How I Got Into Buddhism 

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The thing I like about Buddhism is that even without having to believe in anything in particular, it offers hugely practical help in dealing with the difficulties we all must face. I hope you and your wife continue to grow in strength in the face of your own challenges 🙏

You know how I got Buddhism? I watched one of your videos years ago ~ This lead me to Jetsumna Tenzin Palmo. I had no idea what a Buddhist nun was and for whatever reason the RU-vid algorithm recommended it to me and the rest is history. I took the precepts over zoom with her. She totally changed my life. And honestly, it’s all because of you.❤ she just celebrated her 81st birthday by the way❤

My tips for beginner meditators: ● Do pre-meditation--avoiding anything that agitates your mind 1h prior to actual meditation (e.g. games, music, TV, etc.) ● Don't eat right before meditation, but don't start meditating if you're hungry. ● have a handkerchief and a bottle of water at hand. ● seek a quiet place with minimal stimuli ● use earplugs or noise-cancelling headphones if have them ● Wrap a blanket or mantle around yourself to protect you from insects ● invest in longer, 1h+ sessions if you can

I started doing yoga in 1964 when I was 11. The next year I read Walpole Rahula's What the Buddha Taught. The year after that I tried not to join the church, it went badly, so I had to wait until I was majority age to be a Buddhist. At 21, I started learning liuhebafa, which has an exercise called 'wind-circle standing' which is meditation and for the next 45 years I switched back and forth. I learned Chinese and studied a lot of Daoism, and Daoism-Buddhism (one of the roots of Zen). I did formal sitting in Zen. But usually I prefer standing. 5 years ago I had an experience that began with having a 'perfect stand' -- keeping my mind on each and every breath for the whole 42 minutes. That lead to adding shaking to my practices and switching to what is currently a mixture of Tantra, Shamanism, and Buddhism. My current goto text is Vyaktabhavanugatatattvasiddhi (Realization Through Bodily Expressions), which is in Sanskrit and is by Sahajayogini Cinta.

I was Catholic, then I became fascinated with Judaism, and eventually, I ended up as an atheist. One day I had two days of oneness by coincidence. After that, I came across the Burning Monk video, and from that moment, my life changed 180 degrees.

Thanks for sharing your story. For me, it was exposure to Alan Watts lectures when I was in college that turned me into learning more about Buddhism. One of my professors let me borrow a huge CD set, and honestly it got me through some fairly difficult parts of my life at the time.

I took a class in college where I was really exposed to the Buddhadharma. Thankfully the professor gave everyone the classical What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula, after reading his preface on how westerns should read the book, it was enough for me to have a breakthrough and changed my entire view point on life. Thank you for this video Doug it brought some inspiring feelings🙏

Thank you for sharing your story, Doug. Your channel helped me immensely and is the reason why I started to become interested in Buddhism. Greetings from Argentina!

You kind of remind me of my parents, who were agnostic when I was growing up. I tried meditating a few times as a kid but didn't have a teacher or social support and got distracted by other things. Had an intense and severely life-threatening illness as a teenager that was very traumatizing, but got introduced to yoga and reintroduced to meditation as a freshman in college and had some life-changing spiritual experiences shortly thereafter. I started practicing every day as soon as I had some teachings because it was so helpful for trauma. I had signed up for a month-long Tibetan Buddhist retreat a few weeks before I met Kali in a visionary experience and converted to Hinduism on summer vacation after freshman year. I ended up switching my major from philosophy (mostly western) to religious studies to study Hinduism and Buddhism. I've learned a lot from Mongolian Buddhists and Tibetan Buddhist in the Nyingma and Shangpa Kagyu lineages, and did my MA in Religious Studies and Sanskrit at Naropa University, though I've gotten a lot of flack from both Buddhists and Trika Shaivas for being different from what they consider normative. I like the Nath tradition best.

