buddhism – Abundance of Wisdom

The most important lotus, the true lotus of Buddha, is depicted as pink in color.

Stemming from this title, the pink lotus represents the history and essence of Buddha.

My pond offers moments of pure delight..perfect for meditation, relaxation and presence.

Origins of the Lotus Symbolism

Lotus flowers were symbolically depicted as early as Ancient Egypt, where white and blue lotuses are more common. In Egypt, the flower was known as Seshen and was associated with Egyptian gods. Because of the way in which the lotus emerged from the water, followed the movement of the sun and then closed back up and returned into the water, only to repeat the process the next day, the lotus was associated with the sun god, Ra.

The Ancient Egyptians aksi believed that lotuses were symbolic of creation, rebirth, strength and power. Perhaps, for this reason, during childbirth Egyptian women tended to wear lotus amulets with a picture of Heqet, a goddess of fertility. The lotuses were present in art, hieroglyphics, and paintings to represent fertility, a new beginning, and purity.

Other historical references to the lotus can be found in Ancient Greece and in Indian religions. In Ancient Greece, the flower represented innocence, modesty, and purity.

References to lotuses in Hinduism can be traced back to at least 1400 BC through Vedic texts that depict Hindu gods holding or standing on lotuses. Early references can also be found in the Buddhist religion, and the Buddha is often depicted sitting on a lotus.

Symbolism of the Lotus

The meanings behind the flower relate to the symbolism of the lotus growing out of muddy waters. The flowers’ roots anchor it in the mud, but the flower rises above its murky environment, blossoming open one petal at a time. Based on these unique growing conditions, the lotus flower has come to have many symbolic meanings.

The lotus represents spiritual enlightenment. Regardless of its dirty environment and the muddy water it’s rooted in, the lotus rises above it all to bloom in beauty, facing the sun. This is symbolic of overcoming the material world and emerging from the muddy waters of suffering to reach spiritual enlightenment and wisdom.
The flower symbolizes detachment as the lotus detaches itself from the water and filth that sullies its environment. This symbolism serves as a reminder to separate ourselves from things that could sully our soul and to instead focus on the things that matter, such as wisdom, relationships and spiritual enlightenment.
Lotuses also symbolize resurrections and new beginnings. The flower emerges in the morning, only to close up at night and disappear into back into the water. in the morning, a new blossom remerges and continues the cycle. This representation makes the lotus a common flower at funerals. This is also why the flower was popular in Egyptian symbolism.
The lotus represents purity and cleanliness, as it’s able to emerge from the murky waters pure and unsullied. In particular, the flower represents the purity of the human soul, as the center of the flower is never tainted by its journey, nor is it by the daily exposure to the murky water.
The lotus flower blooms slowly one petal at a time, which is similar to the gradual steps required to reach spiritual enlightenment. In this sense, the lotus is a symbol of personal progress. Regardless of the color of the petals, the middle is typically yellow, which represents the goal of enlightenment.
The lotus has also been associated with nature and womanhood. Some representations use a lotus bud to symbolize a virgin. In contrast, a fully grown flower is a mature, sexually experienced female.
The lotus is also an excellent example of remaining true to yourself and who you are. Regardless of the murky waters and environment, the lotus remains grounded, proud of what it is and yet still a part of its environment. It beautifies it and makes it better simply by being there.

Symbolism in Religion

The lotus is a religiously significant symbol, especially for Eastern religions. While many of the symbolic meanings are similar, each religion has its own associations as well.

Buddhism

Buddhists see the lotus as a representation of life. The mud is the suffering, challenges, and obstacles we face, and the flower symbolizes overcoming those obstacles. This growth can be viewed as progressing towards a state of purity or the path to enlightenment. Also related to life, Buddhists see the flower as representing rebirth and reincarnation. The flower also signifies purity, spirituality, and self-cleaning.

