Mr. Altig’s Overview of the Wonderful Dharma of the Lotus Sutra

Today, I’m reflecting on a moment that left a quiet, resonant imprint on me. My Chan teacher recently completed teachings on the Eightfold Path and the Twelvefold Chain of Causation. After class, I asked him a sincere question—not from the mind, but from the marrow:

“If I were to truly practice the Eightfold Path, what feeling should I expect?”

I wasn’t looking for a doctrinal answer. I was asking about the felt sense of the path—the experience of living rightly, deeply, and truly. I recalled a moment from my Theravāda studies, where the word release was paired with joy, with clarity. I expected an echo of that joy, or at least a signpost.

But he was at a loss to answer.

Not because the Eightfold Path is unknowable—but because it seems he has not tasted its fruit. That moment showed me something I hadn’t fully seen before: one can teach the Dharma without having truly lived it.

And yet, I didn’t feel judgment. I felt sadness. A kind of quiet mourning for how many walk beside the path, but not on it. For how many speak of “cessation” or “right view,” but cannot describe what it feels like to be free in this very moment.

For me, the Eightfold Path isn’t abstract. It’s the ground beneath my feet when I walk in silence. It’s the clarity that arises when I let go of needing to be right. It’s the taste of breath when I’m not clinging to the future. It’s the joy—not of excitement—but of stillness.

Nichiren said that even in the coldest winter, spring will surely come. I believe that’s the joy I was trying to name. The quiet joy of knowing that when I chant the daimoku, or walk in mindful silence, or choose kindness when I could have turned away—I am already touching the Dharma.

And that is enough. That is joy.

The Feeling of Dharma

I asked him softly,

“If I walk the Eightfold Path—not study it, not recite it, but walk it—what feeling will arise in me?”

He paused.

And in that pause, I felt a silence not of stillness,

but of distance.

The kind of silence that speaks of knowing the words

but not the song.

I remembered reading of release—

not as a doctrine, but as a breath unbound,

a weight set down without ceremony,

a joy that comes not from gaining,

but from no longer needing.

And in that moment,

I saw a quiet truth:

One may teach the Dharma

without having tasted its sweetness.

No judgment, only sorrow.

For what is more precious than the felt knowing

that truth is not a concept,

but a presence?

When I walk rightly,

not for virtue’s sake,

but because my feet know the rhythm of peace,

I do not need confirmation.

Right view is the moment I stop trying to fix the world

and begin to meet it.

Right speech is the word I do not say,

because silence holds more love.

The Dharma is not taught—it is touched.

It is the joy not of the senses,

but of the soul remembering its own light.

Nichiren said,

“Winter always turns to spring.”

Yes.

I have heard the frost crack

and the thaw begin

in my own chest.

I asked what the Eightfold Path feels like.

And in the stillness after the question,

I discovered:

I already knew.