— 44 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Than Ajahn: Just concentrate on the reciting itself because the reciting is a form of thinking. If you concentrate on this thinking then you cannot think of any other thing. It is just like when you are singing, what do you do? You just concentrate on the song you are singing, right? It is the same. Just like chanting, you concentrate on the chanting. If you find concentrating on the mantra is too difficult because it is repetitious and if you want something with more variety, you can use chanting, like Namo tassa bhagavato arahato sammā sambuddhassa. Keep repeating that. This is to keep the mind occupied, so that the mind cannot think about other things. When you sit down, you can either continue on with your chanting or recite your mantra, or if you feel tired and want to stop chanting, you can just watch your breath. Be aware of your in and out breath. Don’t try to control your breath. Leave the breath alone. You just want to use the breath as an anchor to keep the mind from wandering and thinking aimlessly. You want to focus on just one thing at a time. Question (M): Does this mean that we can switch from one object to another object as long as it has something to do with our body? Than Ajahn:Yes. Something that is here and now. Be in the present. Don’t wander to the past or to the future. Don’t think about the past, don’t think about the future because when you do, your kilesas tend to arise. If you just look at your body, just be aware of it, it will prevent your mind from thinking. When you sit, you cannot look at the body anymore because the body is not doing anything. Then you watch the breath, or you can use the mantra instead. Sometimes you cannot watch your breath, cannot use the mantra, you might use chanting first to calm your mind. It depends on how your mind behaves at that particular time. You have to find the right kind of meditation subject to calm the mind. Question (M): When we watch the mental state like aversion, do we watch the cause of the aversion?
— 45 — 4 | Laypeople from Malaysia, January 17th, 2015 Than Ajahn: Yes. The cause of your aversion is your desire. You want something, and when you don’t get it, aversion arises. You feel angry. If you can cut down on your desire then your anger will be lessened. Question (M): If we have pain and we watch the aversion towards the pain, and we want a more comfortable position to relieve the pain, how do we approach that situation? Than Ajahn: You should bring your mind to a neutral state, bring the mind to samādhi, to upekkhā. That’s why you need samādhi first before you can go into vipassanā contemplation. When you go into vipassanā contemplation such as the nature of pain, you have to see that it is annicaṁ, dukkhaṁ, anattā. You cannot control the pain, you cannot tell it to go away. But you can control your mind to be able to live with the pain. Question (M): At what level of samādhi can we start to do vipassanā contemplation? Than Ajahn: At every level. You can try it for yourself once you have samādhi. After you withdraw from your samādhi, if you have any problem like any suffering or any desire, try to use vipassanā to solve that problem. For example, if you have pain, the goal is to leave the pain alone, because if you want the pain to disappear, you are creating suffering in your mind. You are creating desire which is the cause of mental suffering, which is a lot stronger than the physical suffering. If you don’t create the mental suffering, then your mind can withstand the physical suffering. It can co-exist with the physical suffering. The mind cannot co-exist with its own suffering, so the goal here is to prevent the mind from creating the mental suffering which is triggered by the physical suffering.
— 46 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 So you first have to have samādhi. When you have samādhi, your mind has this ability to remain still, remain undisturbed. Once you have this ability, when the mind faces the physical pain, then you can just tell the mind that it is okay, it is not that bad, you can live with it. You can do it as long as you don’t have the desire for this pain to disappear. When you have this desire, you are creating the mental pain which is a lot stronger than physical pain. You don’t have to create this mental pain. The Buddha knows this nature of mental suffering. It is created by your own desire, your desire to get rid of the physical pain, which is beyond your control. The physical pain arises sometimes due to circumstances which may or may not be possible to eliminate. When we practise, we have to assume that it cannot be eliminated, so we learn to leave it alone. Just like when you get sick, you know that you cannot get rid of the pain while you are still curing it, so the only thing that can prevent suffering is to accept the pain and not to have any desire to get rid of the pain. You have to see that the nature of the pain is aniccaṁ. It is temporary, it comes and goes. It is anattā, when it comes you cannot tell it to go away. You should just have to wait until it goes away by itself. When you have any desire to get rid of it, you are creating more mental pain which is a lot stronger than the physical pain. You can stop creating the mental pain by keeping your mind calm and peaceful and not reacting to the physical pain. You need to have samādhi to be able to remain calm and not to react to the pain and then study the truth of the pain that the pain is aniccaṁ, dukkhaṁ, anattā. It is better just to leave the pain alone, then there will be no dukkhaṁ in the mind. When you have desire to get rid of the pain, then you are creating dukkhaṁ in the mind which is a lot stronger than the physical pain itself. We are here not to get rid of the physical pain, we are here to get rid of the mental pain which is caused by our desire. The mental pain can arise from many things, not just from the physical pain.
— 47 — 4 | Laypeople from Malaysia, January 17th, 2015 When we are not happy, when our mind is not happy, it is because our mind has desire for things to be like this or like that. When they are not going according to your desire, you become unhappy. If you can get rid of this desire, whatever happens, it will not make you unhappy. This is why we want to train the mind, just to leave everything alone because we cannot control them all the time. Sometimes we can and sometimes we cannot. When we cannot, and we have desire, then we will suffer unnecessarily. If we know things are beyond our control, then just let it go, let it happen, then we will not be affected by whatever happens. Question (F): When the mind is very still and peaceful, sometimes there is a feeling that the mind is separated from the physical body. Do we let it naturally come to a state of investigation? Than Ajahn: When you meditate, this is what will happen. Your mind will be separated from the body, but it is a temporary state. When you are in that state, let it be. Enjoy the separation for as long as possible, so you can know that the mind and the body are separate. They are not one and not the same. After you come out of this state and the mind and the body are once again re-joined, you can use vipassanā to try to remind yourself that the mind and the body are separate. The mind should not worry about the body. The body is subjected to the three characteristics and you cannot change that. The body will have to get sick, get old and die, but the mind doesn’t have to be affected by all the happenings of the body. This is how we use vipassanā. Try to remind ourselves that the mind is separate from the body, try to understand that the nature of the body cannot be changed. The body is destined to get sick, get old and die regardless of how well you take care of the body. You cannot prevent this from happening. If you want to prevent or you want to stop it from happening, you are only creating suffering in your mind. If you don’t want to suffer mentally, then you just have to let go of
— 48 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 the body by accepting the three characteristics. Understanding the three characteristics: aniccaṁ, dukkhaṁ, anattā. Aniccaṁ is to know that the body is temporary, and it keeps on changing. Anattā means you cannot control it. Dukkhaṁ is mental suffering. You want to change the truth but you cannot. Normally we want the body to last forever, to be healthy all the time, not to get sick and not to die but this is not the truth. When the truth happens, we resist and we fight against the truth because of our desire, and thus creating more suffering in the mind unnecessarily. If we understand the truth and when the truth happens we just accept it and then there would be no mental suffering. Question (M): Instead of just watching the body, can we also watch feelings? Than Ajahn: You can watch feelings when you have painful feeling because that’s the real test. That’s what you want to surpass, to overcome, the painful feeling. The other feeling is good feeling which is not a problem, so why watch something that is not a problem to you? The problem is the painful feelings. When the painful feeling arises, that’s when you have to have mindfulness. Mindfulness means teaching the mind just to be watchful, just observe, and not try to interfere with the painful feeling. Just leave the painful feeling alone because it is anattā. Anattā means you cannot get rid of it, you cannot change it. The only thing you can do is just watch it, accept it as what it is, then your mind will not be creating this dukkhaṁ that arises from your desire to get rid of your painful feeling. To develop mindfulness by using vedāna (feeling) is very difficult because normally you don’t have anything to feel. What you have is the body, which is always here. The reason why we develop mindfulness is to stop the mind from wandering, from thinking about this and that thing, so you need to have something to keep the mind busy, keep it occupied, like watching your body.
