Nature, Reality, & Buddhism

[takso]

Buddhadhamma: Embracing Neutrality

 

From a general understanding, Buddha’s teaching is not a restricted path dedicated to a select few.  Buddhadhamma (Buddha’s teachings) is merely about direct experience by yourself and nothing else.  It’s in the air that you breathe, in the things that you feel or touch, it’s just all over the cosmos. Hence, it is universal and applicable to all beings or things, independently of the planes of existence.

 

Meanwhile, the original teaching of the Buddha transcended Buddhism as it is conventionally understood.  The enclosed suffix -ism in this context represents adhesion to a system or class of principles taught by the Buddha.  The original context of Buddhadhamma focuses on methodology rather than on the character of an individual.  This means it lies in the direct experience of oneself, by oneself, or through other means.

 

Furthermore, the Buddha advises his listeners not to believe what he has said until they investigate it.  It is to keep the original essence of Buddhadhamma intact and timeless.  In Buddhism, it is possible to achieve nibbāna by concentrating the mind on letting go of things or matters and exhibiting a balanced attitude.  By doing this, we can steer clear of cultism and dogmatism.  Nibbāna is a supreme phenomenon that will manifest itself without conditional phenomena.

 

In the end, Buddhadhamma is supremely limitless, stereotype-less, and nameless.  It is never about what a single person accomplished a few thousand years ago, but rather about the way to spiritual liberation.  In other words, it is about direct experience, recognition, and liberation, not the blind obsession of Buddhism, which ultimately leads to spiritual imprisonment.  Therefore, embracing neutrality is the key to the ultimate discovery of truth.

“Life itself is a prison,
The instincts are prisons,
The senses are prisons,
Superstition is prison,
Sacred institutions are prisons,
Teachers are prisons,
Holy things are prisons,
Goodness is prison,
Views are prisons,
Purity is the highest prison,
Voidness is not prison,
Freedom is salvation from prison.”
Buddhadāsa

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Namo Buddhaya

Mother Nature refers to the origin of the essential qualities or innate disposition, connected with the intrinsic characteristics that plants, animals, and other characteristics of the world develop on their own.  These essential qualities of nature can be broken down into intrinsic and interdependent aspects that would simultaneously exist in harmony.  In the end, we might find that Mother Nature is sufficiently universal and infinite in its original scheme and is governed by universal laws.

 

In the meantime, Mother Nature is all about the causal elements of energy and emptiness.  As you see through energy, you see through emptiness; when you look at emptiness, you look at energy.  From this comes the saying “Form is emptiness, emptiness is form”.  The applicable principle: see into the form is see into the matter, see into the matter is see into the energy, and see into the energy is see into the emptiness.   

In the dependent nature, everything is a matrix from all things, i.e. all things or matters are interdependent co-arising ad infinitum.  That’s how conventional reality works in a very convoluted web of existence.  The existence of energy will bring the mind into being that, in turn, evokes perceptions, conceptions, labels, borders, names, activities, forms, relationships, descriptions, stereotypes, beginnings, ends, etc.  This means that the mind is a necessary prerequisite to duality or multiple circumstances. 

 

Moreover, something like an object would not arise out of nothing, but rather the elements of energy that emerge into a system. According to Einstein’s formula (E = mc2), energy and matter are simply two facets of the same thing; both are reflected in different shapes on their own.  And because we are incapable of discerning energy with the naked eye, we simply call it empty, rather than nothing.  It is difficult for most people to see that ultimate truth because the mind is intrinsically dependent.

 

With the waves of dependent phenomena, the mind is obscured from discerning the actual circumstances, hence the appearance of ignorance and suffering.  In general, the dependent appearance is only the ultimate result of a variety of aggregation activities observed by the mental consciousness.  And just with balanced circumstances, there could be opportunities for process integration, that is, under balanced phenomena, we could see the prevalence of appearances and vice versa.

 

In the end, the wise Buddha emphasised what ought to be seen from every angle of things or matters while pursuing the ultimate truth or reality.  Without it, the conclusions drawn from its observations will not be fair or unbiased.  Buddhism is simply about seeing, knowing, and letting loose on things or events.  In other words, Buddhism supports direct experience and acknowledgement, but not the belief system.  The discourses or suttas available are but the tools of one’s Dhamma practices before enlightenment.

 

Generally speaking, Buddha Shakyamuni focused his teachings on only four areas, namely the four noble truths as follows: -

  

1.  The truth of dukkha,

2.  The truth of the origin of dukkha,

3.  The truth of the cessation of dukkha,

4.  The truth of the path leading to the cessation of dukkha.

 

The Buddha has discovered that the mind is the forerunner of every state and dukkha is born out of the mind due to ignorance. Therefore, we could witness the iterations of birth, life, death, and rebirth, that is, samsāra.  In Buddhism, dukkha signifies suffering (enduring), and letting go is its antonym.  With a great deal of sustained and continuous effort over several life cycles, it is possible to liberate the mental consciousness.  Ultimately, there is a complete lack of circumstances and it’s like being in balance, that is, nibbāna.