Being a light unto yourself
Jeroen
Not all those who wander are lostNetherlands Veteran
I have come to the realisation that the Buddha was right to tell us to be a light unto ourselves. There is only so much you can learn from others, and instead of just finding writings that you agree with it is better to develop your own understanding. This requires that you get to know yourself, and understand your place in the world, and comprehend what you think is significant.
In a way, by reading and memorising the sayings of the Buddha you end up adding a layer of conditioning to all those that were there before, and by speaking from that knowledge it is often the Buddha who speaks. Your own voice, drawing on your own understanding, can get lost in the endless thoughts of other people. This happens when you speak on topics you have only read or heard about, but that are not your lived experience.
Getting to know your own beliefs (as opposed to other people’s beliefs) is an important step.
Comments
I suppose it depends on how take it. If you mean learn to think for yourself rather than parrot what others have said, I can get on board with that. If you mean whatever you think or feel is right and no one else has anything worthwhile to teach you, not so much.
Regarding lived experience, there is a certain weight or authority that comes from it that doesn't come from book learning. But its not everything, still listen to the person who tells you they read in a book that the Earth is spinning away from the sun at the end of the day, rather than the one speaking from lived experience that the small glowing orb is the one that is moving.
I’d say, rather listen to the test-flight pilot who has been up so high in his plane that the curvature of the Earth became visible…
Doesn't the knowledge that comes from books come from people's lived experience? What's the distinction you're making about second hand information from someone and information from the writings of Buddhist teachers or science, etc?
Often what is in books is not directly relatable to someone’s lived experience, unless it is a memoir. Books are not always written in good faith - often the motivation is to make money.
I’m not saying that books aren’t a good information source, there is a whole argument in epistemology to be avoided there, but books are often written based on other books and papers from journals even if they are non-fiction. And those sources are less easily checked for factual accuracy. Even the good faith of scientific studies can’t be guaranteed, as climate change science has shown.
I'm not sure I'm really understanding what you're saying. It felt like you were maybe saying something binary like lived experience=good, book knowledge=bad. Maybe that's my perception and you're saying something more nuanced.
Apart from that I'd add the word grok. Not the AI but the original term meaning "to understand something completely and deeply through intuition or empathy. It is a verb that means the knowledge becomes a core part of who you are, rather than just basic memorization". Its kind of like the idea of knowing something well enough to be able to explain it to a 6 year old rather than rote memorization. I think that is maybe something like what you're pointing to?
All spiritual knowledge comes from building and retaining ongoing self-awareness. Meditation is only the tool to learn HOW to be self-aware.
“You have to do your own work; Enlightened Ones will only show the way. Those who practise meditation will free themselves from the chains of death.” Dhammapada 20.276
This is interesting. So far, I know myself from the things I do to show my feelings, like making coffee in the morning for my mother or hanging up the laundry when it’s large sheets that she can’t manage. I observe my feelings to know my heart.
I am aware only of my emptiness, in which thought, feelings, senses, etcetera manifest.