The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law is an essential Buddhist scripture that highlights the teachings of Buddha about the lotus. The lesson states that without mud, there can be no lotus, but the lotus remains untainted by the mud. This scripture serves as a reminder that suffering and happiness are not mutually exclusive. Without one, you cannot have the other.

Hinduism

Within Hindu symbolism, the lotus is associated with prosperity, fertility, and beauty. The lotus is also associated with a number of Hindu gods and relates to the sacred Padma lotus. The Padma is the part of the soul that drives people towards spiritual enlightenment even through struggles. This drive is similar to the manner in which the lotus flower pushes through the mud and muck to reach the surface

The lotus is associated with several Hindu gods, including Lakshmi, Brahma, and Vishnu, who is known as the Lotus-Eyed One and is known for beauty and purity. Other gods are depicted with lotuses in artwork because of the association with purity and divinity.

Another association given to the lotus, according to some followers of Hinduism, is creation. Similar to how the lotus blooms with sunlight, Hindus believe the world bloomed into creation in the presence of consciousness.

Sikhism

The lotus flower is used as an analogy for how to live life, as explained by Bhai Gurdas Ji, an influential Sikh figure and writer. These writings are referred to as keys to understanding Gurbani and grasping the basics of Sikhism.

Accordingly, just as the lotus remains unsullied in the water, you must stay unaffected by the evils of the world. Another important point is the idea that as the lotus loves the sun and blooms for it, so will the person who, through loving devotion, know the Lord.

Those are just two of the many references he makes to the lotus flower throughout his teachings. It is mentioned an estimated 420 times as representing the human soul.

Other meanings of the lotus in Sikhism can be considered the same as the general symbolism of the lotus. However, it is worth noting that the lotus flower is not commonly used as a Sikh symbol today.

Jainism

The lotus is not a main religious symbol of Jainism, a faith centered around self-help, but it is an identifying symbol for some Jains. The blue lotus is the symbol of Nami, the 21^st Jain. A red lotus represents the 6^th Jain, Padmaprabha.

Breaking Down Lotus Colors

The lotus flower naturally comes in a variety of colors. While the Hindu religion mainly uses the white lotus in its depictions, Buddhism uses a range of lotus colors, each with its symbolic meaning.

Blue represents the importance of spirit over knowledge. It also represents common sense, wisdom, and knowledge.
White symbolizes Bodhi, which is a state of enlightenment. White lotuses are also known as the womb of the world and represent the purity of the mind and soul.
The eight-petal lotus is shown as purple and represents Buddha’s eightfold path to the noble truth, also known as the path to self-awakening. Because of its association with the path, the purple lotus is viewed as mystical and spiritual.
Red represents the heart, so the red lotus symbolizes pure love and compassion.
The most important lotus, the true lotus of Buddha, is depicted as pink in color. Stemming from this title, the pink louts represents the history and essence of Buddha.
When true spiritual enlightenment has been achieved, it is represented by the gold lotus.

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Today, at the end of the second decade of the 21st century, the word “mindfulness” is omnipresent in all the western contemporary literature concerning well-being. The word was once, during the last few decades of the 20th century, “meditation” but only hippies, new agers, yogis, buddhist monks and the beatles used it or were associated with it.

Now the new name” mindfulness” is on the lips of many mainstream conservative and hardcore medical model practitioners and in tons of their research journals. The latter are now publishing hundreds of studies which show positive result after positive result as to its efficacy for managing anxiety, depression, stress and a horde of other psychological and physical ailments. (check the links below of field specific research journals)

The world just cant get enough of mindfulness by whatever means possible. There’s a squillion apps, books, videos, programs, courses, certificates, niknaks and in fact a billion dollar a year industry has emerged from making meditation a highly profitable product over the past 40 years.

How did the western rebranding of meditation to mindfulness come about?

Changing the product’s name is a very common strategy in branding and marketing. In this case it was a phenomenal coup which came about in the early 80s.

