Tag: Four Noble Truths

The Buddha’s solution for troubled times

A group of monks dressed in brown robes walking in a procession, accompanied by a dog, with a crowd of onlookers in the background.
Walk for Peace USA – Very impressed with the monks.

Before I get started, I wanted to acknowledge the 2,300-mile walk for peace in the USA that started on October 26th, 2025, and is still going on as of February 1st, 2026. The above picture must be from Texas, where they started; they are now walking in January weather, and are currently in Virginia. This is what peace and dedication look like. I feel fortunate to be able to see this on social media every day, as it is truly inspiring.

I wanted to start this post with a quote from the great James Baldwin, as it pertains to what people around the world are going through today. Sorry, no Pali Canon quotes today.

Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it, the loss of all that gave one an identity, the end of safety. And at such a moment, unable to see and not daring to imagine what the future will now bring forth, one clings to what one knew, or thought one knew; to what one possessed or dreamed that one possessed. Yet, it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self-pity, to surrender a dream he has long cherished or a privilege he has long possessed that he is set free-he has set himself free-for higher dreams, for greater privileges.

I live in the United States and during the last year I’ve seen our civil liberties eroding, corruption in government to a degree that is absurd, violence directed against citizens, including immigration officers actually killing US citizens, and a President that is destroying the economy, threatening other countries, bombing at least 8 other countries within the first year of his second term. Our government acts more like an organized crime organization, using threats and coercion against its citizens and the rest of the world. Many in this country fear we no longer have a democracy, but are now an authoritarian regime. No one chooses this, but it is now our reality. The anger and push back it has unleashed is of epic proportions and never seen except maybe during the civil rights protests in the 1960’s.

As one who has studied a fair amount of history, none of this is new, and many of you from other countries would have your own tales of injustice and oppression that may make what we are going through pale in comparison. Cruelty, greed, hate, seeking power, injustice, and endless wars seem to be features of the human world. The suffering from all these things has been the experience and a big part of the history of mankind. At the same time, much of mankind is kind, generous, loving, and works for a better world, not just for themselves, but also for their families, communities, nations, and the world at large. In my long lifetime, there may have been a few years you could count on one hand that we were not experiencing significant conflicts in the world resulting in thousands, if not millions, of deaths in this world. The negative human conditions caused by war, seeking power, corruption, injustice, and greed are so far part of an endless cycle of humanity. As technology has progressed, we are being bombarded by images, truths, and untruths of the atrocities being committed in our world. This real-time information flow does nothing but keep us in a state of anxiety. We either become so disturbed by it all or end up tuning it out altogether.

As the quote by James Baldwin illustrates so well, we change as our illusions are shattered and forced to give up privileges and possessions we thought we owned, but never really did. He goes on to say in the last sentence of the quote above:

“Yet, it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self-pity, to surrender a dream he has long cherished or a privilege he has long possessed that he is set free-he has set himself free-for higher dreams, for greater privileges.”

Baldwin was not writing about Buddhism when he made this statement, but for this illusion we have about ourselves and the suffering that we experience is where I make the case for Buddhism, the 2500+ year old philosophy. While many of us in the world view the current state of things as unacceptable, we need to only look back a few decades ago to what Stalin did in Russia, Mao in China, and Hitler in Germany. According to the Pali Canon and other historical references, peace was a rare thing even in the Buddha’s time, and the personal suffering of sickness, old age, and death was not radically different from what we experience today. The Buddha was very observant as a young man, and having realized the suffering in the world, he decided to understand the root of suffering and how it could be alleviated, or more accurately, created a path to eliminate it for the individual.

After achieving clarity on how to end suffering through enlightenment, he developed an approach or method, if you will, that includes the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. This came to be known as Buddhism, the revolutionary approach to living we know today.

I don’t want to give you the wrong impression that practicing Buddhism will make this all go away if you leave the life you have and join a monastery as a monk. For people who care about others, what is happening in the world will influence their thinking. Caring people want to see justice in the world, and it deeply hurts them to see the injustice and cruelty we experience in this country and so many countries in this world. If you put it in perspective, what we see as the end of the world now is another cycle in the great historical shit show we call mankind. This probably won’t console you, but we tend to think this time in history is either unique or the worst of all time, and neither is true.

