The teachings of Buddha are profound in their wisdom. Merely listening to these teachings will not do any good to an individual, though. One must open up and embrace these teachings, and put them into practice in their daily lives.
“Neo, sooner or later you’re going to realize just as I did that there’s a difference between knowing the path and walking the path.” This is a quote from the 1999 film The Matrix spoken by a character named Morpheus. He is the teacher of another character Neo, just as Buddha is the teacher of many. Both of these wise leaders are trying to convey the same message about finding the right path - if you focus too much on lessons and teachings, you’ll miss the path entirely. It is best to let the path find you. The textbook provides an excellent example. When you uses a map to get to Paris, once you have arrived, you can put the map away and enjoy being in Paris. If you spend all your time with your map, if you get caught by the words and notions presented by the Buddha, you’ll miss the reality.” (Hanh 17)
This same concept can be applied to learning the truth. One must realize that they already know the truth and only need to simply understand it. “A teacher cannot give you the truth. The truth is already in you. You only need to open yourself - body, mind, and heart - so that his or her teachings will penetrate your own seeds of understanding and enlightenment.” (Hanh 13) As an individual attempting to learn the truth, one should not work hard to do so. Straining the body and mind will only make the truth more difficult to obtain. It is much more effective for one to relax and allow their heart and mind to be completely open. This is when the truth can be fully realized. As we learned in the textbook, Siddhartha Guatama sat under a tree for an entire night meditating. When the morning came, he was enlightened with the truth and became a Buddha. Scheduling relaxation and meditation into our busy lives is the best way to become enlightened.
Knowing the truth is only one of many ways that the teachings of Buddha can help an individual improve themselves. Keeping from getting caught in wrong views is another valuable lesson to be learned, but it is not easy to do this. One must first accept that all humans have right views and wrong views inside of us already. From there the most important step is “the ability to distinguish wholesome roots from unwholesome roots.” (Hanh 51)
There are instances in my life where I have had wrong views. Once in elementary school I joined my friends in making fun of another boy. Since I was laughing and having fun with my friends, it felt like I was having fun. After a short amount of time my conscience started feeling guilty from this bullying. I told my parents about what me and my friends had done and they made me go over to this boy’s house and apologize to him. Another wrong view that I had once was during my freshmen year of high school when I plagiarized on an essay. I was in a rush to get a paper done and did not want to miss the deadline, so I copied and pasted a large portion of text from the Internet. This did not occur to me as a big deal at the time because it was a meaningless paper for a class that I did not care much about. After getting the paper back with a large “F” on the top, I had to have a meeting with my professor in which I learned all about why plagiarism is so bad.
Both bullying and plagiarism are two wrong views that I have once had in my life. If I had continued to live by these unwholesome roots, I would have surely developed into someone with an unwholesome character. But my parents taught me to treat others how I would like to be treated and my teacher taught me to respect other’s property, including their intellectual property. Those are right views, otherwise known as wholesome roots. Buddhist principles teach that “Right View is to recognize which seeds are wholesome and to encourage those seeds to be watered.” (Hanh 52) Avoiding wrong views is best achieved by identifying the right views and implementing them into your life every day.
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