Buddhism Plain and Simple was the real break through work for me. Growing up around Christianity I was familiar with "The Message" which was rewording the Bible into a modern way of speaking. This process of converting the old language to new was going on through the 1990s. Right in the middle of that Buddhism Plain and Simple did an excellent job of explaining the basics to a beginner. I realize now that my next door neighbors were likely Buddhist but when I was around them as a kid I didn't realize there were non missionary religions where the adherents were not trying to convert you to their religion. I wish a lot of the Buddha's wisdom rubbed off on me in those early years. Not only works like that previous mentioned but also the what I started reading by Thick Nhat Han over this last year. His teachings on the interbeing and become an inter-are with you who you were as a child have been an important backbone to my writings of childhood lately.

This channel has helped me imensely. One of the best maybe the best place to learn dharma on you tube, and the internet more broadly. Thank you Doug Smith 🙏.

MY deepest sympathies for your struggles with pain with your spouse, your story was very relatable.

Ah yes, the western mysticism to buddhism pipeline. My path went through western alchemy and magic until I had a crush on a girl with a "dharma bum" tattoo, which led me to the book, which in turn led me to the lankavatara sutra.

May dad dubbed Carl Sagan's voice from Cosmos on tape, and used to listen to them in car growing up, he was great and he was enlightened in many ways.

Thank you for sharing your experiences and background. I've often wondered.

THX for honesty that you are a human too and happy to know another Dundgeons&Dragons soul mate. 😉 Not disappointed at all!

Greatly appreciate your sharing of your Buddhist journey. Thank you. 🙏

Awsome some Doug lore. I think this will help others on the path.

I came here searching for an entry point to buddhism. And a lot of what you say at the start(I haven't gotten to the middle of the video yet) really resonates with me. I am curious about the world, quantum mechanics was a mystery to me as a kid and it made me pursue physics. Now I am deep into my QFT studies. I was relieved to hear that you recognized that there is nothing connecting QM and buddhism because I am very tired of people abusing science they do not understand. Makes me want to hear more of what you have to say. I am not here to find god, I am not here to find religion. As an outsider, it feels like buddhism has lots of great insights into the human mind which are accurate on a qualitative level. And I seek these insights to achieve greater harmony and peace within me

I am happy to hear a longer version of this. Thank you for sharing your story and practice 🙏🙏🙏

I used to watch Kung Fu and Monkey on TV as a kid which was an introduction to Buddhism. Some very profound parables in those shows. Fortunately with the Internet now there is a wealth of resources including this Channel on Buddhism. Some of my favourites are Mindah Lee Kumar, Shinzen, Adyashanti and Hardcore Zen.

Thanks for sharing your origin story Doug!

Thank you for sharing your story, Doug! I appreciate that you find your "way" after many years of study, and to me is an important fact: I'm always saying to myself "You're late in life, you must find your way now" and these kinds of things, but your story taught me that it's never to late! Thanks!

How funny, I also credit Gödel, Escher, Bach with my discovery of Buddhism. I also made it about 3/4 through and never finished 😅 it was certainly instrumental in introducing me to the concept of non-duality, that consciousness exists on a spectrum of recursion, and human consciousness is simply a complicated pattern of self-referential loops. I actually found Hofstadter's other book "I Am a Strange Loop" to be far more digestible. It expounds on his basic premise in a less technical, less dense way. I would highly recommend it as a starting point for anyone interested in his writings

Tnx for sharing Doug 🙏🧡

I really appreciate your videos and hearing about your personal path. You and Dr. Wright, were my introduction to serious Buddhist ideas. I was an engineering student at UW-Madison in the late 70's. Glad to know you are a fellow Badger. It was there I took an elective course on a "A History of Science and Theology," which was offered from the College of Engineering in those days. That course probably had a bigger effect on me than all my other engineering courses.