— 49 — 4 | Laypeople from Malaysia, January 17th, 2015 Whatever you are doing, keep watching it, then you cannot send your mind elsewhere, then your mind will be here and now. That’s the goal. The mind can be calm only when it is here and now. It cannot be calm when it goes into the past or to the future. You need something to bring it to here and now. You can use the mantra, reflect on death, watch your body. You can use the 40 subjects of meditation (40 kammaṭṭhāna) and choose the one that is suitable for you. End of Desanā and Q&A
— 51 — Layperson: You said that in order to gain enlightenment, it is better to stay in the temple, and one must have good kamma like yourself. I think I will never be enlightened in this life, because of my past kamma from my past lives. All I can do is to carry on practising meditation, doing good and keeping precepts. Do you think I have a wrong understanding? Than Ajahn: There are people who can be enlightened in this life. It is not necessarily due to kamma from previous lives. You can create the kamma in this life time and become enlightened. Layperson: It is quite difficult to do, such as when you said: “you’ve got to give your money away”. Than Ajahn: What you need is motivation. If you have the motivation, then you can move mountains. If you don’t have the motivation, you won’t be able to do anything. You have to somehow develop this motivation. One way to do it is to study the teachings of the Buddha, keep studying especially from those who are enlightened. You just have to see that by following the Buddha’s teaching; it will bring enlightenment to you. If you 5 Layperson from England February 3rd, 2015
— 52 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 cannot see that point, then you will still be doubtful. You will under-estimate your ability. What is it that I have, that you don’t have? I can tell you what you are lacking. What you are lacking is the perception of impermanence. If you can create this perception of impermanence in your heart, in your mind, then this will be the one that drives you to move forward. If you see that eventually you are going to lose everything, so what’s the point of sticking with these things? The Buddha saw for himself that eventually he was going to get old, get sick and die, so he said that right now I am not old yet. I might as well do something if I can. As long as you can still breathe, you can still do it. You don’t need anything, you don’t need strength to meditate. You just sit down. You need the strength to stop your body from moving, from doing things. You don’t need the strength to drive your body to move around. No matter how old you are, you can meditate. You can become enlightened. It is just that you are so used to your habits of doing other things and it is difficult for you to give up those habits. That’s all. Layperson: Is meditation wasting of time? Than Ajahn: You should sit down and weigh your options. If I do this, this is what I get. If I do that, that is what I get. Which is better? Meditating or going around taking pictures, going to movies? If you know that meditation is better, then you give up other things and do meditation. It is a matter of simple logic, knowing what you do will give you what kind of result and determining what you should be doing. If you say, you are happier when you are working, getting money and having money to buy things, but what happens after you get all these things? Are you happier? If you meditate you will be happier, and more peaceful, so why don’t you spend more time doing it? It is a matter of prioritizing your actions.
— 53 — 5 | Layperson from England, February 3rd, 2015 Layperson: A few days ago, I had a good meditation. The mind became very quiet, and I felt very good, but the next day when I woke up, I experienced a very bad mood. Than Ajahn: Your mind changes. What you achieved from meditation was just a brief result. If you want it to last, you have to do a lot (of meditation). It is like eating. If you only eat one meal, a few hours later you become hungry again. If you want to maintain this fullness, you have to keep on eating. When you feel bad, why don’t you meditate? You have to keep on meditating because your mind keeps on agitating itself. So you need a tranquilizer to calm your mind. Meditation is a form of tranquilizer that you can always have. If you buy (another type of) tranquilizer, it has side effects, and sometimes if you cannot have it, you will be in trouble. But if you can meditate, you can always calm your mind. Your kilesas are always attacking you, but most of the time you don’t know it because you always let it do what it wants to do. You only see the trouble when you resist it, when you don’t do what it asks you to do. End of Q&A
— 55 — Than Ajahn: What can I do for you? Monk: We have some questions. Than Ajahn: Please go ahead. Monk: Some other Kruba Ajahns have said that appaṇā-samādhi and jhāna are different. How are they different? The Ajahns said that appaṇā-samādhi is more crucial for magga-phala compared to jhāna. Than Ajahn: I think appaṇā-samādhi is the fourth jhāna. Anything before that is still not considered to be appaṇā, because there are still some mental activities. When you reach the fourth jhāna, you have just the mere knowing, upekkhā. That is where you want to get to. When you meditate and you start to experience some joy, some rapture, some happiness, you shouldn’t stop there. You should continue focusing on your meditation object, until your mind eventually drops into calm and then when that happens, the mind becomes released. It doesn’t have to be controlled, it is just at rest. You don’t have to do anything, just merely know. That is where you 6 Australian Monks from Sydney February 19th, 2015
— 56 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 get to see the true nature of the mind — the one who knows; it will appear. If you are using ānāpānasati, your breath will become finer and finer as you concentrate, and eventually the breath might seem to disappear. At that point you just keep on focusing on the disappearance of the breath, the emptiness. When some people get to this point, they start to think that if there is no breath, they might die, so they want to grasp for breath, and when that happens the mind becomes more active rather than inactive. You don’t want to react to the breathlessness. Just be aware that there is no breath, and if you just keep on focusing on that aspect, then the mind will eventually drop into calm. Monk: Is it the stage where vision starts to appear and becomes more bright and sturdy? Than Ajahn: No, when you get to that point there is no nimitta, nothing. It is just emptiness. Monk: Is there a point along the mind where the nimitta comes up or is it not at all necessary? Than Ajahn: From what I have heard, for some people it appears before that, and sometimes it appears after that. Luangta said you first enter into appaṇā-samādhi. Then when you withdraw slightly from that state, you enter upacāra-samādhi in which, you begin to experience all kinds of visions. However, for some other people, they said that before getting into appaṇā, they have started to experience some nimittas, some visions. This is what I have heard. Personally I don’t have any visions, so I don’t’ know, but such visions are not important. What is important is to have this peace of mind, this contentment upekkhā that arises from jhāna, upekkhā. This is what you want. Upekkhā means a mind that is neutral and doesn’t have any emotional conditions of like,
— 57 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 dislike, fear or delusion. It means the mind is in a perfect still state, it doesn’t function, it is not active. You want to maintain that state as long as possible, because it will be the tool for you to develop pañña (wisdom), and that is the next step. When your mind is calm, peaceful and neutral, it can withstand defilements. The goal is to get rid of your defilements which means to resist, and not to do what your defilements tell you to do. Once you have strong upekkhā from strong samādhi, even when you withdraw from the state, when your mind starts to think and starts to have desires, you can get rid of them, telling the mind that whatever you desire for is not good for you; it is dukkha, not sukha, because it is impermanent, it is anicca. The benefit that you get from doing what you want to do or getting what you want is only temporary. Once you have it, it disappears and then you want more of it and so you become addicted to what you want. It is like people who smoke cigarettes. When you have the desire to smoke you think that having a cigarette will make you feel good, so you have a cigarette and you feel good briefly, but after a while you want another cigarette. So you have to keep on having cigarettes to make you happy. But if you have this upekkhā from samādhi, then you can think rationally that this is an addiction, not the way to happiness. This is the way to suffering because when you cannot have what you want, you become miserable. So instead of following your desire, you say no (to it), stop it, and resist it. You can do that because you have this upekkhā from samādhi. So this is the way to eliminate your desire, which is the cause of your dukkha, your suffering. Monk: How long does the mind have to be in the state of appaṇā-samādhi for it to be able to resist kilesas? Than Ajahn: The duration depends on the strength of your mindfulness.
