We’ve covered the history of Buddhism: what society, culture and government were like 2600 years ago and why the Buddha's approach to happiness, compassion and freedom was appealing to so many people, especially freedom from the hierarchy of the caste systems. It also feels like a lot of the concepts are still relevant today, for example, the study of the nature of reality and how we can find happiness.
The class looks at the concepts of Dharma (as far as I can tell, a search for truth), the Eightfold Path and how these lay the groundwork for enlightenment through meditation. To become enlightened is to have your human mind grow to the point where it is obvious that we are interconnected and that personal gain is an illusion*. When someone else hurts or is in pain, a part of us is too and doesn't know it.
Before we align ourselves with the collective's happiness, as part of a win-win scenario, we have to work on our inner selves and find our own happiness. Your happiness always comes first, and that isn’t necessarily dependent on external factors. It also helps to have an understanding of what it means for everyone to win. This made me think about why it is important to heal ourselves, working through anger, doubt or sadness - and to express those feelings by journaling or other means, rather than suppressing our emotions.
To quote Professor Thurman:
The other thing that I loved about Professor Thurman's class is his interpretation of meditation in one of the last steps of the Eightfold Path. When the texts speak of meditation, the translation is not just to meditate / concentrate - but to bring into (your) Being the quality that you are meditating on. This resonates 100% from an Energy Healing and intuition point of view because whenever I have tried to connect with Buddha, I kept getting the message to meditate on Happiness and I didn't know that that meant 😅
"Only a self-fulfilled truly happy person can embrace the happiness of others as his or her own heart-felt goal"
Buddhism emphasizes love, compassion and impartiality - though it is not selfish to want to be happy, as I had to remind myself. Please join me in meditating on health and happiness. Start by grounding yourself so that it is easier for you to relax.
* My View of Personal Gain: We do have individual needs and aspirations and it’s unhealthy to deny that. Maybe “having it all” means the personal and the collective are satisfied, but for that to happen, we have to get over the ego’s whims and insecurities.
👉🏻 Read my book Chakra Healing & Magick: the things that we think will make us happy are often just placeholders 💛
Reiki hugs,
Regina
Regina
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