Any help would really be appreciated thanks!
Suggestion: skip the books, skip the temples. Don't waste your time.
Instead, go camping.
Camping? Yes, camping. Bring a tent, sleeping bag, clothes and enough food and water for a month. Do not bring cellphones, books, games, computers, toys or anything to "do." Choose a campsite that is completely secluded, and not one where there will be other campers within sight of you.
Go and spend a month being alone with yourself. No human contact, no distractions, no demands on your time, no humans or pets or jobs or games or television shows or alarm clocks expecting you to interact with them.
Go for one month. Do this and you will understand everything that Buddhism has to teach you. The rest is flax.
I do something similar to this every Summer. When I'm going to my family's Summer house, I don't take any electronic devices with me (excluding my cell phone which is practically an antique that can only be used for texting and calling). I bring lots of books though.
When I make it to the Summer house, I NEVER enter the magical realm of Internet. I don't play any video games too (although I played some old games like Diablo 2 and Heroes 3 with my mother's laptop last Summer). I spend all Summer reading crapload of books, swimming until sunset, and drinking until sunrise with my buddy. Occasionally I sit on the balcony, stare at the beautiful sight from there for an hour, doing nothing. Then I start reading. Sometimes I get absorbed in reading, and I end up reading a book from midnight to morning.
Also, rarely (which is like 3-4 days in 90 days) I sleep on the beach. I simply go to the beach with my best buddy, take a beer or two with me, drink and talk with my buddy until we both go to sleep. We find a beach lounge chair to sleep on, of course, it's no fun to wake up with sand literally seeping from your underwear. We usually go there by 12:00 AM, drink and talk until 3-4 and sleep until 7 AM. Sun wakes you up early even if you are feeling like you could sleep for days. You feel like shit for the rest of the day but it's a good and fun experience, waking up at 7 AM on a beach, absorbing the scenery which you have never noticed, and walking to home. It's hard to describe in words. I go that beach every day (usually at noon) and see that sea every day but when I wake up at 7 AM there, I see things I have never seen before even though I go there all the time. It's different. There aren't any people around. The sun is just rising and the sea is calm. You get a feeling of true companionship and and bond of friendship with your friend because of sharing the same experience. I got a feeling of peacefulness every time I do that (even though it lasts until I fall asleep from exhaustion and wake up groggy).
One time I decided to take a walk around the streets at 4:00 AM (for no reason) and I found a street dog. She was very afraid of me and ran away whenever I got close. She had a baby dog next to her too. The puppy ran to me and started playing with me. The mother dog started howling and barking at me for a second but seemed to calm down after I started petting the puppy. I sit on the middle of the street and started playing with the puppy, then I decided to play with the mother too, but she ran away when I got close. I decided to gave the puppy some biscuits which I was carrying in my pocket. Puppy ate it all, I saved one for the mother. With one hand, I held off the puppy which was trying to eat the biscuit and with my other hand I held the biscuit with my palm open, offering it to the mother. The mother dog slowly walked to me while I was standing still, and she ate the biscuit from my hand. She stood still for a minute, and I petted her carefully. She had the most beautiful blue eyes, shining in the darkness of the night, which I have never seen on the face of a dog, or a human. After a minute, she walked away and her puppy followed her.
I don't exactly know why I just told this (and the other one, for that matter), but it was an interesting moment. From that point, I started having a sympathy for street dogs. I can hardly resist playing with dogs I see on the street. Something similar happened to me with another dog too, and that dog followed me like a bodyguard for 2 hours after that. He even attacked a dog once because it started at me funny. Dogs in that town know me, and they usually follow me around when I pass through their territory. It's not rare for me to end up walking on the street with an army of street dogs following me and barking at outsider dogs. The funny thing is, my best buddy is afraid of dogs and since I know which dog "owns" which territory, I walk in a particular path when meeting up with him so I don't have to shoo the dogs following me. It's heartbreakingly difficult for me to shoo a dog so I try to avoid the dog if I can.
It's interesting. I spend around 3 months at that town every year, but it feels like most of my life took place there. Events that shaped my life and personality always took place there and I find myself more at peace there than the gray, bleak, busy and noisy metropolis I'm living in.
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Topic: Looking into Buddhism (Read 2632 times)