I have found that the world religions acknowledge this experience of ignorance of actual self and of ideal self and that the world religions insist that an individual make a commitment to finding out what the ideal self is to be and how the actual self stands in relation to this ideal self. A commitment is needed because this knowledge is not easy to attain. We must meditate for a long time to discover that our human self is in fact one with the divine self and that we should live with the love that follows from this realization of out oneself in God. Buddha searched for seven years for enlightenment, for the truth that brought love and peace and the cessation of suffering. For seven years, he sought, trying different ways.
Selfish desire is a root cause of suffering.
Selfish desire can be overcome. Selfish desire is overcome by following the 8-fold path of unselfish action, unselfish feeling, and unselfish meditation until the self identifies with the ultimate lawfulness of reality. In a later form of Buddhism, this ultimate lawfulness of reality is the divine reality, called the Buddha Essence, the knowing, loving being of which every separate self is an outward manifestation. Luther summarizes the Old Testament as teaching both the Moral Law to humans and the fact that humans cannot live up to the spirit of the law by thelr own effort. Humans can, for Luther, live the letter of the law by their own effort.