Are We A Lifestyle, Or Life Itself?

‘Lifestyle’ refers to the specific way an individual, group, or culture lives and behaves. Where we live, what we eat, our job, our values beliefs, and personal outlook … all shape our lifestyle. It depends on what we think life is for. Is a lifestyle something we’ve adopted to have interesting things to do? That’s the Samsaric trap.

We walk and talk a lifestyle, secure in the way we’ve learnt to perceive life. Trying to impress others within that lifestyle is the name of the game, and we avoid anyone not playing the same game.

We are born stupid, live stupid, die stupid, while thinking how clever we are. We gauge our stupidity against the stupidity of others. One reason for writing a blog is the realisation of how stupid I was all my life. 🙂

Adopting a lifestyle obscures life itself. Life is consciousness, as occurrences cut across our habitual ways and wake us up – and we evolve. For me, change occurred by acknowledging the Buddha’s advice, “Don’t take my words for the truth … test them!” rather than just becoming a ‘Buddhist’ and adopting the Buddha’s words. The truth is between the words; it’s not the words themselves.

Truth has nothing to do with form.
Truth is pure consciousness.

If we want a no-nonsense life, we need to radically prioritise what is important, stripping away the performative, the redundant, and the insincere to make room for realising reliable truth.

The result: we find we have significantly more time and less anxiety.