Regardless of questions regarding the existence of a creator, the human has enormous mental potential with or without answering that question. Sadly humans often waste this potential through the creation of false ideologies, looking through jaded lenses, and possessing grossly misconceived or illogical perceptions of reality. Self-absorbed and self-righteous behaviors perpetuate these thoughts of illogical division and classification which, in turn, create strangers of the self and others. Because of this, humans do not pool their talents to create exponential mental achievements; instead they engage in gladiator matches of pitting one illogical or incomplete idea against another. This creates a dark world in which violence, terror, sadness, suffering, and a lack of love are the norm. The solution for this state of affairs will not be found in extrinsic searching for a higher being, rather, the individual must look internally to question illogical thoughts and live authentically. Humanity, then cannot reach species potential as long the self imposed world of violence exists and while the search for a creator serves as a scapegoat to avoid self-responsibility.
Buddha was originally known as Prince Siddhartha Gautama. At the age of 15 the young prince became greatly troubled about the suffering among his people. By the age of 29 he renounced his birthright and left the castle to wander among his people to discover the reason suffering existed. He wandered for six years meditating and practicing under various gurus. Then one day while meditating under a Bohdi tree, he finally reached nirvana, or enlightenment. He discovered that there are four reasons, also known as the Four Noble Truths, which explained suffering: 1) It exists; 2) it has a definable cause; 3) because it exists it possesses finality; and 4) reaching nirvana will end it. Reaching nirvana means one lives an enlightened life by following the Eightfold Path. This philosophy later became known as Buddhism.
The eightfold path, or eight stages of enlighenemnt, is meant to deliver the journeyer from the depths of selfish, self-indulgent, cravings to enlightenment by knowledge acquisition. This requires a true knowledge of self, including abdication of all the ill-conceived concepts of self. These ill-conceived concepts, or ignorance, are what causes suffering. Enlightenment means peace acquisition and security or the antithesis of suffering (Moore & Brudder, 2008).
Stages one and two deal with the “initial mental outlook of the individual” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 534). Stage one necessitates that the individual must admit possession of those thoughts, feelings, and behaviors which will hinder his or her progress. When one is thusly limited, then illness of the mind, body, and spirit occur and thus block and abundance. This is about admitting culpability and responsibility for life. And stage two deals with one’s aim in life; one has to want to change and not feel resentment.
Stages three – six “specify appropriate behavior” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 534) for the individual on this path. Stage three means that one is mindful of one’s tongue to keep from telling lies, gossiping, or engaging in useless chatter. Stage four describes one’s proper actions as keeping to an unselfish path particularly in regard to helping others. Stage five deals with achieving one’s livelihood through proper, not scrupulous means. And stage six deals with one making the effort to struggle against those actions that cause harm to others.
The last two stages “pertain to higher mental and spiritual qualities involved in a total disattachment from self” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 534): Seven deals with the necessity for one to be mindful of all of one’s actions and through that mindfulness to “understand the nature of selfish craving” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 534). And eight deals with purification of the thought and consciousness to be unwavering; therefore, liberating the mind from the fetters of suffering through absolute stillness. In all this, however, a deity, originator, or creator was not present. Because of the highly personal nature of these last two, and they are meant to just polish the work of the other six stages, no further explanation will be offered.
To explain better the first six stages of the Eightfold Path, various other philosophers’ ideas will be advanced. In many ways these will be seen as a tool box to help one progress down Buddha’s path by furthering understanding. These philosophies will not explain Buddha’s process per say; however, they will allow the individual to initiate locomotion.
Stage one means the individual must recognize those thoughts, feelings, and behaviors (hereafter referred to as ill behaviors) which will hinder his or her progress. One must first acknowledge that his or her life is one of ill feelings, sickness, and nausea; that the individual is responsible for his or her own life; and just about all of his or her actions are causing the ill feelings. One needs to realize that any action of clinging to something or someone, whether a belief, existence, or a selfish desire also abdicates self responsibility by keeping one away from his or her potential thus relegating one to a mere reactionary animal who happens to be sentient.
According to Buddha, two states of mind are responsible for keeping the individual in suffering and away from reaching enlightened living: ignorance and selfish craving. All ill behaviors that cause illness can be understood by one of these two categories. Likewise these categories find further explanation from a few other external philosophies.
