The eightfold path is a moral compass and guide to your behavior that can lead to the right path and thoughts.
The Eightfold Path of Enlightenment;
Proper views
Resolve
Speech
Action
Livelihood
Effort
Mindfulness
Concentration
Satoru
www.samuraizen.com
Don’t chew the diamonds.
It is my habit that before I retire at night I brush my teeth. I put the toothpaste on my Braun whirling toothbrush, put the device in my mouth and turn it on, then I walk through my apartment and out onto my terrace. There I look over the city and around the terrace until the two-minute signal from the device goes off. Depending on the evening I usually brush longer then walk back to the bathroom still brushing. Then I load my portable water pick with warm water twice and use it on my teeth and gums.
So I was really surprised when I woke up this morning and had a small piece of something in my mouth. At first I thought I had somehow chipped a tooth in the night. Upon closer inspection it turned out to be a square chip of glass. How did the glass get into my mouth? How come it did not wash out with all the brushing and cleaning? How come I did not swallow it sleeping on my back through out the night? And what damage could it have done if I swallowed it? A lot more questions then answers. This was a mystery that I could not solve. Had I swallowed the glass and it caused a blockage in my heart who would have known the cause of my death and even if they found out what did they think?
As I move through life, enjoying every minute above ground, enduring the slow death of a thousand cuts, explanations for events and actions become tiny movements of actions toward oblivion. My eventual demise becomes acceptable and just another minuscule tick in the universe. Acceptance cancels out fear and writing about death, a topic that was so hushed and not discussed as I journeyed through life, is liberating and informative to those who have trouble facing the inevitable.
I think about the people that I have known all my life that have died. Some had so few possessions that there entire life fit into a few cartons while other had such a complex existence that it took years to settle their affairs and possessions. Still, in just three generations all of us will not be remembered except for a few photos or records of our brief survival.
Satoru
www.samuraizen.com
Just as there are many forms of Christianity, with Jesus as the common denominator, so are there many forms of Buddhism with the four noble truths uniting all Buddhists.
This contemplative way of spiritually being and perceptive seeing is personified in the Four Noble Truths.
They are that; life is full of suffering, that most of the suffering, including the fear of death, can be traced to “desire,” and the mind’s habit of seeing everything through the prism of the self. If you continually base your life on desires, you’re longing for wealth, fame, status, children, power, and immortality, then life is unceasingly painful. That this craving engendered by separate selfhood can be transformed and free you from attachment to desires, leading to peace and enlightenment through the transcendence of self to the exalted state called Nirvana or Satori (awakening) and that the means to do it lies in The Eightfold Path to Enlightenment.
Satoru
www.samuraizen.com
Once the word was out that I was collecting sayings and koans, friends, well wishes, relatives, neighbors, lovers, acquaintances, and other writers and artists sent me their favorite writings. With some I was able to ascertain the general source and have listed it in the bibliography. I apologize for any expressions that were gleaned without permission. But it is a daunting and impossible task to research the immense number of sayings, adages, proverbs, treatises, aphorisms, sutras, dictums, and maxims used throughout this book, taught over years and decades, in use in thousands of commentaries, articles, books and in the ancient and general lexicon.
As a teacher, Zen advocate, and life long student, even though I believe in intellectual copyrights, I must allow anyone who wishes to take limited quotes from my book to do so.
How can we change the world for the better if we do not share our learning and give of our intellect and ourselves?
Satoru
www.samuraizen.com
Samurai Zen combines aspects of all three categories with the added caveat of stressing the practical. It is not a “pure” book in the sense that it makes no attempt to adhere to a strict philosophy and it eclectically uses many different sources and attempts to incorporate these wisdom’s into overlapping categories, chapters, and aphorisms while still attempting to be true to the proprieties of Zen Buddhism.
Since many of the expressions, statements and maxims throughout this book are gleaned from a myriad of difference sources, many appear in slightly divergence forms and variations on a theme. This book is also an amalgam of riddles and paradoxes that may transcend the illusions of logic, adages, proverbs, truisms, maxims, gongans, mottoes, aphorisms, self-evident truths, humor, Mondos (Zen tales,) opinions and advice, written emphatically, collected from the wisdom of many different sources, traditions, and cultures. Sometimes thoughts are repeated with only slight variations because this difference can make comprehension and retention significant.
Much of the information that is presented is not necessarily in sequential order. This is an intentional Zen method that forces you to think and perhaps alter your attitude.
Some truisms can be applied to very contrasted situations and applications are therefore repeated. This is intentional since you cannot get too much of a good thing.
Satoru
www.samuraizen.com
A Way To Live – ZEN 