>>183016As a lay person it's very hard to be fully dedicated to the teachings, living in a society that is obsessed with sensual pleasures and materialism and such. We kill bugs like they're nothing, many steal and don't care as long as they get what they want, we all love sex, we all REALLY love talking about things that aren't beneficial to life ("what did you have for dinner last night?"), we all love drinking or smoking weed (which I quit just a couple of months ago), we all over-indulge when eating, we all love using dancing/singing/music/movies/tv/cosmetics as a source of happiness, and we love sleeping on our comfy beds. Those all break the 8 precepts of Buddhism, which are guidelines for living a life with minimal sensual pleasures thus more pure happiness.
Tomorrow is a Uposatha day where we practice the 8 precepts as best we can. Any other day we practice the five. The hardest of the five is abstaining from wrong speech, primarily idle chatter (talking about things that serve no good purpose like football or dinner), because EVERYONE does it EVERYWHERE, all the time.
Other than the precepts, I try to be mindful daily, meaning I try to be fully aware of my thoughts and actions, while practicing the four foundations of mindfulness (contemplation of body, feelings, mind, and phenomena) whenever I can.
Sage cause off topic
