Buddhism seems depressing, an endless cycle of suffering… over and over and over again.
A dialogue between a weary traveler and wise innkeeper
Traveler: "I've always thought that the "endless" cycle of reincarnation and Karma is a never-ending treadmill going nowhere. One could have a virtuous life, be born into a new life with blessings and screw up. Your next life sets you back. Next time, perhaps you do a little better... and so on and so on. It feels like a cruel joke."
Innkeeper: That is exactly what Buddhism teaches about karma and rebirth - it is a pointless treadmill of suffering. That is why it is also called "samsara" which means " "wandering on" or "flowing." Traditionally, there are six "realms" that you can be born into depending on the overall nature of your karma and what is coming into fruition depending on causes and conditions. These are the realms of the hell-dwellers, hungry ghosts, animals, fighting demons, humans, and gods or heavenly-beings. None of them being permanent but some of them (the hells and heavens) lasting for vast amounts of time (so they seem permanent). To be born as a human is considered optimal, because there is not too much overwhelming suffering nor is it so pleasant that it creates complacency. It is humans who have the best chance of realizing that everything is suffering and doing something wise and intelligent about it. But a human rebirth is considered rare and precious! Not only that, while doing good and avoiding evil will sow the karmic seeds for better rebirths (as a human again or in the heavenly realms of the gods) it is not guaranteed that they will come to fruition in the next lifetime. You might have a backlog of bad karma that needs to come to fruition first! The Buddha taught that the permutations of karma are so complex that anyone presuming to fathom their own or another being's karma will go mad - unless of course they are a buddha. So, it is really just New Age wishful thinking that considers karma and rebirth to be only about being reborn a human in exotic and romantic places lifetime after lifetime, perhaps being a tragic or heroic figure or some such soap opera-like nonsense. They further presume that one only progresses, whereas the Buddhist view is that when the merit of even the gods runs out, they fade from the heavens and are reborn in the lower realms (not only as humans but perhaps much further down depending on the backlog of bad karma awaiting fruition). This is also why Buddhism looks askance at religions that aim at only heaven, because heaven is seen as a temporary peaceful and happy abiding at best, and a trap at worst that leads to complacency and even spiritual pride.
Nichiren, a 13th century Japanese monk, looked at all this metaphorically as well as literally. He saw karma and rebirth among the six realms as something that occurred from moment to moment within one's very lifetime. It is about habit patterns and the flow of causes and conditions and modes of greater or lesser suffering (with the hell realms being the most obvious but the god or heavenly realms being the most insidious).
For my part, I grew up believing in karma and rebirth (the New Age version passed on a bit inadvertently by my mother) over the Western monotheistic idea that you only get one life and then an eternity of heaven or hell depending not even on whether you were a good person or not but whether you happened take the right deal offered by God. Of course, I am grossly oversimplifying a bit, but that is how the two world views seemed to me in my youth. Also, prior to Buddhism I had learned the less horrifying and more naive, optimistic, and even Christianized New Age version of karma and rebirth as taught by Edgar Cayce. It took a while to realize that in the Buddhist view karma and rebirth is not something to be at ease or hopeful about. Now of course I am much more skeptical about any metaphysical claims, and I also realize that the Buddha's teaching about karma and rebirth is much more sophisticated than even what I summarized above - as it has to do with a non-self-process and not a "self" (much less a "soul") that transmigrates from body to body.
Traveler: "The ultimate goal of becoming enlightened also seems unattainable IMHO. Humans are not great enough to overcome their limitations on their own. The divine has to be an active part of redemption and the only thing humans can achieve is have the humility to realize this and accept redemption."
Innkeeper: So, there are a variety of responses to this, as I mentioned. Let's start with the approach of Theravada Buddhism or baseline pre-Mahayana Buddhism. In this view, there is no self to begin with. Never has been, never will be. What beings are is a flow of causes and conditions best analyzed in terms of the five aggregates: form, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. Try to identify what you think you are. Are you your bodily form? This changes all the time and is not fully under our control and therefore is unreliable and trying to base one's happiness upon it will lead to suffering. Are you the passing stream of sensations or feelings (mental and physical) that you experience? Again, these change all the time and so on. Are you the passing stream of perceptions (recognized and acknowledge phenomena that are felt)? Again, change, etc... Are you your passing stream of mental formations (including our memories, habitual patterns of action and reaction, attitudes, views, etc...)? Again, these change, not fully under our control, and so on. Are you your consciousness? But consciousness actually arises anew each moment as a result of causes and conditions, it is a continuum, a process and not an entity, always associated with the feeling, perception, and mental formation which are impermanent and so on. Even were it a fixed, independent phenomena, a bare consciousness without an object and with no feelings or memories or any of the other aggregates would be something that we could not recognize as ourselves anymore than a body without a mind, maybe even less so. Where is this self that supposedly is in need of saving? Where is this self that suffers? Where is this self that can supposedly do something about itself? Buddhism teaches that if you look for such a self you will not find it. Any possible candidate will prove to be just an aggregation of changing causes and conditions. What is suffering but a kind of mental illusion (as opposed to optical illusion) that arises in the interplay of causality. The "self" that acts (karma) and enjoys (momentarily) or suffers from its acts whether in the present lifetime or a future one is just a label for a continuum of causes and conditions which include the perpetuation of memory and self-concept and self-clinging. Subjectively it certainly feels like we are here and doing things and experiencing things, but this subjective awareness is itself a flow or causes and conditions, it is a provisional self but one that is not ultimately real upon analysis.
