Land of Bliss, of Joy, of Happiness...........

You Really Disappoint Me!‏

2010-04-11T14:17:00.002+08:00

This reminds me of an interesting story. The monk who took me to see Luang Por Chah was the same age as I was; he had been in the Thai Navy, and I had been in the American Navy during the Korean War. He could speak Pidgin English, and had been on tudong - wandering from Ubon province, where Ajahn Chah lived, to
Nong Khai where I was.

It was my first year as a novice monk and he was the first Thai monk I had met who could speak English, so I was delighted to have somebody to talk to.

He was also a very strict monk, adhering to every rule in the Vinaya. He would eat from his alms bowl and wore dark brown forest robes, whereas in the monastery where I lived, the monks wore orange-coloured robes; he really impressed me as an exemplary monk. He told me that I should go and stay with Ajahn Chah. So after I received bhikkhu ordination, my preceptor agreed that I could go with this monk to stay with Luang Por Chah.

But on the way I began to get fed up with this monk - who turned out to be a pain in the neck. He was forever fussing about things and condemning the other monks, saying that we were the very best. I could not take this incredible arrogance and conceit, and I hoped that Ajahn Chah would not be like him. I wondered what I was getting myself into.

When we arrived at Wat Pah Pong, I was relieved to find that Ajahn Chah was not like that.

The following year the monk, whose name was Sommai, disrobed and he became an alcoholic. The only thing that had kept him off alcohol had been the monastic life, so then he fell into alcoholism and became a really degenerate man with a terrible reputation in the province of Ubon. He became a tramp, a really pathetic case, and I felt a sense of disgust and aversion towards him.

Talking to Ajahn Chah one evening about it, he told me: 'You must always have kataññu (gratitude) towards Sommai, because he brought you here. No matter how badly he behaves or degenerate he becomes, you must always treat him like a wise teacher and express your gratitude. You are probably one of the really good things that has happened to him in his life, something he can be proud of; if you keep reminding him of this - in a good way, not in an intimidating way - then eventually he might want to change his ways.'

So Luang Por Chah encouraged me to seek out Sommai, talk to him in a friendly way and express my gratitude to him for taking me to Ajahn Chah.

It really was a beautiful thing to do. It would have been easy to look down on him and say, 'You really disappoint me. You used to be so critical of others and think you were such a good monk, and look at you now.'

We can feel indignant and disappointed at somebody for not living up to our expectations. But what Luang Por Chah was saying was: 'Don't be like that, it's a waste of time and harmful, but do what's really beautiful out of compassion.'

I saw Sommai in the early part of this year, degenerate as ever; I could not see any change in him. Yet whenever he sees me, it seems to have a good effect on him. He remembers that he was the one responsible for me coming to stay with Luang Por Chah - and that's a source of a few happy moments in his life. One feels quite glad to offer a few happy moments to a very unhappy person.

Extracted from: Gratitude to Parents, by Ajahn Sumedho

Why Did They Make Me Suffer?

2010-01-24T14:31:00.003+08:00

In understanding and compassion, I bow down to reconcile myself with all those who have made me suffer.

I open my heart and send forth my energy of love and understanding to everyone who has made me sufer, to those who have destroyed much of my life and the lives of those I love.

I know now that these people have themselves undergone a lot of suffering and that their hearts are overloaded with pain, anger and hatred. I know that anyone who suffers that much will make those around him or her suffer. I know they have been unlucky, never having the chance to be cared for and loved. Life and society have dealt them so many hardships. They have been wronged and abused.

They have not been guided in the path of mindful living. They have accumulated wrong perceptions about life, about me, and about us. They have wronged us and the people we love.

I pray to my ancestors in my blood and spiritual families to channel to these persons who have made us suffer, the energy of love and protection, so that their hearts will be able to receive the nectar of love, and blossom like a flower.

I pray that they can be transformed to experience the joy of living, so that they will not continue to make themselves suffer, and make others suffer.

I see their suffering and do not want to hold any feelings of hatred or anger in myself toward them. I do not want them to suffer.

I channel my energy of love and understanding to them, and ask all my ancestors to help them.

Extracted from: Teachings of Love, by Venerable Thich Nhat Nanh

What Shall I Do with a Bundle of Jewels?

2010-01-17T14:39:00.003+08:00

Anuruddha suggested they get rid of their jewels and ornaments before they crossed the border. They all removed their necklaces, rings, and bangles and wrapped them in a cloak.

They agreed to find some poor person to give them to. They noticed a tiny barber ship by the side of the road wich was run by a yound man about their own age. He was an attractive fellow but shabbily dressed.

Anuruddha entered his shop and asked his name.

The young barber replied, "Upali."

Anuruddha asked Upali if he could direct them across the border. Upali gladly led them there himself.

Before they left him, they handed him the cloak containing the precious jewels and ornaments.

Anuruddha said, "Upali, we intend to follow the Buddha and live as bhikkus. We have no more use of these jewels. We would like to give them to you. With these, you will have enough to live in leisure the rest of your days."

The princes bid Upali farewell and crossed the border.

When the young barber opened up the cloak, the glint of gems and gold dazzled his eyes.

He belonged to the lowest caste in society. No one in his family had ever owned so much as an ounce of gold or even a single ring. Now he had an entire cloakful of precious gems.

But instead of being happy, he was suddenly seized with panic. He clapsed the bundle tightly in his arms. All his former feelings of wellbeing disappeared. He knew there were many people who would kill to get at the contents of the cloak.

Upali reflected. The young noblemen who had enjoyed great wealth and power were giving it all up in order to become monks. No doubt they had come to see the dangers and burdens that wealth and fame can bring.

Suddenly, he too wanted to cast the bundle aside and follow the princes in pursuit of true peace, joy, and liberation.

Without a moment's hesitation, he hung the bundle on a nearby branch for the first passerby to cliam, and hen he too crossed the border.

Extracted from: Old Path White Clouds, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Why Did the Jackal Run and Run?

2009-11-22T15:17:00.004+08:00

The Buddha once saw a jackal, a wild dog, run out of the forest where he was staying. It stood still for a while, then it ran into the underbrush, and them out again. Then it ran into a tree hollow, then out again. Then it went into a cave, only to run out again.

One minute it stood, the next it ran, then it lay down, then it jumped up...That jackal had mange. When it stood the mange would eat into its skin, so it would run. Running it was still uncomfortable, so it would lie down. Then it would jump up again, running into the underbrush, the tree hollow, never staying still.

The Buddha said, "Monks, did you see that jackal this afternoon? Standing it suffered, running it suffered, sitting it suffered, lying down it suffered. In the underbrush, a tree hollow or a cave, it suffered.

It blamed standing for its discomfort, it blamed sitting, it blamed running and lying down; it blamed the tree, the underbrush and the cave. In fact the problem was with none of those things. That jackal had mange. The problem was with the mange."

We monks are just the same as that jackal. Our discontent is due to wrong view. Because we don't exercise sense restraint we blame our suffering on externals.

Whether we live at Wat Pah Pong, in America or in London we aren't satisfied. Going to live at Bung Wai or any of the other branch monasteries we're still not satisfied. Why not? Because we still have wrong view within us, just that! Wherever we go we aren't content.

But just as that dog, if the mange is cured, is content wherever it goes, so it is for us. I reflect on this often, and I teach you this often, because it's very important.

If we know the truth of our various moods we arrive at contentment. Whether it's hot or cold we are satisfied, with many people or with few people we are satisfied. Contentment doesn't depend on how many people we are with, it comes only from right view. If we have right view then wherever we stay we are content.

But most of us have wrong view. It's just like a maggot! A maggot's living place is filthy, its food is filthy...but they suit the maggot. If you take a stick and brush it away from its lump of dung, it'll struggle to crawl back into it.

It's the same when the Ajahn teaches us to see rightly. We resist, it makes us feel uneasy. We run back to our "lump of dung" because that's where we feel at home. We're all like this. If we don't see the harmful consequences of all our wrong views then we can't leave them, the practice is difficult. So we should listen. There's nothing else to the practice.

If we have right view wherever we go we are content. I have practiced and seen this already. These days there are many monks, novices and laypeople coming to see me. If I still didn't know, if I still had wrong view, I'd be dead by now!

The right abiding place for monks, the place of coolness, is just right view itself. We shouldn't look for anything else.

Extracted from: Right View - The Place of Coolness, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Are You Afraid of Death?

2009-11-22T14:50:00.006+08:00

Now, about 10 p.m., I was sitting with my back to the fire. I don't know what it was, but there came a sound of shuffling from the fire behind me.

Had the coffin just collapsed? Or maybe a dog was getting the corpse? But no, it sounded more like a buffalo walking steadily around.

"Oh, never mind..."

But then it started walking towards me, just like a person!

It walked up behind me, the footsteps heavy, like a buffalo's, and yet not...The leaves crunched under the footsteps as it made its way round to the front. Well, I could only prepare for the worst, where else was there to go?

But it didn't really come up to me, it just circled around in front and then went off in the direction of the pa-kow. Then all was quiet. I don't know what it was, but my fear made me think of many possibilities.

It must have been about half-an-hour later, I think, when the footsteps started coming back from the direction of the pa-kow. Just like a person! It came right up to me, this time, heading for me as if to run me over! I closed my eyes and refused to open them.

"I'll die with my eyes closed."

It got closer and closer until it stopped dead in front of me and just stood stock still. I felt as if it were waving burnt hands back and forth in front of my closed eyes. Oh! This was really it! I threw out everything, forgot all about Buddho, Dhammo and Sangho. I forgot everything else, there was only the fear in me, stacked in full to the brim.

My thoughts couldn't go anywhere else, there was only fear. From the day I was born I had never experienced such fear. Buddho and Dhammo had disappeared, I don't know where. There was only fear welling up inside my chest until it felt like a tightly-stretched drumskin.

"Well, I'll just leave it as it is, there's nothing else to do."

I sat as if I wasn't even touching the ground and simply noted what was going on. The fear was so great that it filled me, like a jar completely filled with water. If you pour water until the jar is completely full, and then pour some more, the jar will overflow. Likewise, the fear built up so much within me that it reached its peak and began to overflow.

"What am I so afraid of anyway?" a voice inside me asked.

"I'm afraid of death," another voice answered.

"Well, then, where is this thing 'death'? Why all the panic? Look where death abides. Where is death?"