— 58 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Monk: Is it a short period like 20 minutes? Than Ajahn: Yes, ten, twenty, thirty, forty (minutes), one hour. It increases gradually as you develop. When you first start you will get a brief encounter, which we call kaṇika-samādhi. Your mind drops into calm and then due to this new experience you become excited, and lose your mindfulness so it withdraws. So the next time you know how to be more mindful. Just simply be aware of the experience and the mind will remain rested longer and if you do more of it, then it will last longer. And also if you develop wisdom after you withdraw (from this state), you can use wisdom to make the mind last longer in appaṇā state. Every time you can resist a desire, your mind will drop into a calmer state, and then your mind will be calmer and the duration will spread not only when you are sitting, even when you withdraw (from appaṇā state), your mind can also remain calm. This will arise from your development of wisdom and resistance to your desire. Every time you want to do something which is not necessary, if you can resist, then your mind becomes less active, or more inactive. So you need more samādhi and pañña to put your mind into a firmer ground, to become more stable, to be calmer. When you first start you don’t have the ability to use pañña or wisdom, so you use mindfulness to prevent your mind from wandering, thinking about this and that, and to bring it into calm. Once you have calm then you can use this calm to develop pañña, to stop your mind and your desire. When you can get rid of your desire then your mind becomes firmer and more peaceful. So this is the process of building up this peace of mind until you eventually get total peace of mind all the time without having to go into samādhi. The reason why your mind is not calm is your desires. But once you can get rid of all your desires, then there is nothing to cause your mind to become restless or agitated, and your mind can become calm without having to go into jhāna.
— 59 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 Monk: Are you implying that appaṇā-samādhi is the samādhi which develops wisdom naturally, so you don’t have to contemplate anything specific such as the body or anicca, dukkha, anattā? Than Ajahn: No. You have to do that (the contemplation). I have already mentioned. I was telling you about aniccaṁ when you desire something. The object that you desire is a temporary object. It doesn’t last. Like a cigarette, after you smoke, it is all gone. The happiness that you acquire from smoking also disappears and then you will have a new desire to have another cigarette. So this applies to everything, I am just using cigarette (as an example). You can apply it to a human body. Having sexual desire, is the same thing as having a cigarette. You want to have sex, but the person you have sex with, will get old and die one day. They will leave you one day, then what happens? You will have to get a new body, like taking a new cigarette. You can also look at the asubha aspect of the body, to conquer your desire because your desire arises from seeing the beautiful parts of the body. If you look at the not-beautiful parts, the repulsive parts of the body, then this can stop your desire. So you still have to contemplate these things. If you contemplate the body, you have to contemplate three or four aspects of it. One is the impermanent aspect. The body is constantly changing, it is temporary, it is not lasting, it is not forever. The body will get old, get sick and die. You want to teach your mind not to cling to your body, because when you do, you become unhappy when the body changes from good to bad, from bad to worse. So, you want to be forewarned of the real situation of the body that the body is not going to be like this all the time. It is going to get old, get sick and eventually die. You want to look at the decomposition of the body after it dies, so you can have a true picture of the destination of the body, where this body goes in the future, not just your body but the bodies of everybody else that you come into contact with. You can use this also to restrain
— 60 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 your sexual desire. Every time when you see a beautiful person, think of the time when he or she dies. During the time of the Buddha, there was a monk who was told by the Buddha to visit the corpse of a beautiful woman. She was a prostitute, famous for her beauty, but she had died. The Buddha knew that this monk still had this problem with sexual desire, so he told the monk to go and look at the corpse of this beautiful woman. Once he saw it then he can eliminate his sexual desire. This is body contemplation, anicca, repulsiveness, asubha and also anattā. You have to go through all the 32 parts so that you can clarify to your mind that not any single part of the body is you. If you can get every part and separate them into different places, put the hair out, put it at one place, put the skin, the nail, the teeth and all the organs (at another place) and ask yourself, “is this me?” Is the hair me? Is the skin me? Are the teeth me? Where am I? So you can see clearly that in this whole body there is no ‘you’, there is no ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘mine’, or ‘myself’ in this body. You can also look at the decomposition of the body that eventually will return to its original state, which is the four elements. The body is composed of the four elements, the air you breathe in, the water that you drink. The food that you take is the earth element, and the fire is the reaction of the three other elements. When you eat, your body becomes hot. This is how you want to look at the body as four elements which are coming in and going out. When the process stops then the body will decompose and return to its four elements. So this is basically body contemplation. When anything happens to the body your mind will react negatively if you don’t contemplate. When you get sick, your mind will become unhappy because you want the sickness to disappear, but if you contemplate, then you know that being sick is part of the body. The sickness is part of you, there is nothing that you can do to prevent it, or to stop it from happening and when it happens you cannot tell the sickness to go away, because it is anattā.
— 61 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 If you are afraid of the pain that arises from your sickness then you have to sit and face the pain. When you sit and meditate, and when you get this painful feeling in your body, you should not get up, you should not move, you should instead use wisdom to teach your mind that this is something that will happen and you have to face it and accept it. If you accept it, then you only experience the physical pain but not the mental pain, because the mental pain arises from your resistance to the physical pain. When you have desire for the physical pain to disappear, you are creating another pain, the mental pain, which is a lot stronger than the physical pain. The pain that you cannot withstand is not the physical pain, but the mental pain. Once you can get rid of your mental pain, you will find that the physical pain is bearable, that you can live with it. So when you sit and you get this painful feeling, try to investigate to see there is another painful feeling which is not the physical pain but the mental pain, which arises from your desire to get rid of your physical pain or to get away from this physical pain. So you have to stop this mental desire. You must tell yourself that you are going to stay with this pain, which is not as bad as you think. You have to learn to like it, instead of hating it. Monk: Do you encourage practitioners to sit and experience dukkha as long as they can? Than Ajahn: That is, if you want to pass the test. These are all sorts of tests that we all have to go through, the asubha test, the anicca test, the pain test. These are things that will happen and passing them is what will keep you from continuous rebirth. When you start thinking about getting away from this pain, your mind has already gone to another existence. You have to stick to the present existence. Don’t leave the present existence. Don’t have any desire because your desire is the one that moves your mind from one existence to the next. If you want to stop rebirth then you have to stop your desire. When you meet death you must not run
— 62 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 away, you have to face death, because death is not you, death is just the body, but you don’t know that now. Delusion makes you think that you are the body. But after you contemplate the truth, you will see clearly that the body is not you. You are the mind, and the mind will never die regardless of whatever happens to the body, so you can just remain calm and face the death of the body. That is the test you have to go through. Monk: We know that we have to sit and face the dukkha-vedanā and try to see when the body separates from the mind. It takes more than just an act of will power to do that. How do you separate the mind from the pain? Than Ajahn: By going through the 32 parts of the body and asking yourself, where is the pain? Is it in the skin? In the hair? In the bones? Does the bone know pain? Does the skin know pain? Who knows the pain? The mind knows pain, but the mind isn’t painful, is it? Who is the one that is experiencing the pain? Who is the one that knows the pain? The one who knows doesn’t experience the pain, it just knows that there is pain in the bone, in the skin, in the flesh, but does the flesh know anything? Does the bone know anything? Does the bone say: let us get away from this pain? The bone is not complaining, the flesh is not complaining. It is the mind that is complaining because the mind doesn’t like to see this pain, that is all, but if you can force the mind to see this pain, why not do that? What is so bad about seeing this pain? You have to use rational thought to convince your mind that the mind is not affected. The mind is not the one who is being hit with the pain. It is the bone, the skin, the flesh that is being hit with the pain, but they don’t complain, so why should the mind complain? If you keep talking like this, eventually the mind will understand and will stop resisting. When that happens the mind becomes upekkhā, it is still and not reacting. It just be aware, just know and the mind is peaceful, and while the pain is still there, it is not overbearing. This is the point. You want to teach the mind to let
— 63 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 go of the pain. You don’t want to get rid of the pain because the pain is something you cannot get rid of. When you get sick, you cannot get rid of the pain, but you can get rid of your resistance, your desire to get rid of the pain, or your desire to run away from the pain. So you have to tell your mind that the mind is not the one who gets sick. The mind is not experiencing the pain. The mind is just the one who observes the pain like a doctor who is observing the pain of a patient. The mind is like a doctor, the body is like a patient, so why is the doctor concerned about the pain of the patient? Because the doctor is delusional, he thinks he is the patient. So you want to separate the doctor from the patient. You need to contemplate in real time. Before the pain appears you are only preparing yourself. You have to contemplate while you are not in the painful state yet, but to pass the test you have to face the pain and use this contemplation to convince your mind to leave the pain alone. Once the mind understands that it is not the one who is experiencing the pain, it is the body and the body doesn’t complain. Then why should the mind complain? When that happens the mind will stop resisting. The desire to want the pain to disappear will cease. Then the mind will become peaceful, like in appaṇā-samādhi. This is three or four aspects of the body contemplation. You have to contemplate the impermanence, the painful aspect of the body, the repulsive aspect of the body, the anattā aspect. Once you have done this, you have finished the body course. Then you can go into the next stage which is the mental course because there are still defilements in your mind, other than the defilements in the body. The mind also has the attachment to the defilements in the mind, like atta, a ‘self. What is your ‘self’? You think that there is ‘I, me or mine and myself’. You have gotten rid of your body delusion, you know that it is not in the body, so where is it now? You said it is in the mind, but is the mind really ‘you’ or is the mind just the knower? So you have to go and investigate the mind.
