Mouse and the Eightfold Path

Dear Friends and Family,

As some of you know, I have been trying to practice the principles of Zen Buddhism to better understand life. I promised a friend I would write a little about the Eightfold Path, which is Zen's equivalent of the Ten Commandments.

My interpretation of the The Eightfold path is that it's a set of guidelines. There's no "thou shalt not" business going on. Instead, the idea is, once you're ready to, you adopt them... one at a time or all at once. They help you to lead a more fulfilling life.

1. Right Understanding: is about understanding the suffering associated with and caused by desire - really, when you want something bad enough, and start to think the end justifies the means, everything starts to go bad and it's all downhill from there
2. Right Thought: is about thinking positive thoughts, not negative thoughts
3. Right Speech: if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all; this covers gossip, lying, negative speech and idle chatter
4. Right Action: this covers a bunch of the commandments all in one - no stealing, no killing, no pushing and shoving, etc. (it also covers other actions to - like overindulgence - wine, food, ahem and other indulgences)
5. Right Livelihood: the work you do should improve the lives of others around you - so gamblers, mercenaries and drug dealers are probably not living by this one
6. Right Effort: making a conscious effort to do the right thing and continuously improve yourself... self discipline
7. Right Mindfulness: pay attention to everything that's around you, be aware, you might learn something in the process you would've have missed if you rush through life with blinders on
8. Right Concentration: things happen better if you focus on them, be focused on the task at hand, then move on to the next task and be focused on that task, repeat as needed

So, not an overly sophisticated take on it all. I'm sure there are scholars out there who'll laugh at my interpretation. But, it's where I am in my journey.

Cheers!
mouse