The Way, Part One

The Buddha Precepts, Part One

With Palms Together,
Good Morning Everyone,


The Buddha precepts are a way of life. This “Way” is to practice from our nature to our nature. It is exactly our nature and nothing more. The precepts, then, are not rules or commandments: they are our actual being. As such they exist outside of time and space.

We say if we meet the Buddha along the way we are to kill him and do so without hesitation. Few accomplish this as it takes deep practice and complete integration of body, speech, and mind. We seem to need our buddhas to be objects of the mind, cowards that we are. Buddhas of his sort are not buddhas. Buddhas are not ideas, concepts, thoughts, feelings, models, or gods. Buddhas of that sort come in many shapes and sizes and reside in our world under many names. Break these.

Actual Buddhas, though, are rarely seen and even more rarely understood. Actual buddha is not a thought buddha or a sound buddha or a taste or touch buddha. Actual buddha is not a Buddha. Awake is the real deal: it is an open heart/mind.

When we open our eyes, facing the wall, walking along the way, eating, or even laying down, we are seeing with an open heart. Seeing with an open heart means realizing heart and mind are one, on the one hand, and all hearts and all minds are one, on the other hand. From this realization arise the precepts of being.

The first is the vow not to kill. In our Order we phrase this way: Not Killing, I vow to respect and be kind to all forms of life.