— 64 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Monk: One Kruba Ajahn said that once you separate the body from the mind, you are a Sotāpanna, but another say that is just going into jhāna. Than Ajahn: It depends on how it is done. If you use mindfulness, it is jhāna. If you use wisdom, in the magga, it is Sotāpanna, Sakadāgāmī and Anāgāmī, three stages. These three stages use the body as the object of contemplation. If you have got rid of the sexual desire, you have reached the Anāgāmī stage. If you have got rid of the fear of death, fear of pain, that is a Sotāpanna stage. Monk: Does one go step by step? Or does one go straight to Anāgāmī? Than Ajahn: You have to go through the stages because the complexity or the difficulty varies. The Sotāpanna stage is easier than the Sakadāgāmī and the Anāgāmī stage. This is according to the scriptures. The scriptures said that you have to go through the Sotāpanna before you can enter the Sakadāgāmī and the Anāgāmī. So the object of your contemplation of the Sotāpanna is the elimination of your desire, your fear of death and your fear of pain. Once you have done that then you have to eliminate your sexual desire. Monk: How will we know for sure that we are not afraid of death? Someone who has been practicing and meditating for years may think that as a Buddhist, he has faith in the Triple Gems and is not afraid of death, but when death comes is he actually still afraid of death? Than Ajahn: You have to test yourself, if you still have any fear then you have not accomplished it. You have to go and find things that you are afraid of to test whether you are still afraid or not afraid of them. That is why monks have to go live in the forest, be surrounded by wild animals, or go to a cemetery. If you
— 65 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 want to know whether you have let go of physical pain, you have to sit and let the pain develop and let it disappear by itself. Monk: Is that the way that pain disappears? Than Ajahn: You have to be peaceful and you have to know that you have got rid of the desire that wants to be rid of the pain. The goal is to see the Four Noble Truths in all these. It always involves the Four Noble Truths. When you have fear that means you have desire to live, you don’t want to die. When you have this desire to live, so you become fearful. If you can get rid of this desire to live, this fear of death will disappear. You only know this when you face death or when you feel that death is imminent. You don’t have to see death face to face. To think that you are dying is enough. When you get sick and you go see the doctor and he said that you only have three months left, then you can see whether you have any fear or not in your mind. This can also be the test for you. If you say: ok, a few months, so what? I am ready for it. Monk: Some people think that they are ready for death. But…. Than Ajahn: They have nothing (insight) in them that gives them the confirmation about the truth. If they go to see a doctor and the doctor said that they are going to die for sure, some people, on hearing that, feel like they are getting the death sentence. They just lose all the enthusiasm to live or to do anything. Monk: You mentioned that the upekkhā from samādhi is very important for contemplation, but if we haven’t got to that level yet, so is it still important to do some contemplation when one sits and walks to help one to prepare? Than Ajahn: Yes, you can start from the preliminary stage here, but to get the real result you need the appaṇā stage, to enable your wisdom to really work.
— 66 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Monk: So when pain arises, does this preparation help the mind to be ready to investigate? Than Ajahn: If you don’t have appaṇā, your mind will become very weak. You will only be able to investigate just a few minutes and then it gives up.You cannot go through the whole process. But if you have appaṇā, you will have the strength to go through it. Monk: Does the preliminary investigation help to develop samādhi as well? Than Ajahn: Yes. Every time you come out of samādhi, you should develop your investigation. If you don’t know how to investigate, then you should just develop your mindfulness to prevent your mind from thinking aimlessly. You cannot get rid of some of the kilesas which are too strong. Kilesas have different strengths. For some kilesas, you can use the present state of mind to get rid of, but some (of the kilesas) are stronger than you and you need to develop meditation to get rid of it. Monk: So, what should we do if the kilesas are too strong? Than Ajahn: Try to resist it as best as you can, and you should accept that you are still under the influence of the kilesas, and then put your aim at these kilesas. You are going to try to get rid of these kilesas, so you go and find out what are the necessary things to do to get rid of these kilesas. Usually you either use impermanence (anicca), dukkha, anattā or asubha, depending on your defilements. If you still have to drink coffee, for instance, you may say: look at the coffee I am drinking. I am making urine. The coffee I drink, comes out as urine. If you want to free from this addiction, you have to resist it. Monk: You mentioned drinking coffee, how do you know that it is a kilesa?
— 67 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 Than Ajahn: When you have the coffee to drink, you don’t feel anything. But when you don’t have the coffee and you still want to have it, then it is a problem. Once you have got rid of the addiction, you can take it or leave it. It is the same with everything. Once you don’t have the desire, you can take it or leave it. Even life and death, you can live or you can die. It is the same for the mind that has no desire. You can live or you can die. It doesn’t matter because you know who dies and who doesn’t die. You know the body dies and you know that the mind doesn’t die. Monk: Concerning fasting, how would you recommend to practise it? Than Ajahn: Fasting is good if you meditate and if you don’t do any physical work. When you are eating normally, you tend to be lazy because you are in comfort but when you are fasting you are in pain, so it forces you to meditate to get rid of your pain. Hunger is a form of pain. When you meditate you can eliminate half the pain, because half the pain is mental. Fasting is not the aim in itself. Fasting is just the tool you use to eliminate the hindrances such as sloth and torpor, your laziness, your sleepiness. When you fast, you don’t feel sleepy. It is just a tool. But if you fast, and you don’t meditate, then it is useless. Monk: When you stayed at Wat Pa Baan Taad, you didn’t really get to know other monks, how does that work in the Dhamma practice? Than Ajahn: So you can have the time to meditate. If you mingle, you lose the time and then also you have a lot of information about other people in your mind, which disrupts your meditation for appaṇā-samādhi. When you want to enter into appaṇā-samādhi, you have to empty your mind. When you mingle and socialise, you have more mental information. This makes it harder for you to empty your mind. When you are alone you don’t have to talk to anybody. Luangta discouraged monks from mingling.
