The Descending Path and the Ascending Path

A Reflection on My 45th Birthday

By Bhikkhu Raṭṭhapāla

Around 2002, I was working near Bayint Naung Junction, one of Yangon’s important commercial areas. At that time, I was struggling to make my way through life as the person responsible for a shop generating approximately thirty million kyats in monthly sales.

Every morning, at around 7:30 a.m., while having breakfast, I would watch the crowds of people travelling by bus into the city for work. Then, at around 7:00 p.m., when I went out for dinner, I would see those same people returning home, their faces weary from a long day of labour.

As I observed them, a series of questions began to arise in my mind.

Why do so many people have to work so hard for such modest salaries?

Is this all there is to life? Is this what it means to live?

If we spend our lives earning money, buying a house, and purchasing whatever we want, can we really say that our lives are complete?

What kind of life do I truly want to live? What is the real meaning of my own existence?

At that time, I had no clear answers to these questions. Yet they had begun to awaken something deep within me—a growing dissatisfaction with the conventional understanding of success and an earnest desire to discover a more profound meaning in life.

The Wealth We Never Truly Own

Some years later, while studying Buddhist literature, I encountered the story of the Bodhisatta Sumedha, the ascetic who would eventually become Gotama Buddha.

According to the traditional account, Sumedha reflected upon the enormous wealth accumulated by his ancestors over generations. Although they had gathered immeasurable riches, none of them could carry their possessions beyond death. Everything they had accumulated had ultimately been left behind.

Reading this story, I began to reflect upon the nature of human existence.

Within a lifespan that may extend to a hundred years, or perhaps far less, people devote enormous amounts of time and energy to acquiring wealth. They struggle, compete, sacrifice their health, and sometimes compromise their peace of mind in pursuit of possessions. Yet when death arrives, they must leave everything behind.

What, then, does it really mean to possess something?

I imagined what those treasures might say if gold, silver, jewels, and all the other objects of human desire could speak. Perhaps they would look at us with gentle irony and say:

“You never truly owned us. You merely possessed us for a little while.”

This thought reveals a profound truth about the nature of material ownership. We may possess things temporarily, but we cannot retain them forever. The things we call mine are subject to change, separation, and loss.

The problem is not necessarily that wealth exists, nor that people seek to provide for themselves and their families. Rather, it is the assumption that acquiring more possessions will ultimately resolve the deeper questions of existence.

We can accumulate wealth without discovering wisdom. We can improve our material circumstances without understanding the nature of suffering. We can fulfil countless desires and still remain uncertain about why we are living.

Reflecting upon the story of Sumedha, I began to understand why he renounced his immense wealth and went forth in search of the deathless, Nibbāna.

He was not merely abandoning possessions. He was turning away from a way of life that could not provide the ultimate answer to the problem of existence.

It was through contemplating Sumedha’s decision that I began to understand the distinction between what I call the descending path and the ascending path.

The Descending Path and the Ascending Path

The descending path represents the familiar direction of worldly striving: accumulating possessions, pursuing status, satisfying desires, and continually seeking something more in the hope that it will finally bring fulfilment.

We may begin with the desire for financial security. Once we have enough money, we may want a better house. Once we have a better house, we may want greater recognition, more comfort, or a higher social position. Each achievement can become the foundation for another desire.

There is nothing inherently wrong with responsible work, material security, or the fulfilment of ordinary human needs. The difficulty arises when we mistake these things for the ultimate purpose of life.

If we never examine our desires, the finish line keeps moving. What we once regarded as sufficient becomes insufficient, and what once seemed to promise happiness becomes merely the starting point for another pursuit.

In this sense, the descending path is not necessarily a decline in worldly achievement. A person may become increasingly successful, wealthy, respected, and influential while remaining inwardly uncertain and dissatisfied.

The ascending path, by contrast, represents the movement towards deeper understanding: investigating the nature of suffering, examining the mind, cultivating wisdom, and seeking liberation from the conditions that perpetuate suffering.

It is a movement away from being governed by desire and towards understanding desire; away from taking impermanent things as lasting sources of security and towards seeing their true nature; away from living without questioning and towards living with wisdom and purpose.

For me, the ascending path came to mean the search for the truth of existence and, ultimately, the liberation taught by the Buddha.

When I began to understand this distinction, the questions that had troubled me during those mornings and evenings in Yangon started to find their direction.

I did not yet possess all the answers. But I had begun to understand which questions were worth pursuing and which path I wished to follow.

From Questions to Practice

In 2002, I began studying the Abhidhamma, the Buddhist system of analysis concerning mind and matter. This study opened a new intellectual and contemplative world before me.

