After his enlightenment the Buddha uttered the following spontaneous verse:

Through many births I wandered,
Seeking, but not finding, the builder of this house.
Painful is repeated existence.
Oh housebuilder, you are seen now.
You shall build no house again.
All your rafters are broken,
Your ridgepole is shattered.
To dissolution goes my mind.
Achieved is the destruction of craving.
(Dhammapada, verses 153,4)

The Buddha-to-be, or bodhisatta, began his quest for enlightenment at some far distant point in time. He eventually reached a stage of spiritual maturity when there was no turning back, and enlightenment was certain. Ninety-one aeons ago he was reborn as a youth called Sumedha. His multi-millionaire parents died while he was young. He reflected, “They have died taking nothing with them. It is better to give it all away before one dies, then at least I will take that wholesome kamma with me when I die.” Thus he renounced all his fabulous wealth and became a wanderer. Then he met the Buddha Dipaṅkara, who predicted that Sumedha would become a Buddha named Gotama in the distant future.

The bodhisatta continued to seek enlightenment throughout many existences. When his spiritual virtues were fully ripe he was reborn as Siddhartha Gotama, made the final renunciation of his wealth to seek enlightenment, and gained it after six years of struggle.

The simile of the house-builder refers to the house of selfhood, which is built by kamma, and protected by the rafters of mental defilements, held together by the ridge-pole of ignorance. With the destruction of ignorance, the other defilements and craving for existence were destroyed, as he attained to nibbāna.

First, we should understand that nibbāna is not a place or realm of existence like heaven, and the Buddha didn’t ‘enter’ nibbāna, neither when he gained enlightenment, nor when he died. Throughout his life, he could abide in the attainment of nibbāna whenever he wished, and all noble disciples can do this too. Nibbāna just means cessation or letting go.

When you just let go of something, you cease to suffer, there and then. Unenlightened people can experience a ‘mini-nibbāna’ every time they suppress the urge to defend themselves from some perceived attack. When we don’t suppress that urge, the ego rises up and we instigate another cycle of suffering.

If you can understand that this so-called ego is entirely mind-made, illusory, and has no substance, then you will see that the house is empty. There is no one at home. No soul, no self, no spirit, no person, no me, no you. Just mind and matter arising and passing away, and creating illusions. So where could a Buddha or Arahant go after death? If a fire ceases to burn because the fuel is used up, the flames go out. It makes no sense to ask, “Where did the flame go?” It didn’t go anywhere, it just went out.

However, it is difficult to see this. Usually, the ego does rise up, so we keep on making kamma, which means intentional actions by body, speech, and mind. This is the driving force that accumulates momentum throughout life, and throws us into this or that existence after death. Wholesome kamma leads to happiness, unwholesome kamma leads to misery. When we die, it is just the last conscious moment that determines the arising of the next existence, so it is wise to cultivate good mental habits and to remove bad ones, since we can die at any moment.

Good question. Short answer is, you don’t, at least not to begin with. The Pali words for the eight factors of the noble path all begin with sammā- e.g. sammā-diṭṭhi (right view), sammā-saṅkappo (right thought). However, sammā doesn’t just mean right.

How do we usually translate “Sammāsambuddho?” You never see it translated as the Rightly Enlightened Buddha, do you? The usual translation is the Fully or Perfectly Enlightened Buddha.

So our view has to be gradually straightened and corrected until it is not just right, but perfect and without any blemish. This action of straightening our views is one of the ten wholesome deeds.

Most people, including many so-called Buddhists, have more wrong views than right ones. When we gain sincere and well-placed confidence in the enlightenment of the Buddha, we get rid of the gross forms of wrong views such as those denying the law of cause and effect, and gain mundane right view, but we have not attained nibbāna yet. Self-view is one kind of serious wrong view that must be eliminated before we can realise nibbāna.

Self-view is the belief in a permanent self, soul, person, or being who inhabits the body, and motivates it.