— 68 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Monk: Some young monks feel lonely. What is your advice? Than Ajahn: Disrobe. Monk: Should there be any friendship to support one’s practice in his early days as a young monk even if it is a hindrance to achieve samādhi? Than Ajahn: Ideally there is no form of friendship. Ideally you have to be alone. You want to devote all your time and effort to developing your mind. If you have to develop friendships, you lose time. Layperson: In your biography you mentioned that you only depended on the dhamma talks and books. Do you think it is important to have some relationship to a life teacher who can answer questions for you? Than Ajahn: A living teacher is like a living doctor. Books teach you how to treat the body. If you have some problems then you can tell the doctor and he will give you the medicine. But if you have to find out the answer yourself, you may have to read the whole books and you might not find it. Monk: Is it important? Than Ajahn: Yes, it is important if you can have a living teacher, but when there is no living teacher, the next best things are the books or CDs. Monk: Some Kruba Ajahn said the body ‘ceases’ at magga-phala? Do you think that it is right? Than Ajahn: Before you can go to the fourth stage, you have to go through the body. You have to get rid of the five-samyojana
— 69 — 6 | Australian Monks from Sydney, February 19th, 2015 (five fetters). They are all in the body. Sakkāya–diṭṭhi, the khandhas and the sexual desire are dependent on the body. These will dissolve once you can let go of the attachment to the body. You will see that you have no doubt in the Buddha, Dhamma, Saṅgha because you are using the teachings of the Buddha to gain enlightenment. Once you are enlightened, you know that the Buddha, Dhamma, Saṅgha exist. You know that the teaching of the Buddha is the right way and can solve your problem. Once you can get rid of the sakkāya–diṭṭhi, you can also get rid of the micchā–diṭṭhi. This is a bonus, you don’t have to separately get rid of the micchā–diṭṭhi because they come together. The other two that comes together is the sexual desire (kāma–rāga) and restlessness. You are restless because you have sexual desire. Once you get rid of sexual desire, your mind becomes peaceful. So if you get rid of your sexual desire, you also get rid of your restlessness. You have to use asubha to get rid of your sexual desire. Every time when you have sexual desire, think of a corpse, think of the 32 parts of the body and your sexual desire will disappear. Monk: Do you use dukkha-vedanā to let go of the body or the contemplation of the 32 parts? Than Ajahn: You use sukha-vedanā to get rid of dukkha-vedanā. To get rid of the fear of death, you have to investigate the death of the body. Death is something that you cannot prevent from happening. You see the anicca of the body, the anattā of the body – the body is not you. Once you see that the body is not you, the body will have to die, then you will say, “ok, so what? I am not dying?” When you reach appaṇā-samādhi, you can see this. When you reach appaṇā-samādhi, your body disappears from your mind and the mind knows it can exist without the body. End of Q&A
— 71 — Than Ajahn: Is there anything you would like to ask? Layperson: When I contemplated the body incorrectly; for example, if I was not careful with my desire to see or to have the same results as I had in the past, it leads to build up pressure in the head and blood pressure tension at the back of the eyes. Sometimes, there was tension (in the head) and it causes headache. I do notice that it was due to the way I did it. Than Ajahn: That is the by-product of your kilesas resisting. Normally the kilesas do not like to contemplate the things that it doesn’t like. So first, for you to be able to contemplate effectively, you have to have samādhi. You have to enter into jhāna. Once you come out of jhāna, your mind will be ready to see the truth of the body. If you haven’t got jhāna, when your kilesas are very strong, you will not be able to contemplate the truth of the body, because if you do it, this reaction will appear. You will get some kind of bad feelings. For some people, if they contemplate death, and if they feel so depressed, they should not continue contemplating it. You need to suppress your defilement first by entering into jhāna, otherwise 7 Layperson from Canada March 8th, 2015
— 72 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 you will not be able to contemplate effectively. That’s why the Buddha said you have to go to samādhi first, before you go to paññā (wisdom). It is something that you cannot skip. You have to have appanā-samādhi, jhāna. Once you come out of jhāna, your mind is peaceful and calm. It has upekkhā. It doesn’t have liking or aversion. It is neutral and then it can look at anything without having any reactions. Try to develop a lot of jhāna, a lot of samādhi first, before you start with your body contemplation. You can contemplate death, but you have to see how much you can contemplate. Once you start to have bad feelings, it is counterproductive to go on. In order to reach concentration, you need mindfulness. You have to be mindful all the time, from the time you get up to the time you go to sleep. Never exist without mindfulness. Always be mindful. Always have something to anchor your mind. You can use your body, by watching every movement of your bodily actions, then your mind cannot wander and think about this or that. Once you have this, you can sit down and focus on your breathing, and if your focus is continuous, your mind will enter into jhāna very quickly. When you come out of jhāna, then you have the neutrality to be able to contemplate the truth of the body. Layperson: When I was practising concentration, my mind became concentrated and extensive. Should I concentrate on this extensity? Than Ajahn: No, you should go back to your mindfulness. Don’t pay attention to anything that may appear during your concentration. Just be with your breath that comes in and goes out. Don’t think about it. Don’t investigate it. Just watch. Just be aware. Just ignore everything. It is not the time for full body contemplation. Right now you only want to concentrate on one object, to pull your mind into jhāna.
— 73 — 7 | Layperson from Canada, March 8th, 2015 If you let your mind go to other things you won’t be able to enter into jhāna because it becomes dispersed. You want it to become one. Just stay on one object. If you use your breathing, just concentrate on your breath only, whether it comes in or goes out, whether it is coarse or subtle, long or short. That’s all you have to know. If any other feeling appears, disregard it, ignore it. If you start to pay attention to it, you lose your concentration. Instead of your mind becoming one, it is dispersed and you will not be able to enter into jhāna. This is the mistakes that most people do. When they are concentrating, some other things appear and they got distracted, then they lose their concentration. They forget that they are supposed to keep on watching the breathing and instead they go after the things that appear. So the mind starts to think and starts to become active instead of becoming inactive. Layperson: Was my mind inactive when it became extensive? Than Ajahn: Yes, but it was still not calm enough. You want to get to the point where there is nothing to observe, even when the breath disappears and the body disappears. All there is, is just the one who knows and emptiness like floating in space. It is a feeling beyond this world. The Buddha said ‘Natthi santi paraṁ sukhaṁ’: the happiness that arises from peace of mind is greater than any other forms of happiness. Your goal is to get there. Before going to the next step, just be focussed. You want single minded. Just watch one thing at a time. If you want to use your body, just watch your body all the time. Whatever you do, such as brushing teeth, just be with your brushing. Don’t think about other things. Then your mind will be constantly in the present and when you sit, you can focus on the one object and that will lead your mind to calm. End of Desanā.