The Buddha never intended his teaching to turn us into unfeeling nihilists. Quite the contrary, he and all the enlightened ones taught compassion and followed the precepts, but they also taught detachment. To me, this is the paradox that you can create happiness in your own life with your practice, yet still recognize that suffering exists in this world and you can play a part in it to make things better. Buddhism offers a way to train the mind so that you can experience happiness through the elimination of suffering for yourself. Your responsibility is to share the dharma with others so they, too, can obtain right view and find peace in this volatile world.

Namaste

References:

Baldwin Collected Essays

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Challenges for the Householder – Enlightenment

"Many people suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore... When you get free from views and words, reality reveals itself to you, and that is Nirvana."

Attaining Buddhahood is not so much a โ€œdestinationโ€ or a special โ€œstate,โ€ but a path, or orbit. . . . To firmly establish ourselves in this orbitโ€•to โ€œattain Buddhahoodโ€โ€•means to solidify in our lives a spirit of yearning for the happiness of oneself and others, and to continuously take constructive action with that spirit. Daisaku Ikeda

Introduction

This is the 5th post in the series regarding challenges for the Buddhist Householder, and the focus of this post is on enlightenment. I recommend reading the previous posts, each of them in this sequence, if possible, before reading this, but it is not required:

Exploring the Householder Path in Buddhism

Challenges for the Householder โ€“ Time to Practice

Challenges for the Householder โ€“ Learning the Dharma

and my most recent post, the Challenges for the Householder โ€“ Meditation

As a householder, someone who is not a monastic, you may have questions about enlightenment, sometimes called awakening, also called Nirvana, or in Pali Nibbana. Maybe you are concerned that, as a householder, will I ever achieve enlightenment, or even what is the criteria for this realization?

Achieving Enlightenment

It seems like a steep hill to climb if your goal is to become enlightened as a householder. Is it possible for someone who devotes maybe an hour or two a day to their practice to become enlightened? I’m going to give you the optimistic take on this; it is not how long you have been practicing, but the quality of your practice that will determine to what degree you become enlightened.

What is enlightenment?

I think this quote from Lions Roar does a good job of explaining what enlightenment is:

“Enlightenment is the ultimate goal of Buddhist practice. Enlightenment represents the highest state of spiritual awakening and liberation from the cycle of suffering and rebirth known as samsara. It is known as nirvana/nibbana in Theravada Buddhism and bodhi in Mahayana Buddhism and is defined differently by the two schools.

When someone, through spiritual practice, gains profound insight into the nature of existence, grasping the impermanent, unsatisfactory, and selfless nature of phenomena, theyโ€™re considered to have achieved nirvana. This is known as the state of the arhat, who has achieved complete liberation from suffering and the ignorance that causes it. In Mahayana Buddhism, the definition of enlightenment is expanded to include a vow to work for the liberation of all beings.”

My own definition may vary a little from the above passage from Lions Roar, but it is similar. I often think about the Four Noble Truths, where suffering is explained. To be enlightened, one must understand suffering, the cause of suffering, have found the path to the end of suffering, and ultimately eliminate it by no longer being ruled by desire, craving, and attachments. I wrote a fairly lengthy post on The Perils Of Attachment that goes into detail regarding the various forms of attachment.

Are there stages of enlightenment?

Regarding stages of enlightenment in the Sutta Pitaka, which is part of the Pali Canon, there are four categories of Buddhists in terms of enlightenment. There are a number of sources for these four types, but Buddhist-Spirituality.com has a fairly succinct description you might find valuable. I am going to paraphrase these four stages as follows:

  1. Stream-enterer
    • This means a Buddhist who has entered the stream. The stream is the Noble Eightfold Path. A stream-enterer reaches arahantship within seven rebirths upon opening the eye of the Dharma. The stream enterer has a high degree of understanding of the Dharma and is said to have Right View.
  2. Once-returner
    • In this stage of enlightenment, the once returner will return at most once to the human world. The stream-enterer and once-returner are distinguished by the fact that the once-returner has weakened lust, hate, and delusion to a greater degree.
  3. Non-returner
    • The non-returner does not return to the human world, or to any world lower than that, after death, thus the name non-returner. Non-returners are reborn in one of the five special worlds in Rลซpadhฤtu called the ลšuddhฤvฤsa worlds, or โ€œPure Abodesโ€, and there attain Nirvana (Pali: Nibbana); some of them are reborn a second time in a higher world of the Pure Abodes. The non-returner has abandoned the five lower fetters, including craving for fine corporeal existence, craving for non-material existence, conceit, restlessness, and ignorance.
  4. Arahant
    • The fourth stage is that of an Arahant, a fully awakened person. They have abandoned all ten fetters and, upon death, will never be reborn in any plane or world, having wholly escaped samsara.

