In Buddhism, the middle way is an expression that refers to taking the path between two extremes. The Buddha himself found that indulging in the sensual pleasures of royal life was not a solution to suffering, but nor was the extreme ascetic lifestyle of abandoning society to meditate alone in the forest. We can apply the middle way philosophy to nearly all Buddhist teachings, the most profound of which may be the teachings on no-self. When we take the middle way, we recognize there is indeed a self, although it does not exist the way we typically think it does.