|
Excellent. So I did have a couple of suggestions for today's talk. The first one was Buddhism mamalade. Sometimes I like crazy suggestions because I've given so many talks in my lifetime. I think I've talked about it just about every subject, but that's one subject I haven't talked about. And I'm not going to talk about it either. Oh, never mind. Okay. The reason why it came up just so that you know, was, you know, yesterday went to one of these little ceremonies for waysuck at the Parliament House. And every now and again, you know, you meet some of these kind of movers and shakers.
I call them movers and shakers because most of the old people in places of authority have got Parkinson's disease. That's why they call shakers. But nevertheless, it's nice to have those connections and they're very useful sometimes. And it's also one of the people who was there. Wuna was the honorary Thai consul and Ruben. And he keeps on winning these mamalade competitions. I mean, like world-class mamalade. And so that's what he gave me yesterday. He always gives me a gift of gold medal, world-class mamalade. So that's what I've been telling everybody about it. They ask me, why did I go over to Parliament House? You know, to meet all these important people, I said, no, no, to get some mamalade. But that's just messing around.
Now, the most important thing you do this, you find out what's the best service you can do to maybe help make this monastery and dhammasara monastery. And even the monastery down in Albany. And I know that sometimes the venerable moodu, the adjunct moodu, this is to this talk on a Wednesday evening. But I think the minister responsible for something or other multicultural affairs or something had told me booty.
And he mentioned he went walking down the Bühbelman track and he actually saw the monastery down in Albany. So he knows the Albany monastery. And he needed to mention anything about crucial though we hare, or actually did mention coastal we hare, or dhammasara. So sorry, venerable nuns. So you're out of the picture. But anyway, we did mention it to him that we've got all of these amazing people here living this monastic life, the biggest monasteries here in Western Australia.
And a wonderful thing it is to have this, but it does need to have that inspiration and protection as well. Because very often these things which Buddhist monks and Buddhist nuns do, which don't fit into the normal way which Westerners do. The culture of our, actually it's not quite the same, the culture of our governments, our democratic. And I always love saying that. I think it's a point which who monks and nuns just know so well. But the Sangha is probably the oldest continually existing institution, democratic institution in the world. Continue to run and continue to spread. And it's a beautiful institution because it does allow for debate. It does allow for questioning. And whatever we do here in this monastery, that we have to have an agreement to do it first of all.
And if all of you sort of don't like what I say, you can vote against me. And I know that I think many of you know this monks. If you think that I'm not doing a good job as an abbot of this monastery, you can meet together and sack me. Come on, that was an invitation. It is in order just to have an easier life.
But I kind of try. When I first became the abbot of this monastery, there's one thing which I really considered very carefully. Actually a couple of things. The first thing that you are a Buddhist monk. And as a Buddhist monk, the last thing you want to do is to let people down by deceiving them. And one of the things which I kept on asking me, once Najan Jakkara, my previous mentor here, did know when he fell in love and decided to go and become a lay person instead of a monk, that let down a lot of people in our Buddhist society. He couldn't help it. He did it the right way. But nevertheless, when the position was offered to me, one of the first things which I did was go into my heart.
I didn't have a nice cave like I do in these days. Go into my heart and just start to contemplate. Najan Brahm, what is the chances of disrobing? And I had to be 100% certain that I would never do that. I had a very fortunate life as a monk. Fortunate, he had nice meditation, giving lots of happiness when you sat down. It was an easy thing for me to do. And also that gave me inspiration. The health was pretty good. Actually, it has always been pretty good. And even though I ate some disgusting foods sometime, it was like the frogs and the beetles and other stuff which was put in the caries in the northeast of Thailand. Only because that was all the villages ate. It was a subsistence economy. And it was tough for everybody. But nevertheless, I always managed to keep in reasonably good health. If we were offered frogs to eat, boiled frogs, we'd always get the best frogs.
