Siddhartha Gotama took up training with two (2) different Teachers.
First, he studied with his initial Teacher who claimed that he had figured out how to attain Enlightenment. This Teacher taught Siddhartha Gotama to hang himself upside down from trees, lay on beds of nails, pierce the body with metal implements, and to starve himself.
The thought was, that if you could cause enough pain to the physical body, through disparaging the body, and the mind could overcome that pain, an individual would experience Enlightenment.
Siddhartha Gotama trained with this Teacher for one (1) year. At the end of the year of training, the Teacher declared that Siddhartha Gotama had learned everything he had to teach him, he had mastered his teachings.
Siddhartha Gotama observed his mind was not any more peaceful at the end of this training than when he was in the palace.
Therefore, he decided to seek out a different Teacher.
Siddhartha Gotama studied with a different Teacher for the next one (1) year, who also claimed he knew how to attain Enlightenment. This Teacher was essentially teaching him the exact same things.
He hung himself upside down from trees, laid on beds of nails, pierced the body with metal implements, and starved himself. At the end of one (1) year of training, this Teacher also stated that Siddhartha Gotama had mastered his Teachings. But, Siddhartha did not see improvement to the condition of his mind. His mind still was not anymore peaceful than when he lived in the royal palace.
Frustrated with the entire thing, he thought he had wasted two (2) years of his life, he decided to venture off on his own into the forest.
While in the forest, the only things he knew how to do were the same things he learned from those first two (2) Teachers. He continued to disparage the physical body thinking, that is what would produce Enlightenment.
He took this so far that he was only eating one grain of rice per day. He had become skin and bones, on death’s doorstep.
He was sitting on the edge of the forest meditating when a mother and her young daughter walked by seeing he was only skin and bones, and close to death.
They pleaded with him to eat some rice, and he reluctantly accepts their offering of rice.
In that moment, he has the realization of “the middle way”.
He realized that when he was in the royal palace he was living a life of luxury, with everything you can imagine available to him. But, when he left the royal palace, he swung all the way to the other side where he was disparaging the physical body, only eating one grain of rice per day.
He realized, that there was a “middle way”. That he needed to do things in moderation. He started eating and focused on training of the mind rather than, disparaging the physical body.
From this point forward, his training accelerates where he discovers the training and The Teachings that are needed to attain Enlightenment.
Over the next four (4) years, a total of six (6) years, he figures out how to attain Enlightenment.
He knows he attained Enlightenment because his mind was completely peaceful, calm, serene, and content with joy. He no longer experiences any discontent feelings. All the sadness, anger, frustration, irritation, annoyance, guilt, shame, fears, boredom, loneliness, shyness, jealousy, resentment, stress, anxiety, etc. had been completely eliminated from the mind through gradual training and gradual practice to experience gradual progress.
He knew his Teachings were radically different than anything anyone else was sharing at the time. Others were focused on disparaging the physical body while his Teachings centered on purification of the mind through training of the mind.
He was unsure of whether to share his Teachings with others or not, so he hangs out at a Bodhi Tree in northeast India for seven (7) weeks contemplating on whether to share his Teachings or not.
Again, I am going to pause the life story of Siddhartha Gotama to teach you something that is not The Teachings of The Buddha. I will meet you inside the little area just over there where you will find a large statue of The Buddha.
The remaining images you see here are based in Thai folk traditions not The Teachings of The Buddha but, they are surely beautiful images if you would like to take a look at them on your way to the small little room where I will teach you some more.