— 75 — Than Ajahn: Nowadays you can download from the internet all the Discourses (Sutta) of the Buddha. There is enough Dhamma, what is lacking is the practice. What you need to do more is practice. Reading the Dhamma is like looking at a map. You don’t get anywhere by looking at the map. You have to travel to reach there. You have to get moving. If you are just looking at the map of Thailand in Singapore, you would never get here, right? You have to buy the ticket, get on the plane and come here. It is the same way with Nibbāna. You need to practice. If you practise you will get there eventually. Right now you have all the information needed to guide you to where you want to go. What you have to do now is to just go, but now you are still attached to your house, your comfort. You don’t want to leave the comfort of your house. When you practise, you have to stay in a place where there is no physical comfort. The physical comforts that you are accustomed to are hindrances for your attainment. You have to live simply with nothing to give you pleasure and happiness. You should seek the happiness from your practice, so you have to give up one thing in order to get another thing. It is like when you have one cup of tea. When you want to get new tea, you have to throw away the old tea, such that you can have room for your new tea. Right now your mind or your heart has this ‘physical happiness’, the 8 Laypeople from Singapore April 28th, 2015
— 76 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 happiness from eating, seeing, hearing and doing things with your body. If you want a better kind of happiness, the happiness of your heart, you have to give up your physical happiness. The Buddha said that you have to take up eight precepts if you want to meditate to acquire the internal happiness, the inner happiness. You have to bring the mind inside, you cannot send the mind outside towards the things you see and hear. That is why you have to take up the eight precepts. The eight precepts will stop your mind from going outside. You will not go to movies, to entertainment venues, or to have fun with what you see and hear. You have to stay put, stay in a house or in a temple and meditate. You have to use something to pull your mind inside because right now your mind is driven by your defilements to go outside, to go, to see, to hear, to visit your friend, to eat, to drink. You need something to pull this back towards the inside. The thing that can pull your mind back inside is mindfulness (sati). Sati has many different ways of being developed. You can use parikamma or mental recitation of a word like the word Buddha, repeating the word ‘Buddho’ ‘Buddho’ inside, not verbally. Your mind will stop thinking about going outside. So you need something to stop your mind from going outside. If you don’t have anything to pull your mind inside, it will keep on thinking of going outside, going to see your friends, going to watch movies, going to this place or that place, going to see and to hear all these things. If you have mindfulness, you can stop this thinking of going outside, then your mind will be pulled inside. When the mind comes inside, it will become peaceful, at ease and relaxed. There is no tension and no stress. This is the inner happiness which the Buddha said is a better kind because it is ours to keep. Once you have this kind of happiness, you will always have it. For the other kind of happiness, you have to rely on other things to make it happen. You have to have a body in order to be able to have the physical kind of happiness. If your body gets sick then you can no longer
— 77 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 have that kind of happiness. You can have the inner happiness from having mindfulness, through bringing your mind inside – anytime, anywhere – with or without the body. Even if the body gets sick, you can still have this kind of happiness. This kind of happiness is a protection against the attack of physical pain. Eventually this body will get sick and the body will become painful, but if you have this inner happiness, this inner happiness will block the physical pain from entering into your mind so you will not be affected by the illness of the body or even the death of the body. Your mind will not become unhappy or sad. So this is something very important for us to do because we are constantly moving towards this destination of sickness, old age and death. If you don’t have this inner happiness, your mind will be bombarded with all kinds of physical pain and they will make your mind very sad. If you have developed this inner happiness, then your mind will remain happy all the time regardless of whatever happens to the body. So you have to force yourself to practise. If you don’t force yourself, you will never practise because your mind has been used to relying on the body to find its source of happiness. Eventually the body will no longer be able to provide you with the happiness that you used to have. The mind will however always be with you. The mind will never get sick, get old, or die. So it is better to rely on the mind as the source of your happiness rather than relying on your body. This is what meditation is about. It is to switch happiness from a physical kind to the mental kind. You need to switch and force yourself to switch. If you don’t force it, eventually you will not have anything. Eventually the body no longer exists and you don’t have anything to rely on to make you happy. That is why you have to return and be reborn again and again, because when you lose this body, you have to go look for a new body. Everyone that you know will eventually get sick, get old and die, so you are all taking rebirth again and again. It is never ending.
— 78 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 We can only come to the end of this rebirth when we come across the teaching of the Buddha. The Buddha is the only person who knows how to stop rebirth, who knows the real kind of happiness. Without the Buddha or his teaching, we will never know this truth and we will always have to be reborn again and again. This time we are fortunate, we are lucky, we have come across the teaching of the Buddha and we know the way to practice, so what is lacking right now is the practice itself. Nobody else can practise for you. You have to do it yourself. DIY – do it yourself. Now they have DIY shops which sell you all kinds of things and you can build or maintain things yourself, right? Now we have Dhamma DIY. Do it yourself Dhamma. If you start doing it, it is not difficult. What is so difficult about keeping the eight precepts? You just don’t do anything, that’s all. The whole goal is to stop all forms of physical activities. The only activity that you have to do is to maintain your body. The eight precepts do not prohibit you from eating, but you eat only enough to keep your body going. You don’t have to take three meals a day to keep your body going. One meal a day is good enough. Most of the hunger doesn’t come from your body it comes from your defilements, from the desire, from the mind. The body only needs one meal a day, but we give it too much. That’s why we have a lot of problems with the body nowadays. The body is overweight, not because the body needs the food, but the mind wants to eat. The body doesn’t want to eat, but we force the body to eat, so the body becomes overweight. If you keep the eight precepts, you can help your body, and lose weight that way. You can get better health. Try to keep the eight precepts. Maybe once a week at first. After you have done it and when you find it beneficial, then you can expand it from one day to two days to three days and so forth. This is the practice you must do, keeping the eight precepts. The Buddha established what we call the Observance Day. We call it ‘Wan Phra’ in Thai, which means Buddhist holiday. It is being observed once a week. We have
— 79 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 a Buddhist religious holiday where buddhists go to temple to give dāna, keep five or eight precepts, listen to Dhamma talks and practice meditation. For people who meditate they need to keep the eight precepts. For people who don’t have time to stay at the temple to meditate because they have to go to work or to do other things, they have to keep the five precepts. If you want to meditate, you have to keep the eight precepts. You want to switch from physical happiness to mental happiness. You have to stop all physical activities. For eating, you only want to eat just enough to keep your body going, so you don’t eat after 12 o’clock (in the afternoon). You stop all sexual activities. You don’t want to find that kind of happiness. You want to meditate instead. If you keep just the five precepts, you can still have sexual activities, then you won’t have time to meditate. If you want to meditate, you have to stop all sexual activities. That is the third precept. You have to progress from Kāmesu micchācārā veramaṇī to Abrahmacariyā veramaṇī. Abrahmacariyā means pure, like the Brahma. Brahma doesn’t have to have happiness through sexual activity. Brahma finds happiness in peace of mind, in meditation. You have to also stop all sorts of entertainment, stop indulging in all sorts of entertainment like singing, dancing, going to movies, going to parties, going to all the entertainment venues. You want to cut your mind from going outside, you want to bring it inside, so it becomes peaceful and happy. You don’t want to sleep more than four or five hours, because if you sleep too much you are just wasting time. You can use that time to meditate. In order not to sleep too much, you should sleep on a hard floor. Even if it is a hard floor, if you really feel tired, you can sleep easily on either a soft or hard floor. If you sleep on a mattress, even after you have enough rested, you don’t want to get up when you become awake, because it feels comfortable and, so you sleep for another three or four hours. If you sleep on a hard floor, when the body has rested and you wake up, you don’t want to remain lying down because it is not comfortable, so you get up and sit and meditate. That is the purpose of not sleeping on sleep mattresses, on a big bed, but to sleep on
— 80 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 a hard floor. You can use a mat or a piece of cloth. This is the purpose of sleeping on a hard floor, so you don’t sleep too much. Some monks even refrain from sleeping altogether because they want to concentrate on practising meditation. That is the “Three Postures” dhutanga practice which monks can take up. The practitioner can take only three postures: standing, sitting and walking and not lying down. If you sleep, you just sleep either in sitting or standing posture. In this way, you will only sleep very shortly, sleep briefly, either one or two hour. Then you will become awake and then you can continue practising. This is the purpose of taking the eight precepts: to remove all other activities that prevent you from meditating. Once you take the eight precepts then you will have time to meditate. You should find a quiet place. You should be somewhere alone if possible. You don’t want any distractions. If you are near people, people will distract you. Their activities will distract you, for example when you keep eight precepts at home and if other members of the family do not keep eight precepts, then they will turn on the television, they have dinner, sometimes they will call you, “come on, join us”, and you will not be able to keep the eight precepts or meditate. You have to go to a place, like in a temple, where everybody does the same things. In most temples people keep the eight precepts and meditate. In the evening they have evening chanting, meditation, listening to the Dhamma talks, so you should go to places like that, then you will be able to meditate. If you live alone in a condominium or in a house, you can use that place to meditate. You can keep the eight precepts there too. It doesn’t always have to be in the temple. A “temple” in a Buddhist view is a quiet place which is conducive for meditation. During the Buddha’s time when he practised, there were no temples as we know today. His temple was the forest. Don’t be misguided by the word temple, because nowadays temples are not really temples. They are shrines. They are like a theater where a lot of people visit to watch some activities. That is not a real temple. A real temple should be a place where people go to sit and meditate.