Friedrich Nietzsche (Moore & Brudder, 2008) described people as herd animals, who mindlessly follow orders and never think for themselves. “Sheeple” or sheep-people also adequately describes this mentality. Nietzsche held that “The herd animal…is cowardly, reactionary, fearful, desultory, and vengeful” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 167). Thus the people embrace slavery mentality and are not free to live in happiness and enjoy life to its fullest.
Jurgen Habermas (Moore & Brudder, 2008), a German philosopher, discussed the limitations on knowledge acquisition originating in deeply rooted ideologies, or illogical beliefs one possesses because of tradition. Political heads of state often initiated these ideologies to allow for political control through the inherent subjugation of the people to a slavery mentality. The people decided to buy into, and prepetuate this slavery of the mind.
Immanuel Kant (Moore & Brudder, 2008) discussed how these ideologies so drastically altered one’s state of mind and why people decided to hold onto them in the first place. Knowledge is inherently jaded or colored and is never an accurate representation of experiences and imagery. In many ways this can be likened to looking through lenses which filter sensory input to determine how one sees the world before one even becomes aware of it. For example, if one wears red colored lenses, then everything the individual sees will be in hues of red. This process of pre-filtering information is known as schema creation is psychology (Morris & Maisto, 2002). Schemas are perfectly normal and are absolutely necessary for higher cognitive functioning and automatic decision making. However, if left unchecked these schemas, or ways of thinking, can be “biased, distorted, partial, uninformed or down-right prejudiced” (2009, Critical Thinking: Where to Begin: Why Critical Thinking?). This excerpt was taken from the Society for Critical Thinking, who went further to explain proper thinking in the sense that, “…the quality of our life and that of what we produce, make, or build depends precisely on the quality of our thought. Shoddy thinking is costly, both in money and in quality of life.” (2010, Critical Thinking: Where to Begin: Why Critical Thinking?). This definition of faulty thinking gives expanded definition to Kant’s lenses or jaded perceptions. When life is seen through these lenses of faulty sensory input, then the result is a break away from human potential.
Jaded ideologies are also known as dogma. Dogma is a person’s infallible truths, particularly of a spiritual nature. These truths are illogical thought systems which create separation through self-importance. Maintaining a firm embrace on dogmas, jaded ideologies, or illogical thoughts means that one lacks self-love; or put another way, one practices self-loathing. Self-importance then is a facade to hide self-loathing to save face or create a life of “stupid self-confidence” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 174) as Albert Camus put it, or a life of false pretences of happiness and joy to cover the ugliness of internal pain. These concepts come with a price not only for the individual choosing to live in darkness and creating separation from the self but also consequences for humanity in creating isolation from others. In isolation ideas are not shared, let alone built upon. This also occurs because humans have the knack to believe they are correct and infallible. The eternal argument of, “I am right and you are wrong” perpetuates because of this self-importance concept. In keeping to doctrine people do not realize how much they refuse to see someone else’s point. People ignore ideas that contradict their own or do not match their lens’ view. When separation perpetuates then ideas will never see the true fruition, magnificence, and exponential magnification which results from unity and sharing.
Deciding to question such illogical thoughts and deciding to hold no belief as sacred and infallible, means that one has decided to live authentically. According to Jean Paul Satre (Moore & Brudder, 2008), the roll of an individual was to gain knowledge by living authentically. Living authentically means making right choices geared toward individual growth, not choices made of greed. Freedom in life can only be had by making authentic choices free of the fetters of dogma, illogical thoughts, and bias. Thus ideology, or slavery, limits knowledge acquisition.
This brings up two concepts: the idea of responsibility through knowledge acquisition and the limitations on knowledge itself. One must be vigilant to acquire proper knowledge and to drive out ignorance causing events such as self-importance, or selfish desires as Buddha put it. This all seems easy; however, people are lazy and will take the path of least resistance. This path leads to suffering.