But I must have been, I did not like them at all. Sometimes when it rained over in Thailand, big heavy rains beginning of the rainy season. You knew you could hear them. All the villagers would be out in the evening, collecting as many frogs as they could. That's when they all came out. And it was good fun for them. But I always remember that I didn't sleep well that night because I knew what we were going to get for lunch the next day. Frogs. But anyway, nevertheless, I was fortunate to have good health, but also that inspiration. I say for health it's important if you possibly can have reasonably good health. And especially just not too many of those energy sappings, energy draining illnesses. As though you can sit peacefully and let the body disappear, then you can get into some really nice deep meditations. I've told you this many times before that even when you have a fever, and a very strong fever, in a hospital, you can still get into good meditations.
And that's one amazing thing which I would love to share with everybody, that just because you're sick does not mean you can't meditate. That's what the Buddha told, Nalaka, Peter. That's the father. But they're like the father of Nalaka and his mother. And said to them that even though you're very old, even though your body's sick, the mind does not need to be sick. There's a powerful statement there. And this is two parts to sicknesses, the bodily sickness and the emotional response to it. And it's a powerful thing to understand that and to investigate it. And after a while, whenever I did get sick, you'd value it. Weird thing, you weren't trying to get rid of it all the time. You were valuing it, seeing this as part of having a human body. It's part of life. It's part of what we learn from. And when we learn from those things we don't like, the things which are hard to accept, when we learn from those things we can't far more what the word is, resilient.
I know that resilience is really important. Now, I've just been over to Indonesia, to so many islands, and just in eight or nine days, just many different islands every day.
And as I'm doing one night stands in each different city. And as you did that, that spreads the dumb around. But it's also very tiring. And of course, there are always flights which are delayed or cancelled and you have to book everything again. And you can get very tired and exhausting. But nevertheless, I always love this resilience. I expect these things to happen. When you expect these things together to happen, and you make the best use of them, I know even this is my travel log, even when I left Perth, you know, it was going to be very difficult to get a meal. Because when it left, it was really early in the morning before dawn.
Well, not actually before dawn, but by the time you got through the customs and immigration, it would be very difficult to get a meal on the inside of the airport. Just flying, just on economy class. And it didn't arrive early enough in the destination to get a meal when I landed there. So I had a pretty much a good idea that I just would not eat. And I know that many of you tried to arrange to get a meal for me, but look, I'm a monk. I thank you for caring for me, but the opportunity to fast for a day was very, very attractive for me, honestly. Unfortunately, the flight was delayed. And because the flight was delayed, I could get a meal before I went through the customs. Many people complained about delayed flights. For me, I thought that heavily beings must be looking after me. They delayed their flights, so can and then can get me a lovely breakfast inside the airport.
A big one, so that was enough for the day. So it's tough like that. You do learn. That's a small thing. Some of you say it's just learning how to adapt and just not really worry about things so much. And when you do things like that, the life becomes much more peaceful, more enjoyable. And this is what you do. You get this kind of resilience. Always see the positive side of things. Always see the positive side of people. And that's one of the things which I remember I was telling me. He said, your trouble, I can't believe. He mentioned this as your trouble. You always see the good things in people. I don't think that's a trouble. I think it's a nice thing to be able to look at, especially the monks and the nuns and the novices and any garricas and helpers and people who look after this place.
And really value their services. And it's just one amazing stuff they do. And because you see their value, you don't see their faults, that makes it a much more lovely monastery to live in. And you try and do as much as you possibly can for everybody so that they can have a happy time here. And they can find some of even the food which they like to eat. Even though some of that food I will never eat myself and you might eat some of the food which I like. Still I always like to make sure that each one of you have something here which you can enjoy. And I sometimes go out of my way to make sure that that food comes. So all of the monks, at least they can look forward to the lunch or whatever else they take here.
And it's stuff which they feel is good for them. And that degree of service keeps going on. And sometimes when you see, just like in the 18, was the 18th Sangha in Damasara, you said, or was it just 18 with anagarica as well? 18 with anagarica as well.
But that's only a matter of time. Their brown needs to be. And when you see just such a big Sangha over here, over in Damasara, over in Kusala, over in Dhamma Yanaama, over in Albany. And it's amazing just what has happened here, thriving sort of Sanghas.
And people just really love listening to some of these talks which we have. And they listen so much. Even though when I was over in Indonesia, it was a different talk every night in different places, except the last couple of days in Jakarta, there was like just a very small weekend retreat.