“I think, therefore I am. I think?” “No you’re not, you’re magnetic ink. The folded sheets of paper clatter through the great computer …”

Before I became a Buddhist, I used to listen to the Moody Blues Greatest Hits album, from which these lyrics come. The very rapid, and almost incessant mental process perpetuates the illusion of a permanent self or person. That is why most people find it very difficult to be silent, and to do nothing.

When we meditate, the mind gradually becomes still, then we can see this profound truth of emptiness, or egolessness, and gain a deeper realisation of right view. When the mind is truly empty of self — selfishness, egoism, pride, arrogance, conceit — then you will clearly discern right from wrong.

The Buddha never tried to convert anybody to his viewpoint, because he didn’t have one. He knew what was right, and helped others to see it too. When you see the truth clearly for yourself you will gain confidence in the Buddha. If I insult your intelligence by trying to tell you what to believe, why should you listen to me?

All conditioned phenomena arise due to one of four causes. These are known as the four foods, or four nutriments:

1. Physical food.
2. Climate.
3. Mind or consciousness.
4. Kamma (including, but not confined to kamma in past lives).

Physical food is essential for life and strength. Good healthy food eaten in moderation gives us health, beauty, long-life, and strength. Too much rich food can cause poor health, while insufficient or poor quality food can also cause disease.

Climate is another factor. In cold climates we need heating, in hot climates we need air-conditioning. Extremes of cold and heat can also cause diseases or death.

Mind or consciousness is important too. Too much anger, lust, fear, or worry is not good for one’s well-being. How we stimulate the mind affects our happiness. We need wisdom to avoid stimulating the mind in unskilful ways.

Then there is kamma. We do not know what we did in the past, and can do nothing about it now. It will give its result when the conditions are ripe, and if it was powerful bad kamma, we will have to suffer. If we are enjoying good results, we can be happy, but we must plant good seeds for the future while enjoying the fruits of the past.

Pain and Disease

Pain and disease comes from having a body. We have to accept it the way it is. When we were young, we had lots of energy and recovered quickly from diseases, as we get older the body decays and finally perishes. The Buddha’s chief supporter, Anāthapiṇḍika, was in agony on his death-bed, even though he had done heaps of powerful wholesome kamma during his lifetime. However, when Venerable Sāriputta taught him the method of insight meditation he was able to transcend the pain and attained bliss as he lay dying.

Actually all pain is mental, not physical. If you are unconscious, you cannot feel any pain. When we talk about physical pain, we mean the unpleasant feeling that arises through physical contact. Mental pain is the unpleasant feeling arising through mental contact.

If one meditates seriously, it is possible to separate mind and matter and observe even severe physical pain and discomfort with equanimity. It is not easy to sit in meditation at first. The beginner may claim to be in agony after only twenty minutes of sitting still, whereas an experienced meditator can sit still for two hours or more without difficulty. It is not that they have no pain, but they do not magnify it with fear and aversion. When mindfulness and concentration are strong enough, pain is not a problem.

Healing Through Insight Meditation

Ardent meditators with strong faith in the Dhamma have overcome serious medical conditions such as cancer, eczema, tuberculosis, gall stones, etc. Even the average person can soon learn to overcome mild ailments such as colds, headaches, high blood-pressure, etc., and minor mental disorders such as stuttering, acute anxiety, compulsive obsessions, phobias, and depression.

We do not claim that meditation is a cure for all ills. Medication and therapy should also be used, but the concentrated mind has powerful healing qualities.

Severe mental disorders cannot usually be overcome, because the unfortunate victim’s mind is just too weak and distracted.

Not my first discourse, I hasten to add, but the Buddha’s first discourse.

That seems like an appropriate place to start. If you are reading this thread then I assume that you wish to know more about the teaching of the Buddha. I will be do my best to reply to any questions that you may have, as long as they are respectful and sincere.

Preamble

The bodhisatta, Prince Siddhattha Gotama, renounced his palace at the age of 29 after seeing four signs: an old man, a sick man, a dead man, and a monk. Seeing that all living beings were trapped by old age, sickness, and death, he resolved to find an escape from this predicament. His noble quest began with the practice of self-mortification because it was believed at the time to be the way to liberation. He practised with five other ascetics as his companions. After six years of strenuous austerities, he realised that this was not the right path, and resumed taking adequate food and rest. Because of this, his five companions thought he had given up the quest, so they left him.