The above stages were developed by the Buddha and his disciples, but don’t think of them as some kind of linear path to nibbana. Through my reading about Zen Buddhism, the Pali Canon, and other Buddhism reference there are many examples of awakening that happened quite suddenly, while others took decades. For myself I have slowly chipped away at the fetters eradicating craving piece by piece, but still struggle with attachments to behavior or emotions that are very unenlightened.

Is enlightenment necessary?

I read a book called Crooked Cucumber, which is the life and Zen teaching of Shunryu Suzuki by David Chadwick. Shunryu Suzuki was a Sลtล Zen monk and teacher who helped popularize Zen Buddhism in the United States. In David Chadwick’s book, it is outlined that Shunryu Suzuki did not consider himself enlightened and even thought it was unnecessary. Suzuki practiced and taught Zazen meditation to hundreds of students in Japan and the United States, yet he did not consider himself enlightened.

By whatever definition you use for enlightenment, it is my opinion that a full Buddha-like enlightenment may not be possible in this lifetime or even necessary. In my own journey, I look primarily to the level of mindfulness by which I live my life. For me, this means am I conscious of my feelings, do I catch myself when I am about to get angry, resentful, envious, or being judgmental. Am I aware of my cravings? Another aspect might be, can you forgive those you feel have wronged you in some way in the past? Being mindful of your thoughts and feelings and then not allowing them to come to fruition by proactively stopping them in their tracks is a powerful skill to cultivate.

Conclusion

Do you need to be enlightened to benefit from your Buddhist practice? My answer would be no, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t aspire for some level of enlightenment that can bring you peace in this life. As I mentioned above, having an awareness of your thoughts and then being able to curtail them is the first step, but this is still, to some degree, a bandage; it limits the damage, but is not a cure. For me, nibbana would include overcoming suffering (craving) and not having those thoughts in the first place. Not getting angry, not being envious, not judging others, and forgiving all past discretions. So where does that leave us? If I don’t possess those negative feelings, then I can focus my energies on showing love, compassion, kindness, and appreciation for those I come into contact with and those closest to me.

Buddhism is a journey that, for some people, may culminate in enlightenment, but if Shunryu Suzuki did not consider himself enlightened, I wouldn’t be too disappointed if I did not reach the final goal. Think how joyful life could be if you eliminated even 80% of those destructive emotions and feelings from your life. I have left a link to a YouTube video below that explains in greater detail that enlightenment is simply eliminating craving and that includes the craving you have for enlightenment itself. How can you be enlightened if you are craving its existence? Maybe enlightenment is not some seminal event, but something that is achieved as you walk the Eightfold Path one step at a time. Those times that you live in the present moment not mired in the past or looking forward to some future event, you are in fact experiencing enlightenment. The focus should not be on achieving enlightenment, but deliberately eliminating craving and attachment. Don’t live your life thinking my practice is imperfect because I am not enlightened. To do that is to concede the happiness of the present moment to the future as if something is lacking. You are not broken, you are a traveler on this wonderful path we call Buddhism.

Why Seeking Enlightenment Prevents Enlightenment โ€” A Buddhist Perspective

References

Shunryu Suzuki – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shunryลซ_Suzuki

Zazen – https://zenfulhabits.com/zen-meditation-zazen-discover-the-science-benefits-and-path-to-calm-and-insight-through-sitting-meditation/

4 Enlightenment Stages – https://buddhist-spirituality.com/suffering-its-reality/devotion-in-buddhism

Sutta Pitaka – http://www.palicanon.org/index.php/sutta-pitaka

Daisaku Ikeda – Daisaku Ikeda (1928-2023) was a Buddhist philosopher, peacebuilder, educator, author and poet. He was president of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist organization in Japan from 1960โ€“79 and the founding president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), one of the world’s largest and most diverse community-based Buddhist associations, promoting a philosophy of empowerment and social engagement for peace. He also founded the Soka schools system and several international institutions promoting peace, culture and education. Quotes on Englightenment by Daisaku Ideda

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Namaste

The End of Suffering #4 – Right Action

We are now on my fourth post regarding how components of the Noble Eightfold Path can lead to the cessation of suffering. In previous posts I wrote about The End of Suffering #1 – Right Understanding, then The End of Suffering #2 – Right Thought, and my last post was The End of Suffering #3 – Right Speech. I would suggest you read these previous posts in addition to what is being presented here.

