Check out this video next on whether the Buddha felt pain: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/qp15gK9nl92aZmw.html Consider joining us on Patreon if you enjoy these videos, and get fun benefits like exclusive behind-the-scenes videos, audio-only versions, and extensive show notes: www.patreon.com/dougsseculardharma 🙂

Important point at 10:25 about non-attachment and detachment. The Buddha did have preferences. Thanks for the brilliant video.

Wow. This is undoubtedly one of Buddha's best teachings. I am amazed to see how wise a person he was. THE TWO ARROWS ! GENIUS 😄

Such a great video! This is my favourite simuli from the Buddha! I wish everyone is taking care of themselves!

I really like this metaphor. I feel you focused more on the longer term cognitive process we inflict upon ourselves as the second arrow. I definitely agree, and would like to add that I see the unconscious, momentary reaction following pain as perhaps more common yet more difficult second arrow to get rid of. For example, the hostility after being cut off in traffic. Those second arrows come fast. Mindfulness meditation had helped me tremendously here.

Thanks again, Doug, for a video timely and that speak directly to me personally and I'm sure to everyone's current situation. The editing to this video seemed vastly improved to others I've seen in the past, too; more natural cuts all around.

Love the topic.

Great content. Doug is very knowledgeable and explain complex concepts with clarity. However, too many ads interrupting the flow and making difficult to concentrate on the topic. Shame!

I love your channel and this video is one of my favourites. Thank you. I'm almost been able to become a patreon. It will be my first time supporting a content creator.

Wow.. this was profound. A top 10. Thank you

Great job on this video Doug! I get repeatedly amazed at how relevant early Buddhist teachings apply to modern times, often times even more so it seems (I guess the human psyche didn't change much from 2500 years ago). Do you think that mindfulness in daily life is the most important component into avoiding the second arrow?

Hi Doug! I’m New on the channel but loved this video thanks for sharing this with us! I’ve been looking a lot for a Buddhist perspective explain in an easy way. Regards from Costa Rica

Hi Doug! Big fan of your content. I was intrigued to hear of the buddhas preferences. I watched your video about the pain and proliferation recommended but Im curious to learn more about the buddhas experience of life and to what extent he expressed and was affected by changing conditions. Do you have other videos on this subject or avenues to suggest? Be well!

Until very recently I believed Mara to be an outside entity. Now I’m beginning to see that Mara is within me. Perhaps early Buddhist texts reflect this idea? The legends of the Buddha’s life and enlightenment led me to believe that fantastical beings exist and actively seek to keep us in samsara. It’s been a painful experience. I suspect that Mara is my own delusional thinking. It was my hand that set the wheel of samsara in motion.

Why is Buddha's preference of pleasant state of mind to a state of pain not a kind of aversion? Where is the line between the preference without aversion and the preference with aversion?

Can I count my all painful past events(bullying unsucces exc) as first arrow?

Hey Doug, have you thought about doing a video on Vasubandhu or Yogacara in general? I went decades without knowing about it and it's fascinating but the amount of translated info and published works is low.

So Haagen Dazs is the second arrow?...

hi, can you make a video on Navayana (New Vehicle) Buddhism?

Do foundations next??(!)

