It may look as if the situation is creating suffering, but ultimately this is not so – your resistance is.
Eckhart Tolle
It may look as if the situation is creating suffering, but ultimately this is not so – your resistance is.
Eckhart Tolle
The mind alone is the cause of bondage and liberation in humans. When attached to sense objects the mind brings bondage, when detached from objects it brings freedom.
Maitrayaniya Upanisha 4.6
What is Karma? Karma is the Sanskrit word for action. It is equivalent to Newton’s law of ‘every action must have a reaction’. When we think, speak or act we initiate a force that will react accordingly. This returning force maybe modified, changed or suspended, but most people will not be able eradicate it.
This law of cause and effect is not punishment, but is wholly for the sake of education or learning.
A person may not escape the consequences of his actions, but he will suffer only if he himself has made the conditions ripe for his suffering. Ignorance of the law is no excuse whether the laws are man-made or universal.
To stop being afraid and to start being empowered in the worlds of karma and reincarnation, here is what you need to know about karmic laws.
1. THE GREAT LAW
2. THE LAW OF CREATION
3. THE LAW OF HUMILITY
4. THE LAW OF GROWTH
5. LAW OF RESPONSIBILITY
6. THE LAW OF CONNECTION
7. THE LAW OF FOCUS
8. THE LAW OF GIVING AND HOSPITALITY
9. THE LAW OF HERE AND NOW
10. THE LAW OF CHANGE
11. THE LAW OF PATIENCE AND REWARD
12. THE LAW OF SIGNIFICANCE AND INSPIRATION
In medio stat virtus : Virtue stands in the middle.
Virtue is in the moderate, not the extreme position. – Horace
Voltaire said : The better is the enemy of the good.
Variant translations:
The perfect is the enemy of the good.
The best is the enemy of the good.
In Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle defined a virtue as a balance point between a deficiency and an excess of a trait. The point of greatest virtue lies not in the exact middle, but at a golden mean sometimes closer to one extreme than the other.
For example:
* Generosity lies in between miserliness and extravagance.
* Courage lies in between cowardice and foolhardiness.
* Confidence lies in between self-deprecation and vanity.
Virtue, by definition, is a characteristic that promotes individual and collective well being. A vice, on the other hand, does not promote well being. What is surprising to me is that a virtue stands between two vices.
Now, this is something to think about. The present day paradigm is being the best. We all are told that we have to be the best at what we do. And we even strive for it.
We give up things just to be the best in what we do. We encourage children to be first in class. In fact our lives are so competitive that we call it a rat race. We drive ourselves hard and get burnt out.
No wonder this puts things out of perspective. We feel miserable when we cant be the best. We don’t forgive our own mistakes.
Pushing to extreme cant be a balanced way of life, even if the extreme is perfection. Being the best may be good for business, but it may not be good for the spirit.
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Note:
Arriving at a middle position is sometimes equated to striking a balance or working a compromise. These can be powerful approaches to mitigate situations that are otherwise held in extremes.
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Note:
In the Pāli Canon of Theravada Buddhism, the term “Middle Way” was used in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta [Sanskrit: Dharma-chakra-pravartana Sūtra; English: Sutra to set in motion of the wheel of the dharma], which the Buddhist tradition regards to be the first teaching that the Buddha delivered after his awakening. In this sutta, the Buddha describes the Noble Eightfold Path as the middle way of moderation, between the extremes of sensual indulgence and self-mortification:
Monks, these two extremes ought not to be practiced by one who has gone forth from the household life. There is an addiction to indulgence of sense-pleasures, which is low, coarse, the way of ordinary people, unworthy, and unprofitable; and there is an addiction to self-mortification, which is painful, unworthy, and unprofitable.
Avoiding both these extremes, the Perfect One has realized the Middle Path; it gives vision, gives knowledge, and leads to calm, to insight, to enlightenment and to Nibbana.
And what is that Middle Path realized by the Tathagata? It is the Noble Eightfold Path, namely: right understanding, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration.