This is straight from the book I'm reading:
Taking refuge is the first step on the Buddhist path to inner freedom, but it is not something new. We have been taking refuge all our lives, though mainly in external things, hoping to find security and happiness. Some of us take refuge in money, some in drugs. Some take refuge in food, in mountain-climbing or in sunny beaches. Most of us seek security and satisfaction in a relationship with a man or a woman. Throughout our lives we have drifted from one situation to the next, always in the expectation of final satisfaction. Our successive involvements may sometimes offer temporary relief but, in sober truth, seeking refuge in physical possessions and transient pleasures merely deeps our confusion rather than ending it.
WOW......does this paragraph ring true with you?? For me it does. Everyone I know has struggled with some sort of addiction or expectation of satisfaction. But it truly can't come from external things. Satisfaction must come from within a person's being.
Treading the Buddhist path should lead to a transformation in the self: a continuous refining of both thought and action, of the way we relate to others and to the world we live in and finally of our self-understanding.
I'm not the type of person to jump headfirst into anything or believe something to be the be all end all. But I am finding there are many concepts and ideals within Buddhism that I really agree with.
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