Index
1. Foundations of Practice & Meditative Doctrine: 102A, 102B, 103–107, 139, 144, 152, 224–233, 234–237
2. Self, Aggregates & Buddhist Phenomenology: 108–118, 128–131, 140–143, 146, 178, 182–183
3. Impermanence, Biological Flux & Conditionality: 114–117, 138, 141–142, 185, 195
4. Karma, Volition & Interpersonal Interactions: 119–127, 122–124, 132–137, 186–190
5. Cosmic / Mountain / Rocketship Metaphor (Soteriological Journey): 127, 152, 156–157, 162, 164, 171, 175
6. Metta, Compassion & Heart Practice: 108, 123–124, 134–135, 137, 145, 199
7. The Path vs Society: Solitude & Renunciation: 147–151
8. Pop Culture as Dharma Lens / Mythic Memes 133, 155, 158–160, 161, 166, 170–172, 176–180, 189–191, 194–195, 196–203, 204–217, 220–223
9. Neo-Loka: Capitalism, Modernity & Social Engines: 125, 132, 158, 169–176, 179–181, 193–194, 197–215, 214–216, 212–213, 209, 205–206, 211
10. Death, Rebirth & Transcendence: 153–154, 157, 177, 199–203, 200, 210, 221, 218–219
11. Right Speech, Digital Ethics & Communication: 193, 226–233, 205, 185
12. Metaphysics, Philosophy & Religion: 171, 173, 168, 183
102A.
Click here for a guide on the basic method of meditation.
102B.
Click here for detailed information on vipassana meditation.
103
Whoever has awakened to the Deathless has done so by first relinquishing the Five Hindrances—the veils of sensual craving, ill will, sloth and torpor, restlessness, and doubt. In their absence, the mind becomes a still and lucid vessel, fit for the arising of insight. Upon this purified ground, one establishes the Four Foundations of Mindfulness—not as mere technique, but as a profound turning toward reality.
104
They (the progressed candidate) contemplate the body merely as body, not self nor soul, but as a transient form subject to decay. They regard feeling simply as feeling—pleasant, painful, or neutral—knowing them as passing waves on the ocean of consciousness. They observe mind as mind, watching its states come and go like weather across the sky. And they discern phenomena (dhammas) as dhammas, seeing the play of causes and conditions with neither attachment nor aversion.
105
Thus, do they dwell ardent, clearly knowing, and ever mindful—having laid aside the fever of longing and the heaviness of sorrow for the world. And know this: the hindrances are not defeated by force but subdued through the serene power of Samādhi—where concentration grows luminous enough to silence their voice and render them inoperative, like shadows fleeing before the sun.
106.
The Anapanasati Sutta declares that mindfulness of breathing alone fulfills the entire four foundations of mindfulness.
107.
Jhana is called the pleasure of renunciation, the pleasure of seclusion, the pleasure of peace, the pleasure of enlightenment. There are five jhana factors. There are five factors to abandon in the first jhana: sensual desire, ill-will, sloth and torpor, restlessness and remorse, and doubt. There are five factors to cultivate in the first jhana: thought, examination, rapture, pleasure, and unification of mind. Rather than losing connection with the body as one enters jhana, the meditator gains heightened awareness if it as the jhana factors develop and suffuse throughout the body. She establishes the rapture and pleasure born of seclusion drench, steep, fill and pervade the body. The first jhana can still be unsteady, and the meditator is liable to fall into lower levels of samadhi. The first jhana is characterized by rapture and pleasure born of seclusion and accompanied by thought and examination.
108.
A friend becomes more when you stumble upon their complex narrative. With Metta it is achievable to become one’s own best friend and appreciate the countless interwebs of causes and conditions that brought you to your present state and repertoire of realizations.
109.
It seems a choice between self-improvement and self-abusement.
110.
A lot of stuff must happen outside my existential particularity.
111.
When we establish identity view or the 'house of self' via graphing after the aggregates we navigate the Loka via this construct or vessel and find fresh delight or enchantment here or there and we thus we feel a need to devour, possess or consume things to satisfy the hungry and thirst that escalates in us, but this hunger is insatiable and we are ensnared in dukkha?
112.
The mind can very seamlessly heap or bundle the aggregates; it is almost like magic and the person that we observe is conjured or animated, that it appears to have life but this is a conjurer's trick.
113.
The eyes as an organ are like a camera taking a fresh snapshot every passing moment but since a lot of what they see or visualise in the loka transpires at slow rates with respect to the fluctuation of aggregates we are again caught in the mind's conjuring trick of perceiving a stability or continuity that it truly artificial to the true nature of reality.
114.
Living things require nourishment to survive and slow down their perpetual march towards oblivion; the nourishment can only forestall the inevitability of transpiration.
115.
A young lady is born in Spring, flourishes as a young adult in Summer, experiences Autumn in middle age, and meets the frost of old age in Winter. The cycle of the seasons are much like the cyclic stages of the Wheel of Life and Death. Embedded in the Loka are the conditioned cyclic nature of all things.
116.
There are cells in the body. The cells form tissues. Certain tissues form organs. Organs function in bodily systems. Some organs partake as sensory faculties. Every moment cells are being created and destroyed. In a snapshot of time there are approximately 37 trillion cells in the human body. With respect to the aggregate of matter or rupa, because of cells, it is not the same body we inhabit from moment to moment; much like the ship of Theseus. The label or name we give to a person is just out of convention because due to the river of flux that constitutes the aggregates, we are never the same river from one moment to the next.
117.
David is a real person, but from a Buddhist phenomenological perspective, his existence as a ‘person’ or ‘entity’ or ‘being’ is a construct of my mind. Saying ‘David is a real person’ is a statement that functions of a conventional level of truth (sammuti-sacca), the level of language and social interaction; on this level we can meaningfully speak of ‘David’, ‘you,’ or ‘me’ and the Buddha never denied this practical utility. But on the ultimate level (paramattha-sacca) - when phenomena are examined through insight (vipassana) - what appears as ‘David’ dissolves into an interplay of nama-rupa (mind and matter), arising and passing according to cause and condition. What I call ‘David’ is a bundle of aggregates (khanda) - body, feeling, perception, mental formation, and consciousness. My mind recognizes patterns in these aggregates - speech, gestures, memories - and labels them as ‘David.’ This labelling process (sanna, perception) and the volition response to it (sankhara) give rise to the appearance of a fixed person. Yet if I look closely, there is no independent existing entity to be found - just processes in flux, dependent on perception, memory, and relational context. So, conventionally, David exists as a person in your field of experience. Ultimately, ‘David’ is a mental construction - a shorthand for a dynamic process of conditions that my consciousness organizes into a coherent ‘someone’.
118.
A “person” is not an enduring self but a pattern momentarily discerned within the five aggregates of form, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. The mind, conditioned to recognize and organize patterns, weaves these aggregates into the illusion of continuity, mistaking flux for form and process for person. Perception and volition label, interpret, and reinforce this fiction, while consciousness illuminates each fleeting configuration. Every aggregate and every moment arises dependent on causes and conditions, giving rise to a ceaseless, beginningless chain of becoming. Human life is but one rhythm within an immense web of nested cycles—birth, growth, decay, and death—mirroring the same principles that govern mountains, planets, and stars. The wheel of life and death turns through ignorance, craving, and volitional action: ignorance is the spark, craving and clinging are the fuel, and karma is the engine that drives continuity. The mind, attached to identity, seeks to perpetuate itself through desire, possession, and becoming, yet this hunger is insatiable and bound to suffering. Liberation begins with observing the aggregates without clinging, allowing them to arise and pass without identification or resistance. Non-clinging is not negation but freedom—the stilling of grasping that gradually exhausts the momentum of the wheel. Through insight into impermanence and conditionality, one perceives that all beings are caught in this same machinery of becoming, turning endlessly through samsara. From this understanding arises compassion—an impersonal kindness born from wisdom, not sentiment or blame. Seeing the cycles within one’s own mind reveals the same laws that govern the cosmos: all phenomena are interdependent, impermanent, and without self. To see this clearly is to open the Dhamma-eye and begin to step beyond the wheel—to where the timeless is known and the conditioned finally comes to rest.
119.
Getting proficient at mindfulness is like installing a network of radar dishes in the canyons approaching your imperial construction yards; making one alert to incoming squadrons of rogue thoughts bent on aversion.
120.
I can only walk up the path myself. When I gain some insight, it can be tempting to go back down the mountain and share with one's fellow platonic prisoners, but people in the digital age of the neo-loka are often so distracted by the shadows to receive you seriously. Could I just be thirsting after recognition, validation, applause or appraise with ego driven preaching? Best not to distract yourself - remain focused - remain ascetic on the long trek to realisation's summit.
121.
Perhaps we are all leaves connected together via the Tree of Life?
122.
Perhaps the number of conditions sustaining even one blink of awareness is effectively uncountable, beyond enumeration — a symphony of interdependence without a conductor?
123.
Maybe I can realise that the aversion that arises is a mask created by my psyche to avoid having to acknowledge the hurt experienced by my self-esteem?
124.
Aversion arises not as failure but as a mask, a habitual shield shaped by past wounds where esteem was unmet and vulnerability feared. Conditioned by experiences of being unseen or devalued, it shapes reactions in the present, sometimes drawing anger or defensiveness. Recognizing this, metta becomes both medicine and path: by offering kindness to the wounded parts of myself, I soften fear and defensiveness; by extending it to others, I loosen resentment and cultivate understanding. Observing the aversion of others reveals the same pattern — suffering is universal, shaped by unmet needs and the pressures of life. Insight grows when I see that all humans, imperfect and limited, navigate samsara with vulnerability, craving, and insecurity. Aversion is thus a signal, pointing to where compassion and self-care are required. Gently observing these patterns, offering metta, and embracing the shared human condition allows the heart to steady, the mind to expand, and the old wounds to slowly transform, freeing me from the tyranny of reactive patterns and opening space for patience, equanimity, and healing.
125.
Society has a way of relentlessly encouraging us to compare, compete, assess, evaluate, juxtapose, critique, analyse ourselves against others; it's almost dystopian.
126.
The Volitional Equation: every human interaction is like an equation - each person brings to the situation impersonal volitional forces, and their interaction or reaction produces a karmic outcome.
128.
A person is like a stage, and the five aggregates are like dancers, and you are the observer watching the performance unfold.
129.
Perhaps what we experience is the wheel of life and death turning on the engine of samsara?
130.
When interacting with another person perhaps I will work or collaborate with them to create a better universe; thinking thus can help resolve feelings of aversion.
131.
Behind the field, mirage, conjury or projections of the aggregates there is really no fixed, stable, external person to direct feelings like aversion to; what is unfolding before the observer are rivers, flavours or permutations of impersonal, conditioned phenomena - the fruit of harbouring such is only bitter karmic volition for oneself.
132.
It can feel at times that we are really living in Magnasanti [01], the simulated city based on the Wheel of Life and Death where people's lives are subjugated, governed or configured by the whims of a totalitarian overload (call it Mara or even 'The Invisible Hand'), and where we exist blindly as economic slaves.
133.
Burn a human life like a fire.
Throw an insect’s life into a fire
Think it over. How dark this world is!
The floating world is no less than a dream.
The Fire Festival Song - The Hidden Fortress (1958)
134.
There are two competing packs of wolves within a candidate/person. The first wolf pack has the wolves of Greed, Hatred and Delusion. The second wolf pack has the wolves of Loving-Kindness (Metta), Compassion (Karuna), Sympathetic Joy (Mudita) and Equanimity (Upekkha). The pack that wins is the one they feed.
135.
You can be the Alpha Wolf, Beta Wolf or Omega Wolf; blowing little piggies' houses down. Alternatively you can be the Metta Wolf; who is infinitely more chilled and good-willed.
136.
It is hard to fathom the Samsaric Engine — the unseen machinery that drives reality and turns the Wheels of Life and Death for all beings caught in its cycle. But the Buddha suggested not to waste time in trying to fully comprehend the complexity of the Samsaric Engine in its entirety and vastness as it metaphysically falls out of scope with the purpose or utility of the Dhamma. He compared such speculation to “trying to measure the ocean with a stick.” In the Acintita Sutta (AN 4.77), the Buddha explicitly says there are four inconceivables (acinteyyāni), one of which is “the precise working out of kamma” — the moral-psychological law that drives the Samsaric Engine. To dwell on it, he warned, leads to vexation, not liberation.
137.
The art of mettā may be understood as an inner clinical practice in which one assumes the dual role of physician and patient. To cultivate loving-kindness is first to diagnose the subtle yet pervasive afflictions of greed, hatred, and delusion that distort perception and conduct. With clarity and honesty, one recognizes these tendencies not as permanent aspects of the self, but as ailments of the mind requiring care and treatment. Mettā thus functions as both diagnostic lens and therapeutic method: by meeting one’s own suffering with compassion, patience, and non-judgment, one prescribes the antidote to the poisons of the heart. In this way, the practitioner becomes both healer and healed, guiding the mind toward balance and freedom through the steady application of benevolence, much as a clinician restores health by discerning the cause of illness and administering the appropriate cure.
138.
The body is made up of 37 trillion cells. Each individual cell undergoes charge every moment to monet via cellular, biological processes such as Cell Division, DNA Replication, Transcription, Translation, Protein Folding, Cellular Respiration, Autophagy, Endocytosis and Exocytosis, Signal Transduction, Ion Transport, Apoptosis, Protein Synthesis, Cytoskeleton Dynamics, DNA Repair and Cellular Migration etc. It makes you realize that even at a cell level all is movement.
139.
Disenchanted to the body can be cultivated by the contemplation of the 32 bodily elements: hair (head), hair (body), nail, teeth, skin, flesh, sinew, bones, bone marrow, kidneys, heart, liver, pleurs (lung membrane), spleen, lungs, intestines, contents of intestines, stomach, feces, brain, bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, grease, saliva, nasal mucus, joint fluid and urine.
140.
The mind is a pattern detector. The mind organizes flux into coherent experiences. Perception and mental formations label and interpret phenomena; consciousness illuminates each moment. Apparent permanence is the mind’s “sorcery”: it sees continuity where there is only conditional change.
141.
On conditionality and dependent origination: every moment of experience and every aggregate arises due to specific causes and conditions. Each moment gives rise to new conditions, creating an infinite, beginningless casual chain. Human life is one rhythm within a nested web of cycles, with larger entities (mountains, planets, stars) operating on longer temporal scales.
142.
On the Wheel of Life and Death (Samsara): Life cycles (birth, growth, aging, death) are conditioned, impermanent and interdependent. The wheel can be compared to seasons, circular trigonometric functions or nested cycles, illustrating periodicity at multiple scales. Different entities have different cyclic periods, but all are driven by the same principles of arising and passing.
143.
On Karma and the Engine of Samsara: Karma is volitional action arising from intention (cetana). Craving (tanha) and clinging (upadana) fuel volitional actions, generating new conditions for future existence. Volition is often tied to reinforcing identity, creating cycles of attachment and rebirth. Ignorance (avijja) is the ‘starter’ of the engine; craving and clinging are the fuel; karma is the moving mechanism.
144.
On Non-Clinging to Aggregates: Observing aggregates without grasping them as self or mine reduces fuel for the wheel. Non-cinging is not rejection, but allowing phenomena to arise and pass. Practicing non-clinging gradually diminishes suffering (dukkha) and opens space for liberation (nibbana).
145.
On Compassion and Insight: Beings are caught in samsara for countless aeons, experiencing suffering due to conditioned existence. Recognizing this generates metta (Loving-Kindness) and Karuna (Compassion). Compassion arises from understanding suffering impersonally, not from blame or judgement.
146.
The 52 mental formations essentially describe/list mental activities that have karmic consequence. The 7 Universal Mental Factors of the 52 Mental Formations are: Contact, Feeling, Perception, Volition, One-Pointedness, Life Faculty and Attention. The 6 Occasionally Present Mental Factors of the 52 Mental Formations are: Initial Application, Sustained Application, Decision/Resolution, Energy/Effort, Joy and Equanimity. The 16 Unwholesome Mental Factors are: Delusion, Lust/Desire, Non-Generosity/Greed, Anger/Ill-Will, Spitefulness, Conceit, Wrong-View, Doubt, Restlessness, Shamelessness, Fearlessness of Wrong, Envy/Jealousy, Worry/Anxiety, Dejection, Sloth and Torpor. The 23 Beautiful/Wholesome Mental are: Faith, Mindfulness, Non-Greed, Non-Hatred, Non-Delusion, Tranquility, Concentration, Equanimity, Wisdom, Generosity, Kindness, Compassion, Sympathetic-Joy, Non-Attachment, Energy, Joy/Rapture, Decisiveness, Equanimity, Satisfaction, Self-Control, Remorse, Fear or Wrongdoing and Awareness of Wholesome Path.
147.
Along the journey one can feel blessed; the darker regions have only given context to the light.
148.
If you are going to trek the path up the mountain, don't expect others to understand. They want you to remain in the city or the village and participate in the industry, commerce and honors of daily life; get qualified, get employed, get married, get property, get children; at no point in their conditioning and programming will they (the lay-person/worldling) register your willingness to sacrifice all this for spiritual insight and progression. They will always prescribe their paths in preference to the one in your heart; but do not be disheartened, for the path of liberation requires inner courage.
