enlightenment
for some, does it take several lifetimes to reach enlightenment?
www.imdb.com veteran since march 1998
[deleted]
what an amazing moment that would be.
www.imdb.com veteran since march 1998
if you can't commit to a lifetime of meditation in a monastery like a lama would, the next best thing is working on your karma to improve your status in the next life. the closer you get, you will start remembering past lifetimes and that could shorten the amount of time it takes.
knowing that where i am right now is because of my past karmic behavior is a lot closer to enlightenment then i was before i knew about buddhism.
suppose you are this average... ordinary... NORMAL everyday teenager who hangs around with friends.. wastes time only concerned with having fun fun fun...etc etc etc
and suddenly this average everyday teenager comes across buddhism by chance and gets deeply involved in it in a way they have never done before that they totally forget about everything else...
...is it possible for the teenager to attain full enlightenment in his lifetime if they work extremely hard... ?
theoretically yes, but you would have to devote all your time to it, and you will need a great spiritual teacher, probably the highest lama you can find, and you would likely have to go to a monastery.
in my opinion there should be no rush, why in one lifetime? just have some patience and keep building good karma and it will come to you.
it is likely you will not achieve enlightenment if you always were pushing for it, because in the back of your mind you would not be learning properly you would be always concerned with how much time each meditation is taking you thereby spoiling your progress..
Fulfillment does not come from having much, but from being attached to little.
"...is it possible for the teenager to attain full enlightenment in his lifetime if they work extremely hard... ? "
According to Dan Ingram, it is entirely possible and even likely. He reached enlightenment while going through medical school and having a normal life, with retreats when he had the time. He wrote a book that's freely available online called "Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha," and I think it's THE best book for an ordinary youth or anyone else to read concerning enlightenment. He basically says that if you put in a decent amount of effort, you'll become enlightened. Now that's enlightenment, which is different from full buddhahood. It's the difference between being free of suffering/seeing things as they are, and (as my friend puts it) flying and turning water into wine. Mastery of the formless (understanding things as they are) is enlightenment, mastery of manifest (skillfully navigating the world) is Buddhahood. Once you see things as they are, you can finally affect true and significant change.
Gah, I'm babbling. Read the book, you'll be inspired enough to change your life. Mine certainly was. And it's free! Which is infinitely cheaper than ANY book you can buy.
The book is at http://www.interactivebuddha.com/mctb.html