Everyone has
heard these two words, but not all understand them well. Here we should know
that if we do something right, beneficial, and helpful, we bring peace and
happiness, security to ourselves, others and the whole universe. So also if we
do something wrong, we are in troubles. In this point, I would like to talk
about the right path that all people should walk along in life. First path is
called Right Understanding (right perspective) – understanding of natural law
of all things, understanding of characteristics of existences, understanding of
truths.
In addition,
right understanding is knowledge with regard to stress, knowledge with regard
to the origination of stress, knowledge with regard to the cessation of stress,
knowledge with regard to the way of practice leading to the cessation of
stress. [ MN: 9, Sammaditthi Sutta] This is the true pathway of mind or way of
understanding that will bring this about, which is a correct understanding of
behavioral cause and effect and reality. And if we develop this correct
understanding, with the strong determination to be free from this uncontrollably
recurring rebirth, then we are free from suffering and its causes.
And in order
to be able to best help others we have to go deeper, we have to overcome the
obstructions that are preventing our mind from understanding the
interrelatedness of everything. So if we understand how everything is
connected, we will understand cause and effect completely. It means that we
will know how to help others: what will be the effect of our actions. So, based
on love, the wish for others to be happy and to have the causes of happiness;
and compassion, the wish for others to be free of suffering and its causes; and
the exceptional resolve in which I take the responsibility to do it myself, to
bring them happiness and get rid of their suffering.
The opposite
of ‘Right Understanding’, we see word ‘Wrong Understanding’. 'There
is nothing given, nothing offered, nothing sacrificed. There is no fruit or
result of good or bad actions. There is no this world, no next world, no
mother, no father, no spontaneously reborn beings; no priests or contemplatives
who, faring rightly and practicing rightly, proclaim this world and the next
after having directly known and realized it for themselves.” This is wrong view
[ MN: 117,
Mahacattarisaka Sutta].
Indeed,
whatever we do for our daily living, it must be following with right
understanding, and otherwise, it will cause a lot of troubles to arise in
family life as well as societies. The
purpose of right understanding is to clear one's path of the majority of
confusion, misunderstanding, and deluded thinking. It is a means to gain right
understanding of reality. Right view should be held with a flexible, open mind,
without clinging to that view as a dogmatic position. In this way, right view
becomes a route to liberation rather than an obstacle.
On the other hand, right
understanding is the foundation for developing a proper sense of values, so
sorely lacking in our age. Without right understanding our vision is dimmed and
the way is lost; all our efforts will be misguided and misdirected, all our
plans for individual and social development must flounder and fail. Such plans
will have to be based on the Eightfold Path with its emphasis on self-effort,
self-control, and respect for the individual. When wrong views prevail we will
operate with a perverted sense of values: we will fling ourselves into the
blind pursuit of wealth, power, and possessions; we will be obsessed by the
urge to conquer and dominate; we will pine for ruthless revenge; we will dumbly
conform to social conventions and norms. Right views will point us towards an
enlightened sense of values: towards detachment and kindness; towards
generosity of spirit and selfless service to others; towards the pursuit of
wisdom and understanding. The confusion and moral lunacy now prevalent in the
world can be eased, if not eliminated, if the path of the Buddha is followed.
Right livelihood and right action, for instance, can help us avoid the
conflicts that result from a wrong way of life and wrong action, thereby
enabling a society to live in peace and harmony.
And other important paths we should
have in life are: Right Thought - being resolved on renunciation, on freedom
from ill will, on harmlessness; Right Speech - abstaining from lying, from
divisive speech, from abusive speech, and from idle chatter; Right Action -
abstaining from taking life, from stealing, and from sexual misconduct; Right
Livelihood - abstaining from making one’s living through a profession that
brings harm to others, such as trading in arms and lethal weapons, intoxicating
drinks, poisons, killing animals, cheating, etc., and should live by a
profession which is honourable, blameless and innocent of harm to others; Right
Effort - making a persisting effort to abandon all the wrong and harmful
thoughts, words, and deeds; Right Mindfulness -
contemplating the body as a body, ardent, fully aware, and mindful,
having put away covetousness and grief for the world. He abides contemplating
feelings as feelings, ardent, fully aware, and mindful, having put away
covetousness and grief for the world. He abides contemplating mind as mind,
ardent, fully aware, and mindful, having put away covetousness and grief for
the world. He abides contemplating mind-objects as mind-objects, ardent, fully
aware, and mindful, having put away covetousness and grief for the world; Right
Concentration - one-pointedness of mind has the function of unifying the other
mental factors in the task of cognition. [DN: 22, Mahasatipatthana Sutta]
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