Sometimes people create such false ideologies because they desperately desire to escape the horrible world of violence around them. According to Camus (Moore & Brudder, 2008), he could see the reason people would choose suicide. He also affirmed that suicide was the easy way out and one needed to work through the roughness of life to reach potential. John Dewey (Moore & Brudder, 2008) believed similarly when he stated that life was not a spectator event and the “spectator theory of knowledge” (p.224) was just an easy way out. Choosing the easy way out, according to Camus relegated one to an inferior position of unfulfilled potential. The stoics (Moore & Brudder, 2008), discussed in the next section, also believed struggle defined the person and his or her fortitude to do what was right.
Camus also believed the violence of the world should not be met with personal violence, either to self as in suicide or a lack of self-efficacy, or in violence to others as in crime, punishment, and harsh words. Instead, one should choose to rise above that violence and choosing a life of authenticity to solve one’s problems. The problem occurs, however, because people cannot resist calls to violence. Meeting violence with violence was the result one would always achieve when living in the darkness of meaningless chatter and clinging to worldly deceptions as Buddha purposed (Moore & Brudder, 2008).
If something requires WORK then many people will succumb to their laziness and hurt other people. Sigmund Freud (Morris & Maisto, 2002), the father of Psychoanalysis, created the concept of the Super Ego which controls the animalistic desires of the id and the irresponsible ego’s fulfillment of those desires. He did add some explanation about laziness of the average person and the desire to take that path of least resistance; however, he committed Plato’s error in assigning such a fatalistic trap to humanity in saying that the average human had no control over such drives. He failed to take into account the concept of self-efficacy (Morris & Maisto, 2002), or the desire a person has to better him or herself and live up to his or her potential. So while the world is a cauldron of violence and strangers, this is not fate, because the individual can decide to do something about it.
Another problem with inauthentic living is the lack of accountability either personal or intrapersonal. According to the pragmatists (Moore & Brudder, 2008) the world will continue to exist in darkness because of ambiguity and incompleteness. People cannot be accountable as long as the darkness of ambiguity reigns. Increased accountability through clarity is absolutely necessary to escape the darkness. In essence, one needs to turn on the lights of knowledge and wisdom by using the proverbial light switch to banish the darkness; but turning the lights on requires work.
This wraps us stage one which basically simmers down to a single concept: one must acknowledge, own, and conquer the tendrils of self-deception and inauthenticity to reach enlightenment. Stage two discusses the resentment that will hold one back from embarking on the path toward enlightenment. One must acknowledge that the path is not easy and resist harboring any resentment about that path. To keep one’s orientation on the path, and to say on it in the first place, one needs to remember the three d’s of determination, dedication, and destination. First, one must challenge his or her own determination to the change. Second, one must remain dedicated to those changes. And third, one must maintain focus on the destination and avoid getting distracted by shiny or glamorous objects. The reason one must have determination, dedication and destination, is because it is very difficult to live one's life authentically when distraction is easy to come by.
The more one begins to question his or her “known” knowledge, or ideologies, the more these ideas come out as incomplete. This can be a maddening process because one quickly realizes that his or her entire life is a lie. Discomfort, something that people avidly avoid, is also a strong potential when embarking on this path. For these reasons the majority of people will not even attempt authentic living. People are creatures of comfort, habit, and complaint. People want to complain and worry, but few want to take action to fix it. Most of all people do not want to admit that their lives are a lie. People do not know about critical thinking, nor are they interested because it shakes up their comfort zone. In this regard, Plato (Moore & Brudder, 2008) was correct when he said that the prisoners of the cave would not listen to the one who had escaped. The escaped prisoner had seen the true reality and knew of the deception in the cave, but to the remaining prisoners their reality was true despite the evidence. The one who carries the truth also carries the key to freedom and is considered a liar by those who live in the darkness. In other words, people have a need to maintain their lives of “stupid self confidence” (Moore & Brudder, 2008, p. 174) and ideologies.
This mimics Buddha’s concept that one only experiences a life of darkness because he or she is tied up in the illusion of self and the need to cling to comfort no matter how many problems that comfort causes. People cannot look past the initial discomforts to realize that this process can be quite liberating and addicting. The further one progresses upon this path the more one begins to relish the destruction of structurally unsound ideologies. This is not the masochism of self-inflicted pain; rather it is an understanding that the discomfort is temporary and not indicative of greater discomfort. Discomfort is not pain only the reality of life is pain. Discomfort does not equal pain; to say thusly is illogical.
