The Path to Enlightenment
Close to 2,500 years ago, Prince Siddharta Gautama was given birth in what’s currently called Lumbini in Nepal. He was born a prince and his birth had been heralded with many special conditions that suggested a future of greatness. The prince’s father went to a wiseman that lived within the kingdom for guidance concerning his boy. The sage man believed that the prince, Siddharta Gautama, might either follow in his father’s footsteps and turn out to be a great king or he might become a spiritual leader.
In hopes that his son should become his heir, the king did his best to separate the prince from those activities that might encourage him towards a spiritual life. The prince was surrounded by comfort and excess, so many benefits that his royal placement could offer. Siddharta Gautama proved to be a brilliant student and outstanding sportsman. He wed a lovely woman whom he loved and they bore a child.
At the age of 29, the prince determined that the world around him was much more complicated than what he encountered in the walls of his palace. Out and about amongst the people of the kingdom, he observed reality: sickness, old-age and death. The great shock of this finding left the youthful prince shaken. He made the decision then to dedicate himself to ending the suffering. Leaving behind his wife and child, the prince forsaked his worldly property and embarked on a spiritual journey.
Guatama commenced a course of study with numerous instructors to master their practices. With the aid of Alara Kalama, he soon started to understand meditation and discovered an exalted form called absorption. This permitted him to accomplish a state of nothingness where there was no moral or cognitive dimension. Although this was helpful it was clear to the past prince that it wouldn’t eliminate the suffering he had seen. Guatama continued his hunt for others who could help him on his spiritual voyage. Udraka Ramputra, aided Gautama to perceive a state of neither perception or non-perception, but this to wasn’t just what he was searching for. The next step in his quest led Gautama to Uruvilva in Northern India. It was there he chose an ascetic way, surviving a life of deprivation for nearly 6 years. This just led to the degradation of his entire body, weakness and self-destruction. Although it cost him his five followers, Gautama ended this ascetic way of life.
The end of this spiritual journey looked as far away as ever, so the Buddha sat down under a Bodhi tree and proclaimed that “flesh may wither, blood may dry up, but I shall not rise from the spot until Enlightenment has been one.” After forty days and nights of thought and meditation, the Buddha at last attained Enlightenment.
It’s the Buddhist understanding that at that time he attained a state of being that exceeds anything else in the universe. Each of our normal experiences are based on preconceptions and circumstances: how we were raised, our ordeals, flaws and shortcomings. Enlightenment is a state in which the complicated inner workings of existence become apparent and the cause of man’s suffering identified.
For the next 45 years, the Buddha moved through much of what’s now north India. He taught the way of Enlightenment to all that desired to understand. This instruction had become referred to as the dharma or “the teaching of the enlightened one.    The Buddha accepted many disciples that in turn achieved their own Enlightenment and so they trained others.
Buddhists believe that Buddha accomplished a state of existence that goes beyond everthing else in the world. If normal experience is based on conditions – childhood, psychology, views, awareness, and so on – Enlightenment is Unconditioned. It was a state when the Buddha acquired insight into the deepest workings of existence and therefore, into the cause of human suffering, the problem that had set Him on His spiritual quest originally.
The Buddha statue we often see doesn not represent a god and would not look at himself as a divine person. He was just a human that endeavored to transform himself through self reflection and meditation. Buddhists view him as an ideal and his quest as a guide that could direct them on the path to enlightenment. Most homes that practice Buddhism will display some type of Buddha decor like a statue of Buddha, but this is intended to remind them of their own spiritual journey.
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