There's a You-Tube video called "The Royal Thai Classical ballet "Angel Dance". It's the most beautiful heavenly imagery I've ever seen come across the screen T.V. or internet. Here we can see the man sitting on the elephant in a meditative stare with the yellow/golden cone on his head. Under him we see performers who have what really represent unicorns horns on their heads and below them. Thailand has another stage show called "Siam Niramat " where at the end of the show performers fly down on a cable dressed in angel costumes with unicorns horns on their heads as they really are in the astral world (Christian angels). The man on the elephant with the cone on his head represents the Angel's in the next higher heaven above the astral world (the ethereal heaven). What sits on his head actually has a flat graduation cap type base under it and a yellow sphere sitting atop the cone. It's meditated into place and without meditation (angelic meditation) it will not sit upon an Angel's head. You as a Buddhist practicing meditation will have entry into the ethereal heaven since the gulf between these two heavenly worlds is crossed via meditation. The heavenly peace in the ethereal heaven is greater than the heavenly peace of the astral world and can be compared to a sparrow and an eagle. A sparrow battles the wind and flies erratically noisily chirping all the time using its own wing energy to fly yet an eagle uses the wind as its energy to fly and the eagles wing energy is more still. This "wing energy" can be compared to our own mental energy i.e. astral world Angel's vs. the mind energy of the omniscient mind/spirit of God energizing the Angel's in the ethereal body/world. Asian is not so much a race or nationality as it is the ethereal body. The flat graduation cap base under the yellow/golden cone is why Asian eyes have the horizontal feature. With time the eyes become aligned with the flat graduation type base under the cone. Some Angel's have just the flat graduation cap, others the graduation cap and the cone but highest (deepest stillness of meditation) is the yellow sphere resting upon the top of the cone. With time it actually becomes a permanent feature as part of the body. That's why the Buddha preferred silence. The mind blowing very, very rare spiritual beauty of this "angel dance" is the cloud silhouette background WHICH REPRESENTS OM!! (The Tao,YHWH,In the beginning was the Word...","the voice of many waters, "God's voice thunders, Allah-God is one, "I heard as it were the noise of thunder saying...") i.e. "the sons of thunder-Peter,James and John-Christ's highest disciples. The cloud represents God in His pre creation, creation and post creation state-Was,IS,WILL BE. Spiritual perfection!!! The highest state of conciousness a human being can attain!!! WOW!! This state of conciousness although it can be meditated into and out of from the level of the yellow sphere on the top of the cone it isn't reachable from the physical or astral body or the lower ethereal levels UNLESS one practices the ancient teaching we find the Budfha practicing (on You-Tube) namely "One who does the headstand 3 hours a day will surely attain enlightenment ". Buddha is depicted in ancient artwork using a sideways tree branch as a headstand prop. Mose's headstand prop was the ANKH of ancient Egypt, Christ's was the cross - deny yourself pick up your cross daily and follow me, and now most commonly we have the cloth hanging from the ceiling or a stand in sky Yoga. You find one in Swami Sivananda's retirement ashram. This practice in time (years-Peter,James and John 3 years) brings the heartbeat to be felt as a pleasant tingling sensation in the crown chakra although absent at first then felt about the size of dime then 50 cent piece then silver dollar then about the size of Jewish Yamika (the beanie Jews wear). This heartbeat sensation will bec6very clear and pronounced then the beating vibration will become a steady frequency and OM TAT SAT to you and yours my brother!! That's how we activate our formless soul (7th chakra is called the seat of the soul) and experience YOGA-union with God,,,formless merging into this formless "cloud of unknowing " OM. OM is formless (God has no shape or form-Moses) and can only be experienced via our formless soul, which can only be awakened from it's dormant state via the pick up your cross daily and follow me...3 hours a day headstand. This lesson taking place in a formless eternity will remain in us as the timezone of eternity overrules temporal time zones of the worlds of form, heaven or physical. It's "in the beginning " before God said anything. The pose of the Buddha with the hands at the center of gravity of the human/angelic form (just under the naval) is the beginning and the end of the human/angelic form. Bhramins of days of old meditating in the formless OM having no shape or form, dead yet born know their name and may come into form briefly sitting in the OM pose I call it because the pranic/Chi energy flow starts there and ends there where the hands are (center of gravity Tan Tian). Like an electro magnetic field runs its course from the batteries then returns. The pose says "this is what the human/angelic form does. They see it as a soul trap and prefer to abide in formlessness. Appearing in this OM pose of meditation as in "been there done that then going back into formless being. The Lord Krishna is said to have entered this formless state of being in OM about 10 years ago. Namaste and OM TAT SAT to you my brother. Share this ancient teaching with other6who may practice it...it's borderline extinct!! Remember Buddha was the richest kid in China and gets the best teachings and the only time we see Christ get angry is with the money changers in the temple because they create a very tightly controlled monopoly and turn teachings like this into a business. It pisses me off too. Anyway this is the highest teaching towards the human form with no close second. It's not so easy to meditate into in the angelic realm with ONE EXCEPTION that this teaching is learned in this lifetime. Rinzai Zen practices perfect enlightenment in one lifetime....Probably SOTOZEN too. I've found this highest state of conciousness a human being can attain with the Yoga Swami's in this day and age. Birds of a feather flock together. Buddhist monks too but Christanity is stuck in a kindergarten class level relative to these higher levels of understanding. They are the Angel's with unicorns horns on their heads, an indescribably beautiful gift of power from Christ. The Holy Bible too is an indecipherable beautiful multi dimensional book and is a Living Lamp of "Lifetrons" Yogananda wrote of. The Living Lamp shaped like a cone (tee pee, since the Native American Indians knew this "Living Lamp" well) if you put it's lessons into one word (the Living Lamp teaches Angel's by taking them (body/mind) of light and imparting Divine wisdom to them without words)- Meditate!!! This Living Lamp is in the astral world. It says MEDITATE because entering into the ethereal body/world is like entering a library. Shhhhh refined from your talking is disturbing others into your mind is interrupting the omniscient mind of God. Thing is to remember to lay down after the headstand session because standing or sitting with the head above the heart will cause a blood rush and faint feeling that kills brain cells one book said. Do we really have a choice in putting this ancient teaching into practice? Either go through our lives with the pineal gland in our brain the size of a raisin or by this practice have a healthy pineal gland the size of an eyeball, 2-5 times larger than an ordinary person. Flouride in our water supply depletes the melatonin in the pineal gland causing it to calcify (turn into a bone). It's reported that 60 million Americans have calcified pineal glands. A horrifying reality in this day and age of modern civilizations. There are You-Tube videos showing how to decalcify the pineal gland. I wonder if this ancient teaching would work with a calcified pineal gland? It's certainly not condusive to it. Great Dharmas Doug.