So what is “right action”? According to the Buddha’s words taken from the Pali Canon right action is as follows:

“And what, monks, is right action? Abstinence from the destruction of life, abstinence from taking what is not given, abstinence from sexual misconduct; this is called right action.”

Pali Canon (SN 45:8, V 8-10)

Right action is where the rubber meets the road, unlike “right understanding” or “right thought”, the Buddha is telling us our actions must align with the right thoughts and right understanding. Here the Buddha lays out three things you must abstain from to practice “right action”:

  1. The destruction of life
  2. Taking what is not given
  3. Sexual misconduct

These three things that you are to abstain from are largely driven by morality. To embrace Buddhism means you must conduct yourself in a moral manner abstaining from killing, stealing, and any form of sexual misconduct. Buddhism requires you to change the way you act not just aspire to a more moral way of living. If you have been brought up in the Christian Religion say Catholicism you are familiar with the Ten Commandments. Where #5 is “Thou shall not kill”, #7 “Thou shall not steal”, #6 โ€œThou shalt not commit adulteryโ€, and #9 โ€œThou shalt not covet thy neighborโ€™s wifeโ€. These four commandments align pretty well with what the Buddha had in mind.

So how does the destruction of life, taking what is not given, and sexual misconduct create suffering?

The destruction of life

In Buddhism, the scope of abstaining from the destruction of life goes beyond human life and instead means all sentient beings. I’m going to use the definition below for a sentient being, but I think from the Buddha’s perspective it meant any human, animal, fish, or insect that could experience pain and thus suffer.

โ€œSentientโ€ is an adjective that describes a capacity for feeling. The word sentient derives from the Latin verb sentire, which means โ€œto feel.โ€ The first letters, โ€œsen,โ€ match the beginnings of common English words including sentiment, sensory, and sensationโ€”all of which give hints as to the meaning of the term. In dictionary definitions, sentience is defined as โ€œable to experience feelings,โ€ โ€œresponsive to or conscious of sense impressions,โ€ and โ€œcapable of feeling things through physical senses.โ€ Sentient beings experience wanted emotions like happiness, joy, and gratitude, and unwanted emotions in the form of pain, suffering, and grief.

Sentience: What It Means and Why Itโ€™s Important, By Jane KotzmannApril 8, 2020

https://sentientmedia.org/sentience-what-it-means-and-why-its-important/

If sentient beings feel pain then it reasons that the killing of a sentient being will cause suffering. There is also the premise that causing pain to others harms us, making us more callous, ruthless, and less compassionate, morally bankrupt if you will. That is probably an understatement, but take even what we often consider to be innocuous destruction of life like killing a mosquito or some other insect that has invaded our personal space. I would suspect that many who are on the path would consider even that transgression as a violation of the abstinence of the destruction of life.

From a Buddhist perspective, the destruction of life means all life that can feel pain, which is people, most animals, reptiles, fish, types of marine life, and yes even insects. Make it simple on yourself and try not to kill anything that moves. Makes you think, doesn’t it? Let’s say a rodent or lizard invades your domicile, while your first inclination is to figure out some way to terminate their life as this is most of the time the most expedient and permanent solution, but as a Buddhist, you start thinking how can I capture them and release them outside.

Taking what is not given

From the Buddhist perspective-taking what is not given is more accurately thought of as stealing from someone. Well, that’s the way I interpret it. It is obvious that this will cause suffering for whoever you stole from. Through the ages, this has been a doctrine of all civilizations, one that is punishable by laws prohibiting it. Not only do you harm the person you stole from, but you are likely to end up in prison where you experience all kinds of suffering. The immorality of theft is rarely questioned in most societies, and the consequences are often dire. As one who follows the path, you also suffer ethically, undermining whatever integrity you had to begin with, as your conscience will plague you, not only suffering the direct consequences, but also the guilt that follows.