There were so many people who would come to every venue. And just the amount of people who would arrive, even though I would have the talk translated into a Bahasa, Indonesia, in every venue. Nevertheless, there was so many people who loved those talks and kept on coming, and coming and coming, and laughing at the jokes. It was always a very hard one. I translated to translate a joke which could understand in English, but then actually was it funny in Bahasa. They all went down really well, so I didn't have to worry about anything there. You know, had enough friends from Indonesia long enough. They knew what to expect and they got it. But that degree of service, sometimes people ask, you know, why do you sometimes give talks with many people laugh? You know, is that what a Buddhist monk should do?
And of course it is, because one of the things which I noticed there was that many of the people who were coming came with their little kids as well. And their little kids, you know, they could do something with Mummy and Daddy, and they understood many of those stories, understood them so well, that the parents would sometimes tell me, said, I don't know, that story you told me about, say the fishing the pond, and those fishing the pond, is a good thing they are in the pond, or should they be free in the rivers? If you are free in the rivers, it is a much more dangerous environment. If you are in an aquarium, then you are much safer, and you always get enough food and heat and cool, whatever you need. Just like being in a monastery, this venerable sister is being in damasawa monastery, it is like being in an aquarium.
Sometimes people come and look at you. Well, you know that always being in some food and good health care, and sometimes the food which you need is actually, it is delivered to you. Just like in an aquarium, people just sprinkle some food over there, and they never put bigger fish in the same aquarium as smaller fish, when those bigger fish will eat you. So you are pretty safe in there. And so these men just can't go travelling where you would like to, but at least you are safe. Safe, peaceful, and have the opportunities not needed to worry about so much. I love that part of Monastic Life.
The fact that many people in this world, they have so many insecurities. Insecurities of where you are going to stay and how you are going to live, are you going to be able to receive enough food and requisites for things like sickness.
And of course, you can always receive enough of those here. That's one of the other things which I contemplated when I first gave an ordination here. I jumped around part of your responsibilities to making sure there is enough resources for everybody. That I can manage to know enough doctors or people to help you if you really need something. And in all these years, our lay supporters, many of you sitting in the back over there, have been helping out this monastic for such a long time, not just this monastic, but all the other monasticers which we have. And what an amazing thing that is, you see some of these lay communities. They have been coming here once a week for the last 31 years. Almost every week they come here. They never abandon us. And they will also support Damasara and Kuzla Monastery.
Basically, whenever we need something, just let them know. And they will find some way of supplying that. And that is a beautiful thing to see that we do have such support. How does that work in a country which is not Buddhist? It is not just relying on the expat community. I mean, as many people who have never been to Thailand or Sri Lanka, or there is great part of the South Korea or wherever, they have never been there before. But I always remember that inspiring story. One of the monks asked, I just started to send monks overseas. And they said, will they survive? And who is going to feed them? And that is when Ajahn Shower made this wonderful statement back. He said, aren't there any kind people in, say, Perth? Of course there are so many kind people in Perth. He said, if there is kind people in Perth, you would never need to go hungry. And what a true comment that was.
It wasn't just relying on Buddhists. It was just relying on people's kindness throughout this world. And that is one of the things you just try and encourage and generate. Not just like faith in the teaching, not just peace in meditation, but people's appreciation of kindness and its power. And of course you know that I try my best to be kind to each one of you. Sometimes you fail, sometimes you just have not got enough energy. You are too tired or it is just impossible for one reason or another. But that ability to be kind and show and demonstrate that kindness. That is an important quality. It is one of the most important qualities of this idea of a Kali Anamita, a good friend, who people could look up to and you can serve them and advise them. And you never let them down. That is one of the most important things is that trust which you develop.
When you can trust the people you live with and trust, no others, the world becomes a very beautiful little island, you know, when which you live. That being an island unto yourself, a refuge unto yourself. But a dumb and sang with the main refuge, but you can see just where you are, becomes this beautiful bubble, if you don't have to fear for anything. And of course it is not just that physical idea of fear. It is the fact that no matter what happens to you, if you do miss a flight, the flight gets delayed, if you do miss a meal, or the meal doesn't agree with you and you have diarrhea, or you have some other sickness, you know, please always trust the fellow monks and nuns, you know, and the lay community in our organisation called the BSWA and beyond. Now we are always trying to do our best to look after you and heal you.
