The mind creates the suffering.

 Its the mind that creates the suffering.

I'm in this cabin for around 7 years now. I moved here because I was practically homeless after my father passed away with very little money and had just been made bankrupt also.

When I first moved in I was still an alcoholic and used to wake up on the floor of this cabin riddled with many negative emotions.

I didnt even have a shower or curtains, I used some of my mattress stock to cover up the windows. My mind was tormented!

Theres are a few ways I could have went back then, jail, death or get into a bit of planting and chanting and follow the Buddha path with devotion as best as I can.

You know when your backed into a corner like this your capable of anything.

But this book I'm reading just came to me at the time, I read it everyday, chanting and made nature offerings daily by planting trees. I set out to try and help people around me more doing goods deeds and did my prayers and rituals every day.

Reading this book though made me see that all my suffering was my own doing, it was me that created the darkness and this book gave me the faith and belief that I can create the light.

Fast forward 7 years, I'm in this same place that was once the most depressing place I've ever woke up and now its my own little sanctuary.

Buddhism for me is a science of the mind. Our mind creates all the suffering and problems.

I always think back to when I was 17 and full of enthusiasm living in a tiny room in a council estate. I had drive like you wouldn't believe, every day I wheeled and dealed at everything and anything to get rich.

I was richer than most by the time I was 21 chasing the soul trap and by the time I was 25 Mara the tempter as they call in Buddhism had me in chains. I was so rich but locked in attachments to money, assets, addictions and many more selfish desires. My mind was far from free.

Attachment is the root cause of suffering is what the Buddha says.

At around 30 years old the negative karma that I created living like a selfish brat was beginning to ripen, I went on a downward spiral that lasted years and lost everything.

I moved back into the bedroom where I grew up taking sleeping tablets daily hiding from life in depression.

I think about this situation a lot. About how the mind created all the suffering.

When I was 17 in the same position with nothing to my name I was full of life. After acquiring all the toys and tinsel of the world and making it big time then losing it all and being put back in the same bedroom I was suicidal. What had really changed?

Why did I not have the same enthusiasm after losing everything and going back into the same bedroom as I did when I was 17!

The mind made up a whole load of suffering due to selfish attachments.

I am absolutely fascinated and inspired by Buddhism. one day I aim to find that stillness of the mind and see the illusions of life for what it really is. To be a humble observer of this passing cosmic movie.

Its all a practice though, right from birth our minds have been wired into the ratrace, our parents minds and grandparents minds have also been wired into the ratrace. To be still is not what Mara wants, when we become still we connect to the Buddha light in us all. Some call it the Christ spark or I like to call it sometimes the kundalini glow stick. Its the spirit of creation in us all and this illusion of life is a form of trickery, like an antenna directing and taking us off on a whirlwind ride masking and hiding the fact that this Buddha light is deep in us all.

Meditate - phantom plant - chant and do good deeds! 

Peace and love

The Phantom Planter