How To Practice: The Way To A Meaningful Life

I won't pretend that some of this isn't complete nonsense, but some of it is brilliant philosophy, aiming to realign one's viewpoint of the world to generate peace and calmness, both with oneself and others.

One thing that struck me very much are the way the Lama's Buddhist worldview can be compared to someone like Thomas Aquinas. Aquinas saw that the idea of physical eternity was absurd and that there could not be an infinite regress of cause and effect; he came to the conclusion, based on the teachings of Aristotle, that there had to be an “unmoved mover,” an entity who was infinite in itself, without beginning and ending, who (so to speak) “kickstarted” everything we see. The Buddha came to a somewhat similar conclusion, but with a stark difference: nothing that exists does so inherently, that is, of its own power, except for the energy of life itself, or perhaps what could be called “consciousness.” So the Lama talks quite a bit about the emptiness of existence (but not in a “woe as me” way), nothing that is reality (nothing) inherently exists; and by this he means nothing exists own its own. In other words, everything has cause and effect, stemming from the consciousness, which the Lama says is eternal.

Anyway, that's a layman's explanation, and as that summary probably shows, some of this stuff is clear as mud, but it's nevertheless fascinating. Ultimately, the same apparent problems that exist with the Buddhist theology are also true of Aquinas's: how does something exist forever and not have something else that starts it off? Furthermore, why is that idea of infinite cause and effect apparently illogical (Newton's laws?)? I'm a big Aquinas fan (he has his problems), probably because Lewis and Tolkien were, and maybe now I'm a Dalai Lama fan, too. I'm reminded of Lewis writing that “truth is always about something, but reality is that about which truth is” (God in the Dock 67): so if I see some grain of truth in Aquinas and the Dalai Lama, it's because they both stumbled (although, imperfectly) into some shared, correct perception of reality (which truth always points to).

As for somethings that I learned (apart from learning about Buddhism itself (specifically Tibetan Buddhism)): one is that you cannot know a thing unless you do it; head knowledge of a subject is not enough: it must be put to use. Another is that enemies (people who cause you problems or pain) are to be cherished, because without an enemy to pester you, you cannot practice patience and love. That's pretty good.