After regaining his strength and health the bodhisatta meditated the whole night and discovered the path leading to enlightnement. By the morning he had eradicated all craving and ignorance, and he gained Buddhahood with the rising of the dawn. Reflecting on the Dhamma that he had realised, he was at first disinclined to teach it, as it went against the current of human desires, and was difficult to understand. Nevertheless, he reasoned that some “with little dust in their eyes” would understand it, so he resolved to teach it.

Realising that his two former meditation teachers had already passed away, he went to Saranath to teach it to the five ascetics who had been his companions in the quest for liberation. When he told them that he had found liberation, at first they did not believe him, because they thought he had given up the path of striving. However, by reminding them of his lifelong honesty, he won them around and they agreed to listen to him. So he gave his first discourse, which is called the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta – the setting in motion of the wheel of the truth.

This first discourse deals with the Middle Way, and the Four Noble Truths including the Eightfold Noble Path. It is very concise. By the end of the discourse only one of the five ascetics, Kondañña, understood it properly and realised nibbana, the other four had to practise meditation as instructed by the Buddha for some time before realising nibbana. Because he was so quick to understand this concise discourse, Kondañña became known as “Kondañña the Wise.”

The Middle Way

The Buddha began by stating that the way to liberation was the middle way, avoiding the two extremes of sensual indulgence and self-mortification. This middle way comprised eight factors: right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

He didn’t explain it in detail, he just stated it in brief.

The Four Noble Truths

Then he stated the Four Noble Truths that he had realised:

1. The truth of suffering (dukkha): birth is suffering, aging is suffering, sickness is suffering, death is suffering, association with the unloved is suffering, separation from the loved is suffering, not getting what one wants is suffering, in brief the five aggregates of attachment are suffering.

2. The truth of the cause of suffering is the craving that causes repeated becoming, and takes delight now here now there, namely sensual craving, craving for existence, and craving for non-existence.

3. The truth of the cessation of suffering is the complete cessation and abandonment of this craving, and liberation from it without any remainder.

4. The truth of the way to attain the end of suffering, which is the noble eightfold path: right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

That, very briefly, is the essence of the first discourse. The Buddha went on to explain that until he had thoroughly realised these four noble truths he did not claim to be fully enlightened. Merely knowing these four truths intellectually is not enough, we have to thoroughly understand them to gain liberation.

In his discourse on the Vammika Sutta, the Venerable Mahāsi Sayādaw relates the following incident that took place in Thanbyuzayat, a town within Moulmein District, and was published in one of the Daily Newspapers.

Four or five elders from that town were chatting on a religious topic. It is customary in Burma among knowledgeable elderly people to meet whenever there is any social or religious function such as a memorial service for the deceased. They usually discuss religious topics while the reception is going on with light refreshments such as green tea and some delicacies like pickled tea-leaf (laphet). Sometimes, heated discussions take place, and the participants disagree on controversial points. On this occasion, the elders became indignant and assaulted one another ending up with them being interviewed by police officers. The news editor who reported the story, remarked that the elders concerned had been placed in police custody, but “a redeeming feature” was that the topic of discussion happened to be on patience (khantī).

The editor hit the nail right on the head. Intolerance is the worst thing when discussing the topic of patience, which needs to be exercised as advised by the Buddha. Indignation resembles the toad that swells up. It gives a great deal of trouble and therefore really needs to be discarded.

Spoiling with too much Kindness

Parents and grandparents who are too kind to children spoil their character. Doing whatever one wants, and being given everything that one asks for, is not the way for children to learn and grow up. They should be taught the values of contentment, gratitude, respect, and frugality from a young age. As my mother once said, when I asked for another apple: “Apples don’t grow on trees.” Well, we know that what she meant was: “The money to buy apples does not grow on trees.”

