Walk Like a Buddha by Lodro Rinzler

Author:Lodro Rinzler
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shambhala Publications

4 / CHANGE THE WORLD LIKE A BUDDHA

When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree by the river of truth and tell the whole world, “No, you move.”

—Captain America

It was when Siddhartha determinedly sat down to meditate until he attained complete awakening that the demon king Mara came to torment him. Mara sent his many demon subjects to distract the future Buddha from his goal. As each of the world’s pleasures and pains was thrown at Siddhartha, he easily shrugged them off, returning to his meditation practice. Finally, Mara took to poking at Siddhartha’s accomplishments: “Who the fuck do you think you are?,” Mara basically said. “You think you’re worthy enough of attaining enlightenment? Cool your heels, chief.” I can really imagine Mara using one of those backhanded-compliment terms like boss or slugger or chief.

In that moment Siddhartha could have responded in any number of ways, but he shut up and simply touched the earth with one hand. It is said that the earth physically shuddered in response, bearing witness to Siddhartha’s worthiness. This single act made all of Mara’s demons flee. Shortly thereafter Siddhartha became enlightened.

From that moment on Siddhartha never backed down from a fight, even though what he was doing was incredibly countercultural. His teachings upset many aspects of Indian society twenty-six hundred years ago and continue to today. He accepted people from all caste backgrounds into his monastic order, and women as well. Through doing such acts he posed a threat to Indian society as a whole. He fought for equality simply through making his teachings accessible. Those same teachings around mindfulness and compassion are still countercultural in today’s speedy, aggressive, chaotic world.

One of the many fonts of wisdom within the comic world, Captain America, offers the advice in the epigraph above about how we can follow in the Buddha’s footsteps by standing firm. When we are present enough that we witness suffering, we can plant ourselves firmly, like a tree by the river of truth, and say, “I won’t stand for that.” We can bear witness to a world in pain and respond with the kindness of an open heart.

In this chapter we will explore what it can look like to bring about social justice in today’s world based on Buddhist tenets. This path is important, as we cannot ignore that everyday we have an impact on this world in one way or another. As Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche wrote, “We have entered a time when spirituality no longer means simply individual liberation—nor would that be possible, given our global connectivity.”1 We will examine how we end up causing harm when we become attached to fixed opinions and perspectives and how to join Buddhist principles with our passion for creating a better world. The view of basic goodness is that we already have everything we need to create social change. At the end of the day, it’s not someone else who is going to come out of nowhere and make the world a better place.

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