I still remember an experience I had when I was such a young monk. And one of the things we were doing in the morning, instead of having like the buffet service we have here, whatever food they had, you know, the rice you could choose as much sticky rice as you wanted, but the rest of the food, you know, the curries and the sweets or whatever there was there, then one of the monks, you know, we'd all feel four of us would get up,and we'd take the pot and just go down the line and scoop it into the monk's bowls. And if the monk didn't want any, he'd just put his hand up and say, you know, like doing Sri Lanka, you know, atty means that's enough. Or tikka tikka just means a small amount. So, you know, you had some control over what you ate. But sometimes if you were the monk who was carrying the bowl and doing the serving, sometimes your bowl was at the mercy of the other monks who were ditching it out.
And I still remember, I don't know why these memories stick in your mind almost forever. I still remember this time, it was in visiting Chittos Monastery. When I was visiting there, there was a fellow who used to deliver custard powder to restaurants in the area. And there'd always be a few packages of custard left over. And it was not sort of stealing. He was allowed to actually to offer whatever was left over to the monastery. So in that period, Chittos Monastery had so much custard. We had custard every day, almost, when I was visiting anyway. I didn't mind custard, but when I was, like, doling out the custard, you know, to the monks that had their bowl, you know, their arms bowl. And it was actually a Sajitto who had to help me because it was such a heavy, big bowl of custard. And I remember, still remember, it kind of slipped when he was ladling it in. And his poor monk, in his one bit of the day, was covered with custard. Everything was covered with custard.
All the curries and all of the, I don't know what else he had in their bread, or whatever sweets or whatever, banana. It was all covered with custard, it was so much. And I remember afterwards, one of the other monks telling me, he said, look, be more careful next time. Because your job is not to be like a tough teacher to, you know, all those other monks, junior and senior to you. Your job is to be kind. He said, see how you can turn them on, find out what they like. They'll literally do that. And make sure, if it's like custard, they hate custard, just make sure you pass them by. And if they want some, say, chilli sauce, and I appreciate it, it's quite a few times, monks just, you know,
I was serving somebody else, and they put a lot of chilli sauce on stuff which I liked, which meant I could hardly eat it.
But they said, try and be kind to everybody. Try and be kind and make sure that you put the chilli sauce, if that's what they like, in the place where they like in their bowl.
Be kind to them. And that was such an important teaching to me. You know, to be kind to people you live with, your job is not to train them and make it so hard for them. To train them with kindness and softness, if you want to be ascetic, that's your choice. But no one else should tell you to be ascetic. You choose that. So in that way, you get a very harmonious kind, monastery. That kindness was something which I didn't expect. I thought it would be just so strict and so tough. If you enjoyed your food, you'll never get enlightened. You know, if you didn't suffer, then you weren't really practicing. Sometimes people would say that. And those type of monasteries never survived. I don't know. I tell this story sometimes before lunch to the people who serve us here. But there was one monastery up in the north of England many years ago.
And the practice they did during the rains retreat was at the end of the morning meal, the one meal of the day, what was ever left over was put in a bucket. And that bucket was put in the freezer and kept to the next day. And the next day it would be warmed up, heated up, and any other, it was properly offered. The binaya was okay. And then any other fresh food which was cooked or came that day would go on the top of the bucket. And the head monk would get a big spoon and stir it all up into a sludge. And then he passed it down the line. Whoever wanted to take whatever they wanted, they could take it. However much they wanted or however little. And whatever was left over would go in the bucket. And it would be frozen and heated up the next day. So there was nothing left over. It was environmentally very, very good. And that was many years ago. Do you think we should do that here? Yes.
The one who said that doesn't appear. Very good. So what happened after three months, with that practice in the range of trees, I guess what happened? All the monks left and went somewhere else. And the head monk was the only one left there. So it's a nice way to get really nice concept. So it was ascetic, but it wasn't kind. And that type of asceticism without the kindness will often mean that things like meditation, just again, you know, you've got no happiness in the mind. And that happiness in the mind is such an important ingredient. They're getting some nice meditation. No, sometimes if I'm traveling and you're tired and you haven't slept that much at night time, and then you've got to go and give a big talk to people. You have a traveling every day on some aircraft going somewhere and it's late. What do you do? Of course, you just cross your legs on the aircraft. Or you just, actually, you can't cross your legs in the aircraft.