"Why, death is within me!"

"If death is within you, then where are you going to run to escape it? If you run away you die, if you stay here you die. Wherever you go it goes with you because death lies within you, there's nowhere you can run to. Whether you are afraid or not you die just the same, there's nowhere to escape death."

As soon as I had thought this, my perception seemed to change right around. All the fear completely disappeared as easily as turning over one's own hand.

It was truly amazing. So much fear and yet it could disappear just like that! Non-fear arose in its place. Now my mind rose higher and higher until I felt as if I was in the clouds.

Extracted from: In the Death of Night, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Is Life Really Empty?

2008-12-20T11:09:00.003+08:00

He smiled, and looked up at a pippala leaf imprinted against the blue sky, its tail blowing back and forth as if calling him.

Looking deeply at the leaf, he saw clearly the presence of the sun and stars - without the sun, without light and warmth, the leaf could not exist. This was like this, because that was like that.

He also saw in the leaf the presence of clouds - without clouds there could be no rain, and without rain the leaf could not be.

He saw the earth, time, space, and mind - all were present in the leaf. In fact, at that very moment, the entire universe existed in that leaf. The reality of the leaf was a wondrous miracle.

Though we ordinarily think that a leaf is born in the springtime, Gautama could see that it had been there for a long, long time in the sunlight, the clouds, the tree, and in himself.

Seeing that the leaf had never been born, he could see that he too had never been born.

Both the leaf and he himself had simply manifested - they had never been born and were incapable of ever dying.

With this insight, ideas of birth and death, appearance and disapperance dissolved, and the true face of the leaf and his own true face revealed themselves.

He could see that the presence of any one phenomenon made possible the existence of all other phenomena. One included all, and all were contained in one.

Seeing the independent nature of all phenomena, Siddhartha saw the empty nature of all phenomena - that all things are empty of a separate, isolated self.

Siddhartha now understood that impermanence and emptiness of self are the very conditions necessary for life. With impermenance and emptiness of self, nothing could grow or develop.

If a grain of rice did not have the nature of impermanence and emptiness of self, it could not grow into a rice plant.

If clouds were not empty of self and impermanent, they could not transform into rain.

Without an impermanent, non-self nature, a child could never grow into an adult.

"Thus," he thought, "to accept life means to accept impermanence and emptiness of self. The source of suffering is a false belief in permanence and the existence of separate selves.

Seeing this, one understands that there is neither birth nor death, production nor destruction, one nor many, inner nor outer, large nor small, impure nor pure. All such concepts are false distinctions created by the intellect.

If one penetrates into the empty nature of all things, one will transcend all mental barriers, and be liberated from the cycle of suffering."

Extracted from: Old Path White Clouds, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Are You Prepared to Love?

2008-09-15T15:17:00.003+08:00

Do you have someone to love? We all want to love and be loved.

We may want to love children who are hungry, disabled, or abused, to relieve them of their suffering. We carry that love in our heart and hope that someday we will be able to realise it.

But when we actually contact these children, they may be difficult to love. They may be rude, they may lie, they may steal, and our love for them will fade.

We had the idea that loving children who need our help would be wonderful, but when confronted with the reality, we cannot sustain our love. When we discover that the object of our love is not lovable, we feel deep disappointment, shame and regret.

We feel as though we have failed. If we cannot love a poor or disabled child, who can we love?

A number of Plum Village residents of Vietnamese origin want to go back to Vietnam to help the children and the adults there.

The war created much division, hatred and suspicion in the hearts of the people. These monks, nuns, and laypeople want to walk on their native land, embrace the people, and help relieve them of their suffering.

But before they go back, they must prepare themselves. The people they want to help may not be easy to love.

Real love must include those who are difficult, those who have been unkind.

If they go back to Vietnam without first learning to love and understand deeply, when they find the people there being unpleasant, they will suffer and may even come to hate them.

You think you can change the world, but do not be too naive. Don't think that the moment you arrive in Vietnam, you will sit down with all the conflicting factions and establish communication immediately.

You may be able to give beautiful talks about harmony, but if you are not prepared, you will not be able to put your words into practice.

We must practise harmony of views and harmony of speech. We bring our views together to have a deeper understanding, and we use loving speech to inspire others and not hurt anyone.

We practise walking together, eating together, discussing together, so we can realise love and understanding.

If you are able to breathe and smile when your sister says something unkind, that is the beginning of love.

You do not have to go some place else to serve. You can serve right where you are by practising walking mediation, smiling, and shining your eyes of love on others.

Extracted from: Beginning Anew, Teachings on Love, by Venerable Thich Nhat Nanh

Is Your Cup Big?

2008-08-28T16:24:00.001+08:00

If your cup is small, a little bit of salt will make the water salty.

If your heart is small, then a little bit of pain can make you suffer.

Your heart must be large.

Quoted from: Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh, Plum Village

How to Live Alone?

2008-07-22T13:55:00.003+08:00

There was a monk whose name was Thera. His friends probably gave him the name Thera, which means "the elder."

That monk liked to live on his own. He always went off on the alms round on his own. He liked to do walking meditation on his own. He like to eat on his own, he liked to wash his clothes on his own. He really liked to do everything on his own. He seemed to like to avoid his friends in the practice as much as possible.

All the monks had heard the Buddha praising the better way to live alone, but the way the Buddha used the meaning of "living alone," he meant not to be imprisoned by the past, not to be pulled away by the future, and not to be carried away by what was happening in the present.

The Buddha did not mean that living alone means to distance yourself and separate yourself from your friends in the practice.

Nevertheless, this monk liked to do things on his own, eating on his own, going to the town on his own, and avoiding other people.

The other monks knew that he liked to do things alone, but they felt that there was something not quite right about this way of life. They felt that he wasn’t really practicing according to the spirit of the Buddha’s teachings.

So the other monks went to the Buddha and they said, "Lord Buddha, one of our fellow practitioners called Thera, the elder, likes to do everything on his own: walking meditation, eating meditation, working on his own, and we don’t know if living like that that is really truly living alone."

And Buddha said, "Where is that monk? Ask him to come here and have a cup of tea with us."

So the monks went and invited Thera to join them, and the Buddha said, "I hear you like to live alone. How do you live on your own? Please tell me."

And Thera said, "Lord Buddha, I sit in meditation alone, I eat on my own, I wash my clothes on my own, I go into the village for alms on my own."

And the Buddha said, "Oh, that is true, then you really do live alone. But maybe the way you live alone is not the best way to live alone, there is a better way to live alone."

And then the Buddha recited a gatha: "If you live without being imprisoned by the past, not being pulled away by the future, not being carried away by the forms and images of the present moment, living each moment of your life deeply, that is the true way of living alone."

When Thera heard this he knew that he had been living alone just as an outer form, and there was a deeper way to live alone.

Extracted from: The Sutra on Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Quack! Quack! That's a Chicken!

2008-07-10T14:36:00.005+08:00

A newly married couple went for a walk together in a wood, one fine summer's evening after dinner.

They were having such a wonderful time being together until they heard a sound in the distance: 'Quack! Quack!'

'Listen,' said the wife, 'That must be a chicken.'

'No, no. That was a duck,' said the husband.

'No, I'm sure that was a chicken,' she said.

'Impossible. Chickens go "Cock-a-doodle-doo", ducks go "Quack! Quack!" That's a duck, darling,' he said, with the first sign of irritation.

'Quack! Quack!' it went again.

'See! It's a duck,' he said.

'No dear. That's a chicken. I'm positive,' she asserted, digging in her heels.

'Listen wife! That ... is ... a ... duck. D-U-C-K, duck! Got it?' he said angrily.

'But it's a chicken,' she protested.

'It's a blooming duck, you, you ...'

And it went 'Quack! Quack!' again before he said something he oughtn't.

The wife was almost in tears. 'But it's a chicken.'

The husband saw the tears welling up in his wife's eyes and, at last, remembered why he had married her. His face softened and he said gently, 'Sorry, darling. I think you must be right. That is a chicken.'

'Thank you, darling,' she said and she squeezed his hand.

'Quack! Quack!' came the sound through the woods, as they continued their walk together in love.

The point of the story that the husband finally awakened to was, who cares whether it is a chicken or a duck? What was much more important was their harmony together, that they could enjoy their walk on such a fine summer's evening.

How many marriages are broken over unimportant matters? How many divorces cite 'chicken or duck' stuff.

When we understand this story, we will remember our priorities. The marriage is more important than being right about whether it is a chicken or a duck. Anyway, how many times have we been absolutely, certainly and positively convinced we are right, only to find out we were wrong later?

Who knows? That could have been a genetically modified chicken made to sound like a duck!

Extracted from: Opening the Door of Your Heart, by Venerable Ajahn Brahm

Don't Cry, Baby

2007-08-02T17:01:00.000+08:00

"Respected Teacher, without understanding love is most difficult.

It reminds me of something that happened to my sister Bhima.

One night she cried all night long until my sister Bala lost her patience and spanked Bhima. That made Bhima cry more.

I picked Bhima up and sensed that she was feverish. I was sure her head ached from the fever. I called Bala and told her to place her hand on Bhima's forehead.

When she did that she understood why Bhima was crying. Her eyes softened and she took Bhima into her arms and sang to her with love. Bhima stopped crying even though she still had a fever.

Respected Teacher, I think that was because Bala understood why Bhima was upset. And so I think without understanding, love is not possible."

"Just so, Svasti! Love is possible only when there is understanding. And only with love can there be acceptance.

Practise living in awareness, children, and you will deepen our understanding. You will be able to understand yourselves, other people, and all things. And you have hearts of love.

That is the wonderful path I have discovered."

Extracted from: Tangerine of Mindfulness, Old Path White Clouds, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

How Can You Be So Stupid!

2007-04-17T17:06:00.000+08:00

One fourteen-year-old boy who practices at Plum Village told me this story.

He said that every time he fell down and hurt himself, his father would shout at him.

The boy vowed that when he grew up, he would not act that way.

But one time his little sister was playing with other children and she fell off a swing and scraped her knee, and the boy became very angry. His sister's knee was bleeding and he wanted to shout at her,

"How can you be so stupid! Why did you do that?"

But he caught himself. Because he was able to recognise his anger and not act on it.

While the adults were taking care of his sister, washing her wound and putting a bandage on it, he walked away slowly and meditated on his anger.

