trap or boat ?

We each are souls living out this lifetime as a karmic lesson. And when we begin to advance questions about our lives, like, "what does it all mean ?" or "why am I here ?", we are beginning a spiritual path of some sort. It might be agnostic , or atheist or in some form of religion of some kind. And as we begin to walk further along a spiritual path, we seek teachers and we find methods within these pathways and in a sense our soul (that which is witness to our lives).

But at the end of the day we do not want to become the pathways we are on , ie Buddhists, or Hindus or Christians, ... we want to become free.

The Buddha liked to talk about the eightfold path as like a boat crossing to the "other shore" of enlightenment. I think this is a very important thing to remember. We don't want the methods and the pathways we are on, to become traps. We don't want the boat to go on endless journeys up and down the river. We want to cross the river to freedom.

See your path and your practice and as beautiful boat towards enlightenment, but realize it is what it is, a means and not an end.

Comments

[Peter Clothier]

I found this quote on Buddha Space. “Traditionally the Eightfold Path is taught with eight steps such as Right Understanding, Right Speech, Right Concentration, and so forth. But the true Eightfold Path is within us – two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, a tongue, and a body. These eight doors are our entire Path and the mind is the one that walks on the Path. Know these doors, examine them, and all the dharmas will be revealed.”
(Ajahn Chah, taken from ‘A Still Forest Pool’.) Another gateway...