It was economy class. But you can just be peaceful, close your eyes and meditate.
And sometimes to be able to meditate, even if you're tired and haven't yet well, what do you do?How can you get some nice meditation and just energize yourself before giving a talk? And how you energize yourself, again, is actually looking at something beautiful when you close your eyes. Something which happened that day, someone you inspired. You know, something which you did, we were raising funds over there for cancer research. It is amazing just what can happen just with a few dollars here, a few dollars there, and how that can help some very, very poor people in some of the motor parts of the many islands of Indonesia. And it's what that means to people. And there's little bits of kindness.You just remember that when you close your eyes and start meditating. That kindness really gives you a huge boost of energy, nice energy.
And when you're traveling or when you're in your room and you just sit down and you've got nothing to do, you just remember the kindness which you've done, which you've been part of. And even though you see many, many people, again, always remember that great teaching, that the one, most important person is the one right in front of you right now. And all those different people from so many different places, you know, just being as kind as you possibly can, making you a few jokes, but certainly paying everybody attention. And there's thousands of them. And when you can do that, you finally get so much more happiness at the end of the day.You can close your eyes.
And the mind becomes very peaceful. You don't go through too many of these preliminaries like relaxing your body. The body is a bit tired, but you sit as best you can. And then you remember all these amazing things which you've performed and the services which you've done, and the happiness which you've created.
And also just the good will which comes to the Buddhist Society of Western Australia, where we're mostly from. And because of that, that really gives a sense of the inner joy and happiness. And again, that's a beautiful source of the energy which is required to get into deep states of meditation. There's the beautiful stuff. It comes from inspiration.
But that inspiration comes from any service, any giving which you have done, not giving with money. You can't do that. I can't do that. I said, man, I don't have any money. But what you do, do, you give your kindness, you give your advice. Sometimes just giving a smile to somebody means a huge amount. And so when a person does that, you get this big boost inside of you. And so when you're teaching, you get a lot of happiness. And that's one of the reasons why, you know, every now and again, we get short of monks or nuns to do the teaching duties which we have.
I don't just ask you to do these things because I'm exploiting you. I will never treat you as a slave no matter how young and an agarica you are.You just all day and today. Of course, you can't bring yourself to do that. It's always presenting opportunities to do some good service, to do some kindness. Even just seeing things like this kitchen project and just how amazing it's turning out to be. I was telling many monks today, it's a really good job. It's a really good job that I've never got involved.
It is a good job. And again, many people are going to be very happy to get their first meal once that kitchen is totally completed. But I don't know how many more days it's going to be. I was saying today, it's good enough as it is. What's done is finished.I love that saying, what's done is finished because I've got so many other emails I haven't replied to yet. So many other questions I haven't answered.
So many other visits I haven't got round to yet. So much stuff which you just don't have time to do. What's done is finished.You can never be perfect, but at least you feel you've done something wonderful in this world. So I need to bring up and help create beautiful monasteries for nuns, for full-life day in bikunis. Great monasteries for monks, still growing, making it try and make it more convenient for everybody. It's more comfortable for everybody. There were some people who just don't want their comfort.
They like the asceticism. Honestly, for myself, I can't always get so happy going back into my cave. You can sleep on the floor instead of a bed. I did once try to sleep on a bed. So I tried to sleep on the floor. When... who was this? Yeah, this was actually an Australian conference. They decided to hold it over in Phnom Penh. So I was invited over there to represent the Australian Buddhism.
And when it went over there, they gave us this really flash hotel, all paid for by the Australian government. I don't know why they did that. Nevertheless, of course, they had this lovely bed in the room.And I said, no, I'm going to sleep on the floor. So I slept on the floor.So in the morning time, when the housekeeper, you know, these housekeepers come in when they're staying in the hotel to clean up. I was there for a few days. And they said, I hadn't touched the bed. I said, yeah, I'm a monk. I sleep on the floor. I don't think she understood any word or what I said. But she thought I was the craziest monk who'd ever been in that hotel. But I kind of enjoyed that. I wasn't doing it because I was being ascetic or, you know, just... or steer. I just preferred the floor. And that's, you know, why I sleep on the floor in my cave. It's much more comfortable sleeping on the bed. I used to do that even in Nolamara in the monk's quarters. I only started sleeping on the bed. And one day they cleaned the carpet. They sprayed some chemical on it. Don't you get to clean it, like a dry cleaning of the carpet.