Around 2007, I began reading the Visuddhimagga, the great Theravāda treatise on the path of purification. I was deeply interested in the meditation practices and stages of development described in the text.

At the same time, I wondered whether I would ever be capable of undertaking such demanding practices myself.

Understanding a teaching intellectually is one thing; putting it into practice is another. Reading about concentration, insight, and purification does not automatically mean that one can cultivate them in one's own experience.

Nevertheless, my interest in the Dhamma continued to deepen. Gradually, the desire to understand the truth of existence became more compelling than the desire to pursue the conventional measures of success.

On 26 January 2013, I entered the monastic life, taking the higher ordination of a bhikkhu.

This decision marked a decisive turning point in my life. It was not simply a change in occupation or lifestyle. It was a commitment to devote myself to the investigation of the mind, the practice of the Buddha’s teachings, and the search for the true meaning of existence.

The questions that had first arisen while watching the working crowds of Yangon had led me towards a different way of living.

The Journey into the Nature of Mind

After my ordination, I trained under learned meditation teachers and undertook the disciplined study and practice of Theravāda Buddhism.

Through meditation, I gradually began to understand more deeply the nature of rūpa (matter) and nāma (mind), as well as the principles underlying vipassanā, or insight meditation.

At the same time, I continued to study Pāli texts, commentaries, and subcommentaries. Through this sustained engagement with the classical literature, my understanding of the Visuddhimagga and its practical implications gradually became more comprehensive.

What had initially appeared to be a vast body of difficult teachings began to reveal an increasingly coherent framework for understanding experience.

The Abhidhamma encouraged me to examine mental processes with analytical precision. Meditation invited me to investigate those processes directly through disciplined observation. The commentarial literature provided a detailed framework for understanding the path of practice.

Over time, I also became interested in the relationship between Buddhist psychology and modern scientific approaches to the mind.

Could the analytical insights of the Abhidhamma enter into a meaningful dialogue with contemporary neuroscience? Could Buddhist contemplative practice contribute to a deeper understanding of psychological suffering? Could the traditional investigation of mind and matter help us formulate new questions about trauma, emotional regulation, and the restoration of psychological well-being?

These questions gradually became an important part of my intellectual and contemplative journey.

I did not wish to reduce the Dhamma to scientific terminology, nor did I wish to use science merely to decorate Buddhist ideas with modern language. Rather, I wanted to explore where these different approaches might illuminate one another, while respecting their distinct purposes, methods, and limitations.

The ascending path, I came to understand, was not merely a journey towards acquiring more knowledge. It was a commitment to investigate, practise, understand, and share whatever understanding could be developed through sincere effort.

The Emergence of the Red Dot Healing Theory

By 2026, my studies and contemplative investigations had developed into a more systematic attempt to bring Theravāda Abhidhamma into dialogue with modern neuroscience, trauma theory, and contemporary psychology.

This work culminated in the formulation of the Red Dot Healing Theory (RDHT), presented in my research thesis, The Red Dot Healing Theory: Temporal Coherence, Trauma, and the Balance of Faculties in Theravāda Abhidhamma and Contemplative Neuroscience.

The central concern of this framework is the relationship between suffering, the loss of present-moment awareness, and the restoration of balance in the mind.

In everyday life, our attention is frequently drawn into memories of the past or anxieties and expectations concerning the future. We may find ourselves repeatedly reliving painful experiences, anticipating dangers that have not occurred, or postponing happiness until certain conditions are fulfilled.

Although our bodies remain in the present, our attention may become entangled in what has already happened or what we imagine might happen.

In Buddhist terms, this investigation draws upon the concept of paccuppanna dhamma, the phenomenon presently arising, and the importance of understanding experience as it unfolds. It also draws upon the analysis of mental states in the Abhidhamma and the cultivation of balanced spiritual faculties described in the Theravāda tradition.

Within RDHT, the red dot serves as a symbol of balanced, embodied presence. It represents the dynamic equilibrium of five spiritual faculties:

• Saddhā — faith or confidence.
• Vīriya — energy or effort.
• Sati — mindfulness.
• Samādhi — concentration.
• Paññā — wisdom.

When these faculties are cultivated in appropriate balance, they support a more stable and integrated approach to contemplative practice. Too much effort may lead to agitation, while too little may lead to stagnation. Mindfulness, concentration, confidence, and wisdom must work together rather than operate in isolation.

The red dot is therefore not a literal visual object that a meditator must see. It is a conceptual and experiential symbol pointing towards the balance of mind and body in present-moment awareness.

My research explores how this contemplative framework might inform our understanding of trauma and psychological distress. It considers whether practices such as mindfulness of breathing, structured breath counting, and embodied awareness can offer useful ways of approaching difficulties involving attention, emotional regulation, and a diminished sense of presence.

