The Buddhist Eightfold Path

Choose one practice from the Buddhist Eightfold Path and describe how you could incorporate it in your life OR provide an example from your life of a time when you have demonstrated one of the practices.

Tha paths that I would like to focus on for this blog post is right effort and right speech. I think that right effort is the path that is extremely important, and that everyone should try to strive towards. Without putting some thought into what you do and without trying your best you will never be able to achieve what you would like, or what you are hoping to. Everything in life is difficult, and you need to face the problems and tasks standing in your way, giving your best effort to overcome them, and bring yourself closer to your goals and dreams. I think that this whole year, at least for me, was about the right effort. Sometimes in school I had assignments that I had a horrible attitude towards, but I realized that if I wanted a good grade, I would need to develop a good attitude and try my best. One of those assignments was the 3D elevation map we had to make in humanities. I thought that I would never be able to do a good job, because I am not very skillful when doing projects that are not necessarily based on writing. However, I decided to give it my best shot, and I ended up being really proud of what my partner and I accomplished.

As for the right speech, I chose this path because I feel that I could incorporate it mor einto my life, and try to improve. When I am angry or frustrated at someone I tend to say all sorts of things, not really paying attention to wether that might hurt the person who I have a conflict with. I have to learn to be more calm, and try to solve a conflict I have with another person through conversation, that should not involve mean and abusive language that only has one goal, and that is harming the other person. Also, I think that I should improve on being an honest person. When people ask me for advice, I usually tell them what they want to hear, not necessarily what I think is the right thing to do, so I would like to start avoiding lies and start being a better human by following the Buddhist path of right speech.