Chapter 7. Contentment & Ambition Scenario

Scenario of Ambition & Contentment

Contentment is a core value of Buddhist monastic life which leads to self-sufficiency and satisfaction against mental craving.  So, it is an ideal for members of the Buddhist monastic community to prosper their contented life and enjoy peace and tranquility for oneself which encourage Dhamma practice such as mindfulness and Vipassana meditation leading to enlightenment.

On the other hand, ambition plays an important role in worldly tasks engagement such as the religious propagation.  This is vital in the work of many Bodhisatta or Buddha-to-be individuals who usually invest concerted effort to advance their religious works including teaching and charities to benefit others as much as possible in order to accumulate merit and cultivate perfections.

In Dhammonomics, we present this scenario with graphs showing how (1) work or tasks (2) productivity (3) peace and tranquility (4) ambition, and (5) contentment are interrelated.  With the graphs, we aim to understand better about this scenario and find the ‘right balance’ between ambition and contentment in order to live our life appropriately in the society by enjoying the peace and tranquility from contentment and being able to do the religious works to benefit others.  

According to graph #1, when ambition is high, one can achieve more work and productivity.  For graph #2, more work leads to less peace and tranquility, and when there is more peace and tranquility, one achieves less work.  When we put graph #1 and graph #2 together, we come up with graph #3 which shows the correlations between (1) work or tasks (2) productivity (3) peace and tranquility (4) ambition, and (5) contentment.  Then, we can find out the more or less of ambition and contentment per our wish in order to achieve work, productivity, and peace or tranquility for ourselves.

 

By Pittaya Wong

16 August 2018