— 81 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 They don’t socialize there. This is the real meaning of the word, temple. The temple that the Buddha and his noble disciples went to is in the forest. Look at all the Ajahns. Ajahn Mun spent 10 years alone up in the forest of Chiang Mai. He did not stay together with the hill tribe people but he relied on them for food. He typically stayed some distance away from the village, maybe half an hour’s walking distance so he will not be disturbed. He only went to the village in the morning to collect food and after that, he went back to his dwelling place, had his food, and then practised meditation. All day and all night, he did walking and sitting meditation. He maintained mindfulness to stop his mind from thinking until the mind eventually converged and became one, where the full force of inner happiness happens. Through this, you will also gain inner strength to fight against the defilements. Mindfulness cannot get rid of your defilements. It can only stop them temporarily. In order to get rid of your defilements, you need wisdom or insight. Insight means to see things as they are. Right now we are not seeing things as they are. We are deluded. We are seeing from the perspective that is opposite of the truth. We are seeing thing that is not lasting as lasting. We are seeing thing that isn’t conducive to happiness as conducive to happiness. We see things that don’t belong to us as belonging to us. When reality strikes, it makes us sad because things that you think belong to you will one day leave you or you will leave them. They are not permanent. This is what you have to teach your mind to see: that everything is impermanent, everything is temporary. Everything that we have here, belongs to us for a certain period of time and after that it will disappear or we will separate from them. Like this body, this body doesn’t belong to us. If it really belongs to us, it will stay with us forever. But after 60, 70 or 80 years, the body says goodbye. When that happens you become very sad. If you know ahead of time then you can teach your mind that this body doesn’t belong to you, it is not you. You are just using this
— 82 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 body like a servant and one day this servant will say goodbye to you. If you know this ahead of time and prepare your mind for that eventuality, when that day comes you won’t feel sad because you don’t have any desire for it to stay on. The thing that makes you unhappy is your desire like the desire for this body to stay with you forever. Once you know that it is not going to stay with you forever, then you won’t have that desire for it to stay with you when the time comes for it to go. Remind your mind that everything doesn’t belong to you. Everything that you have from your body to everything else, to your husband, your wife, your son, your daughter, your father, your mother, your possessions, your house, your car, whatever you have now, one day you will lose them. If you teach your mind in this way, your mind will stop clinging to them and will stop having any desire for them to be with you all the time. You will stop relying on them for making you happy. You will instead rely on your mind to make you happy by keeping your mind calm. If you can let go everything, your mind will become much more peaceful because there is nothing to worry about. Right now your mind worries about everything. By worrying, the mind has no happiness. You can have ten million dollars but you can still be unhappy because your mind worries. If you know that this ten million dollars doesn’t belong to you, then you won’t worry. You know it is going to leave you one day, or you are going to leave it one day, then you will not worry and you can be happy. If you have this inner peace of mind, this mental happiness, then you don’t need anything to make you happy. So you don’t have to worry about anything. You are ready to separate from them. You can live without having anything. If you still have the body, all you need is to feed the body daily, that’s all. This is basically how you should practise if you want to find real happiness, eternal happiness because the mind is eternal. We are all looking for eternity, but we don’t know where to find it. We have eternity right within ourselves but we just don’t see it. We keep looking for things outside. In this universe nothing is eternal. Nowadays people have sent space crafts to the different
— 83 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 planets in the hope of finding something better. However, they won’t find anything better. The thing that is better is here within yourself, but delusion blocks you from knowing this truth. It tells you something is better on the other side of the fence, like the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. So we think the world is bad, we have to go to the moon, we have to go to Mars because we think it is better there. No matter how far you go, you will not find anything better. They are all the same. They are all aniccaṁ, dukkhaṁ, anattā. The only thing that is not aniccaṁ, dukkhaṁ, anattā is in your mind right here, Nibbāna. This is where you want to go, to the inside by practising according to the Buddha’s teaching. You have taken the first step of practice, that is dāna and keeping the five precepts. Now you have to move up to the second level. You have to progress from five precepts to eight precepts. You can stop going around giving dāna. Try to stay put and meditate. Once you can do that, you will find the real happiness inside and then you can let go of everything that keeps you worried, agitated or sad. Once you find the real happiness inside, you can let go of everything and nothing can bother you. You have to move up to the next level. You have been giving dāna and keeping the five precepts for long enough. You have been going to see different teachers, so studying is what you should do next. Once you know what you should do next, you start doing it by keeping the eight precepts at least once a week. Give yourself one day to do meditation practice and not to do anything else. It can be any day, it doesn’t have to be the religious holiday because sometimes the religious calendar doesn’t match your schedule. Your day off and the religious holiday may not fall on the same day. You can use your day off as your religious holiday. If you don’t work on Saturday or Sunday, you can choose one of these days to be your day of meditation, day of keeping the eight precepts. Once you start practising, you will see the results. Once you see the results, you will be encouraged to do more because the result from meditation is better than anything
— 84 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 else in this world. Once people meditate, they may eventually become monks or nuns because there is nothing better to do than meditating. Do the joy and happiness you get from the body for many years make you better off? You still need more and more of it. You still feel sad, feel unhappy. Try to meditate. You will find the difference. Your worry, your anxiety, your fear and your sadness will gradually diminish. You become happier without having anything to worry about. The less you have, the happier you become because the more you have, the more worries you have. Try to have as little as possible. Buddhism teaches us that small is beautiful, little is great. It is like being a monk, who has very little possession but he finds greatness by being a monk. This is my advice to you. I will give you some time to ask any questions.