Suddenly he saw that he was exactly the same as his father. He told me, "I realised that if I did not do something about the anger in me, I would transmit it to my children."

He saw that the seeds of his father's anger must have been transmitted by his grandparents.

This was a remarkable insight for a fourteen-year-old boy. Because he had been practicing, he could see clearly like that.

By making peace with our parents in us, we have a chance to make real peace with our real parents.

Extract from: Teachings on Love, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Sir, You Are Not My Daddy!

2007-03-27T11:13:00.000+08:00

There is a story that is well-known in my country about a young couple who suffered deeply because of pride.

The husband had to go off to war, and he left his pregnant wife behind. Three years later, when he was released from the army, his wife came to the village gate to welcome him, and she brought along their little boy.

When the young couple saw each other, they could not hold back the tears of joy. They were thankful to their ancestors for protecting them, and the young man asked his wife to go to the marketplace to buy some fruit, flowers, and other offerings to place on the ancestors' altar.

While she was shopping, the young father asked his son to call him Daddy, but the little boy refused.

"Sir, you are not my daddy! My daddy used to come every night, and my mother would talk to him and cry. When mother sat down, daddy also sat down. When mother lay down, my daddy lay down."

Hearing these words, the young father's heart turned to stone.

When his wife returned, he could not even look at her. The young man offered fruit, flowers, and incense to the ancestors, made prostrations, and then rolled up the bowing mat and did not allow her to do the same. He believed that she was not worthy to present herself in front of the ancestors. Then he walked out of the house and spent his days drinking and walking about the village.

His wife could not understand why he was acting like that. Finally, after three days, she could bear it no longer, and she jumped into the river and drowned herself.

The evening after the funeral, when the young father lit the kerosene lamp, his little boy shouted,

"There is my daddy!" He pointed to his father's shadow projected on the wall and said,

"My daddy used to come every night just like that, and my mother would talk to him and cry a lot. When my mother sat down, he sat down. When my mother lay, he lay down."

"Darling, you have been away for too long. How can I raise our child alone?" she cried to to her shadow. One night the child asked her who and where his father was. She pointed to her shadow on the wall and said "This is your father." She missed him so much.

Suddenly the young father understood, but it was too late. If he had gone to his wife and asked,

"Darling, I suffer so much. Our little boy said a man used to come every night and you would talk to him and cry with him, and every time you sat down, he also sat down. Who is that person?",

she could have had an opportunity to explain and avert the tragedy. But he did not because of the pride in him.

The lady behaved the same. She was deeply hurt because of her husband's behaviour, but she did not ask for his help. She should have practised the fourth mantra,

"Darling, I suffer so much. Please help. I do not understand why you will not look at me or talk with me. Why didn't you allow me to prostrate before the ancestors? Have I done anything wrong?"

If she had done that, her husband could have told her what the little boy said. But she did not, because she, too, was caught in pride.

Extract from: Teachings on Love, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Baking A Kamma Cake

2007-01-24T15:15:00.000+08:00

It's like baking a cake: kamma defines what ingredients you have, what you have got to work with.

So a person with unfortunate kamma, maybe as a result of their past actions, has not got many ingredients. Maybe they have just got some old stale flour, one or two raisins, if that, and some rancid butter, and - what else goes in cakes? - some sugar... and that is all they have got to work with.

And another person might have very good kamma, all the ingredients you could ever wish for: whole wheat flour, brown sugar and all types of dried fruit and nuts.

But as for the cake that is produced in the end... Even with very meagre ingredients some people can bake a beautiful cake. They mix it all up, put it into the oven - delicious! How do they do it?

And then other people might have everything, but the cake they make tastes awful.

So kamma defines the ingredients, what we have got to work with; but that does not define what we make with it.

So if a person is wise, it does not matter what they have got to work with. You can still make a beautiful cake - as long as you know how.

Of course the first thing to know is that the last way to make a good cake is to complain all the time about the ingredients you have.

Sometimes in the monastery, if there is an ingredient missing the people who are cooking look in the pantry and just use whatever is there. They have to be quite versatile and you get some very strange cakes, but they are all delicious, because people have learned the art of using what they have and making something of it.

So where is kamma heading? What are we actually making of it? Is it to be wealthy or to be powerful?

No. This meditation, this Buddhism, the direction we are going in, is towards enlightenment. We are using the ingredients we have to become enlightened.

But what does enlightenment actually mean?

Enlightenment means there is no anger left in your heart. There is no personal desire or delusion left in your heart.

Extract from: On Making a Mistake, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

What's That Sound?

2006-11-24T16:58:00.000+08:00

Suppose one morning you're walking to work and a man yells abuse and insults at you from across the street.

As soon as you hear this abuse your mind changes from its usual state. You don't feel so good, you feel angry and hurt. That man walks around abusing you night and day. When you hear the abuse, you get angry, and even when you return home you're still angry because you feel vindictive, you want to get even.

A few days later another man comes to your house and calls out, "Hey! That man who abused you the other day, he's mad, he's crazy! Has been for years! He abuses everybody like that. Nobody takes any notice of anything he says."

As soon as you hear this you are suddenly relieved. That anger and hurt that you've pent up within you all these days melts away completely.

Why? Because you know the truth of the matter now. Before, you didn't know, you thought that man was normal, so you were angry at him. Understanding like that caused you to suffer.

Having known, then you can let go. If you don't know the truth you cling right there.

This is knowledge of the truth.

Someone who sees the Dhamma has a similar experience. When attachment, aversion and delusion disappear, they disappear in the same way.

As long as we don't know these things we think, "What can I do? I have so much greed and aversion." This is not clear knowledge.

It's just the same as when we thought the madman was sane. When we finally see that he was mad all along we're relieved of worry. No-one could show you this. Only when the mind sees for itself can it uproot and relinquish attachment.

* * * * *

We say they disturb us, like when we sit in meditation and hear a sound. We think, "Oh, that sound's bothering me." If we understand that the sound bothers us then we suffer accordingly.

If we investigate a little deeper, we will see that it's we who go out and disturb the sound!

The sound is simply sound. If we understand like this then there's nothing more to it, we leave it be. We see that the sound is one thing, we are another.

The sound is just sound, why should you go and grab it? You see that actually it was you who went out and disturbed the sound.

This is real knowledge of the truth. You see both sides, so you have peace. If you see only one side, there is suffering. Once you see both sides, then you follow the Middle Way.

This is the right practice of the mind. This is what we call "straightening out our understanding."

Extract from: The Middle Way Within, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Stop! It's Red Light

2006-11-06T15:46:00.000+08:00

Every time you see the red light, you smile to it.

The red light means "stop!"—stop your running, stop your anguish, stop your belief that happiness can only be possible at the end of the road, that is a superstition and is not true.

Whether there is happiness or not depends on the present moment. So when you see the red light, look at it and smile, look at it as a friend, as a bodhisattva, as a bell master.

Smile, sit back, and enjoy your breathing. "Breathing in, I enjoy the present moment. Breathing out, I smile."

You try to live that moment with peace and freedom.

You don’t allow yourself to be caught in all kinds of afflictions, irritations and bad humor. We are prey for all these afflictions, and if you go back to yourself and use your mindful breathing and smiling, then you are a better self.

Extract from: Cultivating Mindfulness in the Context of a Sangha, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Oh, This Is Awful!

2006-10-26T15:04:00.000+08:00

For example, a few years ago someone did something quite mean to me behind my back.

At the time, I was very upset and thought, "Oh, this is awful. How could this person do this to me?"

Now I realize that I'm glad this situation happened because it opened up a new direction in my life. If this person had not been so unkind to me, I would still be doing what I had done before and would probably be stuck in a rut. But this person's actions pushed me to be more creative.

Although initially the situation was very painful, in the long-term, it had a very good effect on my life. It forced me to grow and to develop other talents. So, even the people or situations that we feel are bad can turn out to be good in the long run.

Extract from: Dealing with Anxiety, by Venerable Thubten Chodron

Where Is My Real Home?

2006-07-26T16:22:00.000+08:00

Like household utensils that you've had for a long time -- cups, saucers, plates and so on -- when you first had them they were clean and shining, but now after using them for so long, they're starting to wear out.

Some are already broken, some have disappeared, and those that are left are wearing out, they have no stable form. And it's their nature to be that way.

Your body is the same...it's been continually changing from the day you were born, through childhood and youth, until now it's reached old age. You must accept this.

The Buddha said that conditions, whether internal, bodily conditions or external conditions, are not self, their nature is to change. Contemplate this truth clearly.

* * * * *

Anyone can build a house of wood and bricks, but the Buddha taught that that sort of home is not our real home, it's only nominally ours.

Our real home is inner peace.

An external, material home may well be pretty but it is not very peaceful. There's this worry and then that, this anxiety and then that. So we say it's not our real home, it's external to us.

Sooner or later we'll have to give it up. it's not a place we can live in permanently because it doesn't truly belong to us, it belongs to the world.

That's the way it is. Wanting it to be any different would be as foolish as wanting a duck to be like a chicken.

Don't worry about things too much, just think "this is the way things are."

So don't waver. Let go. Throw it all away.

Even if you don't let go, everything is starting to leave you anyway.

Can you see that, how all the different parts of your body are trying to slip away? Take your hair; when you were young it was thick and black. Now it's falling out. It's leaving. Your eyes used to be good and strong but now they're weak, your sight is unclear. When your organs have had enough they leave, this isn't their home.

Extract from: Our Real Home, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

How To Smile?

2006-07-25T15:24:00.000+08:00

There's a smile in our heart. But most of us can hardly find time to smile, can we?

We can only manage to smile when things go our way. Most people's happiness depends on having things go to their liking. They have to have everybody in the world say only pleasant things.

Is that how you find happiness? Is it possible to have everybody in the world say only pleasant things? If that's how it is when will you ever find happiness?

We must use Dhamma to find happiness. Whatever it may be, whether right or wrong, don't blindly cling to it. Just notice it then lay it down.

When the mind is at ease then you can smile. The minute you become averse to something the mind goes bad. Then nothing is good at all.

* * * * *

So in order to give up evil and cultivate the good you don't have to go looking anywhere else. If your mind has gone bad, don't go looking over at this person and that person. Just look at your own mind and find out where these thoughts come from.