Extrinsic motivation (Morris & Maisto, 2002), or external validation, explains this lack of desire for living an authentic and non-ideological life and the apparent confusion over the nature of pain. When one seeks external validation, then one is constantly looking to external sources for motivation and feelings of rightness and satisfaction. In other words, extrinsic motivation means the individual does not gain satisfaction from the task, which is the definition for intrinsic motivation; rather satisfaction is only found in the reward for the task. The reward is often as simple as comfort. On the other hand, intrinsic motivation means one seeks internal rightness and would, therefore, see the logical error in believing one’s life is painful as opposed to merely uncomfortable. Therefore, when one puts forth the effort to live in authenticity and without ideologies, then one is generally intrinsically motivated (Morris & Maisto, 2002). Intrinsic motivation means one seeks self-efficacy (Morris & Maisto, 2002), or living up to one’s potential.
People seek external validation over self-validation. People look to an external deity, rules, beliefs, or ideas to control their lives and actions. People do not find satisfaction from intense self-examination and self-control; they do not find satisfaction in the process but only in a reward. This all goes back to many people’s need for ideologies or jaded lenses. There is a comfort to be found in knowing one’s position as a slave; it is scary to be the master. An intrinsically motivated person, on the other hand would find the process of self-realization to be invigorating. The intrinsically motivated person is not a masochist rather he or she looks past the temporary discomfort to find relief from the permanent pain of life. He or she finds comfort in the destruction of unsound ideologies and looks forward to what gets built out of the ashes.
To facilitate the act of drawing distinction between pain and discomfort and the move from extrinsic motivation to intrinsic motivation, one should take awareness of one simple concept. The stoics (Moore & Brudder, 2008) discuss that one needs to harden him or herself against life’s difficulties to aid in that distinction. This hardening would allow the individual to successfully deal with life’s difficulties rather than getting discouraged. Getting discouraged often leads feelings of failure making it easier to succumb to the negative feelings of Buddha’s (Moore & Brudder, 2008) selfishness and Camus’ (Moore & Brudder, 2008) calls to violence. Violence is as anything that robs one of living a life of reasoning in lieu of the compulsion of mere primitive animals. So, if one does not harden him or herself, then one does not have to tools to resist the calls to violence.
This hardening can be understood in the concept of a plant to transplant. Gardeners recommend that when one wants to start plants indoors to get an earlier start on the growing season, then they need to acclimate the new plants to the outdoors before planting them in the ground. This acclimation is to get the plants adjust to temperature and whether variations that are not found inside. Weather includes wind. If the plants have never encountered wind then they never built up strong enough stocks and roots to resist the wind, thus they will easily be blown down. To frame this differently, one can harden him or herself by becoming an expert at coal walking, or ignoring the discomfort and reconditioning one’s perspective about discomfort, to get quickly, and efficiently, to the other side.
To summarize stage two, one needs to realize their determination and desire to change and remain focused on the destination. Authentic living is difficult therefore it is easy to get distracted. People are focused too much on the discomfort and often confuse discomfort as synonymous with pain. In their confusion, people think their lives are merely uncomfortable and living authentically is to live in pain. Life is really the other way around. Pain is suffering, not seeking relief from suffering. This confusion finds explanation in people’s extrinsic motivation and desire for external validation and reward. The intrinsically motivated individual would see the fallacy in the belief that discomfort is synonymous with pain. People would not be so adverse to change or discomfort if they would take the time to harden themselves to resist calls to violence; calls which seem all too easy to submit to. If one cannot resist the calls to violence or the clinging as Buddha would put it, then one will not be able to continue this path without harboring resentment. One must banish resentment through intrinsic motivation if one wishes to continue and find solution for suffering.
To this point, the individual has an understanding of the nature of the problem facing the abdication of suffering. Stages three through six discuss these concepts from a different perspective: to expand one’s perception of where the problems really arise from.
