Morality. This actually ties in with the last question. Morality, in order to increase genuine Morality you have to increase the powers of Compassion and Wisdom. We look at the Noble Eightfold Path, we see Right View and Right Thought are the first two factors of the Path. Then comes Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, this is the Morality side of the Noble Eightfold Path. So in order to have speech that is less harmful to ourselves and others, we have to have a Compassionate intention towards ourselves and others. The wish to not harm others with our speech, the wish to not harm ourselves with our speech. Understanding that our intentions create our Kamma. The same with actions; in order to have actions that don't harm ourselves and others, we need to have a compassionate intention. So true Morality is based in Compassion.
If we can take on some rules it may help us until we can develop this Compassion enough until it becomes just who we are, based in Compassion. So sometimes in Buddhism they'll give the Five Precepts to give you a guide; not killing, not stealing, not having sexual misconduct, not lying, and not clouding the mind with intoxicants. If you look closely at these precepts, why do we not want to kill, steal, have sexual misconduct, lie and cloud our mind? Isn't it through Compassion to ourselves and others? We see that if we do these things we cause harm to others and ourselves. Causing harm to others, it causes their suffering. How does it cause harm to ourselves? Well, if we look at the Buddha's words of "Kamma is intention", then we're creating bad Kamma for ourselves by doing these things.
So in order to increase the Parami of Morality, we need to develop this Compassion in ourselves to a higher level. And the quality of Right View, to go back to the first two factors of the Noble Eightfold Path. Right View comes first: cause and effect and the Four Noble Truths. Understanding that there's going to be results from actions, that we are responsible for everything that we say and do. So by increasing our Compassion for ourselves, it helps to increase our Morality. By looking at using the practice of mindfulness we start to see with our awareness that everything that we think has a result, immediately in ourselves. So through Compassion to ourselves, we try to understand which thoughts are beneficial and which are not.
Morality; speech and action arise from thoughts. You have to have a thought first before you can have speech and actions. So becoming more aware of our thoughts and understanding cause and effect, we develop more Compassion for ourselves. This brings us to having more understanding of what speech is beneficial or not, which actions are beneficial or not, what actions cause harm or not.
We try to increase the power of Morality in our mind, to have correct principles in our life, so that we don't cause ourselves harm or others harm. Because as we start to develop more awareness, we start to see that there's enough suffering in the world without actually increasing it through our own actions. So it actually motivates us to be more aware, and observe ourselves and be more careful. Correct purpose and principles are very important.