Why does the mind think such things? Understand that all things are transient. Love is transient, hate is transient.

Have you ever loved your children? Of course you have.

Have you ever hated them? I'll answer that for you, too... Sometimes you do, don't you?

Can you throw them away? No, you can't throw them away. Why not? Children aren't like bullets, are they? Bullets are fired outwards, but children are fired right back to the parents. If they're bad it comes back to the parents.

Your children are your kamma, they are appropriate to their owners. They are your kamma, so you must take responsibility for them. If they really give you suffering, just remind yourself, "It's my kamma." If they please you, just remind yourself, "It's my kamma."

Sometimes it gets so frustrating at home you must just want to run away. It gets so bad some people even contemplate hanging themselves! It's kamma. We have to accept the fact.

Avoid bad actions, then you will be able to see yourself more clearly.

Extract from: Making the Heart Good, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Why Has He Become Like This?

2006-07-17T14:45:00.000+08:00

Mencius was a Chinese philosopher, very well known.

He lost his father when he was very young, and his mother had to move into a poor quarter of the city to make a living. She stayed up very late in the night to do the work of weaving.

One day the little boy came home very dirty, with his clothes all torn. He just had a fight with the children in the neighborhood. He became something like a delinquent child.

She got angry, because she had great expectations of her little boy. She was doing the work of weaving. She stopped and she was about to punish him, to shout at him.

Suddenly she stopped, because insight came to her. She was able to see that in the neighborhood there was no school. There was only a slaughter house. The children didn't go to school. They spent time playing on the road and playing games like slaughtering a pig or a calf. They would use a raw sweet potato to represent a cow, they used four incense sticks for legs of the cow, and they gathered and performed the killing. They imitated adults. And of course they would fight each other and say rough words to each other.

That is the environment in which the mother of the boy had put him. On the verge of shouting at him, the mother realized that it's her fault. Any child put into that environment will become the same.

So she did not do anything and she was not angry anymore. That is salvation by insight.

Instead she stayed up later into the night, worked harder and saved money. She had an intention to move to another quarter of the city. Three months later she was able to move to a better neighborhood, where there was a school, where the children were clean and polite.

She did not have to punish the child, to shout at him, to suffer. The boy after that became a very intelligent, hard-working student, and finally became a very famous philosopher.

* * * * *

You don't have to suffer if you have insight -- if you understand and that understanding is the fruit of deep looking.

If we suffer so much, it is because we are ignorant. If we get angry at our father, at our mother, our son, our daughter, or our partner, it is because we are still ignorant.

Practice in looking deeply will allow you to see how the other person has become like that. He was not like that when you married him, but now he is like this, like this, very hard to be with. And who is responsible?

Put the questions in front of you and meditate. When I first married him, he was not like that. When I first married her, she was not like that. Why has she become so unbearable today? Who is responsible? Should I blame her, or should I blame myself, or should I blame society? All these questions help with our meditation.

To meditate means to confront reality and not to escape. If you are running away from your real problems, you are not meditating correctly. You need to sit in a mound of calm, of concentration. You need to sit in a mound of mindfulness in order to confront these hardships and to look into the nature of this suffering.

Extract from: Practices for the Twenty-first Century, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

My Dear Little Anger

2006-07-13T17:25:00.000+08:00

The idea that anger is evil, that mindfulness is good, and that you should use the good to fight evil, that is not Buddhist.

You have to use mindfulness, and embrace your anger in the most tender way possible, like a mother embracing her suffering baby: "Darling, I am here for you. Don’t worry, I will take good care of you."

Not only do you deal with your anger in that way, but also you deal with your fear, your jealousy and all kinds of suffering in that way. You have to attend to your pain, you have to provide the energy of mindfulness to take care of the blocks of pain in you when they manifest.

If you know how to do that, you get relief after ten or fifteen minutes…sometimes longer, but continue the practice of mindful breathing, mindful walking, and other kinds of practice.

But after five or ten minutes of embracing it, it may go down again into the seed, and you feel much better. But that does not mean that anger has been eliminated from you.

Anger has just ceased to be a zone of energy up here, and it has returned to its initial form: a seed. And next time that you or someone else comes and waters it, it will be back again.

But one thing is sure: after having been embraced by mindfulness for a few minutes, ten or fifteen minutes, it will go down a little bit weaker. It will always be like that. After taking a bath of mindfulness, your pain and sorrow will be lessened a little bit when they become a seed.

If you know how to do it, next time that they manifest you continue the same practice: "My dear little anger, I know you are there, I will take care of you." You are always ready for it.

Don’t try to suppress it, allow it to come up without fear, because you already have the energy of mindfulness that you have cultivated during the practice.

* * * * *

We suffer not because things are impermanent. We suffer because things are impermanent, but we don’t know that they are impermanent.

Looking into a flower, looking into a cloud, looking into a living being, you touch the nature of impermanence. Without impermanence, nothing can be possible.

If things are not impermanent, how could a grain of corn become a corn plant? How could your child grow up? So impermanence is the ground of life.

But in spite of the fact that things are impermanent, we are not aware of that nature of impermanence in life. So when you practice looking deeply into things, you should discover the nature of impermanence, and you should make it into a living insight.

A living insight means that you carry it in every minute of your life, and then you become a wise man, a wise woman, and you get rid of so much of your pain and sorrow and delusion.

* * * * *

A flower cannot be by itself alone, because it has no separate self.

A flower can only inter-be with the sunshine, with the clouds, with the earth. If you remove the element sunshine from the flower, the flower will collapse. If you remove the element cloud, meaning water, from the flower, the flower will collapse.

So a flower is full of everything. Everything in the cosmos can be found in the flower: sunshine, clouds, minerals, earth, time, space, humans, everything. Only one thing is lacking in the flower—that is a separate existence, a separate self. Now you understand what is meant by "non-self."

Non-self does not mean non-existing; non-self means you don’t have a separate existence, like the flower. A flower is there, full of the whole cosmos, but not having a separate entity.

Nothing can be by itself alone, everything has to inter-be with everything else.

That is the law of interbeing, the law of interdependent origination, the law of no self. "No self" does not mean non-existing. Everything is, in a wonderful way, but everything is a formation.

Extract from: Taking Care of our Mental Formations and Perceptions, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

The War Was Over

2006-07-12T13:52:00.000+08:00

One of the retreatants finally told us his story, that had never been told before.

During a battle in Vietnam, most of his friends were killed in an operation, and he saw his companions die. So he got very angry. He wanted to retaliate.

He brought out a number of sandwiches, he put explosives inside the sandwiches, he left them on the place where children would play, and he hid himself and watched. He saw children coming. They were very happy to see this kind of sandwich, and ate them. And just ten or fifteen minutes later, they began to scream, and their mothers came out, trying to get them to the hospital, but the American soldier knew that nothing could be done in order to help the children.

He had wanted to do so out of his anger and the will to retaliate. Since the time he went back to America, he could not live with that kind of image in his store consciousness.

He told us that every time he found himself together with a few children in a room, he had to run out of that room as quickly as possible. He just couldn’t bear it, for more than twelve years. His mother encouraged him to deal with the present time, to forget the war, the war was over; but for him, the war was never over. Until he came to the retreat.

I told him, “Yes, I know that you have killed children. You have ambushed them as your way to retaliate. I know you have caused suffering.

But I want you to know also that there are many children who are dying around the world, everywhere. Many die just because they need just one medicine pill. Many children die because they need a glass of milk, soy milk. Many step on grenades and bombs that are left over there.

If you know how to use your time, now, you can save many of them, even every day. You have the capacity of acting, of living in mindfulness, in compassion, and I know you will be able to save the lives of many children, now.

Why don’t you make a determination to receive the First Precept of not killing, of protecting life? You receive that precept in the presence of the whole Sangha."

“And you take action right away. You go out and you save children who are dying in the present moment, children even in America. In America there are children who are dying every day because of stupid causes. Children in Southeast Asia, in Africa, everywhere."

And the teaching was already a drop of Dharma nectar. When a drop of Dharma nectar fell into his heart, it opened. He was transformed right away, in that moment. And he made the determination to receive the First Precept and to go out and help.

* * * * *

A writer, a woman writer with a lot of talent, she came to me and confessed that she was abused as a little girl and she has carried that kind of suffering within her. She doesn’t feel that she’s a normal person.

I helped her to practice. I said, “Sit down and practice looking with me. Are you angry at that person? Don’t you think that he was sick? It was only sick people who do that kind of thing to children and ruin their life. Do you see the suffering in that person, how that person has been brought up? There are many of them like that to be helped.

You know, you are a writer. You can help these people. You can do more; you can help the children who are about to be molested by these people. You have the energy, the talent that you need.

“You have to make the vow, the determination to receive the Third Precept: I am aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct in family circles. I have seen children molested and suffer for their whole life, and I now undertake to practice the Third Precept in order to protect the integrity of families, individuals, and children.

I am determined to learn ways to do that with my Sangha, because I know that if I continue to recite the Five Steps of Training, to hold Dharma discussions with my Sangha, and learn better ways to practice them, then I will be able to help.”

During a Precepts transmission ceremony, the Sangha is there with their best presence and they witness to the fact that you are undertaking the path.

During that moment, transformation takes place already, because you receive a lot of energy the moment you decide to receive and practice the Steps of Training.

Extract from: The Five-Fold Steps of Training, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

I Need A Rest

2006-07-11T16:24:00.000+08:00

When an animal is wounded in the woods, it knows how to do this.

It seeks a peaceful corner in the forest and it lays down for several days. Several generations of ancestors have transmitted to them the wisdom that this is the only way to restore themselves.

They don’t have doctors, they don’t have pharmacists, but they know how to rest. They don’t need to run after their prey, they don’t need to eat—in fact, they fast during these three, four, five days of resting. And one day the animal is healed and it stands up and it goes to look for a source of food.

* * * * *

And for your spirit, it is the same. Our consciousness is able to heal itself.

It has the power of self healing but you don’t allow it to rest. You continue to feed your consciousness with your anger, your worries, your thinking, and so on. You don’t believe in your consciousness.

You are seeking for a means to heal it but you don’t know how to allow yourself to rest. You keep thinking the whole day and you keep worrying the whole day. You never allow yourself to rest.

If you know how to practice total relaxation, you’ll know how to smile and how to send your smile to different parts of your body. During that time, you have stopped thinking and worrying because you are focused on your body, your breathing, your walking.