Sexual misconduct

There are numerous forms of sexual misconduct in this world, but a few come to mind that violate the norms of most societies. Cheating on your spouse or partner, also known as adultery comes to mind. Many marriages and relationships have been destroyed not to mention the harm it does to the family. For many, this breach of trust is devasting and causes immense suffering for the person that was cheated on. Then there are the lowly pedophiles that prey on children, scarring them for life. Other deviants will commit rape on their innocent victims, again causing horrific suffering to the person that was raped. Let’s keep this simple, a Buddhist does not perform any form of sexual misconduct. If you are having any issues understanding why or what constitutes sexual misconduct you need help.

Summary

Much of the pain and suffering in this world comes from killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct. The Buddha knew this and made sure that his followers abstained from these behaviors if nothing else on purely moral and ethical grounds. The converse of these destructive actions is promoting moral, honorable, and peaceful conduct, that is “right action”.

Namaste

I wish you peace and happiness; may your life be filled with compassion, kindness, love, and forgiveness towards others.

Let your practice help you end suffering for yourself and all other sentient beings.

 

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The End of Suffering #1 – Right Understanding

In my last post Root of suffering according to the Buddha, it was declared by the Blessed One that desire was the root of suffering. However, there is one exception and that is when desire is used to understand the dhamma. In one of the discourses from the Pali Canon, where the Buddha speaks about the steps towards the realization of truth he states:

“Desire is most helpful for application of the will, Bharadvaja. If one does not arouse desire, one will not apply one’s will; but because one arouses desire, one applies one’s will. That is why desire is most helpful for application of the will.”

(from MN 95; Canki sutta, II 168-77)

One might infer that desire is a double-edged sword; maybe one edge is the desire that causes suffering and the other edge a desire that can be applied for good. Is this possible? You may have a desire to help others, be of service, learn the dhamma, or a desire to end suffering for sentient beings. I actually prefer the word craving, as to extinguish all desires especially those that are focused on positive outcomes would seem nearly impossible. Craving while a synonym for desire seems to have a more sinister connotation at least in my mind. Think about it in these terms:

  • A heroin addict craves a fix
  • An alcoholic craves a drink
  • I am craving ice cream

Craving seems a bit stronger when associated with some form of addiction. Maybe we can just accept that all desires will not result in suffering, but there is always the danger that what we thought of as a healthy desire may someday result in suffering. I just wanted to clarify that the Buddha did have different interpretations of the word desire. Sometimes it is just better to consider that the suffering we experience has its roots in desire and craving, but is often caused or manifested in attachment.

As we know from the Buddha’s teaching the cessation of suffering is the Noble Eightfold Path. In this series of blog posts, I would like to explore each of the factors of the Eightfold Path as they apply to ending suffering and how they address attachment. In this blog post, we will start with Right Understanding sometimes referred to as Right View.

I’m going to use a definition from the Tricyle.org website (reference at the end of this post), which I feel is a good description of what Right Understanding (Samma ditthi) is:

“Right understanding is the understanding of things as they are, and it is the four noble truths that explain things as they really are. Right understanding therefore is ultimately reduced to the understanding of the four noble truths. This understanding is the highest wisdom which sees the Ultimate Reality. According to Buddhism there are two sorts of understanding. What we generally call โ€œunderstandingโ€ is knowledge, an accumulated memory, an intellectual grasping of a subject according to certain given data. This is called โ€œknowing accordinglyโ€ (anubodha). It is not very deep. Real deep understanding or โ€œpenetrationโ€ (pativedha) is seeing a thing in its true nature, without name and label. This penetration is possible only when the mind is free from all impurities and is fully developed through meditation.”

Right understanding helps us see the cause of suffering allowing us to understand how our craving and clinging are actually harming us. Without “right understanding” we would be just tossed about in life, blindly reacting to everything, and being completely oblivious to what is causing our suffering. If you are doing this yourself then “right understanding” is the prescription, but I suspect you are not or you probably would not be reading this blog post.

Once you start to really understand what is causing your suffering you can begin to either avoid the attachment or at least lessen the impact of it. As sad as the loss of a loved one that might include a child, spouse, or parent can be “right understanding” will at least arm you with an understanding of impermanence, which might lessen the attachment you feel. This is always difficult to comprehend as you might think the dhamma is turning you into some cold nonfeeling person who is completely free of attachment. This will not happen to you and when you are faced with the mortality of your loved ones, you will be compassionate and loving to those that are suffering from the loss.

