we can take the steps to fix it. That’s what Buddhist Belief is all about. It’s about ending the suffering of the First Noble Truth. The reason things in life aren’t satisfying is because of our attachments, our cravings, our desires for more and more things to help us to feel less dissatisfied. It’s our resistance to change. It’s our unwillingness to accept the fact that things aren’t permanent. We want things and then we get them. When we get them we start to worry about whether we can hang onto them. But, then the thing breaks, or falls apart. Or the person leaves us or we leave them. We grow weary of something or someone, or the thing deteriorates or the person tires of us. Our greed, our constant desires for more and more are what lead us into dissatisfaction. Let’s face it, even we aren’t permanent, are we?

The Third Noble Truth is a much more optimistic truth. It tells us that there is a way to end this cycle of suffering. It tells us that there is a way to end our cravings and constant desires for more. It tells us that nirvana is possible and that we can all be released from dissatisfaction. It tells us that there is a way to find lasting inner peace.

The Fourth Noble Truth is the crux of Buddhist Belief — it tells what the path is to find this relief from the dissatisfying aspects of our life. The path to follow is the Eightfold Noble Path. It is the path that teaches how to live our lives so that we can get off the wheel of dissatisfaction. The Eightfold Noble Path, which we will discuss in greater detail in future articles, is divided into three sections: the ethics, the meditation and the wisdom.

Now, I know that some of the readers of this blog are thinking that, “Hey! I don’t have a problem! I’m not unhappy. I think everything is perfectly fine in my life.” If your life is everything you want it to be, that’s great. Get out there and enjoy your life. If things aren’t as good as you’d like them to be, then stick around and we’ll see if we can help you to find out how to make some improvements. The Dalai Lama has said on many occasions that the purpose of life is to be happy. The purpose of this blog is to see if there is a way for you to find the long-lasting happiness that is possible for all of us.

Last week we showed you a short 10-minute video of a series produced by the BBC called “The Life of Buddha.” Last week was Part One. This week we’ll show you Part Two. I hope you enjoy it. If, for some reason the video doesn’t play when you press the play button, here’s a link to take you directly to it :

Life of Buddha-Part2

Be in Peace,

Ron Rink

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Meditation, Peace

“There seem to two kinds of searchers: those who seek to make their ego something other than it is, i.e. holy, happy, unselfish (as though you could make a fish unfish), and those who understand that all such attempts are just gesticulation and play-acting, that there is only one thing that can be done, which is to dis-identify themselves with the ego, by realizing its unreality, and by becoming aware of their eternal identity with pure being.”

~~ Fingers Pointing Toward the Moon by Wei Wu Wei

Last time we introduced some thoughts about one of the fundamentals of Buddhist Belief, The First Noble Truth. As mentioned in that article, it’s going to take more than one post to cover the topic of the first of the Noble Truths.

When the Buddha began to teach the Four Noble Truths, he described the First Noble Truth as the “first fact of life”. That fact of life, in its most basic terms, is that all created or conditioned things are ultimately dissatisfying. Buddhists call this dukkha, which is the Sanscrit language for dissatisfaction. However you try to define it, it boils down to the fact that not much in this world will ever be truly satisfying. If you think about it, just about everything that comes into our life, anything that is conditioned, will eventually not last — we’ll find that we’re uncertain about it — it will prove to be unreliable and dissatisfying.

I personally, had a great deal of trouble when I first learned about The First Noble Truth of Buddhist Belief. But try as I might, when I put my mind to it, I couldn’t think of any examples that were truly satisfying in the long run. Sure, it was easy to think of things that felt good, that were satisfying in the short run, that caused pleasure, but ultimately they either faded away, or fell apart, or got lost, or ran away, or died. Or I got tired of it, or them, and began to look for something else that would take it’s place and give me a new boost of satisfaction. It seemed that no matter what I thought of as an example of something that met the requirement of always being satisfying — 24-7-365 — some form of negativity would creep into it at some point in its time in my life. I saw one person refer to this as the “roller coaster of life”.

This Buddhist Belief, the First Noble Truth, does have another side to it, however. There is a place where there is a lasting, perfect peace. There is a place that we can always be certain that what we have will not fail us in some way. This place is not a state of mind. It is not a thought to be analyzed. It’s not something we make up. It is not a created or conditioned thing. It is completely reliable and always will be. This is the place we can all find through our own enlightenment, our awakening. It is our natural state. It is who we truly are.

The First Noble Truth is that anything that we create, (emphasis on the world WE) is conditioned. It will always be dissatisfying and uncertain. It’s in its nature, and cannot be anything other than what it is. As long as its stuff we create, it will ultimately be something that will keep us from finding true peace.

On the other side of this, our true nature, the essence of who we are, our Buddha-nature, is not a created thing. It will always bring us inner peace. It will always be there. It has always been there. It will never change or become something other that what it is — our true self. This is the essence of Buddhist Belief.

