Realms of My Own Reality

I was awakened in the middle of the night (1:20 AM) to find myself wanting from some compulsion to write something that meant so much to me at the time. I don't know why but this is it. I need to understand that everyone has the potential for the Buddha nature. I can respect that but that doesn't mean I want to live next door to someone who can't show the slightest compassion towards other people. I lived a portion of my life as a selfish, self centered person and would like to change but no one will care since I did some things wrong at one time and it doesn't seem to matter, even to those who say that they believe in forgiveness, since they can turn me into the bottom class and that means more to them than anything else.
It occurs to me that I was smarter than most people and experienced in some ways but was always critical of myself. But doing the right thing is simpler than anything else. My game plan dates back before Christianity. It has to do with four realities and and eight step plan. Now, I wish to mention here that I have followed the Twelve Step program and it is really good to fix you if you are broken but the eight step plan is something that one can do to keep from needing to be fixed. Within it are the secrets of how to get along in life even better than Dale Carnegie could have designed. First I must digress here a moment to explain my point of view that has to do with humanistic values.
First we must look at society as we know it, as Professor Srikumar S. Rao explains, "We work really hard our whole life at being unhappy..." in that we put expectations on everything. First we must look at society as being dissatisfied. So, here is the problem and the four realities.
Most people in our society are unsatisfied. Most dissatisfaction comes from selfish desire, desiring to have what we don't have, even if it doesn't do anything but make us want more. There is an option that will cause us to stop feeling disatisfied. That option is the eight step program.

Step one is Right View: mostly right view has to do with the acceptance that you understand and accept the four realities. Simple, wasn't it?

Step Two is Right Thinking: Right thinking is one’s intent or resolve to develop a mind free of wickedness and cruelty.

Step Three is Right Speech: Right speech is to speak in ways to create positive value instead of causing harm through lying or slander.

Step Four is Right Action: Right action means abstaining from all wrong deeds such as harming other lives, stealing or debauchery.

Step Five is Right Livelihood: Right livelihood is generally understood as the purification of one’s thoughts, words and deeds while living with compassion and avoiding the harming of others. (Right livelihood is also interpreted as avoiding professions that cause harm to others such as slave trading or arms dealing.)

Step Six is Right Endeavor: Right endeavor is one’s conscious, diligent effort to stem evil and promote goodness toward the establishment of a wholesome state of life.

Step Seven is Right Mindfulness: Right mindfulness generally means being at all times mindful and aware of what one is doing, thinking, and feeling.

Step Eight is Right Concentration: Right concentration means training the mind to achieve the state of concentrated attention necessary to enter a deep meditative absorption characterized by lucid awareness and achieved by focusing the mind on a single object.

Even though these are called steps, they need to be achieved in accord with each other, not in a sequence. As you can see, if you elect your life to change, then you can follow the eight steps together in the understanding that they are the answer to the four realities and all are part of a happier life.
Now, can I tell you a secret? I just taught you the basis of Buddhism. The four realities are what we call the four noble truths, and the eight steps are called the eightfold path. It is that simple. Were you waiting for a divine deity or mythological paradises? There are things like that in Buddhist scripture but they are now understood to be analogies for parts of your own mind. I hope this makes it easier for you to accept that you just learned the basis of Buddhism and your butt didn't fall off and the spawn of Satan didn't appear. How about that? I hope now you can continue reading to find out the whole story. It doesn't matter to us what else you believe as long as you follow along with the basic philosophy which is designed to do nothing more than make you happy. Enjoy.