These connections between Buddhist contemplative psychology and contemporary neuroscience are intended as a framework for interdisciplinary inquiry, not as proof that traditional Buddhist concepts correspond directly to particular neural mechanisms. The theory remains open to further investigation and empirical evaluation.

Nevertheless, I believe that this dialogue offers a worthwhile direction for research and practical exploration.

The work has resulted in the completion of my research thesis and three further books associated with the Red Dot Healing Theory, alongside other research writings. More importantly, it has enabled me to begin developing work intended to help people understand their suffering and explore ways of responding to it with greater awareness and wisdom.

What began as a personal search for the meaning of life has gradually developed into an effort to make that search useful to others.

Discovering the Meaning of Life

Looking back, I can see that the questions which arose in Yangon more than two decades ago were not meaningless doubts or passing thoughts. They were the beginning of a journey whose destination I could not then imagine.

At that time, I saw people working tirelessly, travelling through crowded streets, and returning home exhausted. I wondered whether the pursuit of money and material comfort could truly constitute the meaning of human existence.

Today, my understanding has developed considerably through the study and practice of the Dhamma.

I have come to see that the meaning of life cannot be measured solely by what we accumulate, how much we achieve, or how widely we are recognised. Such things belong to the changing conditions of worldly existence. They may have practical value, but they cannot, by themselves, resolve the fundamental problem of suffering.

For me, the search for meaning has become a commitment to understanding the truth, cultivating wisdom, and making whatever knowledge I acquire beneficial to others.

There is a profound difference between living merely to possess and living to understand. There is also a difference between accumulating knowledge for oneself and using knowledge in the service of others.

The former may increase one's possessions or intellectual resources. The latter can become a source of lasting value through the understanding and benefit it makes possible for others.

I do not claim that my journey has answered every question or that I have reached the final destination of the path. Rather, I have found a direction that I consider meaningful and worthy of continued effort.

The search itself has become part of my life’s purpose.

A New Path for the Benefit of Humanity

Through my engagement with the Abhidhamma, contemplative practice, and contemporary research, I have begun to develop what I regard as a new path of inquiry: one that brings classical Buddhist psychology into dialogue with modern scientific and psychological perspectives in the hope of contributing to the alleviation of human suffering.

This work is still a journey. Its possibilities must be explored carefully, its limitations acknowledged honestly, and its practical applications examined responsibly.

How far will I be able to take this work? How much will I be able to accomplish within the time available to me? To what extent will it genuinely benefit humanity?

I cannot know the answers to these questions.

Our lives are limited, circumstances are constantly changing, and the results of our efforts do not depend upon our intentions alone. What I can do is continue to study, practise, investigate, write, and share what I have come to understand, while remaining mindful of the limits of my knowledge and the uncertainty of the future.

If the ideas I have developed can help even some people understand their minds more clearly, approach their suffering with greater wisdom, or discover a more balanced way of living, then the work will have served a meaningful purpose.

For me, this is one way of walking the ascending path: not simply seeking understanding for personal fulfilment, but endeavouring to turn understanding into something that may benefit others.

A Reflection on My 45th Birthday

As I reflect upon my forty-fifth birthday, I find myself returning to the questions that first arose more than twenty years ago.

What is the purpose of life?

What does it mean to live meaningfully?

What should we leave behind when we can no longer remain in this world?

The answers I would offer today are different from anything I could have articulated in 2002.

We cannot take our material possessions with us when we die. Our achievements, too, are subject to change, and our time in this world is uncertain. Yet the knowledge we cultivate, the wisdom we develop, and the beneficial work we undertake may continue to influence others long after our own lives have ended.

I therefore wish to continue learning about the truths I have not yet fully understood and to share what I have learned so that others may have the opportunity to understand them as well.

The descending path may lead us towards ever-greater accumulation, but the ascending path invites us to investigate what is truly worth seeking.

One path asks how much more we can acquire. The other asks how deeply we can understand.

One may keep us occupied with the pursuit of what we do not yet possess. The other encourages us to examine the nature of the mind, the conditions of suffering, and the possibility of liberation.

At forty-five, I do not regard my life’s work as complete. I regard it as an ongoing commitment to the search for truth and to the responsible sharing of whatever understanding that search may yield.

I have found a path that I wish to continue walking. How far I will travel, how much I will accomplish, and how much benefit I will be able to offer humanity will depend upon the conditions of my life, the time available to me, and the effort I am able to sustain.

For now, I will continue walking.

May whatever understanding emerges from this journey become a condition for the welfare and happiness of others.

Bhikkhu Raṭṭhapāla

On the occasion of my 45th birthday, 2026.