You had an awakening moment 😊

Thanks for sharing your personal story, Doug.

im a srilankan buddhist . buddhism in srilanka in mainstream media have gotten political . on the otherhand ,this is breath of fresh air.btw buddhist temples in my local areas haven't got politcial at all

Fascinating journey! I too started from analytical philosophy, and slowly and unfortunately went down the reactionary atheist pipeline, Buddhism marked a point in my journey when I started to view not the world in terms of contrasts and more as unities. I’ve know opened to fields like Dialectics, which along with Buddhist principles, plays well with the field of my expertise, AI.

Thank you very much !

Thanks for this video Doug, really interesting. My wife has also been through a few years of terrible chronic pain, so that part was very relatable. We do practice some meditation these days and that helps. Best wishes to you both.

This is crazy to hear because I’m 19 and have followed a very similar journey with introduction and childhood to these ideas and quantum mechanics pseudoscience kind of ideas. I’m pursuing physics in undergrad and have long since realized these conceptions were largely unfounded and pseudoscientific but it is fascinating how many share this journey

Exactly like mine! Kidding, we all have such a unique path...

Thank you for sharing. Very cool.

Thank you for sharing your background. Our hobbies and interests are very similar and I also live in New York (up state). I have been doing some journaling in part to discover who I am. Your videos are helpful. I think we also might share a personally type, INFJ. Who knows. Anyway thank you for the great content.

Thank you for your videos Doug, fascinating story 🙏

Excellent video! Thanks Doug. I'm deciding between doing a phd in either philosophy or Buddhist studies, leaning towards philosophy this is very helpful.

Hey Doug - haven’t tuned in a quite a while, but just saw this video pop up on my feed. You were instrumental in helping me understand more deeply the principles and ideas behind Buddhist thought/practice. For a while, I considered myself a quasi-Buddhist, as someone who started meditating as a means to control anxiety, but then become curious about the history behind such practices. Since then, however, God has revealed his Glory to me through His son, my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It was actually during an intense meditation session that God’s presence flooded me like wave and I knew right then and there that Jesus, as He claims, is the Way, the Truth and the Life. I pray too that one day you would come to the same conclusion. God Speed, my friend.

I just got curious about who buddhists worship because I don't hear about them in the whole 'my religion is the true religion' conflict which drove me away from Christianity, Islam, Judaism & Hinduism. So I spent all weekend researching it and I liked most of what I found in comparison to the other religions. Not a fan of the restrictions on speech though. No idle chatter or harsh speech aka never speak up because you could upset someone. Of course it's super easy to follow those restrictions but they make me feel dead inside. Also people get offended when I don't have much to say.

Inspiring! Star Wars and Star Trek fan too! I entered Buddhism through the back door. Aka psychedelic visions. 😎🙏🏻 Anyone else enter this door?

Your mention of attempts to tie together quantum mechanics and Buddhism reminds me of similar attempts to tie quantum physics and magick/spellcraft when I was Pagan. Also struck me as unsupported, based on wishful thinking. Thank you for sharing your story and the efforts you put into your videos

rest in present awareness be still close eyes listen to your breathing.

Hey Doug, thank you for another video . Have you ever made a video on Ashoka the Buddhist ling after the Kalinga war? That might be cool. You don't have to, but it's another idea if you're not sure. 😊

Greek mythology and norse mythology what got me started on buddhism talk about possibility of reincarnation and nirvana having past live and future trying to get out of samsara sound intersting

I also get interested in many things and it gets hard to sustain my attention on just one thing. As for me I was born into a Buddhist family but I didn't had much interest in Buddhism. But as I had gotten older and began to understand it more through books and other forms of media, I stopped being a Nominal Buddhist and embraced it more. Note: I get mistaken to be a Tibetan but to set it clear, I am a Bhutanese

I knew Doug was my long lost dad 😊 same interests growing up

Buddhism has been a constant source of peace and a rich path for spiritual and intelectual exploration. Your videos have been useful in this exploration. I'm grateful for that. Nevertheless, I can't help thinking sometimes that, in a way, the message is that the existence of individual lives is a sort system error that we have to try to correct until we dissolve and ceased to exist as individuals. It's kind of sad to think that the whole point of our existence is to fix a system error. I would like to know your thoughts about this.