Stage three discusses that one needs to be mindful of the tongue. Buddha believed there were three forms of chatter which needed to be quieted: body, mind, and word. One could only reach enlightenment when all three chatters were quieted. All forms of chatter must be eliminated to bring the individual true freedom and happiness. He also believed that once one found this silence and reached nirvana then he or she was in a position to lead others. Martin Hiddigger (Moore & Brudder, 2008) discussed the incessant chatter which takes place among people as a result of internal chatter. This, he said eliminated meaningful communication. Heiddigger seemed to refer to some external source when he discussed that meaningful communication meant listening to the wisdom of being. Buddha did not discuss allegiance to a deity, doctrine, or set ideology; in fact these things were detrimental. However, the wisdom of being could also be seen as an internal source. This internal source can be seen as that little voice inside one’s head which warns of danger, offers suggestions, and is the intuition, but is rarely listened to. If one is not mindful of the tongue, then he or she will pay allegiance to an external source rather than listening to the wisdom of being. One cannot listen if one is constantly talking.
Stage five deals with one finding their path or their livelihood by not succumbing to scrupulous means or by perverting the laws of justices. This also means that one should not take advantage of another person to gain the upper hand. All interaction should be fair. Another tool of assistance on this path is to look at life from the perspective of a game where all humans and life participate. The game must be fair. According to most, however, there must be a winner and a looser. John Nash (Osborne, 2002), restated Game Theory which necessitates a winner and a looser, to state that the best course for a game was to have everyone win. How is this possible, how can everyone win? This was called the theory of Equilibrium, and basically states that what is best for game progress is to ensure everyone has the best possible outcome. When everyone helps everyone else, then the game is a lot easier. In addition, he further explained that whenever a player looks out for his or her best interests they are relegating themselves to a lesser position.
The necessity to find a win-win solution means that traditional means of income generation must be re-examined. All forms of advertisement are meant to deceive the buyer into taking an action he or she would not normally take. This is all based on an understanding of psychology and what pushes people’s buttons to take action. Because almost all forms of income generation rely on advertising, then all are unscrupulous because they take advantage of a fellow human. All forms of exchange must be done with the best interests of both parties to be beneficial.
Knowledge seeking and application also suffer from scrupulous deception. All subjects across all realms of study, including humanities and science, suffer from a lack of unification. The problem with all forms of knowledge acquisition and human interaction is people are too convinced of their own self-importance. This prohibits any real win-win solution to be found. This self-importance also leads to the lack of unification. When self-importance is clung to, then knowledge could get lost in the skirmish. Knowledge would be further advanced if people would cease to engage in gladiator matches to pit one idea against another.
The Socratic Method (Moore & Brudder, 2008) could be used to facilitate the finding of a win-win solution (Osborne, 2002). This method involves systematically questioning each idea to bring about more clarity, thus finding a win-win solution. Once an idea is clarified, then each listener has a better understanding of the other’s concept or position. This understanding would also allow for the opposite views to be modified to find more alignment between the two concepts or to find that they were not so different after all. This unification among seemingly dissimilar ideas would mean that knowledge acquisition would occur at a much more rapid pace. When similarity is sought, solutions are created to solve bigger problems; when two or more come together to solve a problem, the results will be exponential. The knowledge seekers of today need to eliminate the stance of self-importance and learn to understand and integrate the knowledge of their counterparts to stop the stymieing of knowledge. The great solutions needed to solve the world’s massive problems will never be found if people cannot work together by finding win-win solutions.
Stage six deals with one being on guard against all forms of deceptive behavior and to continue to keep up the fight. These behaviors are like an addiction with a far spreading root system. The addiction, almost as if it has a life of its own, will struggle for survival. When one actively tries to make a change and deny something in his or her life, the denied behavior can, and often does, go underground and later resurfaces at an unexpected moment and in a form which will not alert the path traveler. According to Buddha, it would seem that the only life an addiction has is the clinging one has to that addiction. The addiction will leave when one is ready to cease clinging. Therefore, because one is not ready to cease clinging, but consciously does not want to admit that, then he or she will seek underhanded ways to cling without having to admit to the self the real problem.
