in my first Buddhist school, we looked at all the Buddha’s teachings in terms of the elements, wonderfully simple and unified. it was used as a main vehicle. I laid it out in in this chart.
we start from the outside on our path, and move inwards through the different teachings. First, the precepts tell us what to do, then the paramis are the resulting state of mind. in the middle, there’s the loves, then the wisdoms, the qualities we arrive at when you get awakened,
when we get right into the middle we turn around, and go out again in our Bodhisattva work, we move out through the loves into the states of mind and into the actions and activities, in your efforts to help the world become wise and be relieved from suffering.
the image was set in computer form by Carolyn Oldham.