The Eightfold Path: Right Speech

The third “step” towards Buddhist enlightenment

“Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much.”
— Blaise Pascal

Words have power. (What better community than Medium to understand that?) And we can use that power to divide people, cause hate, or torment ourselves in our heads. Or, we can use the power of speech to deliver truth, encouragement, and compassion.

The third step of the Eightfold Path, which is the Buddhist prescription for attaining freedom from suffering, is Right Speech. It consists of the four following principles:

Replace False Speech With Honesty

Buddhism is all about cultivating peace and harmony between people and within oneself. Deliberate lies foster distrust between people, which leads to conflict, and therefore suffering. Think of the boy who cried wolf! After so much lying, nobody was there to help him when he really was in need.

Lying to yourself is like cutting out your eyes. If you refuse to face your problems, then who will solve them?

The alternative is honesty — do your best in communicating to reflect what you perceive as real to yourself and others. That will cultivate the good environment of peaceful trust with yourself and your society.