Buddhism by the numbers

10 worlds of Buddhism
10. Buddhahood
9. Bodhisattvas
8. Awakened ones
7. Learning
6. Heavenly Beings
5. Human Beings
4. Anger
3. Animality
2. Hungry Ghosts
1. Hell
The Seven Factors of Awakening
“At least once every 15 minutes, we need to practice letting go. Bear in your heart no hatred, utter no unkind words, remain always compassionate, with no hostility or ill will. The Seven Factors of Awakening are the practices of love.” – Thich Nhat Hahn
Buddhism by the Numbers
The Six Paramitas
Giving
Offer to all joy, happiness, and love. The greatest gift we can offer anyone is our true presence.
Give the gift of stability. The one we love needs us to be solid and stable. We can cultivate our stability by breathing in and out, practicing mindful walking and sitting, and enjoying livening deeply in every moment.
Other gifts we can offer: Freedom, Space and Peace.
Cross over to the other shore…the other shore of peace non-fear, and liberation.
The Five Powers
Mindfulness leads to concentration, and concentration leads to insight and to faith.
According to the Lotus Sutra, all sentient beings have the Buddha nature.
“Buddha” comes from the root verb “budh”, which means wake up.
Every moment is the opportunity to water the seeds of happiness in yourself.
Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh
The Five Aggregates
A human being is composed of Five aggregates (skandas): form, feelings, perception, mental formations, and consciousness.
The five aggregates are interconnected or as Thich Nhat Hahn says, “Inter-are.”
The Four Immeasurable Minds
Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn
The Buddha came to be represented as having “three bodies”:
When he was about to pass away, the Buddha told his disciples, “Dear friends, my physical body will not be here tomorrow, but my teaching body (Dharmakaya) will always be with you. Consider it to be the teacher who never leaves you. Be islands unto yourselves, take refuge in the Dharma. Use the Dharma as your lamp, your island.”
The original meaning of Dharmakaya, the way to realize understanding and love.
Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn
Photo by Benn Bell
The Three Doors of Liberation:
Emptiness or shunyata:
Emptiness always means empty of something. A cup is empty of water. A bowl is empty of soup. We are empty of a separate, independent self.
Emptiness does not mean nonexistence. It means interdependent co-arising, impermanence, and non-self. Emptiness is the middle way between existence and nonexistence.
Everyone we cherish will someday, get sick and die. If we do not practice the mediation on emptiness, when it happens, we will be overwhelmed.
Signlessness or animitta:
The second door of liberation is signlessness. “Sign” means an appearance or the object of our perception.
Signs are instruments for our use, but they are not absolute truth, and they can mislead us. Wherever there is a sign, there is deception, illusion. Appearances can deceive.
If you see the signlessness of signs, you see the Tathagata. Tathagata means the wonderous nature of reality.
Everything manifests by means of signs.
Life span is the period of time between our birth and our death. We think we are alive for a specific period of time that has a beginning and an end. But when we look deeply, we see that we have never been born and we will never die. And our fear dissolves. With mindfulness, concentration, and the Three Dharma Seals, we can unlock the door of Liberation called signlessness and obtain the greatest relief.
Aimlessness or apranihita:
The Third Door of Liberation is aimlessness. There is nothing to do, nothing to realize. The purpose of a rose is to be a rose. Your purpose is to be yourself.
Be yourself. Life is precious as it is. Just being in the moment in this place is the deepest practice of meditation.
According to the Heart Sutra there is “nothing to attain.”
Aimlessness and Nirvana are one.
Present Moment, Wonderful Moment
Waking up this morning, I smile
Twenty-four brand new hours are before me.
I vow to live freely in each moment
and to look at all beings with the eyes of love.
-Thich Nhat Hanh
These twenty-four hours are a precious gift, a gift we can only realize when we have opened the Third Door of Liberation.
The practice of aimlessness, is the practice of freedom.
Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh
Photo by Benn Bell
The Three Dharma Seals
Impermanence, Non-self, Nirvana
Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh
Photo credit: Benn Bell