Four Kinds of Nutriments for a Fulfilled Life or Four Hungers for Experience?

If we feel low and under-nourished, we easily make frequent pilgrimages to the sacred tabernacle of the West, the refrigerator.

We indulge in eating and drinking, often in unhealthy ways. Guilt and self-blame haunt our life due to our habits and addictions.

Millions keep telling themselves to change their eating habit in a merciless cycle of gaining weight and losing weight.

Diets have become big business selling us the idea that a specific diet will make us feel good about ourselves. For how long…?

Have we looked at people in the supermarket?

Have we looked in the mirror naked? Are we deluding ourselves that the next diet provides the answer. Where is the social evidence in a society of heavy, overweight people, millions of adults and children sadly live with obesity?

The Buddha referred to four areas of nourishment. All four matter equally and mutually support each other. Diet is not the answer. The other three kinds of nourishment contributes to a balanced diet.

Everybody, without exception, requires nourishment. Organic, healthy food and drink nourishes all of our being.

  1. We eat mindful food, primarily organic, including grains, vegetables and fruit leaving space in the stomach for the food to convert to energy.
  2. We develop happiness through all the senses – what we see, hear, smell, taste and touch. This happiness does not require ownership of the object. Happiness comes to our eyes and ears through the wonders of life including what we read or listen to. We feel nourished through such contact.
  3. We develop wise intention/aspiration/wise approaches, creativity. We find enjoyment in healthy initiatives of engagement in co-operation.
  4. We explore consciousness, mindfulness, meditation and reflection, times of stillness and silence for receptive to deep realisations.

The Buddha on the Four Nutriments

The Buddha warns of the hunger of experience for any of these four nutriments. His tone emphasis the danger of indulgence in the four. He endorses liberation from indulgence in any of the four.

Discourse on the Four Nutriments.
Given at Saavatthii.
SN 12.63

“There are four nutriments

“Edible food, coarse and fine,
sense-impression
intentions
consciousness.”

FOUR WAYS OF NOURISHMENT
Wednesday 5 May 2021 Israel time 20.00. 19.00 CET. 18.00.
60 Minutes. Guided Meditation. Talk. Question and Answers.
For further information, contact organiser Michal Goran in Israel 
gm.michal@gmail.com.
Michal will send you the Zoom link.

MAY ALL BEINGS APPLY WISDOM TO THE FOUR NUTRIMENTS

 

 

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Scroll to Top