Dear Helcat/ Everyone:

Looking for the tale you mentioned I came across an incredible online resource I didn’t know about- wisdom library. org. It offers summaries of many books on Buddhism. One book summarized is titled, A Brief Outline of Buddhism. Here are two quotes: “The Buddha was endowed with Divine eye and Divine ear… He is devoid of greed, hate and ignorance; He is the All enlightened… He preached the first sermon which was on the middle Path which lies between the two extremes…  The Middle Path…  is the Noble Eightfold Path, namely, Right Belief, Right Thought, Right Speech, Right Action…  Right Belief is the realization of the Four Noble Truths, namely, “this is pain, this is the cause of pain; this is the cessation of pain, and this is the way that leads to cessation of pain…

“The great importance of the Middle Path or rather the Noble Eightfold Path in Buddhism cannot be over emphasised. It is so important that it is often called ‘The Message of Buddhism‘ in spite of the fact that The Buddhas Messages are, as mentioned previously, in thirty-one books. Really it is the ‘MESSAGE of BUDDHISM'”.

Helcat, you wrote: ” I am not fond of affirmations but…  give myself permission to be happy. I shall also practice the serenity prayer regularly and see where it takes me” – the teaching of the Middle Path is, considered to be the first lesson the Buddha taught after awakening, is about a path of moderation, which in regard to your quest, would mean (I am thinking) not wanting too much to accept what you can’t change (the serenity prayer), and not wanting happiness (your affirmation) too much. In regard to happiness, the Middle Path would be about avoiding attachment to the idea of being happy, on one hand, and avoiding aversion to the idea of being unhappy, on the other hand, while practicing the Eightfold Path… in moderation.

anita