Glossary & Key Concepts

This course's shorthand for the three domains of knowledge: the inner world (the mind — studied by the humanities), the social world (life between people — the social sciences), and the physical world (matter — the natural sciences). The course centers the inner world.

First used in Lesson 1.1

The canonical collection of Buddhist scripture and the main source for this course. Its three parts are the discipline (Vinaya), the discourses (Sutta), and the higher analysis (Abhidhamma). The standard Thai edition runs to 45 volumes.

First used in Lesson 1.4

The first "basket" of the canon: the code of conduct and community rules for monks and nuns — effectively the tradition's body of ethics and law, developed case by case.

First used in Lesson 1.4

The second "basket": the recorded teachings, conversations, and stories. The most widely read part of the canon and the heart of this course.

First used in Lesson 1.4

The third "basket": a systematic, fine-grained analysis of mind, mental states, matter, and liberation — a kind of classical psychology. Used sparingly in this course.

First used in Lesson 1.4

The physical side of a person — the body and the material world it senses. One of the "two reeds." Paired with nāma.

First used in Lesson 1.3

The mental side of a person — awareness, feeling, perception, and thought. The other "reed," leaning together with the body.

First used in Lesson 1.3

The five components that together create the sense of a "self": body, feeling, perception, mental formations (impulses and habits), and consciousness. A central idea explored fully in Module 2.

Introduced in Lesson 1.3; explored in Lesson 2.1

A classic description of the teaching: it invites verification rather than belief. The spirit of the whole course — test each teaching in your own experience.

First used in Lesson 1.5

A famous discourse in which the Buddha advises a doubtful community not to accept claims on the basis of tradition, hearsay, scripture, logic, or authority alone — including his own — but to know their truth and value for themselves.

Discussed in Lesson 1.5

Three deepening ways of knowing: wisdom from hearing (learning from others), from thinking (reflecting until it makes sense to you), and from practice (direct experience through trained attention). A teaching becomes truly yours only at the third stage.

First used in Lesson 1.5

The mind's recurring unwholesome tendencies — broadly, grasping/greed, aversion/anger, and confusion/delusion — that cloud clear seeing and drive reactive behavior. Central to Modules 2 and 3.

Referenced from Start Here; explored in Lesson 2.3

The particular movement within Thai Buddhism from which our source book comes. Some of its views — especially on meditation and cosmology — are specific to it and differ from other Buddhist schools. We flag these differences where they matter. See Start Here.

Background — Start Here

The first mental aggregate: the immediate tone of any experience — pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral — that arises before thought. One of the four parts of the mind.

First used in Lesson 2.1

The mental aggregate that recognizes and labels — matching what we meet to memory and naming it ("that's my phone").

First used in Lesson 2.1

The aggregate of impulses, reactions, intentions, and trains of thought — the busiest and most consequential of the mental parts, and the seat of habit and volition.

First used in Lesson 2.1

The aggregate of bare awareness — the simple fact of knowing in which feeling, perception, and formations are registered.

First used in Lesson 2.1

The felt center where the four mental aggregates gather into a single point of "me." In this course's source it is treated as the command center of a life — "the mind is master, the body is servant."

First used in Lesson 2.2

The tradition's claim that the mind is naturally clear, bright, and at ease, and is only temporarily clouded by the visiting pulls — like a lamp that burns steadily under a cloth.

First used in Lesson 2.2

The first of the three pulls: the mind reaching out to grab, keep, and hoard — felt as a hunger that "more" never ends. Likened to a fire never satisfied by fuel.

First used in Lesson 2.3

The second pull: the mind heating up and pushing away — anger, irritation, resentment, anxiety. Likened to a bomb that destroys itself first.

First used in Lesson 2.3

The third and deepest pull: not seeing things as they are, then acting on the blur. The background fog that lets greed and aversion run unexamined.

First used in Lesson 2.3

Greed, aversion, and delusion taken together — the "soil" from which nearly every unskillful action grows. Their opposites (generosity, kindness, clear seeing) are the roots of wholesome action.

First used in Lesson 2.3

Defined in the canon as intentional action — what you deliberately do through body, speech, or mind. Not fate or cosmic payback; simply deeds and the patterns they build. Comes in wholesome (kusala) and unwholesome (akusala) kinds.

First used in Lesson 2.4; revisited in Lesson 3.1

The deliberate aim behind an action — the factor that, in the canon, defines an action as karma. The same outward act carries different weight depending on the intention behind it.

First used in Lesson 2.4

The ripening of an action: first inwardly, as a mark on one's own mind and character, and later outwardly in circumstances. Likened to a seed that may sprout quickly or grow slowly like a tree.