And, you know, after I had an allergic reaction, you know, to whatever they sprayed on that carpet. So I climbed on the bed. And it was much better up there. At least you'd get to sleep. And I've been sleeping on that bed in Nolamara ever since. It's not a king bed or a queen bed or an emperor bed or whatever. But it was just a comfortable, simple bed. And this is the sort of thing where, you know, you try and create that comfort and well-being for others. And any monks, you know, just need to stay in town. It's a nice place they can stay in Nolamara Temple. So they can look after the elderly parents. Maybe the other elderly people, or they need to have an early fright one morning from the airport. And they can stay in Nolamara overnight before they go. It's wonderful having those resources so you can be kind to monks and nuns.
It would make their life that much more easy without too much bother or difficulties. And it's all done to that trust. So please don't abuse it. But nevertheless, when it's there, use it. And that's what it's there for. And that means that you can have a calm, quiet, peaceful life as a monk or as a nun. And as you're a practice, there's no peaceful life. If you have no worries, no arguments with any other person in this monastery, these are your friends. These are your companions, your caliana mitterer, you know, in the journey to enlightenment. It's amazing just how, you know, that just joy comes up.
And that joy comes up. And then you sit down and just want to meditate. It's a weird thing, but you know, some, often, you know, I'm really tired. I'm really old monk or worn out. But still get sort of inspiration every now and again. And you just go back to your cave, you just want to meditate. You can't not meditate.
And you just, that inspiration comes up, that joy comes up. And that's like the power source of the mind. And when that power source of the mind starts to operate, you're all dead. But you know, honestly, I thought I was mindfully enough. I thought I've got lots of energy now. And I think this Mahler just reminded me that I'm not this young monk I used to be. But the energy comes up and you just want to meditate. Sometimes you get into some beautiful meditations when you least expect them. That's one of the reasons why you least expect it. When you expect things, that's another word for wanting. When you least expect it, you just being peaceful, letting the mind do what it needs to do. And letting go, being still. Just allowing things to happen. You know, one of the questions that a handerker asked me, in public, he said, just a quick answer, just one sentence, what's the essence of Buddhism. He didn't repair me for this.
He just asked me on the spot and I just said, let him go.
He said, a lovely answer, I think. I was sick by that answer. There's not some deep philosophical teaching. But not this deep practice, we actually do. Let's let go. So this idea of a self and a controller, a being, an adjunct Brahman side that tells everybody what to do, that kind of disappears. I don't even tell myself what to do, but alone any of you. But you trust everyone here, inspire them. You know what the veneer is, you know what the dhamma is? Practice. There are many, many huts here, and in dhammasara, a beautiful dhammasara, where you can have some solitude, you can close the doors and windows and sit inside there and hopefully get some beautiful meditation experiences. And when you get those beautiful meditation experiences, it's not just for blissing out. It's kind of worth it, you know, to bliss out a bit, and you can't deny anybody that happiness. But it's also how it cleans the mind up, and how it gets rid of these five hindrances.
So you can actually see clearly. When you see clearly, you hear clearly, you smell clearly, and even the food which you eat, can't help re-tetting that story. You know, the first meditation retreat I did was in boarding houses for students in 1970. Remember this case as well. And when I booked in for a meditation retreat, and I hadn't done that much meditation before, I see hardly any. But nevertheless, I thought, give it a try.
The worst fear I had on going to this meditation retreat in Cambridge in student boarding houses during the vacation period was that the food would be disgusting. I don't remember that. I think many of you know that. The food in England was not well regarded. And there's a good reason for that. But the way that it was was boiled. Boiled until there's no taste left. That's what I remember. Especially for these poor boarding house students. I used to stay in the cottage and eat theirs.
