Tracks
“These roots of virtue are to be understood to be equal to a Tathagata.”
-the Buddha; Sanghata Sutra.
Read that sentence above again, and think about it. The Tathagata is a fully Enlightened Buddha. He’s saying that being rooted in virtue is the heart of Buddhahood.
If we wish to progress in our dharmic understanding, we have to decide from moment-to-moment, how to apply virtue to each situation as it arises. Those moments of decision- (do this/not that) are the very seeds of our own Enlightenment.
The Buddha is right here, within each one of us.
Uttarabodhi mudra, the mudra of supreme enlightenment.
Waking up your inner Buddha and staying awake requires extraordinary self-knowledge and presence of mind. It means paying close attention to how you think and how you act, and it means making an ongoing commitment to searching inward for answers. Inward. Deeper. Beneath the surface of things, not just inside yourself.
- Lama Surya Das;
“Awakening the Buddha Within”
Gone, gone, gone beyond,
gone completely beyond,
Hail Enlightenment!
- Heart Sutra
“The Net of Indra is a profound and subtle metaphor for the structure of reality. Imagine a vast net; at each crossing point there is a jewel; each jewel is perfectly clear and reflects all the other jewels in the net, the way two mirrors placed opposite each other will reflect an image ad infinitum. The jewel in this metaphor stands for an individual being, or an individual consciousness, or a cell or an atom. Every jewel is intimately connected with all other jewels in the universe, and a change in one jewel means a change, however slight, in every other jewel.”
- Stephen Mitchell;
The Enlightened Mind.
(It’s also interesting to note that contemporary physicists are in general agreement that this ancient metaphor is indeed a good description for the universe.)
Clearing clouds from a sky-like mind.
We have it in our power to achieve an Enlightened state by overcoming dukkha (suffering, dissatisfaction), with dukkha itself.
The very thoughts which trouble and distract us so much-
are the necessary means of our liberation.
Without those thoughts and emotions, we would be unable to learn just
1: how they arise,
2: how they attach,
3: how they subside, and
4: how they can be destroyed.
Those disturbing thoughts are the very reason our lives are so precious. They make us human and so able to view all things, even our own thoughts and projections, in an objective, equanimitous manner.
Dukkha gives way to Nirvana.
- Namaste!
The fundamental aim of Buddhist practice is not belief; it’s enlightenment, the awakening that takes place when illusion has been overcome. It may sound simple, but it’s probably the most difficult thing of all to achieve. It isn’t some kind of magical reward that someone can give you or that a strong belief will enable you to acquire. The true path to awakening is genuine discernment; it’s the very opposite of belief.
- Tulku Trinley Rinpoche
The only thing bad about worry is that it distracts us from achieving Nirvana.
But other than that… :)