First used in Lesson 2.4

Behavior worn smooth by repetition until it runs without a decision. Upanisai refers to the deepest, most ingrained grooves. The tradition holds that good habits must be deliberately cultivated, while unhelpful ones grow on their own.

First used in Lesson 2.5

The three signatures of everything that arises from conditions: impermanence (anicca), unsatisfactoriness (dukkha), and not-self (anatta). Shared across virtually all Buddhist traditions.

First used in Lesson 2.6

The first mark: everything conditioned is always changing. The aggregates are "verbs pretending to be nouns."

First used in Lesson 2.6

The second mark: because everything shifts, grasping at it for lasting satisfaction always falls short. The ache is in the clutching, not the things themselves.

First used in Lesson 2.6

The third mark: no fixed, separate "owner" can be found or commanded behind experience. Not a denial that you exist — an invitation to hold "self" more lightly, and a recognition that a process can change.

First used in Lesson 2.6

The "lawfulness of action" — the principle that intentional actions tend to ripen in kind, wholesome toward wholesome and harmful toward harmful. The law of the harvest: you tend to reap what you sow.

First used in Lesson 3.1

The tradition's map of natural law in five kinds: physical (utu), biological (bīja), moral (kamma), mental (citta), and causal (dhamma). Karma is only the moral order — so not everything that happens is "your karma."

First used in Lesson 3.2

"Beings are the owners of their actions" — the teaching that you are the heir of what you do. Offered as empowerment (the pen is in your hand), not fate, and applied to oneself rather than as a verdict on others.

First used in Lesson 3.3

Wakeful, present attention to one's life — the opposite of autopilot (pamāda). The tradition calls it the root of all wholesome qualities; the Buddha's last words urged it. Relaxed, savoring presence, not tension.

First used in Lesson 3.4

The tradition's core diagnosis: there is suffering; it has a cause (craving); it can cease; and there is a path to its ceasing — the Eightfold Path.

First used in Lesson 4.2

Eight dimensions of a wise life, practiced together: wise view, intention, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, and concentration. "Right" (sammā) means skillful and well-aligned, not finger-wagging.

First used in Lesson 4.2

The Eightfold Path folded into three trainable areas: ethics (sīla), meditation (samādhi), and wisdom (paññā) — which rise together in a spiral.

First used in Lesson 4.3

The training of conduct — not harming, and acting with integrity. The foundation that quiets the mind enough for the other trainings.

First used in Lesson 4.3

The training of the mind — settling scattered attention into calm, clarity, and steadiness. Like letting a stirred pool of water grow still and clear.

First used in Lesson 4.3

The training of clear seeing — understanding how things actually work, and aiming the heart well. Grows best in a mind that is ethical and settled.

First used in Lesson 4.3

Speech that clears five marks: true, kind, beneficial, well-meant, and timely. A simple filter to run words through before speaking — and knowing when silence is wiser.

First used in Lesson 5.2

Lying (musāvāda), divisive speech (pisuṇa-vācā), harsh speech (pharusa-vācā), and idle chatter (samphappalāpa) — the verbal half of unwholesome action.

First used in Lesson 5.3

Material wealth — the four requisites (food, clothing, shelter, medicine) directly, and money indirectly as a medium of exchange. Useful but vulnerable: it can be lost, stolen, or left behind.

First used in Lesson 6.1

The seven inner riches — faith, virtue, conscience, moral caution, learning, generosity, and wisdom — which can't be stolen or lost and are available at any income.

First used in Lesson 6.1

The trainable skill of "enough" — an inner setting rather than an outer amount. The tradition calls it the greatest wealth. Not the end of ambition, but acting from fullness rather than restless craving.

First used in Lesson 6.3

Open-handed giving — of money, time, attention, or forgiveness. The direct antidote to greed, and a reliable source of well-being for the giver. Spirit matters more than size.

First used in Lesson 6.4

The principle of balance — neither excess nor deficit — applied here to health: most lifestyle illness is too much or too little, and the remedy is returning to "just right."

First used in Lesson 7.2

Conditions conducive to well-being — a good environment, wholesome food, attention to climate, and healthy activity. The tradition's reminder that the body is shaped by its conditions, so tend them.

First used in Lesson 7.2

The levels of being in the tradition's cosmology (traditionally 31), from realms of suffering through the human and heavenly realms to subtle formless states. Held as worldview — and read inward, a map of states of mind.

First used in Lesson 8.1

The tradition's teaching that the mind journeys across many lives and realms, driven by karma, until grasping is laid down. Presented in this course as a matter of faith.

First used in Lesson 8.2

The tradition's ultimate goal — the peace beyond grasping and beyond the round of rebirth, reached when the deep pulls of greed, aversion, and delusion are fully laid down.

Referenced in Lesson 8.2