More than 2,500 years ago, Prince Siddharta Gautama was given birth in what’s now called Lumbini in Nepal. He was born a prince and his birth had been heralded all sorts of distinctive conditions that suggested a destiny of greatness. The prince’s father went to a wiseman that lived inside the kingdom for advice about his son. The sage man believed that the prince, Siddharta Gautama, would likely either follow in his father’s footsteps and turn out to be a great king or he might become a spiritual leader.
In hopes that his son would end up his successor, the king managed his best to separate the prince from those things that might encourage him in the direction of a spiritual existence. The prince was surrounded by luxury and excess, all the advantages that his royal placement could provide. Siddharta Gautama proved to be an intelligent student and outstanding sportsman. He wed a lovely woman whom he cherished and they bore a child.
At the age of 29, the prince learned that the world surrounding him was far more complicated than he experienced in the walls of his palace. Out and about among the citizens of the kingdom, he discovered reality: sickness, old-age and death. The great shock of this finding left the youthful prince shaken. He made the decision then to dedicate himself to ending the suffering. Leaving his wife and child, the prince forsaked his worldly belongings and embarked on a spiritual quest.
Guatama started a course of study with numerous instructors to understand their methods. With the help of Alara Kalama, he began to understand meditation and learned an exalted form referred to as absorption. This permitted him to attain a state of nothingness where there was no moral or cognitive dimensions. Although this was beneficial it was apparent to the past prince that it wouldn’t solve the suffering he had seen. Guatama carried on his search for other people who might possibly assist him on his spiritual quest. Udraka Ramputra, helped Gautama to comprehend a state of neither perception or non-perception, but this to wasn’t what he was trying to find. The next step in the journey led Gautama to Uruvilva in Northern India. It was there that he selected an ascetic way, surviving a life of deprival for nearly 6 years. This only led to the destruction of his entire body, weakness and self-destruction. Even though it cost him his five followers, Gautama rejected this ascetic lifestyle.
The end of this spiritual journey looked as far away as ever, so the Buddha sat down under a Bodhi tree and proclaimed that “flesh may wither, blood may dry up, but I shall not rise from the spot until Enlightenment has been one.” After forty days and nights of thought and meditation, the Buddha finally attained Enlightenment.
It’s the Buddhist understanding that at that moment he received a state of being that surpasses anything else in the universe. Each of our normal experiences are based on preconceptions and conditions: how we were raised, our encounters, imperfections and shortcomings. Enlightenment is a state in which the complicated inner workings of life become apparent and the cause of man’s suffering identified.
For the next 45 years, the Buddha journeyed through much of what is now northern India. He taught the way of Enlightenment to any or all who wanted to comprehend. This teaching had become referred to as the dharma or “the teaching of the enlightened one.    The Buddha took a number of disciples that subsequently attained their own Enlightenment and so they trained others.
Buddhists believe Buddha attained a state of being that goes out beyond anything else in the world. If typical knowledge is based on conditions - upbringing, mindsets, views, perceptions, and so forth - Enlightenment is Unconditioned. It was a state when the Buddha obtained insight into the deepest workings of existence and for that reason, into the reason for human suffering, the problem that had set Him on His spiritual quest in the first place.
The Buddha statue we often see doesn not represent a god and didn’t consider himself as a divine person. He was simply a man who endeavored to transform himself through self reflection and meditation. Buddhists view him as an ideal and his quest as a guideline which will lead them on the path to enlightenment. Most homes that practice Buddhism will display some type of Buddha decor like a statue of Buddha, but this is intended to remind them of their own spiritual journey.
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