BUDDHA

Buddha (Buddha the Awakened) or Siddhartha (Siddhartha) Gautama is a life of compassion, enlightenment, and truth-seeking. Born into a world of luxury, he began a spiritual journey that brought him to deep realization. His life and teachings have inspired millions of people all over the world, and have shaped the very fabric of Buddhism.

 Early Life Siddhartha was born into a wealthy family, the Shakya clan, in what is now Lumbini (Nepal) in the sixth century BCE. He was raised by a wealthy family of the same name, the Suddhodanas, who protected him from the world of human suffering. The Suddhodanas raised him in a world of opulence and luxury, but Siddhartha was always curious about the world outside the palace walls.

Siddhartha’s Spiritual Journey Siddhartha was fed up with the insipidness of his life as a prince, so he left the palace grounds to explore the world around him. He faced the realities of age, illness, and death that affected him deeply. He renounced his status as a prince and left behind his family, worldly possessions, and possessions. For six years Siddhartha devoted himself to the practice of asceticism, enduring extreme suffering, suffering deprivation, and meditation under different spiritual teachers. However, he could not find a permanent solution to the issue of suffering. He realized that extreme austerity was not the answer, so he decided to find a middle ground between self-pleasure and self-destruction. Siddhartha went into deep meditation, sitting under Bodhi tree, at the Bodhisattva