150.
It becomes important to keep in mind that worldly success and spiritual success are often measured by diverging factors. Quantifiers of wealth, status, acquisitions, possessions, honour, titles, recognition, appraisal may not be really conducive to the path. Rather, the candidate should feel blessed by other determinings, such as being born to good, supportive, loving parents, being free of association with fools, residing in the loka in a safe, secure and comfortable location and accommodation, having had access to a good education, having time and financial security for spiritual practice, a life that lures one away from harmful habits such as drugs, porn, social media addiction and intoxicants, etc.
151.
It can be hard to find others interested in the merit of dhamma and the idea of transcending samsara. Seeing the world through the Dhamma-eye often goes against the grain of the fashion or madness of the neo-loka, which has been designed to distract or enchant people under the spell of self and sensual delights. But what prompts one to wake up and realize the wasteland? Cast adrift in samsāra’s wasteland, a candidate discovers in the Buddha’s teaching a haven of stillness — a lamp amid the storm. Having tasted the calm of insight and seen the fever of craving that consumes the multitude, they no longer wish to wrestle with the world’s delusions nor to join its quarrels. Like one who, finding no shelter among wild beasts, withdraws beneath a quiet rock ledge to wait out the storm, they dwell inwardly, content to purify their own heart. They know that railing against the blindness of others avails nothing, for beings act according to their delusion. Therefore, they cultivate peace, tending the flame of mindfulness and compassion, and if they can but live harmlessly, free from ill will, and depart this life with a mind at rest, they count that victory enough.
153.
At times the Universe or Loka feels quite malicious in how it fates us to a perpetuity of insignificance. How infinitely deep the well of aversion can be, and how bitter can be the taste of the liquid we draw from it; we drink via harmful comparisons with ourselves with others. The loka can seem filled with people more talented, credible, recognized, successful, established, popular and loved. Life can seem truly unfair and in our hurt we naturally turn to blame others: parents, teachers, associates, enemies, even Clotho the spinner (the first sister of Moira). But perhaps the wheel that she spins is part of the larger mechanism of the Wheel of the Dhamma, or the Wheel of Life and Death; the ‘clothes’ or station that we find ourselves in this life arises out karma, which, having collected from vast past lives and conditioning, provides the momentum for the spinning in this life.
154.
The jet engine of Samsara, its turbines of life and death turning on the fuel of tanha, generates the ceaseless flux perceived by all conscious beings.
155.
Perhaps one should treat romantic partners as Sirens drifting amid the asteroid belts of the great space-flood, singing their honeymoon songs of enchantment; for Odysseus wisely knew that taṇhā for them would crash and destroy his ship.
156.
Dark clouds of resentment, gloom, and bitterness often gather when the mind fastens itself to the perceived inequities in the distribution of worldly success. In the ensuing downpour, we may find ourselves standing beside our rocketship, drenched in feelings of inadequacy. Yet, at times, there lies a subtle design in the way phenomena unfold. Though we may harbour disdain toward certain experiences—particularly those that were traumatic—it is ultimately redemptive to recognize that we could not have become the samsara-escaping, metaphysical rocket engineer we are today, without having directly encountered the truths of dukkha (unsatisfactoriness), anicca (impermanence), and anatta (non-self) through those very same trials. The downpour, in retrospect, reveals itself as the rain of healing. Worldly-success would indeed be nice, but based on our experiences we have everything we need to achieve spiritual success within reach of our fingertips. And the only person who really matters in validating or acknowledging this is ourselves; only this person fully knows when they are psychologically and emotionally ready to launch. Realization of this can be very liberating.
157.
Perhaps the aspiring engineer/candidate is agreeable to the song Farewell Rocketship by the indie band Children Collide [04], which describes a world that is treacherous, its structures fragile, and its politics, wars, and ambitions capable of ensnaring the heart in ceaseless suffering (unsatisfactoriness) within Samsara.
158.
When immersed in the machine structure of society and all its various mechanical constructs, it generally pays to Know Your Enemy [05]. It can be difficult to discern exactly who the enemy is, but according to Rage Against the Machine (RATM) these equate to teachers whose lessons compel the ‘self’ — in everyday terms — to fight against itself. Usually this is via concepts like, ‘compromise, conformity, assimilation, submission, ignorance, hypocrisy, brutality, the elite’ - all of which are neo-Loka dreams.
159.
Critics sometimes accuse Buddhist thought of contradiction, observing that its practitioners, who are often taught about non-attachment, usually maintain possessions. Yet such criticism misapprehends the principle of reduction at the heart of the Dhamma: possessions are not condemned per se, but the attachment to them — the craving, clinging, and fear of loss they provoke — is recognized as an obstacle to liberation. The Buddha advocated a middle path between extremes: neither intoxication on sensual desire nor austere self-neglect. Having been exposed to both as prince and ascetic, he demonstrated that one may maintain sufficient possessions to secure safety, health, and nourishment, while cultivating the mind for Dhamma practice. The measure of one’s life, therefore, is not the disaccumulation of objects, but the reduction of clutter and distraction, so that the practitioner may navigate samsara with clarity, equanimity, and the steadfast pursuit of Nibbana.
160.
There appears to be an inverse relationship between Utopia-stability and population.
161.
Are humans self-interested and motivated by desire? Fickle and unreliable? Agents of deception? Primarily guided by fear or self-preservation? Generally lazy in virtue? Machiavelli’s The Prince answers ‘Yes’ to all. Yet, while human nature may be flawed, the Buddha teaches us to cultivate encompassing Metta toward others; and ultimately, the chief-engineer to whom one must entrust the workings of life is oneself. No-one else is going to build that Rocketship for you.
162.
Much like The Seventh Seal (1957), one may find oneself encountering Death — or Mara — beside one’s Rocketship on the mountain shores of the sky-flood. Yet instead of chess, he draws a deck of Cards Against Humanity.