True “right understanding” helps you to see things as they really are, which will take some of the tragedy out of life. I will give you a brief example of where a lack of right understanding led to a lifelong scaring of a person. My father in law worked for a well-known drug company starting with them very early in life. He was very loyal to the company, but when he was about 50 years old the company terminated him and a number of other employees. Fortunately for him, he received a generous pension something that is almost unheard of today. Instead of seeing this as just another bump in the road or something that happens when you work for a corporation he took it as a personal attack. He is in this ’80s now, and he has never forgiven the company, and in fact, he never went back to work. Those of us that do not possess “right understanding” will encounter one round of suffering after another, blaming themselves, or someone else for the pain they feel during their lives.

Cultivate some measure of “right understanding” and your sense of attachment will diminish over time and then you will suffer less. In my next blog post, I will delve into how “right thought” can be an asset in your quest to end suffering for yourself and others.

Namaste

Reference: https://tricycle.org/magazine/noble-eightfold-path/

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Cause of Suffering

I think we can all agree that there is much suffering in the world. I have yet to find someone that doesn’t feel this to be true. However, as a practitioner of the Dhamma, it is important to realize the cause of suffering. Why are we suffering? Once we understand the causes of our suffering we are in a better position to address the causes. You already know there is the potential to end suffering by walking the Noble Eightfold Path. I like to look at suffering not just from Buddhist definitions, but also from a personal perspective. I would hazard to guess that most of the things I consider the causes of suffering are pretty universal and will resonate with you.

Suffering is caused by:

  • Craving – It’s pretty obvious that all those things you crave only bring suffering in the end. You might be craving material things, sex, alcohol, drugs, money, status, or any number of stupid things. Time spent craving something inherently brings you pain, feelings of unease, a focus on the future, and dissatisfaction with what you have. For most of us, craving is the #1 cause of suffering and encompasses other causes.
  • Ego – For me, this means a sense of self that craves recognition because I have some inflated view of myself. We all want to be special, but a life that is driven by ego will forever feel disappointing. We create an image of ourselves based on what we do for a living or how talented we think we are. This is a false self, one we create for this world we live in, not our true nature.
  • Envy – To some degree, we are envious of others because we crave what they have. We perceive their life to be better than our own. Envy often manifests itself in resentment. We resent that the others have it so much better than we do. They are more successful, have more money, are more attractive, have more leisure time, and the list goes on and on. Instead of being grateful for the small things in life we are envious of someone or some group of people and this causes suffering.
  • Death and Aging – We realize that someday we or someone we care about will die and leave this earth. This fact alone causes us to suffer, knowing that our time is limited and that we have wasted much of it. As we age we experience pain and the inability to do what we did when we were young and healthy, thus causing more suffering. Sometimes it just comes down to the underlying fear of death that hovers over us every day of our life.
  • Attachment – “If you observe yourself and others then you will see that people crave for pleasant experiences, crave for material things, and crave for eternal life. We are attached to sensual pleasures, wealth and power but also to ideas, views, opinion, and beliefs. Taken together, the four types of attachment are the main problems that Buddhists need to understand. The four types of attachment are 1) sense objects, 2)ย opinions and views, 3)ย rites and rituals, and 4)ย self-hood.” Buddhism seeks to break this attachment to these things and ideas.

There are possibly dozens of other causes of suffering, but recognizing that any of these causes may be the root of your dissatisfaction is really a good thing. Without understanding the cause of suffering all the meditation in the world will not lead to its cessation. This is maybe the most fundamental truth that Buddhism seeks to address. Life is suffering, there are causes, there is a solution, and the end of suffering is the Noble Eightfold Path.

You will never change your behaviour by changing the way you think until you realize what are the primary causes of your own suffering. These defilements or taints you suffer from must ultimately be addressed and eradicated. There is no Nibbana for someone that does not address their issues with ego, craving, envy, and their own mortality. In my next post, I will make a case for moving your thinking from ego and craving to service, which is another key tenant of Buddhism.

Namaste

Reference:

Guide to Buddhism: Step 5 โ€“ Eliminating Attachments

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