What the Buddha Taught

Rahula addresses meditation, one of Buddhism’s most-known tools for self-awareness. He laments that Buddha’s teachings on meditation have become distorted, stating that many people, whether Buddhist or non-Buddhist, believe that meditation is a technical ritual that must be performed alone. Meditation is a translation of the Pali term for “mental development” which people practice to eliminate hateful, anxious, and lustful thoughts and replace them with concentration, joy, intelligence, and other positive qualities. Ultimately, mental development should help people realize the ultimate truth or Nirvāṇa.

Some meditations that emphasize concentration existed before the Buddha’s time as part of other religious traditions. The Buddha’s teachings acknowledge that these meditations can promote peace of mind but are not essential for enlightenment. Buddhist meditation is different. It is an “analytical method” which uses “mindfulness, awareness, vigilance, observation” (115).

Rather than being separate from daily life, these meditations are intentionally integrated into modern life. Living mindfully means focusing on the present action at hand and only thinking about the past or future when it is relevant to the present. Rahula paraphrases the Buddha’s teaching to live in the present, writing, “Real life is the present moment—not the memories of the past which are dead and gone, nor the dreams of the future which is not yet born” (119).