163.
The three daughters of Mara keep appearing on your dating app: Tanhā (Desire), Rāga (Lust), and Arati (Aversion). You are never quite sure whether to keep swiping. Why is it so hard to find a nice girl?
164.
The Catch-22 is: To launch the rocketship of enlightenment, one must prepare in samsara; yet preparation itself binds one to samsara. The path to freedom is paved with the very obstacles one seeks to transcend.
165.
Like Pip in Dicken’s Great Expectations, we can become enthralled by a singular vision of desire, fixating on what is unattainable (Estella) and neglecting the steady presence of what is real. Such attachments; the elevation of craving over clarity; bind the mind in a personal samsara, generating suffering through idealization and expectation. True insight arises not from conquest or possession, but from tempering desire with discernment, and seeing affection, beauty, and love with eyes unclouded by obsession.
166.
Yoda says the Force binds all beings, surrounding even the land and sunken X-wing. So too, in Buddhism, all phenomena are energy, and we can touch them spiritually.
167.
Do not practice Buddhism out of faith that following rituals or observances will shield you from suffering; there is no such guarantee. Life is fragile, and even periods of peace can be followed by loss, illness, or hardship. Buddhism is not about amassing or stockpiling karma for rainy days. To take refuge in the Buddha is to recognize that all things; including our fragile bodies; are subject to decay, dissolution, and impermanence. This truth can unsettle those seeking simple answers.
168.
It would be a bit foolish to imagine a Karma-Police enforcing the totalitarian authority of Big-Buddha (Orwellian 1984 ref.). Karma law is not an enforced reward (for compliance) or punishment based on a cosmic bureaucracy or ledger accounting. It is rather based on the causational observances of wholesome or unwholesome phenomena unfolding from a volitional seed.
169.
The idea that people welcome (rapid) technological advancement is falsified by the observance of creative destruction, where people fear and oppose technology due to it infringing on their economic and political interests. When Gutenberg’s printing press spread across Europe, it faced fierce opposition from disgruntled scribes, copyists, and the monastic orders whose livelihoods and authority depended on hand-copied manuscripts. What seemed a miraculous invention to some was, to others, an act of creative destruction — replacing centuries of skilled labor and upending entire industries built on the scarcity of written knowledge. Many now oppose AI-generated art with the same fervor once shown toward the printing press — not only because it disrupts creative tradition, but because it displaces the livelihoods and identities of artists who once found value in the scarcity of human-made expression. These are just two parallel examples. At its core, such opposition reveals a familiar truth: people are rarely guided by the collective good when their own stability is threatened. Faced with the loss of status or income, they will often defend the familiar order — even if it means stifling innovations that could ultimately benefit society as a whole. From a Buddhist perspective, it is naïve to believe that human actions arise from simple goodwill. Most intentions are entangled in craving, aversion, and delusion — the very roots of suffering — and thus even noble causes often conceal subtle self-interest.
170.
In Roger Hargreaves’ delightful Mr. Men series, there’s a Mr. Clever, Mr. Rich, Mr. Perfect, and Mr. Cool. But where is Mr. Successful? Perhaps it’s futile to personify something that cannot be universally defined. Despite society’s markers or metrics: wealth, intelligence, power, status, fame, influence: success is best discovered within, not measured from without. Insight allows you to become your own evaluator of success. Don’t be overly critical, myopic, or narrow-minded. Recognize that your path is uniquely yours, with Metta. Reach for the distant stars with that Rocketship of yours, and cultivate the energies within to become not Mr. Successful, but Mr. You. Maslow might even classify it as self-actualization at the top of his classical pyramid of needs.
171.
‘If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him’ is a Mahayana Buddhist kōan or Zen paradoxical teaching, frequently misinterpreted. You kill the Buddha — not literally, but in your mind. What this transmits is the idea of not clinging to idols, ideas, or authority (even the Buddha himself); enlightenment is not found in symbols and blind reverence, but in the fearless seeing of reality within yourself.
172.
The components of insight acquired from social media feeds are often unreliable, and sold via junkyards owned by dodgy second-hand parts dealers (of information); probably a poor place to source parts for the samsara-escaping Rocketship you are planning to build.
173.
Philosophy seeks understanding through reason and critical inquiry, while religion seeks meaning through faith, practice, and devotion. Dhamma has higher yields in the first mode.
174.
Persons attesting themselves as ‘friends’ will come and go with the tides of fortune, but the Dhamma is like a true non-judgemental astromech-like companion that accompanies you throughout your journey.
175.
There is no point praying to the Buddha; he has crossed to the Unconditioned and no longer abides within our universe — he cannot hear you. Prayer belongs to the religious mode: a plea for external, divine intervention. True Buddhist practice however, that which is aligned with metaphysics, teaches the rocket-engineer within us that through our own volition (our karmic energy) we are the scribes and architects of our own fate.
176.
The perturbed idea that one can ‘convert’ to Buddhism feels very much like it belongs as a relic of religious-mode thinking; you are pursuing awakening, not joining a gang or tribe.
177.
The film Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (2003) unfolds as a living mandala of Samsara — a cycle where each season mirrors a station in the evolution of consciousness. In Spring, innocence is marred by ignorance, and the child learns that cruelty, though born of play, binds both victim and perpetrator alike. In Summer, the fires of desire awaken, drawing the boy (now an adolescent) into the delusion of possession and the transient sweetness of passion. In Fall, attachment matures into suffering — love curdles into jealousy, and the fruit of ignorance ripens into moral decay and remorse. In Winter, repentance chills the restless heart; the man, now an adult monk, seeks purification through solitude and the carving of insight into the frozen silence of his being. And when Spring returns, life circles back — the child reappears, as though reborn, to tread again the path of delusion and awakening. Thus the film becomes an allegory of Samsara: a ceaseless rotation of birth, death, and rebirth, where ignorance perpetuates craving and suffering until, through understanding and renunciation, one perceives the unmoving stillness beneath the turning of all things.
