Simple, short answers and illustrations to the question, what is Buddhism? by spiritual life coach, author and Bangkok meditation centre founder Supawan Green.
I recently watched an interview on the Next Level Soul Podcast, one of my favourite YT channels. In this particular episode (REVEALED: Secret Ancient Teachings Shown to Change Lives), Alex, the host, interviewed Brad Warner, the author of The Other Side of Nothing. Brad tried his best to connect all the jigsaw puzzle pieces about Buddhism.
I know that this is tough because Buddhism comprises 84,000 topics, which contain 45 volumes known as the Pali Canon. One can touch on anything in this massive pile of ancient knowledge, but whether one gains a clear perspective is another matter. I asked myself if it was me and how I would conduct my presentation to help the audience understand Buddhism in a short time like that.
The answer entered my head right away. I would rather talk about what made Prince Siddhartha become a Buddha. What exactly happened on the night of his ‘enlightenment’ to make a man qualified to be a Buddha?
What is Buddhism according to Buddha?
Having been through 6 long years of self-torture in the blink of death, during his meditation under the Bodhi tree in Gaya, India, the prince’s consciousness was finally disconnected and went beyond his thoughts and feelings. It was as if his consciousness was snapped off from his thoughts like the two magnets lose their suction and free themselves from each other. Only then did he witness the enormity of mental and spiritual freedom on a scale he had never had before. This awesome event is known as the ‘Ultimate Enlightenment’ and was recorded as the 3rd Noble Truth.
Having known the fact of humanity being imprisoned by their own thoughts, this significant achievement is the source of inspiration and compassion for the Buddha to teach and empower humanity to free their consciousness (true self) from the enslavement of their thoughts and emotions. This leads to the 4th Noble Truth – the path to liberation or enlightenment. The egg analogy can give you a clear perspective on this subject of enlightenment. You must initially learn Buddha’s basic concept regarding the five human components first.
Humans comprise the body, thoughts, memories, feelings and consciousness. Only the body is physical in these five components, and the other four are non-physical and exist within this physical body. Such nonmaterial and unseen nature makes it very difficult to understand the mindconsciousness and how they interact with each other.
Buddha separates the consciousness from the mind (thoughts, memories and feelings). They have different functions and play different roles. That’s why I must create characters like Tom and Jerry and deliver this ancient wisdom in story language. The most suitable analogy to explain Buddha’s enlightenment is ‘egg talk’.
To answer what is Buddhism with an analogy we can all understand in any culture, let’s equate consciousness as egg yolk and mind as egg white. The unenlightened people, their mind-consciousness, are mixed like scrambled eggs. For those who engage in meditation, their mind-consciousness begins to separate, like a fried egg. In practice, consciousness is used as an observer to view the sense object for anchoring, such as breathing or movements
The meditators are those who follow in Buddha’s footsteps and walk the path to ultimate enlightenment. They cultivate a good ‘mental habit’ for themselves, having self-awareness and reasonable control over their minds – thoughts, and emotions. They can also tackle illusion/Maya brought upon by their thoughts and emotions.
Hence, they earn profound insight from seeing how the mind and consciousness interact. They become much calmer individuals, knowing how to handle the most perplexing material world they live in especially dealing with the mundane and the ultimate loss of the loved one.
They gradually master the ‘art of living’, knowing when and how to escape into the eye of the storm by living in the Void. This is the meaning of the saying: as within, so without, as above, so below. As long as the practitioner diligently keeps up with their meditation, which could take years, the components of mind-consciousness will finally be separated and become independent, analogously speaking, egg yolk and egg white as shown in the illustration.
This means the consciousness is finally free from the bondage of thoughts and emotions, experiencing true mental and spiritual freedom. This is the state of the Ultimate Enlightenment. The consciousness returns to its pure and innocent state without being tainted by positive or negative thoughts or above Yin and Yang.
Such pure consciousness will perceive the physical world of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and touches as they truly are or have the Innocent Perception – Nirvana.
What is Buddhism to other cultures and religions?
The image below illustrates the clear perspective of the spiritual journey one takes. Using analogous language, we start the journey from a scrambled egg to a fried egg and finally reach the separation of egg yolk and egg white – a total liberation from imprisonment. This awesome spiritual achievement turned a man and a Prince into a Buddha.
Once you know this clear goal of attaining Nirvana, you’ll know that everything else is only the details of Buddha guiding his followers to Nirvana during his 45 years of teaching. The enlightenment is indeed the core teaching of Buddhism. The missing link or the last piece of the jigsaw puzzle to what is Buddhism is the detachment of thought, which is the same as detachment from all issues in life. Once it is done through the long practice of meditation and guided wisdom from a skillful teacher, you will no doubt understand yourself in relation to the entire cosmos – knowing that it is a matter of one droplet of water being lost from home and trying to find its way home to the body of water in the ocean. Once found, this single drop of water jumps in, melts in with the rest, and becomes the great Oneness.
Then, you can easily handle the details of the 84,000 topics, knowing that they all point to the one goal – Nirvana or the Innocent Perception. My term is Bring Your Mental Self Back Home. Well, this is what I would love to share with the audience if an opportunity comes my way.
Perspective reminder – Having to deal with the non-physical nature, these are the collection of words used as labels pointing to the same experience and the same practice.
Spiritual destination: Nirvana, God, Tao, Truth, Source, Void, here & now, Oneness, the Final Frontier, Innocent Perception.
The means to spiritual destination: The Four Foundations of Mindfulness, mindfulness meditation, Vipassana, Bring Your Mental Self Back Home.