When you practice mindful breathing, when you practice “In, out, deep, slow,” not only can you nourish yourself—body and spirit—but you can also stop your thinking.

Stopping the thinking, stopping the worries, is very important.

* * * * *

Our mind is like a cassette tape turning nonstop day and night.

We have a habit. You are not there, because you are carried away by your thinking, by your worries. You may get lost in the past, regretting the past or being caught in the suffering that you endured during the past.

You suffered in the past already but now you want to suffer more by recalling the past. You call your past back in order for you to suffer more. Why do you have to show it several times, your suffering?

Cows, when they eat grass, they swallow and then they bring it up again and swallow for a second time. Many of us do the same. We have suffered already in the past. But we want to bring our suffering back to the present moment and suffer more. We like that.

* * * * *

Remember when you lost someone very dear, you suffered, and you thought that you’d never restore yourself, you’d never be able to forget that suffering. You thought that the suffering would dwell with you, the wound would be with you, forever.

But some time later you got used to it and you were able to go on with life. This means that your mind, your spirit, was able to heal itself.

Extract from: Healing is Possible through Resting, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Growing Pain

2006-07-08T11:19:00.000+08:00

You ask a child how old he is. He may be close to five and he will say five years old. He wants to be an adult and has this growing anxiety.

This growing anxiety doesn't end when the child grows up and becomes an adult. Once he comes to a certain age, he wants to stop it. He cannot stop it. He has initiated that process and it goes on and on.

Growth itself is not painful. What happens to the mind when we think of growth makes us painful. It is not the appearance of old age that is painful or the growing process itself is not painful.

When we think of it, that thought is painful. Why? Because the growth takes us somewhere. Brings us in one direction and we begin to anticipate what is going to happen. That is another thing we don't want.

(Pali) We get a shock - people die. I will die. That thought is so shocking. If there is anything we can do to stop it, we will do it. People spend money to stop death, growth. Not just plastic surgery but they do many things other than that to stop growing and die.

* * * * *

On the one hand when we think of the problems in this life we don't want to be reborn.

On the other hand when we think of the pleasure we enjoy in one life we want repeat it, to be born again and again. You want to be reborn with a certain person in the next life. How many times have you made that vow?

This is why Buddha said once you enjoy something, you want to repeat it.

That is the nature of desire. So, that creates both in this life and the next. That is not the suffering caused by desire. Suffering caused by desire is losing what you get.

The pleasure you enjoy is not faithful to you. That pleasure will turn back to you, it goes away, impermanent. That impermanent pleasure you want to hold onto but it disappears. That person who you want to live with forever, betrays you and eventually becomes your enemy.

When you don't want it, you cannot get away from it. After some time you want it, and again the same thing happens. Therefore there is no permanent happiness in anything we enjoy.

Desire deceives us and asks us to repeat it. That is called sensual desire.

* * * * *

Meditation doesn't mean sitting in one place focusing the mind and getting a little bit of concentration and forgetting the world. That is not meditation. That is a very tiny part of meditation.

True meditation is the practice of the Noble Eightfold Path. You can see it coming together in practice of our daily life.

Extract from: Four Noble Truths, by Venerable Bhante Henepola Gunaratana

A Mango Tree

2006-07-03T15:55:00.000+08:00

One day, while visiting a park with his retinue of ministers, from atop his elephant, he spied some mango tees heavily laden with ripe fruit. Not being able to stop at that time, he determined in his mind to return later to partake of some.

Little did he know, however, that his ministers, coming along behind, would greedily gather them all up; that they would use poles to knock them down, beating and breaking the branches and tearing and scattering the leaves.

Returning in the evening to the mango grove, the king, already imagining in his mind the delicious taste of the mangoes, suddenly discovered that they were all gone, completely finished! And not only that, but the branches and leaves had been thoroughly thrashed and scattered.

The king, quite disappointed and upset, then noticed another mango tree nearby with its leaves and branches still intact.

He wondered why. He then realized it was because that tree had no fruit. If a tree has no fruit nobody disturbs it and so its leaves and branches are not damaged.

This lesson kept him absorbed in thought all the way back to the palace: "It is unpleasant, troublesome and difficult to be a king. It requires constant concern for all his subjects. What if there are attempts to attack, plunder and seize parts of his kingdom?" He could not rest peacefully; even in his sleep he was disturbed by dreams.

He saw in his mind, once again, the mango tree without fruit and its undamaged leaves and branches. "If we become similar to that mango tree," he thought, "our "leaves" and "branches," too, would not be damaged."

In his chamber he sat and meditated. Finally, he decided to ordain as a monk, having been inspired by this lesson of the mango tree.

He compared himself to that mango tree and concluded that if one didn't become involved in the ways of the world, one would be truly independent, free from worries or difficulties. The mind would be untroubled. Reflecting thus, he ordained.

From then on, wherever he went, when asked who his teacher was, he would answer, "A mango tree."

He didn't need to receive teaching all that much. A mango tree was the cause of his awakening to the Opanayiko-Dhamma, the teaching leading inwards.

And with this awakening, he became a monk, one who has few concerns, is content with little, and who delights in solitude.

His royal status given up, his mind was finally at peace.

Extract from: Dhamma Nature, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Storm

2006-06-29T10:32:00.000+08:00

Every time you have a strong emotion, like anger or despair, it is as though you are exposed to a storm.

Look at the tree outside the window. She is trying her best to stand in the storm. When you look at the top of the tree, you see that several small branches and leaves are swaying back and forward very violently in the wind, and you have the feeling that they could be broken at any time.

We feel very much the same when we are exposed to the storm of emotions.

We feel that we may die because the emotion is so strong—the fear, the despair, the anger, the unhappiness—but if you look down a little, you see that the trunk of the tree is firmly rooted in the soil, and then you have another impression. You know that the tree is going to stand in the storm.

We are like trees also. On this level we are very vulnerable. So during the storms of emotion, if you dwell on this level, the level of the brain, the level of the heart, you might be broken, you might feel that you are not going to be able to stand it, you are going to die.

But bring your attention, down, down, to the navel, a little bit below the navel, and pay attention to the rising and falling of your stomach, practicing mindful breathing. When you breathe in your stomach will rise, and when you breathe out, your stomach will fall.

To stop all the thinking, to just focus all your attention on the rise and fall of your stomach, and to dwell there at the root of your tree, and not to float up here at the level of the heart or the brain, is a very important practice.

If you can do that for ten minutes, or fifteen minutes, the emotion will go away and you survive the storm. And if you can survive the storm once, you have confidence. The next time that depression comes, when a strong emotion comes, you will do the same. And that confidence is very important in you.

* * * * *

We should know that we are more, much more than our emotions.

An emotion is something that comes, stays for some time, and goes. Things are impermanent. Nothing can be permanent.

Your emotion is not going to stay there forever. You know that you are more than your emotions.

Why do you have to die because of one emotion? But so many young people, when they are overwhelmed by their emotions, have the feeling that they cannot stand it, and the only way to stop the suffering is to go and kill themselves. That is why the number of young people who commit suicide in our times is so high: they don’t know how to handle their emotions.

It’s not very difficult – to be aware that the emotion is just an emotion. It is born, it stays for some time, and it will go away. Why do you have to die because of it? You are much more than your emotions.

* * * * *

To die, what does it mean?

In our minds it means that you are someone, and then suddenly you become no one. You are something, suddenly you become nothing—that is our idea of death.

But if we observe things deeply, we see nothing like that in reality. There is nothing that can be reduced to nothing, or to nothingness.

Can you reduce a cloud into nothingness? No, you can only help the cloud to become rain. You can help the rain to become snow. But you cannot make a cloud into nothingness.

A sheet of paper—can you reduce it into nothingness? No. You may burn it, and it is transformed in many ways. Part of it will become a cloud, the smoke rising. Part of it will become the heat, penetrating into the cosmos. Part of it will become ash, that can be reborn as a flower or a blade of grass, sometime later.

So everything is on their way, on their journey of manifestation of being.

You are also like that. If you don’t manifest yourself in this form, then you manifest yourself in another form.

Please don’t be afraid of being nothing. Nothingness is just an idea. Non-being is just an idea.

The Buddha said not only is non-being an idea, but being is also an idea. Reality transcends both being and non-being.

* * * * *

It’s like when you look into space, into the air.

You don’t see any color, you don’t hear any sound, you don’t see anything, but if you have a radio or a television set, you will capture radio or television programs, and sights and sounds will manifest themselves. So the radio or the television set is just one more condition enabling you to see the signals manifest.

Signals are reaching us all the time, signals from satellites, and because we lack one condition, we believe that they do not exist, but they do exist.

So our notion of being is also a notion. And our notion of non-being is another notion. Reality transcends both being and non-being. That is the teaching of the Buddha in so many, many discourses.

* * * * *

The typical sentence is like this: when conditions are sufficient, your body manifests, and you say that the body "is". And when conditions are not longer sufficient, and your body does not manifest itself, then you say that there is no body. Your idea of "there is" and "there is not" are just ideas.

Your true nature is free from these two ideas: being and non-being. That is why, within the teachings of the Buddha, to be or not to be, that is not the question.

The Buddha helps us to practice stopping, concentrating, calming, in order to be able to direct our looking deeply into the heart of things, to discover the true nature of reality, the nature of no birth, no death, no being, no non-being, no coming, no going.

Extract from: The Island of Self; The Three Dharma Seals, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Memory's Like That

2006-06-27T10:54:00.000+08:00

I studied British colonial history in India. An account written by a British historian is very different than one written by an Indian historian.

Is one of them lying? No, they’re probably honorable scholars, both of them, but they each see and remember in different ways. Memory’s like that.

So when you explore memory, just observe that memories come and go; and when they’re gone consciousness is what remains.

Consciousness is now. This the path, here and now, the way it is.

Use what is happening now as the path rather than going along with the idea that you are somebody from the past who needs to practice to get rid of all your defilements in order to become enlightened in the future. That is just a self you create and believe in.

* * * * *

Try taking a guilty memory and deliberately sustaining it. Think of some terrible thing you’ve done in the past, then determine to keep it in your consciousness for five minutes.

By trying to keep thinking about it, you will find how difficult it is to sustain.

