Being and becoming. Being and becoming are such fundamental concepts that we often take them for granted. But actually, they’re deep subjects to which we can devote an enormous amount of study and development work.

After all, without being we wouldn’t exist. How could we do anything or have anything? First, we have to be. Descartes had it backwards: “Because I am, I think.” Because I exist, I can do. And because I do, then I can have things.

So being is fundamental. And when we want to change our being, then we’re talking about becoming. So, becoming is how we change our being.

For example, if we want to learn. Let’s say we want to learn to be a musician, or we want to become a pilot. There’s two ways to approach this: through peripheral methods and through essential methods.

Peripheral methods study the externals of a subject or state of being. For example, if we want to study leadership, we’ll read books by great leaders and about great leaders, and we’ll discuss examples of what they did in this situation, in that situation; and then we’ll try to emulate or imitate them.

But wait a minute. That’s imitation. That’s not authentic.

Authentic leadership comes from the essence of being a leader. And if we’re not being a leader now, how do we become a leader? If we’re not being a great musician now, how do we become a great musician or whatever it is we want to be?

Fortunately, the Buddha’s teaching has a great deal of information on being and becoming. And that’s what this video is all about.

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