Word: nirvanas
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...flirted with Buddhism in the 1950s and again in the '70s; vestiges of those dalliances still waft, pleasant yet amorphous, through the pop atmosphere. Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson applies Zen to the art of Michael maintenance, and Tina Turner and Herbie Hancock chant Buddhist mantras. Terms such as Nirvana and koan are in common usage, if seldom understood...
...that suffering, including the fear of death, can be traced to "desire," the mind's habit of seeing everything through the prism of the self and its well-being; that this craving can be transcended, leading to peace and eventually to an exalted state of full enlightenment called Nirvana; and that the means to do that lies in the Eightfold Path of proper views, resolve, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness and concentration...
...Truths dovetailed with the Hindu scheme of reincarnation: we are reborn again and again, in an endless and wearying cycle called samsara, each life affected by the good and bad deeds performed in previous existences, according to a system called karma. The attainment of Nirvana allows us finally to step away from what one writer called "the squirrel cage of birth and rebirth" and enter into oneness with the cosmos. From the beginning, a practice of meditation was the chief mechanism to gain the awareness necessary for enlightenment...
...China, Japan and Korea, sustained the Four Noble Truths and the practice of meditation. But Mahayanans saw the Buddha as a divinity to whom prayers could be addressed. They also revered--and hoped to become--bodhisattvas, fully enlightened, Buddha-like beings who had won the right to enter Nirvana but chose to be reborn on earth to enlighten others. A cornucopia of Mahayana offshoots sprang up over the centuries. Zen, which was adopted by the Japanese samurai class, combined chanting and teacher-student dialogue with an extremely strict sitting meditation practice, often enforced with whacks from a ceremonial wand...
...three good years and everyone thinks we've landed in Nirvana," Rudenstine said. "We cannot expect our markets to keep going like this...The changes could be quite drastic...