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ABSTRACT We tend to misunderstand freedom to mean freedom from restrictions. This leads to materialism and environmental degradation. From a Buddhist perspective, freedom begins with generosity (dana), which leads to moral living (sila), which in turn leads to mindfulness (bhavana). This is what creates true freedom and happiness.
Human beings aspire to freedom, but the concept itself has many different meanings. The perception of freedom prevalent in modern society is of a freedom from external limitations or restrictions, including freedom from limitations or restrictions placed by our fellow humans or nature. Seeing freedom in this way conditions the way we see other aspects of life-happiness, for example. If we see freedom as the ability to control or manipulate circumstances, free from restrictions, by amassing a wealth of material possessions or controlling nature, then we will believe happiness depends on the amount of material possessions or control we have.
This kind of perception has reached an end point in environmental degradation and deterioration and the inability of resources to support an increasing population at certain standards of living. It has also led to a situation in which most people recognize that we are forced to compromise with other people and nature in order to survive. A happiness dependent upon manipulating nature without restraint leads to a dangerous situation as world resources are depleted, the environment is damaged and our survival itself becomes threatened. This necessity has led to a kind of compromise: we agree to forgo some personal pleasure, possession, or control in order to allow the world to continue. We agree to this compromise, but we are not truly happy with it. It is a sacrifice made to survive and not a viable way of living.
The impasse described above comes from a fundamentally wrong attitude toward and misunderstanding of both freedom and happiness. From a Buddhist perspective, the establishment of freedom and happiness for human beings must have three levels. The traditional Buddhist method for cultivating these begins with the practice of dana, generosity, and then extends through sila, precepts, to bhavana, mindfulness. With these three, we plant the seeds of peace within ourselves, our communities, and the larger world.
The development of dana begins with giving what one does not want...