Six Myths We Live By: And How to Overcome Them

by Karuna Cayton

Overview

Buddhist wisdom for everyday problems rooted in Buddhist philosophy and meditation, Six Myths We Live By shows us how to uncover our misperceptions and leads us on a path to self-development.

The truth is you probably believe all sorts of myths, but you don’t even know it. To escape any hardship, any suffering or discomfort, we all believe myths about how the world works and how we live in that world. In Six Myths We Live By, therapist and long-time Buddhist practitioner Karuna Cayton guides us through six common myths that may give us comfort, but actually only perpetuate our problems:

• the myth of reality;
• the myth of identity;
• the myth of permanence;
• the myth of randomness;
• the myth of happiness;
• the myth of only living once.

Cayton takes us through each of these myths using real-world examples and draws upon Buddhist principles, philosophy, psychology, and meditation practices to show how we can wake up to reality. By planting a seed of doubt about the beliefs that we’ve always thought were true, we can open our eyes and deepen our relationship with the way we see our life, our potential, and the nature of our struggles and achievements.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781614298762
Publisher:	Wisdom Publications MA
Publication date:	11/11/2025
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

For over thirty years, Karuna Cayton worked as a licensed psychotherapist, business psychologist, and coach to help people achieve a more balanced life. When he was twenty years old, he moved to Nepal, where he lived for twelve years. In Nepal he studied and practiced Tibetan Buddhism at Kopan Monastery with Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Karuna is the author of The Misleading Mind: How We Create Our Own Problems and How Buddhist Psychology Can Help Us Solve Them. He has dedicated his life to explaining the deep teachings of Buddhism and their relevance for everyday people.

Read an Excerpt

When the Buddha gained enlightenment, he didn’t teach for seven weeks. He didn’t even speak. He thought, “I can’t communicate this. They won’t get it.” His fellow ascetics kept requesting that he teach, and when he finally did, the first thing he taught were the four noble truths beginning with: Life is suffering.

From our modern perspective it might seem odd to start there. What a bummer! Life is suffering? Why didn’t he start with the truth of nirvana, the liberation from all suffering, something more uplifting? That’s how we would do it in our culture: Make a promise to consumers, a carrot on the end of the stick to lead them through a necessary set of actions so they can arrive at understanding. The Buddha, on the other hand, started with the truth of suffering because things, frankly, are not that good. If you don’t have an appreciation for our condition—whether you call it suffering, incompleteness, or discontent—you don’t make the real effort that is required.

With respect to the presentation of Buddhist thought in the modern world, a lot of it is what we might call “watered-down milk.” When I was living in Nepal, if we couldn’t get our milk directly from a farmer, we would buy it in the marketplace. The big challenge there was getting a straight answer from the peddler whether they’d actually watered down the milk. Despite their assurances to the contrary, once we got it home and put it in our tea it would sometimes become obvious we had been duped.

In a similar way, people today feel the freedom to interpret the Buddha’s teachings in their own way, to make them palatable to a wider audience. Yet the Buddhist philosophy on life, happiness and fulfillment has existed for more than 2,500 years. It is a philosophy of purpose that has worked for millions of people over the millennia. I’m not interested in changing it, nor am I qualified to do so. I have spent 45 years studying this material, including 12 years in a Tibetan monastery in Nepal, to glean all that I can. In Six Myths We Live By, I attempt to present it to the reader in a way that is accessible, yes, but without changing the meaning.

A good example of watered-down milk is the present trend around self-compassion. My root teacher, Lama Thubten Yeshe said, “Be gentle with yourself. If you can be gentle with yourself you can be gentle with others.” But what is the effective way to be gentle or kind to oneself? The self-kindness Lama Yeshe is referring to is a self-kindness that leads to ultimate happiness, not some temporary feel-good state. We need to pay attention to the effects of our self-compassion; we have to be kind with a balance of wisdom. Does self-care directly work on the causes of our underlying dissatisfaction? To go for a run in order to relax your body and clear your mind so you are more effective in helping oneself and others is proper self-compassion. On the other hand, I regularly speak with people who say their “therapy” is exercising. They say they can’t be happy without their daily burst of endorphins generated through working out. With this limited motivation they are not being deeply kind to themselves but rather increasing their dependency on an endorphin hit. I think what Lama was referring to was a self-kindness that is helpful for the long term, as a support for lasting contentment.

What’s happened in our culture, on the other hand, because we are so materialistic and self-absorbed, is that self-compassion has become the latest indulgence in increasing “me-ness.” That can be destructive in the long-term. One of my psychotherapy clients sent her son back to his dad in Florida because she said she needed to work on herself more. She needed more time for herself. I have empathy for her, but that may not be the solution. Self-compassion, like any other Buddhist strategy, is about using each circumstance to improve ourselves so we are better at having a positive impact. Self-compassion, when used properly, allows one to take care of oneself while not becoming hijacked by self-centeredness. Thinking of others is not the same as being codependent. These distinctions are crucial, and they are becoming lost.

The audience for this book is therefore comprised of those seeking the truth of human existence, not another quick fix to feel good. If you belong to a more traditional Buddhist audience, the concepts, references and connections herein should all check out solidly. Beyond that group, I hope this book will appeal to seekers in general. People who are into self-development, if not self-help, or those who view psychology as their means of development. None of these readers need to come to the book with a sophisticated understanding of metaphysics, only a degree of earnestness and curiosity.

Editorial Reviews

"Karuna tells us in his down-to-earth way what the Buddha found from his own direct experience—not from revelation, not from on high, nothing mysterious: that we’re not in touch in reality and that this is why we suffer. And he shows us that it’s not a question of believing what the Buddha says but instead learning to look freshly at his findings and prove them for ourselves, one step at a time."

Robina Courtin

"In Six Myths We Live By, Karuna Karuna Cayton calls upon both the inspiration he received from the extraordinary Lamas he lived with in Nepal and his more-than-thirty years of practical experience as a psychotherapist in the West, producing something our conflicted environment truly needs. His breadth of learning and depth of experience enable him to assist his readers in identifying and then cutting through the fundamentally mistaken notions—the so-called "six myths"—responsible for the range of problems and conflicts so evident in our fractured world today. And because Cayton also possesses the admirable ability to share his insights in a warmly conversational style with clarity, sympathy and humor, this work—for all its psychological profundity—never lacks the true human touch. I strongly recommend it.

Jonathan Landaw