This Blog Is Neither Religious Nor Scholarly

This blog is neither religious nor scholarly:
it is about practical Buddhism within a modern world.

In order to be practical,
it has to be direct and observable, without elaborations.

This blog is a niche, a nest, for minds that aren’t quite satisfied, that don’t want to follow, but just to rub shoulders with like-minded people; to meet and spend a little time together.

When ‘spirituality’ is mentioned, it means pure consciousness – that which is reading these words now, before mental reactions set in. You cannot get more direct than that. In the Tibetan Nyingma tradition, this is called Dzogchen.

There are three aspects to our gross physical life: attraction, aversion and indifference. These correspond to three approaches to life; the peaceful approach uses attraction and keeps us calm, while the wrathful approach uses aversion to sharpen our wits. Indifference maintains dullness.

In Tibetan Buddhism, there are deities that represent qualities of our nature. Each deity has two sides, one peaceful and one wrathful, and these are both versions of love. The peaceful deities have the quality of awareness, while the wrathful intensify that awareness. When we experience intense aversion, this can make us more alert if we are trained to recognise this signal.

To become enlightened, we must know what is evil. The evil in this world creates wars, division and conflict. We ordinary people don’t usually cause trouble but our reactions do, because of a self-image projected on the wall of the mind.

We all have our own path to enlightenment. Our personal path is about uncovering our confusion, rather than following others’ confusion (and people do do some odd things with their spirituality! :-))

The Buddha’s first truth is admitting that we suffer, or are dissatisfied. That is when we start to seek an answer to life and the universe. Our problem lies in finding the right words to express our feelings as we’re too used to generalisations.

Finding the answer to a problem is satisfying as it means that something has been realised. Once we realise something, we are at peace … for a while, until the next question arises. Realisation isn’t the final answer; it is a series of stepping stones of understanding.

Wanting an instant answer is for fly-by-nights – those who seek to evade responsibility. 😀
Wanting to join others is being a follower or imitator – those who seek to evade responsibility. 😀
Wanting to know is for those who take individual responsibility in their personal investigation. 🙂

When we take responsibility for our life, we no longer have to be led because we are our own leader. Our personal path is uncovering our confusion, rather than following others’ confusion.

The result is so satisfying! I used to think Buddhism was very heavy when I encountered other students who took themselves seriously. In actuality, there is no such thing as a Buddhist. If there was, it wouldn’t be Buddhist. You don’t have to be Buddhist to understand the Buddha’s teaching – the Buddha wasn’t.

Your views are always welcomed and interesting.
If you want to chat you can write to buddhainthemud@hotmail.com

There are hundreds of blogs about classical, scholastic Buddhism, written by knowledgeable people, but do they hit the spot for everyone?

There is Dharma in everything.
Buddhism actually makes life fun!

Every time someone speaks,
they show their light side, their dark side or their indifference.
And all of that we can empathise with.
😀

BUDDHA IN THE MUD
Practical, everyday insight into Dzogchen Buddhism.
It’s not about feeling good about yourself.
It’s about feeling good about your self;
your self is your karma, and your teacher.