Buddhism – Plain and Simple
The Practice of Being Aware, Right Now, Every Day
Book Edition Details
Summary
"Buddhism Plain and Simple (2013) is your no-nonsense guide to essential Buddhist practices like building awareness and living in the present moment. Its teachings are explained clearly and accessibly, linking them to everyday life where they are most needed."
Introduction
Imagine sitting at a magnificent feast with tables overflowing with delicious food, yet slowly starving because you don't recognize that what you need is right in front of you. This striking metaphor captures the human condition according to Buddhism - we suffer not because life lacks meaning or joy, but because we fail to see what's actually present in each moment. Twenty-five hundred years ago, a man named Gautama experienced a profound awakening that freed him from this confusion, earning him the title "Buddha" - the awakened one. His teaching wasn't about belief systems or religious rituals, but about a practical method for seeing reality clearly, without the filters of our hopes, fears, and preconceptions. Through this exploration of awareness itself, we'll discover how the Buddha identified the root causes of human suffering, outlined a practical path for liberation, and revealed the interconnected nature of existence. These insights remain as relevant today as they were in ancient India, offering anyone willing to look closely at their own experience a way to find genuine peace and understanding in our rapidly changing world.
The Four Noble Truths and Human Suffering
The Buddha's diagnosis of the human condition begins with an honest acknowledgment that something fundamental feels out of balance in our lives. He called this duhkha, which translates poorly as "suffering" but originally meant a wheel that's out of kilter - imagine riding in a cart with a wobbly wheel that creates constant discomfort with every turn. This captures our experience perfectly: even when things are going well, there's an underlying sense that something isn't quite right. This dissatisfaction manifests in three distinct ways. First, there's obvious pain - physical illness, emotional distress, and the inevitable challenges of being human. Second, there's the suffering caused by constant change - we want to hold onto pleasant experiences, but they fade; we want to push away difficulties, but they return. Third, and most subtly, there's the deep existential unease that comes from sensing our mortality and feeling lost in a vast, seemingly meaningless universe. The Buddha's revolutionary insight was that this suffering doesn't come from external circumstances but from our internal response to them. We create our own misery through craving - desperately wanting things to be different than they are. We thirst for pleasurable experiences, cling to existence itself, or sometimes wish we could escape from life entirely. Like someone dying of thirst in the desert while sitting next to a clear spring, we suffer not because relief is unavailable, but because we don't recognize what we actually need. The Buddha wasn't offering false hope or promising to eliminate life's inevitable difficulties. Instead, he pointed out that while we'll always face challenges - what he playfully called our "eighty-three problems" - we can eliminate the "eighty-fourth problem": our desperate wish that we didn't have any problems at all. This recognition opens the door to a fundamentally different way of relating to life's ups and downs.
The Eightfold Path to Liberation
Having identified the source of human suffering, the Buddha outlined a practical solution: the Eightfold Path. This isn't a sequential journey from point A to point B, but rather eight interconnected aspects of awakened living that work together simultaneously. Think of it like learning to ride a bicycle - balance, steering, and pedaling all happen at once, each supporting the others. The path begins with right view and right intention - seeing reality clearly and committing wholeheartedly to awakening. Right view isn't about adopting particular beliefs, but about recognizing when we're caught in frozen, conceptual thinking that doesn't match our actual experience. Right intention means having a mind that doesn't lean toward getting something or pushing something away, but simply aims to be present and aware. The next three aspects - right speech, right action, and right livelihood - form the ethical foundation. These aren't rigid commandments but guidelines for living in harmony with reality. Right speech means being truthful and helpful in our communication, avoiding words that create division or confusion. Right action flows naturally from clear seeing, like a leaf falling from a tree without forcing or controlling. Right livelihood involves earning our way in the world without causing unnecessary harm to ourselves or others. The final three aspects - right effort, right mindfulness, and right meditation - develop the mental qualities needed for sustained awareness. Right effort isn't strain or forcing, but the natural energy that comes from being fully engaged with this moment. Right mindfulness means remembering to pay attention to what's actually happening rather than getting lost in thoughts and fantasies. Right meditation is the practice of sitting quietly and observing the breath, learning to be present without trying to achieve any special state of mind. Together, these eight aspects create a complete approach to living with clarity, compassion, and freedom.
Understanding No-Self and Interdependence
Perhaps the most challenging and liberating insight in Buddhism is the teaching of no-self - the recognition that what we normally think of as "me" cannot actually be found. This doesn't mean we don't exist, but rather that we exist differently than we imagine. Instead of being a solid, unchanging entity moving through time like a cork floating down a river, we are more like the river itself - pure flow, constant change, with no fixed center. When we look carefully for this "self," we find only streaming processes: thoughts arising and passing away, sensations coming and going, emotions flowing like weather patterns across the sky of awareness. The body we think of as "ours" is completely different from the one we had as children, changing moment by moment at the cellular level. The mind we consider "ours" is a constant flux of experiences with no permanent observer to be found. What we call "self" is actually a mental construction, a story we tell ourselves to make sense of this flowing process. This realization naturally leads to understanding interdependence - the recognition that nothing exists in isolation. Just as a leaf cannot be separated from sunlight, soil, rain, and countless other conditions, we too exist only in relationship with everything else. The book you're reading contains forests, printing presses, human creativity, and the entire history of language. Your existence is inseparable from your parents, their parents, your food, your breath, and ultimately the whole universe. This isn't merely a philosophical concept but a directly observable truth. When we stop trying to maintain the illusion of separation, we discover that what we feared losing - our individual self - was never actually there to lose. Instead, we find ourselves as part of something much larger and more wonderful: the seamless fabric of existence itself. This recognition dissolves the deepest source of fear and opens us to a life of natural compassion and effortless action, like leaves falling in perfect patterns without any controlling hand to guide them.
Summary
The Buddha's teaching offers a revolutionary insight: our suffering stems not from life's inevitable challenges, but from our confused attempts to make an ever-changing reality conform to our desires for permanence and control. Through careful observation of our actual experience - rather than our thoughts about experience - we can discover that the separate self we're trying to protect and satisfy is itself a mirage. When this illusion dissolves, we find ourselves not as isolated individuals struggling against the world, but as expressions of the seamless, interconnected flow of existence itself. This recognition doesn't require belief or faith, only the willingness to look honestly at what's actually happening in each moment. How might your daily experience change if you approached each situation with genuine curiosity rather than predetermined expectations? What would it feel like to respond to life's challenges from a place of openness rather than defensive self-protection? For readers drawn to practical philosophy, meditation, or anyone seeking a clear-eyed approach to life's deepest questions, this ancient wisdom offers surprisingly modern tools for finding peace within uncertainty and meaning within change.
By Steve Hagen
