Enlightenment is life’s purpose, said the Buddha. It’s not just survival and production. That’s why he would love me, a gay guy. He would love that I’m not here just to reproduce. Well, I suppose he wouldn’t “love” me in the attached way that I’m implying. But shit, maybe he would.

You gotta have something to give up in order to give it up and feel the loss. Isn’t that right? If you start with nothing, you don’t have very far to go. You gotta figure out way more shit that way, or else spend your whole life striving for wealth, only to die before realizing it’s not the answer. RIP.

Big shoutout to all the people out there who have a few more lifetimes to go. You can still get some good karma going, but it might be harder, because of the cards you were dealt. But don’t worry about it. Give it a shot anyway, and you’ll land somewhere better next time. It carries over, I swear!

Guy who gets really into Buddhism but starts hoarding all the shit that his students gave up. He’s an evil dude who’s figured out how to worm his way into this religion that relies on loving-kindness. He’s able to meditate himself into a really good position. He becomes Mara, evil incarnate.

What I love about Mara is his cartoonish “storms off” moment when the Buddha manifested those fuckers from the forest to explain how good he is, and he sang a song that was so beautiful, and he was so hot, and Mara was so pleased in every way that he decided to give up on trying to corrupt him. Team Rocket ass villain.

I’m rediscovering Buddhism and finding it so much… like, I’m just finding it so, so… much. I find it so much.

It’s a good thing to find at this point in my life. I feel lucky. All signs recently are pointing toward it, once again.

It refocuses everything really nicely. It’s just perfect. It changes everything. Middle way. Everything is a middle way. It’s all about middles and averages. According to math, the distance between the archer's arrow and its target keeps getting cut in half as the arrow flies. Mathematically, it never really pierces the apple, only gets 50% closer with each... unit time, or whatever. That’s something. I think it is. I don’t know what it is, but it's one of those things I keep remembering, so it must be something. There’s only that one pesky matter of time that’s getting in the way of me and the true meaning.

I’m eating beans with cheese, if things like that even matter to you. Surely by now you’ll have found a more perfect union of yourself and the world. Yourself and everything. A more perfect everything. You will have disappeared. The concept of you.

damn i forgot

I was reflecting earlier on how foreign the concept of selflessness (in the Buddhist sense) was to me when I discovered it. I wish I would’ve documented my whole progression through Buddhism when it first happened.

Though we are at the start again now, aren’t we? The key is in my hand. Everything started right now. And right now.

You just lost one. You just lost one.

It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now. It all starts right now.

This is the first moment of the rest of my life. The first moment of the rest of the entire history of the things that have ever made up me, and the things that I will make up in the future.

The self exists nowhere and everywhere. Undeniably, there is something there when I look at the mirror—a seed, a nidus, a something that is me. It’s not what we all think, maybe, but it’s certainly something. And that something must exist in every single one of my cells, mustn't it? All of us, united toward goals and trying to get organized behind a purpose. We’re still looking for it. We’ve found many as the years have gone on, but never one unifying one.

Look at the red light of the TV, how it’s on all the time. Whether the TV is off or on, it’s red.

Meditation is just being crazy with extra steps.

No, this is a tradition that has gone on far longer than I have, and even longer than this common era that we find ourselves in. Five centuries BCE is when the Buddha came, and that was because there had been a lot of surrering before that, and people not knowing what the fuck was going on. The people manifested him out of a pure need and desire.

Crazy how long time has been going. Like, there was fully an emperor-king at that time who gave birth to the Buddha himself, named Siddhartha Gautama, the one who succeeds or whatever his name means. An emperor-king? Those must've been the days.

I must not tell a lie. That is the truth. I must not lie to anyone, including myself.

In many ways, this feels like the perfect rebirth. I can’t fuck this up. It would be so disappointing to all the lives in the past who have committed extraordinariily brave and benevolent acts for me to get where I am—and not just for that, but for the good of all sentient beings. All the things I did back in the day just for the sake of goodness… it’s all led here.

Whatever you do, do it for others. Whatever you do, do it for others. Whatever you do, do it for others. Whatever you do, do it for others. Whatever you do, do it for others.

Everything I need to do is in the service of others. Everything I do needs to be in the service of others. Everything I need to do is in the service of others. Everything else is distraction.