— 85 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 Question (F1): How do you reconcile the life of lay people who go to temple to meditate and do not socialise. Are they anti-social? Than Ajahn: No, nobody ever told me that I am anti-social. It is your defilement that makes you think that way. Once a person meditates, the rest of the people will understand that he is a meditator, and not being anti-social. He wants to be alone. He wants to find peace of mind. It is your defilement that makes you think this way and prevents you from meditating. Nobody will call you anti-social. They will praise you for it: Oh, this person is great; he or she can do something that we cannot do. Your defilement keeps telling you that other people will think that you are antisocial, in fact they are not. Did anyone ever call me anti-social? It is your defilement trying to mislead you, trying to stop you from meditating. Question (F1): Laypeople have duties such as looking after the family. How then can laypeople practise? Than Ajahn: That’s why I say you have to start by choosing a day once a week. You have day off from work, right? Do you have to Question and Answer
— 86 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 look after your family seven days a week? You can have a day off from looking after them, and to look after yourself. I only ask you for one day a week to start with. Once you have the experience and some results then you think it is good, then you can increase the number of days of practice. There is a way to do it once you want something badly enough. You can give up everything. You can give up your father and mother when you find the right husband, right? So don’t worry. Once you start meditating and you have achieved the result, you can give up everything because you know that eventually you are going to give it up anyway, right? You cannot live with them forever. You don’t think about this, you only think that you are going to live forever. If you go to meditate you think that you are leaving them, but eventually they will leave you or you will leave them anyway. Your thinking is led by defilement but not by Dhamma. If your thinking is led by Dhamma, everything becomes so easy. Okay? Question (F2):If I decide to take eight precepts for the long term, is this considered as running away from my problem? Than Ajahn: No. The real problem is your defilements, everything else is not a problem. When you meditate, you are confronting your real problem. Question (F2): How about when I have family, such as my parents, if I go as long term eight precepter, I will not be able to give them money to take care of them. Than Ajahn: They are secondary, they are not important. They can take care of themselves. What happens if you die today? Question (F3): If feeling of pain arises and it becomes worse, how can I handle this?
— 87 — 8 | Laypeople from Singapore, April 28th, 2015 Than Ajahn: It doesn’t get worse by your meditation. It is the condition that gets worse, you just have to accept it for what it is. That’s all. Question (F3): Do we look at the spasm (of pain) or do we go back to the rising or falling of the abdomen? Than Ajahn: There are two methods. The easiest is to come back to your meditation and disregard your spasm. The second method which is harder because you need a stronger mind; that is to look at the spasm and leave it alone. You look at it and understand the nature of the spasm that it is something you cannot do anything with. It is beyond your control. If it wants to remain, let it remain. Don’t have any desire to get rid of it because when you have this desire, you create more mental stress which is more painful than your spasm. Just leave it alone. You can go back to your meditation object and treat the pain like the rain which you cannot force to go away. You have to live with it. If you leave it alone then your mind will become peaceful and not be hurt by the physical pain. Question (F3): I have this pain and when I try to meditate, I cannot settle my mind. Than Ajahn: That is because your mindfulness is not strong enough. You should try to develop mindfulness even before you meditate. You should do that all day long, from the time you get up you have to develop mindfulness right away. Don’t let your mind think about anything else. Force it to think about ‘Buddha’ ‘Buddha’ ‘Buddha’. Whatever you do, keep on repeating ‘Buddho’ ‘Buddho’, whether you are washing your face, brushing your teeth, combing your hair, keep on repeating ‘Buddho’ ‘Buddho’ ‘Buddho’. Don’t think about anything. If you want to think, think only about something important but other than that, stop thinking.
— 88 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 Question (F3): When the spasm arises, I just leave it alone and continue with ‘Buddho’ ‘Buddho’? Than Ajahn: Yes. There is nothing you can do about it. It comes and goes. When it comes you cannot get rid of it. When it goes, you cannot get it back. You just have to leave it alone. You just focus on your meditation object. Nothing else. Question (F4): I am using ānāpānasati, after a while the concentration goes to stomach area. Do I focus on the stomach or go back to the breathing? Than Ajahn: You go back to whichever point which is more convenient for you. Try to stay at one point. Don’t follow the breath. End of Desāna Sādhu Sādhu Sādhu
— 91 — Than Ajahn: Anyone would like to ask any questions? Monk: You have a way that you would usually teach either monks or lay people with regards to kammaṭṭhāna, specifically with regards to meditation or the bhāvanā development. What is your approach? Than Ajahn: We always talk about the fundamentals first, the basic stuffs that you need to have. It is like a building block. Before you can get into meditation practice, you need sīla to support your practice and before you can have sīla, you need to have dāna. As far as you are concerned, you have done your part on dāna. You have given up your possessions, your wealth. You no longer have any money to worry about. For lay people, they have to give a lot of dāna first, in order to free themselves to have the time to bhāvanā, to keep the precepts, to maintain the sīla. As far as monks are concerned, we usually talk about sīla, samādhi and paññā. When I stayed with Luangta Mahā Boowa, he was very strict with the Vinaya, the 227 precepts and the dhutanga practice. 9 Monks from Wat Pah Nanachaat June 9th, 2015
— 92 — Dhamma in English 2014 & 2015 He always stressed the necessity of maintaining the purity of sīla and maintaining the dhutanga practices because they support the practice of bhāvanā, and support the development of samādhi and paññā. So we have to be very strict with our korwat, our regular duties each day like going on pindapatt, coming back to monastery, eating once a day, eating from the bowl and doing work like sweeping the temple ground and cleaning the sālā. Communal work is considered very important in the community of the Sangha. Every monk should participate unless they are sick or there is a special reason. Luangta allowed us to skip the normal routine if we fast. He wanted to encourage us to be alone, and not to mingle with other monks. So sometimes when we wanted to intensify our practice, we took up fasting. When we fasted we didn’t have to come out to pindapatt, we didn’t have to come to the sālā (dining hall) for food, or anything like that. All you have to do is just practise walking meditation and sitting meditation in your kuti. But if you come for pindapatt and eat, then you are expected to do the normal routine with other monks. Whatever we do he always stressed the development or maintenance of sati (mindfulness). We should always focus our attention on the thing we are doing at the moment. During walking just know that we are walking, sweeping or whatever we do, we always focus on that activity and nothing else. The mind shouldn’t be scattered into two different things at the same time, like when you are sweeping and thinking about this and that. This is not being mindful. You need mindfulness if you want to concentrate your mind and have samādhi. You need mindfulness to pull your mind inside. Your mind is being pushed out by your desire, your kāma-chanda, your desire for the senses, the sounds, smells, tastes and tactile objects, so you need mindfulness to pull it back in. So this is a constant tuck of war. If your mindfulness is not strong enough, you will not be able to bring your mind to samādhi to become calm and peaceful. So that’s why we have to maintain mindfulness right from the time we get up. We have to constantly
— 93 — 9 | Monks from Wat Pah Nanachaat, June 9th, 2015 focus our attention on one particular thing either the activity of the body or a parikamma, mantra – reciting the word of the Buddha, ‘Buddho’, ‘Buddho’. This is in order to stop the mind from thinking about other things which are useless for our practice. Our practice here is not to worry about other people or other things. Our practice here is to bring the mind inside, bring it into samādhi. If we have reached samādhi then we have reached peacefulness and happiness which will be something that will sustain us in our lives as a monk. If we don’t have this, the mind will be constantly pushing outward towards the sight, sound, smell, taste, tactile objects, and if you cannot rein it in, it will eventually force you to disrobe. So what you want to do is to bring the mind into samādhi first. Don’t worry about wisdom yet. Wisdom is the next step. First you need a calm mind to be able to reflect or to contemplate the true nature of things. If your mind is not calm, when you contemplate the true nature of things, your kilesas (defilements) will come and stir up your emotions, make you feel bad, and then you don’t want to think about the true nature of things anymore because the truth is hard to swallow. You can only swallow it when the mind is peaceful, that’s when the kilesas that makes things hard to swallow stop functioning temporarily. Samādhi is very important for the development of paññā (wisdom). So first of all you need to gain samādhi. In order to have samādhi you need to have mindfulness all the time. You always have to bring the mind into the present, don’t go to the past, don’t go to the future and don’t go to sight, sound, smell, taste and tactile objects. Bring it inside. Once you could bring it inside, the mind will be peaceful and calm. The defilements will temporarily stop functioning. Then there will be no resistance to the truth. Normally the defilements are the ones that want to resist the truth. They do not want to see the truth, like contemplating asubha or contemplating death. This is something that the defilements do not like. They will resist it. If you don’t have any samādhi