Eight Steps to Freedom | Page 5

of the universe as mountain. In the final vision, it is no longer other, but participates with us in the mutual being of the moment.
We do not sacrifice anything by attaining this enlightened perspective. We are still able to function in the world of things with the same facility as before. We use reason and discrimination in our daily lives with even more adroitness than we did when we saw each thing as a reality onto itself. Now we understand on a visceral level that there is no action we take that does interact with the whole. Impetuous and stupid actions we would have taken before, thinking them to be in our self interest, are now seen for what they are.
For the first time we can trust our intuition to be a full partner with our reason in determining life's action. This is because there has been a fundamental turning round of consciousness which allows intuition to flow directly from that shared being which is the universal consciousness. Before intuition was crippled by the mind's obstinate adherence to a conception of the world of things separate in being.
We can begin to move through the world with the grace of a virtuoso who, having attained technical mastery of his instrument, can now let his intuitive genius flow into the symphony of life, but with our own unique touch and accent. The old view of self, which we believed gave us a sense of freedom, actually held us back from experiencing the beauty of our life. This beauty is what we call the Buddha Nature; it is the harmony of life of which we are one note. This view of life which recognizes the Buddha nature and the laws of spiritual reality is what is called Right View.
Right Resolution
Once a person has attained a view of the world that accurately perceives the nature of spiritual reality, they understand it is necessary to live a life appropriate to this vision. Since no one is possessed of perfect virtue it will be necessary to make a commitment to a course of action that will enable a person to transform themselves according to this new commitment.
Resolution and right view constitute an understanding that in Buddhism parallels the energy and purpose of faith in monotheistic religion. Buddhism, however, is a tradition based upon systematic inquiry rather than theological commitment. Although it has a cosmology and metaphysical framework, elements of tradition do not play an active part in the systematic process of self transformation embodied in the eight fold path. For a Buddhist, cosmology is not something that commands his attention as a fundamental part of practice. His attention is riveted upon the psychological and epistemological factors that govern his state of consciousness and therefore, his spiritual growth.
This is because Buddhism is essentially a spiritual practice rather than a religion. The psychological principles of human existence as delineated by the Buddha, provide a vehicle for self transformation. They are the only fundamental constituents of reality which an individual has some degree of control over, and therefore can provide a potential for practice. A person has no control what so ever over the metaphysical and cosmological nature of the universe; any practice based on these would have to be magical, and therefore based purely on faith. We do have the ability, however, to focus our concentration on a specific object of consciousness, be it an idea or sensory object, thus giving us the ability to manipulate the factors of consciousness. We are powerless to control the metaphysical, cosmological structures of the universe. Were it not for our ability to control our focus of consciousness, we would be unable to bring about self transformation and the idea of right resolution would be meaningless.
Since Buddhism accepts the reality of a will which is both conditioned and capable of choice, a Buddhist is not faced with the dilemma of relying upon an outside agency's metaphysical grace for salvation. The doctrine of mutual identity and co-interdependent origination allows for the possibility of a man bringing about his own salvation through spiritual work.
The problem of free will is really a problem of the concept of freedom. The standard view of freedom can be found in Webster's dictionary definition "not determined by anything beyond its own nature of being." The problem with this understanding is that from the Buddhist perspective, nothing exists that does not share it's being with everything else. This makes the concept of free will a glorification of self that does not hold up to Buddhist philosophical scrutiny.
First of all, freedom has no meaning unless we are speaking of a very relative freedom. Whenever we have a choice, we must have some predicating factor behind the choice which in effect then limits freedom. If there is no ground for choice in