But when that same memory arises and you resist it or wallow in it or believe in it, then it can hang around the whole day. A whole lifetime can be filled with guilt and remorse.

Every time you’re
aware of what
you’re thinking,
you’re getting to
be an expert.

* * * * *

At first it may seem like emotions and desires are much stronger, that it’s impossible to simply be aware.

You may have only a few brief moments of awareness and then back into the raging storm.

It may seem hopeless, but it’s not. The more you test it out, investigate and trust this awareness, then more stable it becomes.

The seemingly invincible power of the emotional qualities, obsessions, and habits will lose that sense of being the stronger force.

You will find that your real strength is in awareness, not in controlling the ocean and waves and cyclones and tsunamis and all the rest that you can’t possible ever control anyway.

It’s only in trusting in this one point—here and now—that you realize liberation.

Extract from: Attending to the Here and Now, by Venerable Ajahn Sumedho

Why Is There A Name?

2006-06-21T16:02:00.000+08:00

Take people, for instance.

In reality people don't have any names, we are simply born naked into the world. If we have names, they arise only through convention.

I've contemplated this and seen that if you don't know the truth of this convention it can be really harmful. It's simply something we use for convenience. Without it we couldn't communicate, there would be nothing to say, no language.

I've seen the Westerners when they sit in meditation together in the West. When they get up after sitting, men and women together, sometimes they go and touch each other on the head!

When I saw this I thought, "Ehh, if we cling to convention it gives rise to defilements right there."

If we can let go of convention, give up our opinions, we are at peace.

* * * * *

However, they are a characteristic of our world.

Take Mr. Boonmah, for instance; he used to be just one of the crowd but now he's been appointed the District Commissioner.

It's just a convention but it's a convention we should respect. It's part of the world of people.

If you think, "Oh, before we were friends, we used to work at the tailor's together," and then you go and pat him on the head in public, he'll get angry. It's not right, he'll resent it.

So we should follow the conventions in order to avoid giving rise to resentment.

It's useful to understand convention, living in the world is just about this.

Know the right time and place, know the person.

* * * * *

Why is it wrong to go against conventions?

It's wrong because of people!

You should be clever, knowing both convention and Liberations. Know the right time for each.

If we know how to use rules and conventions comfortably then we are skilled. But if we try to behave according to the higher level of reality in the wrong situation, this is wrong.

Where is it wrong?

It's wrong with people's defilements, nothing else! People all have defilements.

In one situation we behave one way, in another situation we must behave in another way. We should know the ins and outs because we live within conventions.

Problems occur because people cling to them.

If we suppose something to be, then it is. It's there because we suppose it to be there.

But if you look closely, in the absolute sense these things don't really exist.

Extract from: Convention and Liberation, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Stop Running

2006-06-20T17:12:00.000+08:00

I remember one day when I was sitting on the bus in India, with a friend, visiting untouchable communities.

That friend of mine was sitting on my right on the bus. We went to many states in India to offer days of mindfulness and public lectures and retreats.

The landscape was beautiful, with palm trees, temples, buffaloes, rice fields, and I was enjoying what I saw from my window.

When I looked at him, I saw that he looked very tense, and was not enjoying it as I did. He was struggling.

I said, "My dear friend, there is nothing for your to worry about now. I know that your concern is to make my trip pleasant, and to make me happy, but you know, I am happy right now, so enjoy yourself. Sit back, smile. The landscape is very beautiful."

He was very tense. He said, "Okay," and he sat back.

But just two minutes later, when I looked back at him, he was as tense as before. He was still struggling, struggling and struggling. He was not capable of letting go of the struggle, that struggle that has been going on for many thousands of years. He was not capable of dwelling in the present moment and touching life deeply in that moment, which was my practice, and still is my practice.

He was an untouchable himself. Now he has a family, a beautiful apartment to live in, a good job, and he does not look like an untouchable, but he is still one, because he still carries all the energies, the suffering of all his ancestors in the past many thousands of years. They struggle during the day, they struggle during the night, even in dreams, and they are not capable of letting go and relaxing.

Our ancestors might have been luckier than his, but why do many of us behave very much like him?

We do not allow ourselves to be relaxed, to be in the here and the now.

Why do we always try to run and run, even when we are having our breakfast, even while having our lunch, while walking, while sitting?

There is something pushing us, pulling us, all the time. We are not capable of being free, in order to touch life deeply in this very moment. Your depression, your illness, is an outcome of that kind of behavior, because you have never allowed yourself to be free.

You make yourself busy all of your life, you believe that happiness and peace is not possible in the here and the now, that it may be possible in the future. That is why you take all of your energies in order to run there, hoping that someday in the future you will have some happiness or some peace.

The Buddha addressed this issue very clearly. He said, "Don’t get caught in the past, because the past is gone. Don’t get upset about the future, because the future is not yet here. There is only one moment for you to be alive, and that is the present moment. Go back to the present moment and live this moment deeply, and you’ll be free."

* * * * *

A young man from America came here for the summer retreat about ten years ago. He enjoyed his three weeks of practice in the Upper Hamlet, he enjoyed walking and sitting and breathing and cooking, and so on.

One day we organized a ceremony called the Thanksgiving Ceremony. Because we also have our own way of celebrating thanks giving – to our parents who brought us to life, to our teachers who show us the way to live happily in the present moment, to our friends who support us in difficult moments, and to all living beings in the animal, vegetable and mineral realms. That day we practiced being aware of their existence, and lived in such a way as to be grateful for their support.

That young man was asked by his fellow Americans to go to Ste. Foy la Grande to do some shopping, because each national group had to cook something very special from their country, in order to place it on the collective altar of ancestors.

When he was in the market shopping, suddenly a kind of energy came up, and he suddenly became restless, and hurrying. He lost his peace and his beauty.

During the three weeks in the Upper Hamlet he never behaved like that, because he was among his Sangha, and everyone was practicing walking and sitting and doing things in a relaxed way, learning how to live in the present moment.

Now he was alone in the market, and suddenly he felt himself rushing, feeling restless, and trying to do things quickly in order to go home to the Upper Hamlet. But because he had already been practicing for three full weeks, he was able to recognize what was going on within himself.

He had a kind of insight: he saw that that was the habit energy of his mother, because she was always like that, rushing, hurrying, agitated, restless.

At the moment when he got this insight, he went back to his in-breath and his out-breath, and he said, "Hello, Mommy!" and that feeling of restlessness and hurrying just disappeared.

He knew that he was not surrounded by brothers and sisters of his Sangha, and that alone in Ste. Foy la Grande he had to use his mindful breathing as his Sangha. From that moment on he continued the practice of mindful breathing, and he stayed stable and joyful and peaceful the whole time he was shopping. When he came back here he told us the story.

So that negative habit energy that pushes us may have been cultivated by us during the past many years, but it may also have been transmitted to us by our mother, or our father, or our ancestors. And that is our heritage.

Extract from: Transforming Negative Habit Energies, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Which Day Is A Lucky Day?

2006-06-03T11:07:00.000+08:00

Throughout his life, Luang Pu never accepted the idea of lucky hours or lucky days.

Even when he was simply asked, "What would be a good day to ordain?" or "to disrobe?" or "Which days are lucky or unlucky?" he never went along with the idea. He'd usually say, "All days are good."

If people asked him to determine an auspicious time, he would have them go find out for themselves, or else he would say, "Any time that's convenient is a good time."

He would conclude by saying,

"Everything comes from our behavior. Good times, bad times, lucky times, unlucky times, merit, sin: All these things come from human behavior."

Extract from: Gifts He Left Behind, by Venerable Ajaan Dune Atulo

He Does, But He Doesn't

2006-06-02T15:37:00.000+08:00

In 1979, Luang Pu went to Chantaburi to rest and to visit with Ajaan Somchai.

On that occasion, a senior monk from Bangkok — Phra Dhammavaralankan of Wat Buppharam, the ecclesiastical head of the southern region of the country — was also there, practicing meditation in his old age, being only one year younger than Luang Pu.

When he learned that Luang Pu was a meditation monk, he became interested and engaged Luang Pu in a long conversation on the results of meditation. He mentioned his responsibilities, saying that he had wasted a lot of his life engaged in study and administration work well into his old age.

He discussed different points of meditation practice with Luang Pu, finally asking him, "Do you still have any anger?"

Luang Pu immediately answered,

"I do, but I don't pick it up."

* * * * *

"When a person has shaved his hair and beard and put on the ochre robe, that's the symbol of his state as a monk. But it counts only on the external level.

Only when he has shaved off the mental tangle — all lower preoccupations — from his heart can you call him a monk on the internal level.

"When a head has been shaved, little creeping insects like lice can't take up residence there.

In the same way, when a mind has gained release from its preoccupations and is freed from fabrication, suffering can't take up residence at all.

When this becomes your normal state, you can be called a genuine monk."

Extract from: Gifts He Left Behind, by Venerable Ajaan Dune Atulo

No Strings Attached

2006-05-30T16:39:00.000+08:00

Why is it that we don't choose our children, yet we love them forever, and unconditionally? Even if they turn out far less than desired, we still love them.

On the other hand, although we carefully choose our husband or wife, checking them out more thoroughly than anything else in our life before signing the contract, on the whole we do not love them forever, and certainly never unconditionally! Why?

It is because the love that flows between partners in a relationship is not the same as the love that flows between parents and children.

In an article in Time magazine several years ago entitled, "The Chemistry of Love", bio-chemists demonstrated that when boy meets girl over a romantic, candle-lit dinner, hormones are secreted into the bloodstream to produce a chemically induced high.

Your partner literally "turns you on". And you love that high, not that person. Or as Time put it, "You love the way they make you feel".

Later, when your body builds up a natural tolerance to those chemicals, your partner doesn't turn you on any more. So it's not their fault after all. It is just chemistry. So, please, never shout and get angry with your partner, shout and get angry at the chemistry book instead!

The love between a parent and a child is substantially different. You love them even though there may be nothing in it for you. You love them irrespective of the way they make you feel.

It is selfless love, unconditional love.

Extract from: Living Meaningfully, Dying Joyfully, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

Transform Our Mind

2006-05-22T14:12:00.000+08:00

There is a story of one Tibetan man who wanted to practice Dharma, so he spent days circumambulating holy relic monuments.

Soon his teacher came by and said, "What you're doing is very nice, but wouldn't it be better to practice the Dharma?" The man scratched his head in wonder and the next day began to do prostrations.