Given all that - what the Buddha is recommending is introducing new mental habit into the mental continuum of self-concept, self-clinging and suffering. These habits are wholesome conduct which make it easier to cultivate calmness of mind, which make it easier to introspect and recognize that all things are a flow of causes and conditions. Doing that one sees through the delusion of selfhood, which extinguishes greed, hatred, and ignorance, which brings that particular continuum of causes and conditions to a more peaceful and now fully realized selfless flow. Does such a nirvanized flow of causality still appear as a being after death? The Buddha remained silent, saying that such speculations were not helpful but a distraction from what was important - understanding that all conditioned states are conducive to suffering (the six realms in other words), uprooting the cling that perpetuates wandering on in birth and death, realizing the end of craving and thus suffering, and cultivating the Middle Way of the eightfold path which can bring about such understanding, uprooting and realizing. The eightfold path consists of a way of life that is "whole" and "complete" (the meaning of samyak that is translated as "right") as opposed to partial and biased. It is recognized that this is not easy to do. The Buddha is reported to have hesitated to teach at all because his teaching went so against the grain of how people understood themselves, and what they wanted from life (or the afterlife), and what they were capable of actually putting into practice. Nevertheless, it is said that Brahma (the Vedic creator god) came down and personally requested that the Buddha teach because surely there were some people who could "get it."
Still, from a Theravada perspective, only a very few will ever attain the degree of self-discipline and contemplative virtuosity needed to attain even the degree of enlightenment that would make someone an "arhat" or "worthy one." An arhat is a person who awakens to the non-selfness of phenomena, extinguishes greed, hatred, and delusion (i.e. attain nirvana) and upon death will never have to be reborn among the six realms again. Mahayana Buddhism in East Asia calls this "reducing the body to ashes and annihilating consciousness" because this seems a bit nihilistic (though the historical Buddha refuted nihilism and refused to say whether an arhat or Buddha would be reborn after death or not). As for trying to attain buddhahood that is looked upon as extremely presumptuous and unrealistic. Also, it is really only monastics who can even hope to attain nirvana in this lifetime and become arhats, as striving to realize non-self and overcome the three poisons through calming and contemplation is a full-time task and family and secular work would be a hindrance at best. As for lay people, while they might be able to attain nirvana on their deathbed, it would be better for them to accrue merit by doing good and supporting the monastics so that in a future life they might be able to become monks or at least attain a human or heavenly rebirth.
All this hinges upon the recognition, in a state of calm contemplation, of non-self. So ironically self-discipline and self-effort can reinforce the very sense of selfhood that you are trying to see through. There is a recognition here already that attaining enlightenment/liberation is not something that a self can do. It is more of an accident, and Buddhist practice is about making you more accident prone in that respect, by examining, loosening, and making transparent one's habitual assumptions and reactivity about the "self."
Enter the Mahayana. Mahayana initially criticized those who only aspired to become arhats for only wanting to save themselves, so to speak. From a Mahayana perspective, a truly wise and compassionate person should not aspire to just opt-out of the six realms but should aspire to help all beings be liberated from the six realms, and the best way to do that is to become a buddha oneself. However, becoming a buddha takes a really long time (3,000 innumerable kalpas and 100 minor kalpas - wherein a kalpa is an eon in which universes form, abide, dissolve, and become nothing until they form again) because one must build up a huge store of meritorious deeds and insights that can come to fruition in that final lifetime in which buddhahood is (seemingly) suddenly attained. Still, there were those who believed that true compassion demanded having the gumption and patience to undertake such a task.
Might one backslide on such a long and perilous journey? Certainly! However, after a certain amount of time, one would at last reach a stage of non-regression, wherein virtue, meditative skill, and insight start to come so naturally that one will progress from then on without backsliding. It was also believed that one would receive help from other bodhisattvas and buddhas. In fact, in the vast reaches of the universe there are living buddhas presiding over pure lands where bodhisattvas can be reborn and find optimal conditions for attaining buddhahood or at least reaching the stage of non-regression. In fact, some pure lands make it so easy that one can practically attain buddhahood as soon as one gets there. And how do you get reborn in one of these pure lands? For some of them, you have to do a lot of good deeds, and practice intense visualizations and so on, dedicating all the merit accrued to being born in the pure land you are going for. In others, all you have to do is call to mind (or chant) the name of the presiding buddha (like Amitabha Buddha, the Buddha of Infinite Light) to be born in that buddha's pure land. In Pure Land Buddhism this is called relying solely upon faith in the Other-power of the Buddha, as opposed to relying on one's unreliable self-power.
