Finding Balance in an Extreme World: Part 2 - Buddha's Middle Way

In my last blog, I explored Aristotle's answer to the question: How do we find happiness in a world of extremes?  In Part 2, I'll explore Buddha's answers.

Buddha described a practice of non-extremism he called the Middle Way. This path of moderation lay somewhere between the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification. Siddartha Guatama, or Buddha, lived in extreme comfort and extreme solitude and penance at different periods in his life. This helped him to realize that extremes did not help him become an awakened being.

He saw that those who spend too much energy and time accumulating things are likely to be weighed down by their accumulations and to suffer accordingly. Inversely, those who spend too much energy and time renouncing things are also likely to suffer. This is reflected in our times. People who are motivated by materialistic values and pursue pleasure and profit above all else remain unhappy. Religious fanatics or extreme activists who become consumed by denial, restraint, resentment and judgement also remain unhappy. Each sees the other's extremism but not their own.

Buddha's Middle Way helps to shine a light on these extremes and to find balance between them by practicing moderation and by having compassion for the sufferings of others.

Daisaku Ikeda explains the essence of the Middle Way as:

"reverence for the sanctity of life - one's own life, the lives of other people, the life of non-human nature and all its extensive and intricate interrelations - coupled with the determination to make this reverence the basis for all one's actions...when the value of human dignity and life is accorded this kind of centrality, there can be no question of compromise or accommodation with forces of destruction and divisiveness that would threaten life or undermine our humanity. But being uncompromising does not mean labeling the other as 'enemy' and engaging in open-ended conflict...The only truly effective means to do this is dialogue, based on a firm recognition of our mutual humanity, and guided by an unflinching commitment to the ideal of harmonious coexistence." 

This brings me to my next point. Buddha used this term to refer to the middle ground between all dualities..essentially claiming that dualities are delusions.  For example, there is no Good Guy or Bad Guy. Instead, these characters we create in stories are reflections of the good and bad within each of us. Thich Nhat Hanh puts it well:

There is no battle between good and evil, positive and negative... This is the nonduality principle of Buddhism: there is nothing to throw away...There are always waste materials (fear and suffering) and flowers (compassion, love, and peace) in us. The gardener is constantly on the alert to save the waste materials because he knows how to transform that compost into flowers and vegetables. So be grateful for your suffering - you will need them...if a person has never suffered he or she will never be able to know happiness.

I often draw on this idea of compost and flowers, as it helps remind me that every experience in my life is valuable and is serving a purpose. There are no 'good' and 'bad' experiences, as each feeds the other. For example, is a lonely night a bad experience if it helps me to really appreciate and enjoy my next evening with friends?

Does this apply to our broader experience as a society? Beautiful times and ideologies have grown out of hard times (the Renaissance, for example). Are we currently at the cusp? I feel that we live in an exciting time. There's lots of talk of change, the age of Aquarius, and a feeling of shifting values. The Occupy Movement exemplifies this. It's a reflection of the frustrations people are feeling with the system we are all in. It's a demand for a different life with different values. Matt Taibbi puts it well:

"Modern America has become a place so drearily confining and predictable that it chokes the life out of that built-in desire. Everything from our pop culture to our economy to our politics feels oppressive and unresponsive.We see 10 million commercials a day, and every day is the same life-killing chase for money, money and more money; the only thing that changes from minute to minute is that every tick of the clock brings with it another space-age vendor dreaming up some new way to try to sell you something or reach into your pocket.  The relentless sameness of the two-party political system is beginning to feel like aJacob's Ladder nightmare with no end; we're entering another turn on the four-year merry-go-round, and the thought of having to try to get excited about yet another minor quadrennial shift in the direction of one or the other pole of alienating corporate full-of-shitness is enough to make anyone want to smash his own hand flat with a hammer."

I'm excited to see the flower that will sprout from the seed this compost is nurturing!