Good chefs there. But in these boarding houses, and I really, really thought I'm not exaggerating. I knew the place. Maybe I'd get some money and just to make sure that I would go out for dinner every evening. That's a good stuff to eat. Or just put something in my bag and just eat my own little stuff.But most of these experiences, it was surprising. Totally unexpected. The food tastes more delicious than in the college which have professional chefs.And I couldn't believe it. It made no sense to me. Until at the end of the retreat, you started figuring out this is sort of thing which happens when your five hindrances get weakened. It's a strange thing to say, but it's true. Even the food that tastes better, once the five hindrances disappear, you can... The small, the tiny remnant of taste which was left after all that boiling. You could pick up. You could discern it. You could taste it. Mmm. Not much left, at least you could taste it. And that made all the difference.But it was kind of weird. Sensations. You know, the reality of your life when you were mindful, which... And when your mind was clean, you started to investigate or explore and understand why those things happen.
Why you can have a monastery such as Damastar, a monastery such as this, and such a beautiful place to live. And how do you feel about it? How are you content and happy? Do you feel wow? You're so lucky to have made it to being an anagarica in Body of the Garden of Monastery. You're here. You've got that eight precepts in front of everybody. Well done. You know, I was like I normally do it's my character or it's trying to tell jokes. But, you know, when I was doing that ceremony, you were doing such good chanting. It even inspired me, honestly. And I thought, no, no, this is too important. This is too holy, too respectful. I don't want to tell jokes when people are just really feeling the power of joining a monastery and just committing yourself to being an anagarica. All right, Tamara, a novice ordination. That's even more amazing. You're joining the Sangha. And don't think that's only a novice. The novice was the big ordination. The three places you should always remember for the rest of your life. The place you took Papa Jah, was Tamara.
And also, we became a stream winner. We became fully enlightened. It's the way up there. When I first read that I thought there must be some mistranslation. Chet in the party is accurate. And they kind of inspire me. When I get inspired at the four bikus, which we gave for ordination to a few weeks ago, I don't know if you get inspired, but I really get off on that. I milk that for all it's worth, and it's worth a huge amount. So if I need to get a boost of energy when I go back to my cave, I don't need to meditate deeply. That's what I do. Four men, you've seen them, come to this monastery many times. And then they do the one year as an anagarica, and the one year as a novice. And then they take the full ordination. Oh, that's huge. When I go to Dharmasara, the last time I went there for an ordination ceremony, I just got really emotional insight. I think I mentioned that to a few people.
It was amazing. This is actually happening. So we have that opportunity, which I enjoyed and got inspired about so much when I was a young man in Thailand. The ability to ordain and join this amazing sanger. Now you see that with women here in Perth, war. That was almost out this world. It was happening. It was real. And you can start to see these beautiful things and the effects of these brown, robed men and women living this monastic life. And it inspires me so much. I use that from my own practice.I just get some really powerful deep meditations. There are lots of energy, lots of bliss. And of course, I try to encourage you to also notice incredible value that you're having a bald head and a brown robe,a light-bound, dark-bowed. It doesn't matter. And you are joining this amazing, such an old, old, old path. And we were talking up in earlier about, should we let go of traditions to bring this modernizedness up? Well, it's the old traditions.
Someone in the simplicity, the renunciation, the kindness, the gentleness. That should never be renounced. It's how it's expressed. You may be able to adapt to that. It's just basically the second factor of the eight-four path. We make sure we're coming from a point of renunciation, not winning, not trying to be better than a monastery next door, not trying to be the biggest monastery in the whole world with the most hourhuts in the whole world. That's not where we're in. Oh, actually, it's having hourhuts, yes, sure.
We don't go gouty. And the dumbest hour's got two more than I've come on mucks. Of course you never say all these things like that. It's not a question of competition. It's a question of letting go and being free. The whole idea of freedom sometimes is saying your, my cave. You just use that as a nice word to really investigate. You explore in this little cave two doors, I lock them both, and they're my free. I'm unlucky in a prison, like in a cell, like in a morgue.