The new name mindfulness was better accepted in scholarly research programs and more reachable to the mainstream population.

Psychology patients accepted this terminology of meditation more easily and it stuck. The technique grew in popularity and now mindfulness also called “mindfulness meditation” is fully known globally.

My postgraduate research thesis in Psychology in the late 90’s was titled ‘Mindfulness meditation and anxiety in women” and I was the first and only student in the department interested in this subject back then. Because of my yoga teaching background and positive personal experience I wanted to explore what science if any existed on meditation as a technique in psychological treatment.

Conducting my study offered me the opportunity to research thoroughly all the scientific literature on meditation available from around the world at the time. Most of the studies from the 60’s to the 80’s focused on Transcendental Meditation (TM) which is repeating a mantra during meditation. The studies were published in mostly Indian, some British and French as well as in very few american science journals. Many of these studies had serious internal validity issues. As for Buddhist meditation, or Zen meditation it was only written about in eastern religion journals and not mentioned in any western medicine or psychology journals.

Meditation in all its forms at the time especially the buddhist mindfulness meditation technique which is breathing and observing thoughts was a brand new seed of what is now a gigantic tree of scientific research.

That seed, named the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program (MBSR) was planted at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center by Jon Kabat-Zin with a formal, well funded and carried out plan to explore the benefits of Mindfulness as a useful technique to manage stress. The researcher removed the buddhist framework but utilized the teachings and the concepts of mindfulness. No Mantras, no yogis, no hippies.

Stress in the 90’s was the new big societal disease, the modern day plague, and was accused of being the cause of everything gone wrong in the body and mind and everybody wanted a cure. Hence the creation of the billion dollar industry “stress management”.

Kabat-Zin’s and other such programs experienced a roaring success and influenced, initiated, and inspired an entire field of Psychology in stress management where mindfulness is still the prominent technique recommended and taught.

My thesis ended up being a recap of Kabat-Zin’s research articles which created the framework for my study. Positive results were also shown in my experiment for practicing mindfulness to manage anxiety.

On a personal note, I certainly would not be who I am today, professionally and personally without mindfulness meditation and feel very grateful to Psychologists such as Dr Kabat-Zin who early in my career as a therapist inspired me.

So that was a very brief and somewhat mono view of the origin of Mindfulness in the west. Now why do it?

Why do it?

Because it works. Simple as that. Science shows it.

If you want to research the neuroscience of meditation and how all the synapses in the brain function whilst in a meditative state as shown on MRI photo data. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12671-018-0884-5

The Harvard Gazette published a great article about the science of Mindfulness with great research links if you need further nudging in terms of evidence.

Your self-care routine

Like with any good habit forming and/or modification it begins with THE decision.

Decide you want to practice a form of meditation daily for 10 minutes minimum and it becomes like brushing your teeth. After a disciplined first month it becomes routine. And boom in a few weeks you are meditating daily, you are less stressed, more peaceful, more aware, more “mindful”.

Why not try one of the squillions apps or ubiquitous videos and podcasts. No need to spend any money. However if you do want to spend money on fancy podcasts, videos and apps by wonderful teachers out there do it! spoil yourself. Better then spending on addictive, health destroying crap.

It becomes that bit of time just for you to close your eyes and recalibrate the brain. Regulate the emotions, even out the moods. Let the thoughts go by and detach. It’s only 10 minutes a day.

It’s worth it because it works. It’s easy and it’s free.

You just need to close your eyes and breathe. Observe the thoughts without judgment. Relax your body in the process.

Why not also use some of that time to (or not) pray to your god/power/universe/inner self.

End your meditation time by finding 3 things in your life that you are grateful for and say thankyou to yourself, your god etc.

That time of mindfulness is yours. It’s allocated. It’s the routine.

Self-care means prioritizing time for self in solitude and retreat from the external world to resource, to relax, to be still.

Try this 5 minutes guided Relaxation for stress release;