And then there are the tantras, providing esoteric initiations and the practices those initiations empower the tantric practitioner to do that can speed up the process to the point where you can attain buddhahood in your very body! This usually involves mudras (gestures), mantras (chants), and mandalas (mental imagery inspired by external images) so that one is imitating the deeds, words, and thoughts of the Dharma-body (i.e. Reality-body) of the cosmic buddha Mahavairocana (or others of similar scope and significance) and there is a merger of self and cosmic Other.
Zen calls B.S. on all this mythological nonsense and says that it all comes down to what is simply right in front of you and stop creating problems where there are no problems. So Huike comes to Bodhidharma and says, "Help me pacify my mind." Bodhidharma says, "Show me your mind and I will pacify it for you." Huike says, "But, when I look for it I cannot find it." Bodhidharma says, "There, I have pacified your mind." There is no problem (or self) in the first place. So there!
In Nichiren Buddhism, we go by the Lotus Sutra wherein the Buddha taught two things of major importance. One is the One Vehicle, wherein all the Buddha's teachings actually have the aim of enabling people to attain buddhahood, and any lesser goals are just mileposts along the way for those who aren't ready to think so big or would be daunted by the idea of attaining buddhahood. This is connected with the teaching that all beings have buddha-nature, which means they already have all the qualities of buddhahood. The qualities of the Dharma-body of buddhahood are the true nature of reality which is the true nature of all beings, which is covered up by adventitious defilements like a sun behind clouds which is still shining even though we can't see it. Rather than spending countless lifetimes trying to earn buddhahood or build up merit and wisdom, these qualities are already the true nature of our life and we need to encounter someone who has already realized buddhahood and hear the Dharma from them in order to remember and start to at least pretend to be what we really are through Buddhist practices.
The other major (and considered more important) teaching in the Lotus Sutra is when Shakyamuni Buddha announces that he actually attained buddhahood in a past so remote that it is unquantifiable. In other words, his buddhahood has no beginning or end. In fact, nothing has a beginning or end, everything is unborn and deathless. This is very consistent with other Mahayana sutras, particularly the Perfection of Wisdom sutras, but here the teaching that since all phenomena have no self-nature they cannot be said to ever substantially arise nor to ever substantially cease is radically applied to the attainment of buddhahood. Buddhahood is suddenly not something in the past realized by someone else, or something only encountered in the afterlife or another plane of existence, or something only attainable eons in the future. Somehow, buddhahood is an ongoing reality that is already part of our lives, trying to help us realize as quickly as possible that it is always there. Because this is "difficult to believe and hard to understand" (as the Lotus Sutra says), we can only enter into this through faith (i.e. a deep joyful confidence that will then allow us to begin perceiving and living it for ourselves).
Nichiren also taught that the Lotus Sutra seems to be teaching self-power but it is not a self that is restricted to ourselves but a selfless self that includes all beings and esp. all buddhas and bodhisattvas, and it seems to be teaching Other-power, but the Other is the Buddha who is already a part of our own true nature. For my part, I appreciate that Nichiren is telling us to escape our limited conceptions of what self-power and Other-power are about, and not to get stuck on either of those poles. Self-power can lead to pride and arrogance or (when we face up to our shortcomings) despondency and even despair. Other-power can lead to presumption, complacency and antinomianism. There is a recognition that there is a seeming synergy between self and Other power, but on a deeper level Buddhism really sees the self and Other distinction as provisional at best, and the perpetuation of the delusion of self at worst. Whether relying upon self or Other power initially, the point is to break through the delusion of self and enter the selfless, or at least to try to let go of self enough that selflessness enters in (or really becomes apparent where before it was overlooked).
Oh, and of course you can't realize the unconditioned by relying on conditions, yet the unconditioned has no restrictions and can work through conditions as needed.
I can only add that for me this comes down to everything - hells, humans and heavens - are contained in the present moment which is a continuously fluid flow state of arising – in other words “Creation.” Opening oneself to the present moment of creation is an experience beyond description and is joyful, fulling and meaningful beyond imagination… and then it flows into the next moment and so on. Suffering is caused by trying to hold onto something from the past or anticipate something in the future. Enlightenment itself is a moment-to-moment state, which implicitly suggests that even awakening itself is impermanent and takes constant effort and mindfulness. Enlightenment is not ‘one-and-done.’
“Now my friend what would see be havin’ for dinner tonight?”