There's no windows. But when I'm in there, it feels so incredibly free. When I'm sitting, beginning to meditate in my cave, it's just that I don't have a monastery anymore. I don't have any duties or responsibilities. I'm not the spiritual director of anything. When you're in the cave, it's like in this old monk. In that kind of tradition I love, because it's so beneficial. You reminding yourself that you have nothing. Nothing which you can own. Nothing which you can possess. That's why those times when people ask you, what any retire and get a pension? I can't, I don't have anything. Don't have any means, don't have any pension, don't have any health insurance, don't have anything.
And that makes me feel so incredibly rich. If I want for nothing, when you want for nothing, then you feel free. And that feeling of freedom. Yeah, sometimes it could be cooler, it could be warmer.
Sometimes a cushion could be a bit softer. Every now and again I get a really nice cushion. Just sit meditation. I'll be, no what happens to it. Like a rover's season, it disappears to get auctioned. That's my life. But anyway, you're so happy that that's going to help somebody else. It's going to be enough to build, say, a road for BGS down in Albany. They can have a nice road to access their monastery.Maybe that's not such a good idea having a road. Nothing, I don't need one. I said maybe not because maybe too many people's luck going there afterwards. It's a beautiful place. But anyhow, so just that idea of simplicity and kindness. The three factors of the second factor of the eightfold path may come. It's the opposite to like wanting and accumulating. It's letting go of stuff. See how much you can let go of. And the gentleness. The kindness. There's a couple of big yawns a moment ago. But you don't feel tired. It's kind of weird. The body is just saying one thing.
My mind is saying another. And of course the mind is that which dominates and wins.
The mind is a happy mind. Very glad to have served overseas. I'm very happy to serve over here. And I see how many of you get into this beautiful act of trying to look after this monastery, and to Damasara, and to Kushalahrihara, and to Damayana Rama next door, and to the Buddhist society at Upwehara and Nolamaara, and all these other little places, like even Venerable Sari, how has she been in contact with her for a while? So anyway, I hope that all of these wonderful places are well looked after, cared for. And they're not just an inspiration for others. They're not just an idea of promoting Buddhism in Western Australia. It's here for promoting peace and happiness and joy.
A kind of peace, a kind of joy, a kind of clarity, which doesn't create conflict. That's one of the other weird things I've found in my own practice. That when a person really does practice properly, and they get these wonderful meditations, when they don't want anything, you realize you're never going to be in competition with anybody.
And there's plenty of real resources of peace and happiness and kindness. There's like three, like little wealth, and there's more than enough the whole world. Peace? If you have huge amounts of peace, that doesn't diminish anybody else's ownership of peace.
Kindness, doesn't matter how kind you can be, there's plenty of kindness left, more than enough for everybody else. Kindness, peace, stillness. Stillness, again, is one of these quantities, qualities, which the more stillness you have, you're not taking it away from anybody else. So there's huge amounts for everybody, and that becomes our wealth. Huge amounts of stillness, and kindness, and gentleness and peace. That's so much, and it doesn't let, doesn't compete with anybody, which means that it's pure freedom and bliss. Those are the sorts of things which in the dumber, you don't say can you, you sometimes have to buy somebody else's land in order to build a heart, you know, obviously because they're very happy to sell it to you.
But you don't have to diminish anybody else's stillness, peace, kindness, to build more for yourselves. That's one of these qualities that people cannot compete for. It is there for the taking, as much as you want. And when you realize it's that type of value, it means you have this lack of worry, lack of fear, and it's wonderful little direction in your life. You don't want accolades, you don't want to be the best or the biggest or the toughest monk in the whole of Dabasara, the Dara Amax in there to stay long. But you just, nobody, just a peaceful person with so much kindness, so much doingness.
So much peace. And that's where you kind of disappear. That's the other thing which I love about Buddhism. Look, you know, what are we trying to attain? We're not trying to attain anything. We're not trying to get more things, more insights, more understandings. We're always trying to get less. To disappear more and more.
So the insights are not something which makes us a bigger eager, a smaller eager. If you can vanish more and more and more. And you're vanishing enough. No one can find you anymore. Kind of like that idea. We were talking a little bit earlier about dying. How do you want to die? It will be wonderful for you to sit down there meditating and you vanish slowly. I can find that will be very cool. I'm not going to do it this evening, so don't worry. So let's have enough for this evening. Give me a little.
Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu, Anumadami.
|