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- Misery and suffering. Fear, grief and destructive rages or depression. A feeling of being imprisoned by one's circumstances.
+ Having experienced hell helps us maintain a desire to better our circumstances. Empathy, understanding the sufferings of others. |
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- Being dominated by desires or cravings, both physical and mental.
+ The driving force to improve a situation. People can hunger, even yearn to see others happy and fight for peace in the world. |
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- Instinctive behaviour, lacking in reason. Fear of those who seem stronger and bullying of those who seem weaker. The 'law of the jungle'.
+ Protective instincts, for example, that we need more sleep. Preservation of self or others. |
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- Feeling superior to others and wanting to show it. Aggressiveness. Feeling in conflict with others. The world of self-centredness and ego.
+ Anger at injustice. The passion to fight authoritarian behaviour. |
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- Constant inactivity, laziness, passivity.
+ Being at peace, calm and reasonable. An opportunity to restore one's energies. |
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- Short term gratification when one's desires have been achieved . Can quickly revert to hell, or hunger.
+ Temporary joy when desires are fulfilled. Exhilaration at being alive. |
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+ Learning about life and oneself from others and from existing knowledge.
- Can lead to self-centredness and separation from others. In the Lotus Sutra people of Learning and Realization were taught they could only enter the realm of Buddhahood through faith. |
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+ The wisdom or insight where we gain an understanding of an aspect of life from our own observations and experiences.
- Can lead to self-centredness and a tendency to use one's intellect, rather than one's wisdom, to solve problems. |
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The word consists of bodhi (enlightenment) and sattva (beings) and means someone who seeks enlightenment, for themselves and others.
+ Devotion to the happiness of others as shown by eg nurses or a parent's love for a child.
- May turn to arrogance if you feel superior to those you are helping. Pouring life-force out towards the lives of others, without paying attention to one's own needs means that one's life will move towards the lower life states. |
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| An ordinary person awakened to the true nature of life, and experiencing absolute happiness and freedom within the realities of daily life. Indestructible joy, unlimited wisdom, courage, compassion, creativity and life force. |
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| The Workings of the Ten Worlds |
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| The 9 worlds (from hell to Bodhisattava) can be experienced as positive or negative. The Buddha state originates from the very depths of life, called the amala consciousness, meaning the fundamentally pure life force or consciousness. The function of the Buddha state is to bring out the positive side of the other 9 worlds. |
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