178.
The five-dot tattoo (four enclosing one) may be read as the prison of being: the four outer points are the walls of form, feeling, perception, and formations, enclosing the central point of consciousness that mistakes itself for the prisoner rather than the space itself. Thus do the five aggregates, when clung to, tattoo upon the mind the mark of Samsara; a confinement not of steel or stone, but of delusion.
179.
The neo-Loka and its fraud-culture: those amoral scammers hustle through deceitful designs. Yet the Buddha taught Right Livelihood as a foundational stage along the path.
180.
In the game title No Man’s Sky (2016) by Hello Games, players are stranded on desolate, procedurally generated worlds. They must mine and harvest resources to repair their spacecraft and continue their quest toward the center of the galaxy. The title itself hints at a subtle truth hidden within the vastness: that no single being owns the cosmos, and in recognizing this, one glimpses the non-duality of existence; the seamless, boundless interconnection of all phenomena along the endless journey of Samsara.
181.
Sensual experience resembles a city-state, structured into Producers, Guardians, and Philosopher-Rulers, as envisaged by Plato. The gates of the city correspond to the sensory faculties: sight, sound, taste, smell, and touch. The Producers, driven by desire, seek to trade with the world through these gates, feeding a relentless appetite for sensory indulgence. Left unchecked, this commerce can destabilize the city. It falls to the Philosopher-Rulers to station Guardians at the gates, regulating the flow of sensation, and preventing overload, excess, or intoxication.
182.
The twelve links of dependent origination turn like the twelve stations of a clock — each conditioning the next in the ceaseless rotation of becoming. Ignorance strikes one, and before awareness can awaken, the hands have already swept through birth, decay, and death again. Time, too, is saṃsāra’s metronome, ticking the rhythm of craving and return.
183.
There are fourteen Avyākata (“Unanswered”) questions that the Buddha declined to resolve: Is the world eternal? Is the world not eternal? Is the world finite? Is the world infinite? Is the self (attā) identical with the body? Is the self distinct from the body? Does a Tathāgata (the fully awakened one) exist after death? Does he not exist after death? Does he both exist and not exist after death? Does he neither exist nor not exist after death? Does life (jīva) dwell within the body? Does it not dwell within the body? Is it both within and not within the body? Is it neither within nor without the body? The Buddha remained silent on these because they are irrelevant to liberation: they do not lead to dispassion, cessation, or insight, but rather agitate the mind through further perplexity. When persons such as the wanderer Vacchagotta posed such questions, the Buddha explained that all conceptual dichotomies—existence and non-existence, eternity and annihilation—collapse in the realization of Nibbāna, which transcends the framework of conditioned thought. Many expanded questions likewise fall outside the scope of the Dhamma: they arise from attachment to views, attempt to frame the Unconditioned in conditioned terms, and express craving for certainty rather than insight into impermanence.
185.
So many crafty souls keep attributing dubious quotes to the Buddha. The internet has birthed an epidemic of misinformation — posts flaunting implausible Buddha sayings for the sake of likes, shares, and virality. One can’t help but wonder, ‘Did the Buddha really say that?’ It’s enough to make you imagine him returning from the Unconditioned just to exclaim, ‘Oi! Stop misquoting me!’
186.
Perhaps to cultivate mettā requires us to transition from the idea that there are ‘bad’ people to a non-labelling alternative: there are people that perform or execute bad deeds.
187.
In the Parable of the Mustard Seed (Kisā Gotamī and the Dead Child), When a young woman named Kisā Gotamī loses her only child, she is consumed by grief — an attachment born from self-view (sakkāya-diṭṭhi) and craving (taṇhā). She goes to the Buddha, begging him to bring the child back to life. The Buddha tells her to bring a mustard seed from a household where no one has died. After searching in vain, she realizes that no house is free from death.
188.
In the Saṁyutta Nikāya 47.8 (Satti Sutta), a monkey, grasping at a tar trap thinking it’s food, gets stuck by its paw, then the other, then both feet, and finally its mouth — until completely bound. The Buddha compares this to a person caught by craving for sense pleasures, unable to free themselves.
190.
The story of Angulimāla [08] reminds us that the Buddha invited us to see those who commit wrongful deeds—not as ‘criminals,’ but as beings who have performed unwholesome actions, or crimes. In the same way, when reflecting on our own past misdeeds, shame, or regret, we are urged to temper harsh self-judgment with metta. In a world governed by cascading conditionality, no one is entirely free from the mud of Samsara. Recognizing this, we open a path of redemption for ourselves and others, understanding that each present moment offers a precious opportunity to cultivate wholesome karmic energies.
192.
When one partakes in a nourishing meal, it is an act of karmic merit to cultivate gratitude—toward those who have prepared and provided the sustenance, and toward the vast interdependent conditions of the universe that have afforded such fortune. Reflect that innumerable beings are not so privileged. Wisely reflecting, one partakes of food not for amusement, intoxication, or beautification, but for the maintenance and support of this body (Paccavekkhaṇa Sutta, AN 4.37). Partake with mindfulness and discernment, inwardly resolving: ‘May this nourishment fortify the body and sustain the cells within, that I may possess the strength to ascend the arduous path toward liberation.’ Consider how blessed it is to be endowed not only with human birth but with access to wholesome sustenance. These are the ripened fruits of past wholesome actions; let them not be squandered through negligence of the Path.
193.