Gilles Deleuze (Moore & Brudder, 2008) discusses a similar concept. He said life is often viewed as a tree where all pieces of life are disconnected an alone. However, he believed the idea was incorrect. Life should be viewed as having characteristics more similar to that of a rhizome which spreads underground, horizontally, occasionally sending up shoots, but it is all interconnected. A rhizome will spread and destroy anything blocking its progress, but it never develops a deep root system. To look at an addiction, ill behavior, or something which is desired by the possessor to be removed, then one would see that these things are almost never isolated incidents. Rather they have far reaching and spreading roots which have occasionally sent up shoots elsewhere. This would explain why when a thing goes underground and resurfaces later, the individual thinks it is a different thing. Close examination would show that this new thing has an intricate, underground root system which links back to the original behavior and this behavior is harder to eradicate than originally thought.
In these early stages of detaching from self, one needs constant reassurance that he or she is on the right path. In many ways, a young one on this path is like a child who needs comfort and reassurance from the parent. This is why honest leadership, in service to the individual, and who possesses with unselfish focus on the individual’s forward progression is necessary. This leader could then also be seen as a teacher who offers guidance and encouragement. The child needs the parent’s comfort. In the early stages, if an individual lacks a parent for comfort or a teacher to seek guidance from, then it is appropriate for the individual to look to God or a source for this very necessary reassurance. This is not to decide whether or not a source exists, it is to say the external seeking is not harmful when done only under these conditions. Under these conditions one is not giving up his or her personal power. The woman described above cannot attest to life in the other four stages because she has not experienced it. She does give constant thought, however, as to the processes. She will need to cease chatter (stage three), live unselfishly and practice unconditional love (stage 4), achieve honest livelihood (stage 5), and attack the rhizome addiction (stage 6).
A Story:
Bri is a young woman embarking on this path. She actively works on trying to follow Buddha’s path. Following stage one she identified many things she needs to change. She is more or less in stage two, working on having complete acceptance without resentment. She realizes that these stages are not distinct and separate; rather, she works on each stage as it comes up. She accepts this and is trying to keep the faith that she is making forward progress; this is particularly hard when a habit or mannerism which she thought was gone springs back up. She works to maintain a vision of her goal by constantly reminding herself of her destination, determination, and dedication.
Why is she doing it? What is the purpose? It is for the benefit of her daughter and future generations. Primarily, she does not want her daughter to have to suffer in life. The daughter will encounter various pitfalls and pain. If she has the tools to successfully navigate and evade these challenges, then she will go much further than Bri who has to figure it out. Bri does not have a teacher and, therefore, wants to be the teacher she never had. Bri knows that if her daughter is thusly equipped then she can change the world.
Wisdom directs that the world’s problems can only be solved with a fresh, untainted approach; the approach of a pure, untainted being; in other words a child. Bri often faces discouragement at such a monumental task. She particularly faces discouragement because she is aware of her many faults and inadequacies and therefore feels she is inadvertently tainting her daughter because of her lack of quick progression and clinging to the old habits of a deluded self. In other words, she feels as if she is not making enough progress in a quick enough manor. Further wisdom and understanding is necessary for her to realize that the daughter’s unique witnessing of the transformation of her mother is actually arming her for an even greater perspective than Bri could have otherwise hoped for.
Authentic education for her children is vitally important, even though Bri cannot fathom why in her limited human perspective. She just needs to maintain the faith that she must continue this path to authenticity so her children will be able to do greater things than she, herself, is capable of. This will be the case because they were never encumbered by the burdens of clinging to illogical ideologies. Bri knows that she is giving her children the gift to heal the world and more with their new found potential.
References
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Haselhurst, G. & Howie, K. (2010). Ancient Eastern philosophy: on the ancient wisdom of Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism & Confucianism. Retrieved from http://www.spaceandmotion.com/buddhism-hinduism-taoism-confucianism.htm.
Moore, B. N. & Bruder, K. (2008). Philosophy: The power of ideas (7th ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill.
Morris, C. G., & Maisto, A. A. (2002). Psychology: An introduction (12th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Nevid, J. S. & Rathus, S. A. (2005). Psychology and the challenges of life: Adjustment in the new millennium (9th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Osborne, M. J. (2002). Introduction to Game Theory (Draft Chapter). Nash Equilibrium Theory. Retrieved from http://www.economics.utoronto.ca/osborne/igt/nash.pdf.
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