He did hundreds of thousands of prostrations, and when he reported the total to his teacher, his teacher responded, "That's very nice, but wouldn't it be better to practice the Dharma?"

Puzzled, the man now thought to recite the Buddhist scriptures aloud. But when his teacher came by, he again commented, "Very good, but wouldn't it be better to practice the Dharma?"

Thoroughly bewildered, the exasperated man queried his spiritual master, "But what does that mean? I thought I have been practicing the Dharma."

The teacher responded concisely, "The practice of Dharma is to change your attitude towards life and give up attachment to worldly concerns."

The real Dharma practice is not something we can see with our eyes. Real practice is changing our mind, not just changing our behavior so that we appear holy, blessed, and others say, "Wow, what a fantastic person!"

We have already spent our lives putting on various acts in an effort to convince ourselves and others that we are indeed what in fact we aren't at all. We hardly need to create another facade, this time of a super-holy person.

What we do need to do is change our mind, our way of viewing, interpreting and reacting to the world around and within us.

* * * * *

Once, Bengungyel, a meditator doing retreat in a cave, was expecting his benefactor to visit.

As he set up offerings on his altar that morning, he did so with more care and in a much elaborate and impressive way than usual, hoping that his benefactor would think what a great practitioner he was and would give him more offerings.

Later, when he realized his own corrupt motivation, he jumped up in disgust, grabbed handfuls of ashes from the ashbin and flung them over the altar while he shouted, "I throw this in the face of attachment to worldly concerns."

In another part of Tibet, Padampa Sangyey, a master with clairvoyant powers, viewed all that had happened in the cave. With delight, he declared to those around him, "Bengungyel has just made the purest offering in all Tibet!"

The essence of the Dharma practice isn't our external performance, but our internal motivation.

Real Dharma is not huge temples, pompous ceremonies, elaborate dress and intricate rituals. These things are tools that can help our mind if they are used properly, with correct motivation.

We can't judge another person's motivation, nor should we waste our time trying to evaluate others' actions. We can only look at our own mind, thereby determining whether our actions, words and thoughts are beneficial or not.

For that reason we must be ever attentive not to let our minds come under the influence of selfishness, attachment, anger, etc.

As it says in the Eight Verses of Thought Transformation, "Vigilant, the moment a disturbing attitude appears, endangering myself and others, I will confront and avert it without delay."

In this way, our Dharma practice becomes pure and is effective not only in leading us to temporal and ultimate happiness, but also in enabling us to make our lives beneficial for others.

Extract from: Chocolate Frosting and Garbage, by Venerable Thubten Chodron

Can You Bend Spoons With Your Mind?

2006-05-19T10:55:00.000+08:00

One time I gave a talk in a Hong Kong school to a group of children.

One child asked, "Can you bend spoons with your mind?" Another asked, "Has God ever talked to you?" They were very disappointed when I said, "No."

I went on to explain that for me a real true miracle is becoming a kind human being.

If you have psychic powers but lack a kind heart, the powers are of no use. In fact, they could even be disadvantageous: people may get very upset if they find all their spoons have been bent!

How do we cultivate a kind heart?

It is not enough to tell ourselves that we should be nice, because telling ourselves what we should or should not be, feel, or do doesn't make us become that way.

Filling ourselves with "shoulds" often just makes us feel guilty because we never are what we think we should be. We need to know how to actually transform our mind.

In other words, we must realize the disadvantages of being self-centered. We must truly want to develop a kind heart, not just keep thinking that we should develop a kind heart.

In the morning, when we first wake up, before getting out of bed, before thinking about what we will eat for breakfast or which obnoxious jerk we will see at the office, we can start the day by thinking, "Today as much as possible, I won't harm anybody. Today as much as possible I am going to try be of service and benefit to others. Today I want to do all actions so that all living beings can attain the long-term happiness of enlightenment."

Setting a positive motivation the first thing in the morning is very beneficial.

When we first wake up, our mind is very subtle and delicate. If we set a strong positive motivation at this time, there is a greater chance of it staying with us and influencing us throughout the day.

After generating our positive motivation, we get out of bed, wash, maybe have a cup of tea, and then meditate or recite prayers.

By starting the day in this way, we get in touch with ourselves and become our own friend by treasuring and re-enforcing our good qualities.

Extract from: Practicing Buddhism in Daily Life, by Venerable Thubten Chodron

No Fighting

2006-05-18T10:22:00.000+08:00

He was saying that once he had malaria and, instead of just laying in bed, in typical Ajahn Maha Boowa style he decided to fight it, to battle it and conquer it with his will. So he got off the floor, went out of his hut, got a broom, and started to sweep even though he was sweating and shaking.

Tan Ajahn Mun saw him and told him off. Later that evening he gave a talk to the monks saying: "There are some people in this monastery who are born boxers and they haven't changed". He was of course alluding to Ajahn Maha Boowa who was a boxer when he was a layperson. Ajahn Mun said that's not the way of Buddhism. He actually said it is the way of Hindu yogis.

The way of Buddhism is to investigate suffering, not to fight it. Because if you fight you will find that you just get more and more suffering. Instead, use wisdom power rather than will power.

Wisdom power is always much more effective because it's coming from a good place.

Will power, in nearly all cases, comes from ego, from self, and you cannot expect it to produce results if it's coming from such an unfortunate source.

To use wisdom power means remembering the Teachings and looking at your experience in the framework of those teachings, the framework of the Four Noble Truths.

The Lord Buddha taught that birth is suffering, old age, sickness and death are suffering. And all that goes in between is also suffering. In brief, life is suffering.

So when suffering comes -- as disappointment, as frustration, as loneliness or depression, or as wondering what you're supposed to be doing -- you're seeing here a basic truth of nature which every human being, whether in a monastery or outside, must come across from time to time in their lives.

There are times when you don't know what to do because the suffering is so bad. As Ajahn Chah used to say, "You cannot go forward, you cannot go back, you cannot stand still" -- you don't know what to do. This is a beautiful time. It is the time you can really understand what the Lord Buddha was talking about -- about the suffering of life.

The thing to do when suffering arises is to investigate. To investigate means to watch and to observe in silence. You have to watch without interfering, without getting involved, because if you get involved you're not watching fully.

Extract from: Joy at Last to Know There is No Happiness in The World, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

A Driveless Bus

2006-05-16T16:14:00.000+08:00

Years ago I gave the simile of "the driverless bus".

It's like you're driving through life in a bus, and you get pleasant experiences and unpleasant experiences. You think it's your fault; or you think that it's the driver's fault.

"Why is it that the driver doesn't drive into pleasant country and stay there for a long time? Why does he always drive into unpleasant territory and stay there a long time?"

You want to find out who is controlling this journey called "my life".

Why is it that you experience so much pain and suffering? You want to find out where the driver is, the driver of these five aggregates (Khandhas): body, feeling, perception, mentality and consciousness - the driver of you.

After doing a lot of meditation and listening to the Dhamma, you finally go up to where the driver's seat is in the bus, and you find it's empty!

It shocks you at first, but it gives you so much relief to know there's no one to blame.

How many people blame somebody when there is suffering? They either blame God, or they blame their parents, or they blame the government, or they blame the weather, or they blame some sickness they have, and in the last resort if they can't find anyone else to blame, they blame themselves.

It's stupidity. There is no one to blame!

Look inside and see it's empty, "a driverless bus". When you see non-self (Anatta), you see there is no one to blame; it's Anatta.

The result is that you go back into your seat and just enjoy the journey. If it's a driverless bus, what else can you do?

You sit there when you go through pleasant experiences, "just pleasant experiences that's all".

You go through painful experiences, "just painful experiences, that's all".

It's just a driverless bus.

Extract from: The Ending of Things, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

Happiness vs. Unhappiness

2006-05-11T15:01:00.000+08:00

So are you saying that you can let go of happiness easily, while unhappiness is difficult to let go of?

And you think that the things we like are easy to give up, but you’re wondering why the things we dislike are hard to give up-but if they’re not good, why are they hard to give up?

It’s not like that.

Think anew - they are completely equal. It’s just that we don’t incline to them equally.

When there is unhappiness, we feel bothered, and we want it to go away quickly, so we feel it’s hard to get rid of.

Happiness doesn’t usually bother us, so we are friends with it and we feel we can let go of it easily.

It’s not like that; it’s not oppressing and squeezing our hearts, that’s all. Unhappiness oppresses us. We think one has more value or weight than the other, but in truth they are equal.

It’s like heat and cold. We can be burned to death by fire. We can also be frozen stiff by cold, and we die just the same. Neither is greater than the other.

Happiness and suffering are like this, but in our thinking we give them different value.

Extract from: The Exhaustion of Doubt, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

The Hole Is Too Deep

2006-05-10T11:11:00.000+08:00

Most people just want to perform good deeds to make merit, but they don't want to give up wrongdoing. It's just that "the hole is too deep."

Suppose there was a hole and there was something at the bottom of it. Now anyone who put his hand into the hole and didn't reach the bottom would say the hole was too deep. If a hundred or a thousand people put their hands down the hole, they'd all say, "The hole is too deep!" No one would say that his arm was too short.

We have to come back to ourselves. We have to take a step back and look at ourselves. Don't blame the hole for being too deep. Turn around and look at your own arm. If you can see this, then you will make progress on the spiritual path and will find happiness.

* * * * *

Oil and water are different in the same way that a wise man and an ignorant man are different.

The Buddha lived with form, sound, odor, taste, touch and thought, but he was an arahant so he was able to turn away from them rather than toward them. He turned away and let go little by little, since he understood that the heart is just the heart and thought is just thought. He didn't confuse them and mix them together like an ignorant man does.

The heart is just the heart. Thoughts and feelings are just thoughts and feelings.

Let things be as they are. Let form be just form, let sound be just sound, let thought be just thought.

Why should we bother to attach to them?

If we feel and think in this way, then there is detachment and separateness. Our thoughts and feelings will be on one side and our heart will be on the other.

Just like oil and water - they are in the same bottle but they are separate.

* * * * *

Right now we are sitting in a peaceful forest.

Here, if there's no wind, the leaves remain still. When a wind blows, they flap and flutter.

The mind is the same. When it contacts a mental impression, it, too, flaps and flutters. According to the nature of that mental impression.