In doing some research for these articles, I came across a series of short films produced by the BBC called The Life of Buddha. Here is the video of the first part of this series. I’ll include the others along with our next few articles. I hope you enjoy this:

The Life of Buddha – Part One

Until the next time,

Be in Peace,

Ron Rink

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Meditation

“On hearing the Teachings, the wise become perfectly purified,
like a lake: deep, clear, and still.”

~~~ Buddha

I can tell you right from the get-go, that covering the topic of The First Noble Truth, of the Four Noble Truths, is going to take more than one of these posts. Oh, I guess I could summarize the heck out of it and come up with something short and sweet, but I would feel guilty if I did that. It needs to be given the time it’s worth, I feel.

We’re getting onto the fundamental teaching of Buddhism, from the ground up. We’re going to be spending the next several posts talking about the Enlightenment experience. My way of presenting this to you is to approach it from the point of view of someone who is in the process of discovery right along with you. For those of you who might be well-trained in the Buddhist Belief, this may all seem elementary to you, however, it’s anything but. These are the basics of Buddhist Belief.

The Four Noble Truths were taught by the Buddha some 2500 years ago. What are the Four Noble Truths? They are the basic facts of life, folks. They are the facts of life as seen from an enlightened person’s point of view, the point of view of the Buddha. He also taught the Eightfold Path, and we will be covering that here as well in the future.

So, let’s start at the beginning. Probably the most fundamental thing about Buddhist Belief, about Buddhism, is what is called the Enlightenment experience. Buddha taught that this experience is our birthright and it is a fact of our true nature. This Enlightenment experience isn’t just something that Buddha had, it is just as possible and accessible for every one of us. In fact, many people, in this current time and down through the ages, have realized this wonder.

This Enlightenment experience, (or you may want to call it, spiritual awakening — or self realization — or illumination — these all mean the same thing), is just learning to recognize who and what we truly are — understanding our true nature. It’s not a new thing we’re looking for here — it’s always been there. It’s the true essence of who we are. It’s something that is always right here — now — in this moment. Our problem is that we’re just about always somewhere else than right here and right now in this moment.

When we come to this place of Enlightenment we often begin to see the world in a different light. The events and things around us may seem to be different in some way. As we begin to realize that we have a new insight, it’s important that we use our new-found wisdom to it’s best advantage. We might wonder what we’re doing with our life. We might begin to discover that we’ve been heading off in a wrong direction for years and years. We begin to wonder why do we die? We begin to wonder why are we all suffering as much as we do? Why is it so hard to be satisfied with our lives?

Reminds me of that song that Dionne Warwick sang, “What’s it All About, Alfie?” (You younger readers may not remember that one!)

That’s what the Buddha was thinking when he reached his enlightenment or awakening. So, he decided to give his first lesson to his followers. Historians refer to this talk as the “Fire Teaching”, because when he was asked why he looked like he was glowing with some amazing inner peace, he responded, “Because I have realized a truth that is beyond suffering. All created, conditioned things are unreliable or dissatisfying ultimately; all are burning. I have realized something is beyond this conditioning, this unreliable, impermanent, dissatisfying world. It is right in the midst of it, but it is not the things.”

I know, the Buddha can be kind of hard to understand at times, but stay with me in this blog and I’ll try to clear it all up for you.

Anyway, the Buddha described this as the First Noble Truth — the basis of life — that all created or conditioned things are ultimately dissatisfying. If you study some of the texts about Buddhist Belief, they will call this the dukkha. Lots of translations call this suffering. It really just boils down to life can really be a bummer! It’s just darn dissatisfying most of the time.

Alright. On that positive note, we’ll call it a day for this post. What you’ve just read is the lead-in to the First Noble Truth. Next post I’ll dig into it a lot more for you. Do come back — this is interesting stuff!

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Meditation

“Turn your mind away from things which are not permanent.”

~~~ Buddha

In the last post I talked a bit about why I came to follow a Buddhist lifestyle — and how that lifestyle is now leading me to start this blog about Buddhist belief. The primary motivating factor was a search for inner peace — and a search for peace throughout the world. Once I was led to begin the study of Buddhism as a way to help with my search, I found that one huge Buddhist Belief was that inner peace was possible for everyone.

Today, let’s talk about who he was and how he arrived at his amazing realizations.

First of all — Buddha was a man. He wasn’t a god during his life and he isn’t a god today.

He was born as Siddharta Gautama, the prince of a small kingdom in northern India. Until he was 29 years old, he lived the life of the son of a King. As you can imagine, that life was a highly privileged life. It probably wasn’t too far off from the lives of some of the princes of today. He probably partied a lot, ate a lot, more than likely had his share of sexual encounters and was likely quite well protected from the life of the common people.