Your formative years sound very much like mine. I'm sure we would have been friends growing up. Like you, I attended U.W., but in the Buddhist Studies/South Asia Dept. The earliest book dealing with Buddhism I can recall reading is "Halfway Through The Door" by Alan Arkin.

U make me think about I got in to it. Growing up in an atheism orientated family I got across the four truths when I was ten or eleven. I must have been suffering a lot because I felt them to be fundamentally true at once. Well, it was so with at least with the first, second ,and third one. Now, quite a couple of decades have passed imho to be fourth is my kōan. namu namu & thanx a lot! ☘️☘️🍀🌸🍀☘️☘️

I also was first introduced to zen and koans by reading GEB, great book!

Thank you for sharing. Starting with the early sutras is a good idea. Did you do or ever think of covering Christian mystics and their paradoxical language? It would be interesting to look at Zen paradoxes (koans) and compare them to e.g. Christian mystics. Another thought that feels natural especially in regard to this video is how you can understand suffering in Judaism, Christianity and Buddhism. ❤❤❤

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Thank you Doug, this was great. I still have a question, though, albeit one you touched on in the video. Why Early Buddhism instead of Zen? I've only been learning about Buddhism for a mere 5 years, but it seems like the things you have to set aside in early Buddhism, like multiple-lives reincarnation, are already done away with in Zen. So from my rather ignorant standpoint, Zen would seem to be a better "starting place" for secular Buddhism than early Buddhism. But maybe I'm still in the "Zen Buddhism is cool Buddhism" mindset of a beginner? Thank you for your channel and wisdom!

Thanks for the great video Doug! It's really interesting to hear your journey, I was also raised in a secular household and similarly was super interested in myths (mostly greek when I was younger). I had a question, seeing as you have your doctorate in Philosophy, have you ever considered doing a video about Schopenhauer and how he contributed to a Western understanding of Buddhism?

Just out of curiosity, you mentioned early in the video that you got into meditation. Without mentioning what type of meditation. I would also be interested in how you view meditation, what is its usefulness. I ask because I meet so many people that view meditation as an end. Where it is actually the beginning. Meditation is simply a way to practice different skills that you then apply in life. It is a form of wisdom. Learn something useful and apply what you have learned in your life on an ongoing basis.

You mentioned not finding connection between quantum physics and Buddhist thought having dabbled in looking at it. Are you referring to the dialogue between Krishnamurti and David Boehm?

Thank you for this interesting insight into your personal evolution. Many things sound very familar to me... 😄 Best wishes to you and your spouse! 🐱🙏

I'm surprised you didn't mention CARL JUNG, BERTRAND RUSSELL, ALAN WATTS, or JOSEPH CAMPBELLS "THE POWER OF MYTH", yea? My meditation started with martial arts, clear the fear, yea? "EVERY WISH FULFILLED" ET.............................

Sometimes I wonder if I haven't given Buddhism an unfair amount of my time. Maybe I should look more into other things. My relationship with Buddhism is very complicated, but I guess that's okay... you know... with there not being a self and all.

What is your Myers Briggs type? If you happen to know it

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by habit

What made you leave academic philosophy Doug? I'm curious to hear your perspective because I am a current undergraduate student in philosophy and am debating whether or not to go to grad school and pursue my studies in eastern philosophy or not

I like Doug

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Wait - are you me? I’m confused now 😆. Born in late 1970, and I suspect you’re about my age. Too many similarities…

Hi . Do we find yoga in early Buddhism?

I think it's useful to study with the buddhist tradition rather than Americanized secular buddhism if you want to reach such goals as peace, emptiness, happiness.