And the less we know of Dhamma, the more the mind will continually pursue mental impressions.

Feeling happy, it succumbs to happiness. Feeling suffering, it succumbs to suffering. It's in a constant flap.

* * * * *

Don't be angry with those who don't practice.

Don't speak against them. Just continually advise them. They will come to the Dhamma when their spiritual factors are developed.

It's like selling medicines. We advertise our medicines and those with a headache or stomachache will come and take some. Those who don't want our medicines let them be.

They're like fruit that are still green. We can't force them to be ripe and sweet — just let them be. Let them grow up, sweeten and ripen all by themselves.

If we think like this, our minds will be at ease. So we don't need to force anybody. Simply advertise our medicines and leave it at that. When someone is ill, he'll come around and buy some.

Extract from: A Tree in a Forest, by Venerable Ajahn Chah

Tricky Mind

2006-05-09T10:21:00.000+08:00

The mind plays a lot of tricks.

When you are living a life in which you can’t simply fulfill your wishes and do what you want, strange feelings and incredible forms of obsessive greed can arise over things that had never really seemed a problem before.

When I had been a layman, my greed was spread over a wide range of things, but in monastic life it was all focused on sugar and sweets. Here I was, an ordained monk trying to lead a spiritual life, acting like a hungry ghost, dreaming about sugar. Another American monk even had his mother send big boxes of sweets and chocolate cakes.

Because the greed was so focused, I could easily contemplate it. Learning to reflect on these desires, these obsessions of the mind, is very important.

It’s here that we often need the precepts to stop us from following our habits or whatever is easiest to do. Precepts help us to see our impulses, how we follow them, and the results. The restraint and restriction of the precepts give us a sense of stopping.

With reflective awareness, we begin to notice how strong the mind’s impulses and compulsions can be. We see them as mental objects rather than as needs we must fulfill.

Even though the mind sometimes screams, "I can’t take any more of this," the truth of the matter is that we can take more. Human beings have amazing powers of endurance. If we learn to endure and not just be caught in the momentum of impulsivity, then we begin to find a strength in our practice.

We don’t have to be a slave to habits and impulses.

* * * * *

We can’t control what arises in the mind, but we can reflect on what we are feeling and learn from it rather than simply being caught helplessly in our impulses and habits.

Even though there is a lot in life that we can’t change, we can change our attitude towards it. That’s what so much of meditation is really about—changing our attitude from a self-centered, "get rid of this or get more of that" to one of welcoming life as it is.

Welcoming the opportunity to eat food that we don’t like. Welcoming wearing three robes on a hot morning. Welcoming discomfort, feeling fed up, wanting to run away. This way of welcoming life reflects a deeper understanding.

Life is like this.

Sometimes it’s very nice, sometimes it’s horrible, and much of the time it’s neither one way nor the other. Life is like this.

Extract from: Life Is Like This, by Venerable Ajahn Sumedho

Drive Safely

2006-05-02T15:49:00.000+08:00

When we drive a car, we are expected to observe certain rules so that we do not have an accident.

Two thousand five years ago, the Buddha offered certain guidelines to his lay students to help them live peaceful, wholesome, and happy lives. They were the Five Wonderful Precepts, and at the foundation of each of these precepts is mindfulness.

With mindfulness, we are aware of what is going on in our bodies, our feelings, our minds, and the world, and we avoid doing harm to ourselves and others.

When we are mindful, we can see that by refraining from doing "this," we prevent "that" from happening.

* * * * *

In Buddhism, precepts, concentration, and insight always go together.

Practicing the precepts brings about concentration, and concentration is needed for insight. Mindfulness is the ground for concentration, concentration allows us to look deeply, and insight is the fruit of looking deeply.

Practicing the precepts, therefore, helps us be more calm and concentrated and brings more insight and enlightenment, which makes our practice of the precepts more solid.

Extract from: For A Future To Be Possible - Commentaries on the Five Wonderful Precepts, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

Let Go!

2006-04-29T12:03:00.000+08:00

Meditation is the way to achieve letting go.

In meditation one lets go of the complex world outside in order to reach the serene world inside.

In all types of mysticism and in many traditions, this is known as the path to the pure and powerful mind. The experience of this pure mind, released from the world, is very wonderful and blissful.

* * * * *

In the way that I teach meditation, I like to begin at the very simple stage of giving up the baggage of past and future.

Abandoning the past means not even thinking about your work, your family, your commitments, your responsibilities, your history, the good or bad times you had as a child..., you abandon all past experiences by showing no interest in them at all. You become someone who has no history during the time that you meditate.

As for the future, the anticipations, fears, plans, and expectations - let all of that go too.

The Lord Buddha once said about the future, "Whatever you think it will be, it will always be something different"! This future is known to the wise as uncertain, unknown and so unpredictable. It is often complete stupidity to anticipate the future, and always a great waste of your time to think of the future in meditation.

* * * * *

I describe this as developing your mind like a padded cell!

When any experience, perception or thought hits the wall of the 'padded cell', it does not bounce back again. It just sinks into the padding and stops right there.

Thus we do not allow the past to echo in our consciousness, certainly not the past of yesterday and all that time before, because we are developing the mind inclined to letting go, giving away and unburdening.

* * * * *

Often with meditation there will be some hard work at the beginning, but be willing to bear that hard work knowing that it will lead you to experience some very beautiful and meaningful states. They will be well worth the effort!

It is like a person who goes to work all day Monday and gets no money at the end of the day. "What am I doing this for?", he thinks. He works all day Tuesday and still gets nothing. Another bad day. All day Wednesday, all day Thursday, and still nothing to show for all the hard work. That's four bad days in a row.

Then along comes Friday, he does exactly the same work as before and at the end of the day the boss gives him a pay cheque. "Wow! Why can't every day be a pay day?!"

Why can't every meditation be `pay day'?

Now, do you understand the simile? It is in the difficult meditations that you build up your credit, where you build up the causes for success. While working for peace in the hard meditations, you build up your strength, the momentum for peace. Then when there's enough credit of good qualities, the mind goes into a good meditation and it feels like `pay-day'. It is in the bad meditations that you do most of the work.

Extract from: The Basic Method of Meditation, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

I Don't Eat Durian, Dear

2006-04-27T16:53:00.000+08:00

One day when I was practicing chanting alone in my temple in Vietnam, there happened to be one durian on the altar that had been offered to the Buddha.

I was trying to recite the Lotus Sutra, using a wooden drum and a large bowl-shaped bell for accompaniment, but I could not concentrate at all. I finally decided to turn the bell over and imprison the durian so I could chant the sutra. After I finished, I bowed to the Buddha and liberated the durian.

If you were to say to me, "I love you so much I would like you to eat some of this durian," I would suffer. You love me, you want me to be happy, but you force me to eat durian.

That is an example of love without understanding. Your intention is good, but you don't have the correct understanding.

In order to love properly, you have to understand.

Understanding means to see the depth of the darkness, the pain, and the suffering of the other person. If you don't see that, the more you do for her, the more she will suffer.

Creating happiness is an art. If during your childhood, you saw your mother or father create happiness in your family, you were able to learn from those things. But if your parents did not know how to create happiness in your family, you may not know how to do it.

So in our institute, we have to teach the art of making people happy. Living together is an art. Even with good will, you can make your partner quite unhappy. Art is the essence of life. We have to be artful in our speech and action. The substance of art is mindfulness.

Extract from: Happiness of One Person, Touching Peace, by Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh

My Mind Is A Water Buffalo

2006-04-26T14:27:00.000+08:00

At one time in Thailand, a man was taking his water buffalo out to the fields to graze. The water buffalo became very excited and ran off. The man tried to stop him.

Just try stopping a water buffalo. Think how big a water buffalo is. It’s huge, and this was just a small Thai farmer. He held onto the rope. The rope became twisted around his finger and pulled his finger off!

He came into the monastery missing half a finger. Obviously, there was blood everywhere, and quite a lot of pain. The abbot took him to the local hospital and got him patched up. The farmer was okay afterwards.

But that was a great metaphor which he gave us. The metaphor was that you are foolish to try to stop a water buffalo; it will just pull your fingers off.

Your husband, your wife, your children, and sometimes your mind are like a water buffalo. If you try and stop them, what happens is that something is ‘pulled off’, and you get a lot of pain and suffering.

What happens if you do let the water buffalo go? The water buffalo only runs about half a kilometre or so down the road. It doesn’t go that far. It stops and settles itself down, and then you can walk gently up to it and pull it back again. It’s stopped, and it’s easy to control.

Sometimes that’s what you need to do with husbands, and wives, and kids. They run off, and then they stop and you can pull them in.

Often, the mind is like that in meditation; it’s running off into thoughts and fantasies. Let it go. Don’t let it pull your finger off. Once it’s gone a little way down the road, when it’s stopped and it’s had its little bit of fun, okay now bring it back to the silence.

* * * * *

The best thing that you can do for the whole world, the best gift you can give to others, is to become Enlightened, so that you can have huge compassion and huge resources of wisdom to share with others.

You become Enlightened for your own sake, and for the sake of others. There is no difference between these two ways. People make all these differences.

So go out there into the world, and for your own sake become Enlightened, and become Enlightened for the sake of others.

Extract from: Practising in the World, by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso

Gossip, Gossip

2006-04-21T15:53:00.000+08:00

I have an old habit of talking about the faults of others. In fact, it's so habitual that sometimes I don't realize I've done it until afterwards.

What lies behind this tendency to put others down?

One of my teachers, Geshe Ngawang Dhargye, used to say, "You get together with a friend and talk about the faults of this person and the misdeeds of that one. Then you go on to discuss others' mistakes and negative qualities. In the end, the two of you feel good because you've agreed you're the two best people in the world."

* * * * *

Everyone wants to be loved - to have his or her positive aspects noticed and acknowledged, to be cared for and treated with respect.

Almost everyone is afraid of being judged, criticized, and rejected as unworthy.

Cultivating the mental habit that sees our own and others' beauty brings happiness to ourselves and others; it enables us to feel and to extend love.

Leaving aside the mental habit that finds faults prevents suffering for ourselves and others.

This should be the heart of our spiritual practice.

For this reason, His Holiness the Dalai Lama said, "My religion is kindness."

Extract from: Speaking of the Faults of Others, by Venerable Thubten Chodron