Читать книгу The Buddhist Path to Simplicity: Spiritual Practice in Everyday Life - Christina Feldman, Christina Feldman - Страница 8

The Buddha said so simply and clearly that the source of happiness and unhappiness lies nowhere else but in our minds and hearts. We can make endless journeys to find happiness, and engage in countless strategies to rid ourselves of unhappiness, but—the key traveler on all the journeys and the central player in all the strategies is ourselves, and it is to ourselves we always return. There is a wonderful Zen saying, “The only Truth you find on top of the mountain is the truth you brought with you.” We discover happiness through making peace with ourselves and the circumstances of our lives, not through trying to escape from them, nor through living in fantasies about the future. Our lives will continue to present us with unexpected challenges and opportunities. Our bodies will age and become fragile, our teenagers will rebel, our colleagues may frustrate us, financial demands will continue to appear. We will meet with allies and adversaries. We will be asked to find room in our hearts for the needs of others, to embrace our own demons, and to respond to the changing circumstances of each moment. We make peace with our lives through learning to connect with the simple truths of each moment. As the graffiti on the bridge tells us, “We are not in a traffic jam. We are the traffic jam.”

We do not have to travel far to discover simplicity. Each encounter, event, and moment is a mirror that reflects our reactions, fears, longings, and stories. When we encounter another person, in that moment we also meet ourselves in our thoughts, feelings, and responses. Exploring and touching our own heart and mind, we become intimate with all hearts and minds. Fear and anger, greed and jealousy, loving kindness and generosity, compassion and forgiveness are not personal possessions, but universal, human feelings. Understanding how our world is created on a moment-to-moment level, we understand all worlds.

The present moment we are in offers everything we need to discover the deepest serenity and most profound simplicity. There is not a better moment, a more perfect moment for us to awaken and uncover the immediacy and well-being we long for. Tolstoy once said, “If you want to be happy; be.” Yearning for simplicity we are guided to turn our attention to those events, circumstances, and inner experiences that appear most entangled. The places where we feel the most lost and confused are the places we are asked to shine the light of clear and kind attention.

The Buddha said, “I teach only one thing—there is suffering and there is an end of suffering.” All Buddhist traditions and practices rest upon this one simple statement. We all live in the same world experiencing sounds, sights, tastes, smells, feelings, and thoughts. We share the same story of birth, aging, sickness, and death. We all have the capacity for delight and distress, great compassion and great struggle. In the universal story none of us will remain untouched by loss, sadness, and pain, and we will all be touched by moments of simple joy and gladness—we will all laugh and we will all weep. It is a story of change and unpredictability, and it will not always be under our control. This is the story of life.

Simplicity will not be found in trying to mold life to comply with our desires and expectations. The events and circumstances of our world feel no obligation to conform to our expectations. Again and again we learn that the gap between what is and what “should be” is an ocean of distress, disappointment, and frustration. These feelings are not intrinsic to living but derive from our unwillingness to turn our hearts and minds to the realities of each moment. To have the wisdom to acknowledge the bare truths of the moment—“this is grief,” “this is fear,” “this is frustration”—enables us to lay down the burden of our stories and “shoulds,” and follow the road to peace. Simplicity is born of a depth of understanding that enables us to harmonize our inner world with the changes and unpredictability of life.