The current generation of computer and Internet users expect everything to be tailored to suit their demands.  Software developers cannot possibly satisfy everyone. Even free software or nearly free software is not good enough for them. If something is not to their liking, instead of simply requesting improvements, or asking for temporary solutions, they make demands such as: “This software is unusable, until this feature is added, I will go back to using my old software.” Of course, such threats are empty. If their old software was perfect, why are they trying out something else?

The problem lies between the keyboard and the chair. Negativity breeds dissatisfaction, and obstructs the learning process.

Complaining Rewires Your Brain for Negativity

Repeated complaining rewires your brain to make future complaining more likely. Over time, you find it’s easier to be negative than to be positive, regardless of what’s happening around you. Complaining becomes your default behavior, which changes how people perceive you.

And here’s the kicker: complaining damages other areas of your brain as well. Research from Stanford University has shown that complaining shrinks the hippocampus — an area of the brain that’s critical to problem solving and intelligent thought. Damage to the hippocampus is scary, especially when you consider that it’s one of the primary brain areas destroyed by Alzheimer’s. (Travis Bradberry)

Vivaldi’s Horrible Bookmarking System

“The one thing stopping me from using Vivaldi as my main browser is the horrible bookmarking system that I simply can’t and don’t want to use, coupled with the fact that I can’t import my existing bookmarks although the latter wouldn’t make me use Vivaldi as my main browser, without the simple system as well.” (Alviv)

The above complaint is typical. A new user does not know how to import bookmarks, nor how to add them via the icon in the address bar or keyboard shortcut. Rather than asking how it can be done, he/she just complains.  After a couple of users respond with sarcasm, a moderator edits their replies, fixes the thread title, and locks the thread. This is idiot compassion at work. The fault lies with the new user, who failed to ask before complaining, and threatened not to use the software unless the perceived, but non-existent, faults were fixed.

Constructive Criticism

Since everything is imperfect, everything can also be improved, given time, money, patience, and resourcefulness. Good people respond well to constructive criticism. Even bad people do sometimes. Almost no one likes harsh criticism that is unjustifiable, unfair, untrue, or simply the expression of someone’s negativity.

Did the Buddha Criticise Anyone?

It is true that the Buddha never slandered or abused anyone. He was completely free from jealousy and ill-will. However, he certainly did say some things that were displeasing to others. When he started teaching the Dhamma, the Brahmins were well-established as the “Church” of the day. They held that the Brahmins or priests were a superior caste to workers, farmers, merchants, and nobles. The Buddha ridiculed them in many ways, both in private with his loyal disciples and in public when non-believers were present. They lost most of their support, and conspired to discredit the Buddha by hiring a prostitute to pretend she had had an affair with him, then hiring some thugs to murder her.

The Buddha also criticised evil-doers among his own followers and constantly admonished his loyal disciples not to be heedless. He said, “Ānanda, I will not treat you [gently] as a potter treats an unbaked pot. I will instruct and admonish you repeatedly [robustly if necessary]. The sound core will stand the test.”

A basic assumption in Buddhism is that living beings are imperfect. They have defects rooted in greed, ill-will, and delusion. A Buddha, or Fully Awakened One, is a human being who began his career as a Bodhisatta many aeons ago, and cultivated spiritual perfections to achieve Buddhahood.

When Siddhattha Gotama was born, he was still an unenlightened Bodhisatta. Although already free from the vast majority of human defects shared by ordinary folk, he was still not a Buddha. He left the comfort of his palace, and meditated strenuously for six years to achieve perfection. Thereafter, he became a Buddha, and spent the remainder of his life teaching to others the meditation method that he had discovered for himself under the Bodhi tree.

Those who have faith in the Buddha’s teaching may become lay disciples, monks, or nuns. They become trainees who willingly undertake the discipline prescribed by the Buddha to train the mind, leading the practitioner towards perfection.

The Buddha would encourage his disciples with kindness and admonish them with harshness when necessary to remove their faults. If they did not respond to instruction, he would stop speaking to them. For a disciple this was the ultimate punishment. It is a spiritual death to refuse admonishment from one’s teachers and fellow monks or nuns. (See the Kesi Sutta).