According to the Sammā Vācā Sutta (SN 45.8) and Majjhima Nikāya 41, the Buddha delineated four abstentions constituting Right Speech (Sammā Vācā): false speech (musāvāda), divisive speech (pisuṇāvācā), harsh speech (pharusāvācā), and idle chatter (samphappalāpa). In the neo-loka—the digitized sphere of communication encompassing platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, X (Twitter), and TikTok—these principles must be extended to what may be called Right Communication. One should refrain from posts that deceive, exaggerate, catfish, or deliberately mislead; from posts that foment discord, backbiting, or division among individuals and groups; from posts that express cruelty, sarcasm, or verbal aggression; and from the endless stream of frivolous, performative, and herd-like chatter that saturates digital space. Every post, like every spoken word, generates karmic volitional energy (cetana), shaping both the mind of its author and the collective mind of its audience. The illusion of anonymity does not shield one from karmic consequence, for the law of cause and effect extends its subtle apparatus even into the digital frontier.
194.
Hurrying down the station platform to catch your train, you spot a vending machine gleaming beneath the fluorescent lights. Its label reads: Samsara Co.—Beverages for the Restless. Inside sit three soft-drink cans in garish colours: Lobha, Dosa, and Moha. Curious, you tap your card and select one of each. The green Lobha can fizzes open and floods you with craving; the red Dosa can burns down your throat with aversion; and the orange Moha can leaves your mind deliciously clouded in delusion. Feeling dizzy yet strangely satisfied, you glance at the nutrition label—and only then realise, to your horror and amusement, that you’ve just consumed the Three Poisons.
196.
You are at the city showgrounds, wandering through a lively fair. Among the rides, you spot a classic jhāna tester carnival game. You buy a ticket, and the attendant seats you down to meditate. You focus with all your effort, but the puck rises only just below the 1st jhāna — the level of initial joyful absorption. The attendant apologizes: there’s no fluffy toy for this tier of achievement. As you turn to leave, a wild Arahant appears and takes the seat. He meditates, and the puck rockets past the 1st jhāna, past the 2nd jhāna where rapture deepens, pleasure arises effortlessly, and the mind grows unified. You watch, astonished, as it passes the 3rd jhāna, where rapture fades, pleasure remains, and equanimity begins. Finally, it soars beyond the 4th jhāna, where even pleasure is transcended, leaving only pure equanimity (upekkhā) and mindfulness (sati). The excited attendant offers the Arahant a massive plush toy, but he declines with serene composure, walking away through the fairgrounds — utterly unmoved by the sights, the sounds, or the prizes.
197.
In Buddhist cosmology, there are Six Realms of Existence (Gati): Deva, Asura, Human, Animal, Hungry Ghost, and Hell. In the modern, capitalist cities of the neo-Loka, these realms find their reflections on Earth: the Elite and Upper Echelons, the Upper Middle Class and Professionals, the Working and Middle Class, Shadowy Precarious Creatives and Gig Workers, the Poor and Welfare Class, and the Homeless and Marginalized — the city’s own Hell State.
198.
The Ten Fetters in Buddhism are: Belief in a Permanent Self (Sakkāya-diṭṭhi), Doubt (Vicikicchā), Attachment to Rites and Rituals (Sīlabbata-parāmāsa), Sensual Desire (Kāmacchanda), Ill Will (Vyāpāda), Lust for Form Existence (Rūparāga), Lust for Formless Existence (Arūparāga), Conceit (Māna), Restlessness (Uddhacca), and Ignorance (Avijjā). Each one is like a stubborn Chinese finger trap wrapped around a finger, dramatically reducing your dexterity as you try to assemble the delicate components of your samsara-escaping rocketship.
199.
You can almost picture ‘The Four Immeasurables’ as a trendy K-pop group, with its four ultra-hip members—Metta (Loving-Kindness), Karuṇā (Compassion), Muditā (Sympathetic Joy), and Upekkhā (Equanimity)—taking the neo-Loka by storm.
201.
Samsara Co. makes ice-cream tubs as well! They’re kinda like neapolitan, but instead of Chocolate, Vanilla and Strawberry, you dig into and taste into the three delicious marks/flavours of existence: Dukka (Unsatisfactoriness), Anicca (Impermanence) and Anatta (Non-Self). Now available in the ice-cream aisle at all good supermarket stores!
202.
You can almost imagine Maitreya (the future, anticipated Buddha) posting on social media to spread the Dhamma only to be limited by the algorithms.
203.
You can perhaps picture Maitreya returning to the neo-Isipatana of the digital frontier, and dispensing his first sermon of the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta to the five ascetic algorithms, ie. Meta, X, YouTube, Tiktok and Snapchat.
204.
The cyclic neo-Lokian routine: eat, sleep, work, crave, like, share, post, slave. [10]
205.
People who have religiously ‘sanctioned’ visions inline with the social construct, ‘imagined-orders’ and herd moralist agendas are seen as ‘chosen’ but those having societally-deviating, pathological schizophrenia induced hallucinations are deemed dangerous and prescribed Zyprexa, Abilify, Seroquel or Risperdal etc, strongly suggesting that society defines sanity and sanctity based on conformity rather than content or experience.
206.
Rebecca Black’s Friday [11] is the bubblegum anthem of samsaric capitalism — a cyclic hymn to arbitrary calendars societally enforced, where the commodity ‘fun’ (much like soma, the ‘happiness drug’ in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World) is rationed and sold to the young as rehearsal for the working week; a pop mantra training minds to crave release from a trap they’ve yet to enter.
207.
Psychologically, are human societies really more evolved than goldfish tanks, where those with visible wounds or defects are pecked at and ostracized by the rest? Humans, too, being animals, are ruled by their own conditioned and programmed social instincts.
212.
In the heartlands of the fashion capitals, electronic boutiques, and even the digital eCommerce frontiers, the consumer is enticed by the perennial ‘Sale’; which allure, via eye-trapping banners and tick-down counters, and reaches frenzied crescendos on festive days (Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Boxing Day etc) converted, modified or designated for spending; drawing the zombified out to the registers via tanhā to reap and feast discounts [15].
214.