The way I learned the story was that one day the people assigned to protect Siddharta Gautama from life outside the palace walls lost track of him. For the first time in his life, this privileged young man saw an old, sick man in the street and it horrified him. He had never before seen a human being suffering with the rages of sickness and decay. He wondered how people could ever find happiness if they knew that life led only to sickness, decay and death. These thoughts had never crossed his mind before.

The prince became quite depressed once he discovered this fact of life, until one day he met a holy man. The prince noticed that this holy man was able to maintain a level of peace and serenity despite what was happening in the world around him. So, the prince decided to follow this man, become his student, and embark on a spiritual path.

In Siddharta’s day, this path meant a drastically new way of life for him. He became a monk relying on the goodness of others for food, shelter and clothing. The school of study that he followed believed that mortification of the body would lead to purification of the mind and spirit. You were required to starve yourself. You had to sit upright for days without sleep. You had to literally whip your body until it bled. Siddharta kept this up until he reached the age of 35. At that point he was a mere skeleton of his former self. He realized that this lifestyle wasn’t anymore satisfying than his former spoiled, luxurious life as a prince.

Siddharta abandoned his monastic vows, much to the disgust of his fellow practitioners. He strengthened his body and sat down under a fig tree to do some serious thinking. That’s where the dawn struck! He came to realize that there was a way to find inner peace. At that moment he reached Enlightenment.

He was now The Buddha, which means the Enlightened One, or the Awakened One. Some of his fellow former monk-pals noticed the change in him and asked him to teach them what he had learned. He taught them about the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism. These Noble Truths are the core of the Buddhist belief system. The only way to reach Enlightenment (which is good) is to accept these Noble Truths.

In the next post we’ll start our discussion of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhist belief.

Always remember ….

“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”

~~~ Buddha

Shanti … (A sanscrit word meaning, “Let there be Peace. Peace, beautiful Peace. Peace within, Peace without. Peace in this world. Peace for all beings.”)

“Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.”

~~~ Buddha
Have a peaceful day!! —

Ron Rink
http://www.theleaderinside.com
http://www.wecould2.com
http://www.buddhistbelief.com

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Meditation, Peace

“Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.” ~~~ Buddha

My name is Ron and even though I live as close as I can to a Buddhist lifestyle, I can’t really lay claim to being a Buddhist. Sure, I understand Buddhist beliefs. I need to have some understanding of these teachings in order to live a Buddhist lifestyle.

Before we embark on my journey into Buddhism, let me tell you why I’ve started this blog and why I feel a need to write about Buddhist Belief.

Many years ago, I grew up as a young boy living on the streets of Detroit. This sounds pretty awful when you look at how the streets are today in large cities, but when I was growing up, it wasn’t as bad as it is these days. The primary reason was that kids didn’t have guns back then like they do now — that is one of the major differences. I was on the streets because I needed to get away from a home where my father believed that kids needed to be beaten regularly, no matter how hard they tried, they were just bad. I was also made to go to work in a bowling alley setting pins when I was eight years old because we needed the money. That was hard work for a little kid. However, there was a good side to that — I learned to earn money very young. That ability helped me to survive the rest of my youthful days and nights as a street kid.

While working there, I got to know other kids my age, and a little older, who were members of some of the local street gangs. I soon learned that if a guy wanted to get along with these gang members, he’d better learn everything there was to learn about how to street fight and he’d also better become a member of one the gangs.

To get to the point, and to keep this blog post from getting too long, I did learn, early in my life, that using violence, (obviously not a Buddhist belief), seemed to be the best way to survive if I needed to live on the streets. By the time I was eleven years old, I was full-time homeless.

This life of violence eventually led to some serious trouble that landed me in the Navy when I was 17 years old. It was a matter of either join the Navy or go to prison when I turned 18. This was during the Korean war. Thankfully, my father signed the papers for me to go into the Navy.

One of the major things I learned while serving in that war was that violence was not the way to solve problems. How I learned that is for another post to this blog later on. For today, the primary point is that near the end of the Korean War I became a pacifist, and began to seek ways to be a more peaceful person and to advocate for peace — all kinds of peace — peace within — peace without — peace in this world — peace for all beings.

The decision to become a pacifist eventually led me to reading some books about Buddhism. Was Buddhism a philosophy? Was it a religion? To this day, I still don’t feel I have an answer to those questions — but I did learn that if you follow Buddhists beliefs and teachings, you have a much better chance of finding inner peace.

“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”

~~~ Buddha

Shanti … (A sanscrit word meaning, “Let there be Peace. Peace, beautiful Peace. Peace within, Peace without. Peace in this world. Peace for all beings.”)

“Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.”

~~~ Buddha

~~~ Ron
http://www.theleaderinside.com
http://www.wecould2.com
http://www.buddhistbelief.com

Technorati Tags: Buddhism, Buddhist Belief, Meditation, Peace