Buddhism

My interests are definitely moving in an easterly direction. After reading my first book on the history of India just a few months ago, I couldn't help downloading the audio course Buddhism, by Professor Malcolm David Eckel and published by The Teaching Company.

Not surprisingly, I'm really enjoying the course, possibly because it is just so incredibly foreign to anything I've studied before. The basic precepts are fascinating... The idea that complete enlightenment and happiness can only be achieved through study and the total elimination of any desire. What a revolutionary concept when contrasted with the Western notion that happiness can only be attained through material gain!

It turns out that there is just a lot that makes sense to me in Buddhism. The Middle Path, the avoidance of all extremes (not too much wine, not too little!) syncs up completely with my upbringing, with constant encouragement to keep everything in balance. And I particularly love the idea of not getting too wrapped up in yourself (i.e. I'm too cool for school) while at the same time not forgetting your own needs.

I'll admit that the concept of Emptiness almost lost me, at least at first. The world, and human experience, are both comparable to a river that is always flowing and always changing. It's literally going through countless modifications every second of every day. This constant change calls into question, and in the Buddhist tradition actually renounces, the existence of anything at all. Emptiness doesn't exactly mean that nothing is there, but it optimistically reveals that anything is possible. Only Buddhism could define something called Emptiness as something so wonderful!

I'm not even going to get into the more complex themes of the Buddhist tradition, mostly because I don't really understand them myself. But there is definitely something very appealing about what I have learned.

And it's more than enough to propel my studies eastward!