The lure and lustre of the corporate world is drawn to permeate its stench throughout the university campuses via internships and grad programs; appealing to the dullness and unimagination of fresh minds aspiring a career built on suit-wearing, corporate-servitude, backbiting, appraisal-chasing, long-hours, white collar labor exploitation, boot-licking and relentless ladder-climbing.
215.
The modern University, obsessed with producing research outputs to nourish the industrial complexes that sustain it, functions less as an intellectual sanctuary and more as an economic enterprise. Its appetite seems insatiable, ever eager to harvest students and tuition fees through calculated marketing campaigns that peddle parcels of hope to those cornered by financial, social, and cultural pressures to become ‘productive citizens.’ There is a marketing and commodification of formal education as a salvation. Thus, the University devolves into a degree-factory: manufacturing qualification as deterministic of insight or education.
220.
The Melbourne Star — a colossal ferris wheel in the heart of the city’s Docklands. Whenever I look at it, I’m reminded of the endless Cycle of Birth and Death that all beings in Samsara are caught within. Each capsule circling the wheel feels like one of the twelve links of Dependent Origination — Ignorance, Volition, Consciousness, Name-and-Form, and so on — turning ceaselessly under the conditions that sustain them.
224.
The Seven Factors of Awakening are sequentially: Mindfulness, Investigation of Dhamma, Energy, Joy, Tranquility, Concentration and Equanimity.
225.
The Seven Factors of Awakening can be considered the spiritual antidotes or counterweights to the seven afflictions of modernity:
1. Digital distraction & algorithmic capture - (Antidote: Mindfulness)
2. Misinformation & ideological ensnarement - (Antidote: Investigation)
3. Burnout, apathy, and neoliberal exhaustion - (Antidote: Energy)
4. Hedonic treadmill & commodified pleasure - (Antidote: Joy)
5, Anxiety epidemic & overstimulation - (Antidote: Tranquility)
6. Fragmented attention & multitasking culture - (Antidote: Concentration)
7. Emotional volatility & outrage cycles (Antidote: Equanimity)
226.
Mindfulness: In modernity we encounter habits of endless scrolling, fractured attention, algorithm-driven cognition and perpetual partial attention. Mindfulness becomes the “reclamation of cognitive sovereignty” in a world where tech corporations monetize citizen attention. In this light, Mindfulness is the rebellion against an attention economy that profits from our forgetfulness. Sati is the counter-algorithm. It is the capacity to hold the present moment before it is fragmented into a thousand notifications.
227.
Investigation: Citizens of the modern condition are frequently bombarded with information loading and media that can mislead one into conspiracy thinking, ideological bubbles, manufactured outrage, intellectual inertia, and self-polarization. To awaken is to cultivate investigation as a faculty that cuts through narratives, propaganda, and delusion. In an era of algorithmic echo chambers, investigation becomes the discernment that guards one’s worldview against hijacking.
228.
Energy: As part of the modern condition, a citizen can be engulfed by burnout culture, paralysis through overstimulation, motivational depletions and a wave of endless demands. The light or awakening derives from realizing that Energy (viriya) isn’t about frantic productivity, but rather sustainable, clear and ethical revitalization. Thus, In a contemporary world that drains us with performative productivity, effort becomes the quiet courage to persist without self-destruction.
229.
Joy: The modern citizen can be misled down a path of excessive consumption, dopamine addiction, novelty-chasing or corporate-curated desire. Piti sources joy that arises purely from clarity, not consumption. Piti covers the joy that consumer capitalism cannot sell; a renewable delight produced by the mind’s own freedom. Where hypercapitalism markets pleasures that decay upon contact, piti arrives unpurchased and unperishable.
230.
Tranquility: The neo-Lokian environment is laced in chronic stress, hyperarousal, sensory overload, digital noise and relentless pace. Tranquility is the psychological stillness modernity systematically undermines. It is the silence modernity forgot; the stillness beneath the noise floor of civilization. In the anxiety economy, tranquillity becomes a revolutionary act.
231.
Concentration: The modern world is fraught with the task of multitasking, fragmented cognition and shortened attention spans. In this domain, Concentration is the bliss of cognitive unification; the reclamation of deep focus. It is the mind gathered from its digital scattering.
232.
Equanimity: Experiencing the modern affliction of emotional volatility and outrage cycles, the citizens of the neo-Loka face the prospect of hypereactivity, social media outrage, tribalism, emotional contagion and dark catastrophising. In this realm, equanimity is a form of awaking in that it constitutes the unshakable mind amid the storm of reactive modern life.
233.
Awakening from the digital-spell [15] brought about by the seven afflictions of the modern age thus requires a self-administration of the seven antidotes as outlined above.
234.
The manifest of tanhā in the digital age seems unrestricted merely to tangible objects, but extends itself towards a thirst for stimulation. The smartphone; the ultimate neo-Lokian necessity item; cascades to its user no singular mono-desire, but rather an infinite scroll of micro-urges, each one collapsing into the next in a parade, before any real or true satiation is allowed to transit or occur. In this world, craving is never quite the pursuit of pleasure but instead the pursuit of the next thing. This is the new wheel of becoming; an algorithmic samsāra where the cursor is conditioned to chase what it cannot hold.
235.
The tanhā of today is engineered. Various platforms turn craving into business models by monetising our neurological restlessness. The self essentially becomes a consumer-loop with dopamine as currency and attention as a commodity. The Buddha called tanhā ‘the origin of suffering’; technocrats calls it ‘increased engagement.’ Ultimately, both describe the same mechanism. It is perpetual dissatisfaction disguised as choice.
236.
If tanhā once resembled a wandering thirst, the digital world has transformed it into a bottomless well. Every swipe is an act of becoming: the mind leaning outward, seeking its next form, its next hit, its next identity. We scroll not because we want, but because wanting has become the architecture of our inner world. Taṇhā is no longer merely a flame; it is the entire electrical grid of modern consciousness.