The 4 thoughts are 4 statements which are commonly used as a meditation in Tibetan Buddhism. They remind the practitioner, how important their path is and why they are doing it. This is relevant because I believe a lot of people, including myself at times, have come to Paganism or Occultism for the wrong reason. To alleviate the potential damage that such a mind-set could reak, they should meditate on the 4 thoughts to bring them back to a good un-egotistical reason for doing what they are doing. However, what would these thoughts be for the modern Pagan?
The 4 Buddhist Thoughts are:
- The rarity and preciousness of getting a human birth
- Death and impermanence
- Karma and,
- The pain of Samsara.
In slightly more detail, the first is about how unlikely it is that we are born as a human. Of the myriad of species out, human is one of a very select few that is intelligent enough that they are capable of practicing and achieving enlightenment. There are many that we are not aware of like gods whose existence is still in Samsara, but it isn’t nearly as painful as ours so they aren’t so worried about escaping it. Imagine people in prison with a TV, Gym, Library, Internet, 5-star food and Netflix. Why leave? (I’m not sponsored to mention Netflix, but if they offered me money for mentioning them by name I wouldn’t say “no”. Hint, hint.)
The second is about how futile life is. Why spend your life accumulating wealth and striving, when you’re going to die and lose all you have accumulated? Much of it, you will lose at some point before you die anyway. Perhaps we should focus on something with some permanence.
The third is about the effects of Karma. If we consider all the terrible things we have done and the haunting debt we have accumulated in our short life then we should be spurred on to do something that might relieve us of that Karmic debt.
The last is the painful state of our own existence. In this world, we become attached to things emotionally, we lose them and we experience pain. We get sick and we die. Don’t you want to escape this suffering?
My proposal
What should these 4 thoughts be for the modern Neo-Pagan though? This is hard to write because so many Pagans don’t share the same beliefs and it is difficult to write something generic for so many different paths. The following 4 thoughts are my best suggestion for a Pagan alternative. Please forgive me if they don’t fit with your personal practice, but if you want to message me and let me know what you would do differently then I will set up a feedback page soon and you can do so.
I suggest:
- The preciousness of the current opportunity
- The impermanence of existence
- The building of Self-worth
- The pain of the current world
The first is really to recognise that not only are we lucky to have been born human, but actually most of the world works so much to bring in a handful of rice to survive, that they just don’t have the time for spiritual pursuits. If you are reading this not only are you lucky to be in a society that has the time for spiritual pursuits, but you recognise the importance of it AND you’re likely to be part of the just 0.4% that identifies as Pagan.
We are all part of a massive collective of lives. We could live the life that has been lived over and over of the person who has sat and watched the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina on Netflix (sponsor me) and have the same experiences as nearly everyone else or we could do something different with our lives. Doing something different means, you have unique experiences to contribute to society. Just do it.
The second is recognising that nearly every kind of equity we build on earth has a limited life span. We have such a fleeting existence. Even if we were someone like Martin Luther-King who changed the world forever, whose name lives on in history books, then we still have to face the mortality of not only ourself, but our deeds as well. There will come a day when Martin Luther-King will be forgotten OR humans will render the earth uninhabitable, die out and there will be no-one left to remember him. This is true for all of us, no matter how great we are. Our effect on the universe will diminish and cease and everything we do in our physical lives will eventually cease. So why not focus on what, if anything, has some kind of permanence?
The third is being able to look back and even if it were for selfish reasons being able to say, “I did something good. I did something selfless. I did something unique.” Perhaps you might not recognise that the universe will reward you for that, but sometimes being able to say “well I lived my life and it was fun, and it was different, and I did the best I could” brings the most peace in our reflection. Build just enough pride in what you did with your life that it gives you peace, but not something that you get attached to or that feeds your ego. This also provides us with a sense of direction in a world that essentially has no direction to it. Often a meaning and something to do with our time.
The fourth and final part is recognising that life is full of sickness, depression, anxiety, other forms of pain and generally so many forms of suffering that we need something to take the edge off. As we walk along any spiritual path, we begin to get in touch with the spiritual side of ourself which isn’t subject to so much pain. The more we do this the more we identify with it and the less pain we begin to experience.
Why are these important? So often people are drawn to massive occult Orders with hopes of getting high grades and the respect of newer initiates. This gives us a struggle for power that was so well demonstrated in the second series of the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (Netflix why haven’t you sponsored me yet?), where you witness characters marrying for a powerful position and many people abusing positions of high power often to create more power. This can totally destroy all the potential spiritual growth that we are setting out to achieve. There is one remedy for this. To take a step back and to meditate on good reasons for doing the practice. I suggest you turn each of these 4 thoughts in your mind for at least 2.5 minutes on a daily basis for a week and then remind yourself of them every so often. You could also potentially make them more relevant to your practice.
Thank you for reading. This article was inspired while I was writing a book review for Bruce Newman’s A Beginner’s Guide to Tibetan Buddhism. As I look over my own motivations for writing some of the posts for this blog, I find that I too am lead by egotistical thought and desires and this should be a great meditation for me as well.