Buddha

Mindfulness in Plain English
Bhante Henepola Gunaratna

Chapter 1

Meditation: Why Bother?

Part 4 of 7

Happiness and peace. Those are really the prime issues in human existence. That is what all of us are seeking. This often is a bit hard to see because we cover up those basic goals with layers of surface objectives. We want food, we want money, we want sex, possessions and respect. We even say to ourselves that the idea of 'happiness' is too abstract: "Look, I am practical. Just give me enough money and I will buy all the happiness I need". Unfortunately, this is an attitude that does not work. Examine each of these goals and you will find they are superficial. You want food. Why? Because I am hungry. So you are hungry, so what? Well if I eat, I won't be hungry and then I'll feel good. Ah ha! Feel good! Now there is a real item. What we really seek is not the surface goals. They are just means to an end. What we are really after is the feeling of relief that comes when the drive is satisfied. Relief, relaxation and an end to the tension. Peace, happiness, no more yearning.

So what is this happiness? For most of us, the perfect happiness would mean getting everything we wanted, being in control of everything, playing Caesar, making the whole world dance a jig according to our every whim. Once again, it does not work that way.

Take a look at the people in history who have actually held this ultimate power. These were not happy people. Most assuredly they were not men at peace with themselves.

Why? Because they were driven to control the world totally and absolutely and they could not. They wanted to control all men and there remained men who refused to be controlled. They could not control the stars. They still got sick. They still had to die.

You can't ever get everything you want. It is impossible. Luckily, there is another option.

You can learn to control your mind, to step outside of this endless cycle of desire and aversion. You can learn to not want what you want, to recognize desires but not be controlled by them. This does not mean that you lie down on the road and invite everybody to walk all over you . It means that you continue to live a very normal-looking life, but live from a whole new viewpoint. You do the things that a person must do, but you are free from that obsessive, compulsive drivenness of your own desires. You want something, but you don't need to chase after it. You fear something, but you don't need to stand there quaking in your boots. This sort of mental culture is very difficult. It takes years. But trying to control everything is impossible, and the difficult is preferable to the impossible.

Wait a minute, though. Peace and happiness! Isn't that what civilization is all about? We build skyscrapers and freeways. We have paid vacations, TV sets. We provide free hospitals and sick leaves, Social Security and welfare benefits. All of that is aimed at providing some measure of peace and happiness. Yet the rate of mental illness climbs steadily, and the crime rates rise faster. The streets are crawling with delinquents and unstable individuals. Stick your arms outside the safety of your own door and somebody is very likely to steal your watch! Something is not working. A happy man does not feel driven to kill. We like to think that our society is exploiting every area of human knowledge in order to achieve peace and happiness.

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Free Buddhism books, teachings, podcasts and videos from Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions:

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"Monks, eleven advantages are to be expected from the release (deliverance) of heart by familiarizing oneself with thoughts of loving-kindness (metta), by the cultivation of loving-kindness, by constantly increasing these thoughts, by regarding loving-kindness as a vehicle (of expression), and also as something to be treasured, by living in conformity with these thoughts, by putting these ideas into practice, and by establishing them. What are the eleven?

1. "He sleeps in comfort. 2. He awakes in comfort. 3. He sees no evil dreams. 4. He is dear to human beings. 5. He is dear to non-human beings. 6. Devas (gods) protect him. 7. Fire, poison, and sword cannot touch him. 8. His mind can concentrate quickly. 9. His countenance is serene. 10. He dies without being confused in mind. 11. If he fails to attain arahantship (the highest sanctity) here and now, he will be reborn in the brahma-world.

Metta Sutta
Anguttara Nikaya 11.16

Mindfulness in Plain English
Bhante Henepola Gunaratna

Chapter 1

Meditation: Why Bother?

Part 3 of 7

Over on the other side of the mind lies the box labeled 'bad'. When we perceive something 'bad', we try to push it away. We try to deny it, reject it, get rid of it any way we can. We fight against our own experience. We run from pieces of ourselves. Let us call this mental habit 'rejecting'. Between these two reactions lies the neutral box. Here we place the experiences which are neither good nor bad. They are tepid, neutral, uninteresting and boring. We pack experience away in the neutral box so that we can ignore it and thus return our attention to where the action is, namely our endless round of desire and aversion. This category of experience gets robbed of its fair share of our attention. Let us call this mental habit 'ignoring'. The direct result of all this lunacy is a perpetual treadmill race to nowhere, endlessly pounding after pleasure, endlessly fleeing from pain, endlessly ignoring 90 percent of our experience. Than wondering why life tastes so flat. In the final analysis, it's a system that does not work.

No matter how hard you pursue pleasure and success, there are times when you fail. No matter how fast you flee, there are times when pain catches up with you. And in between those times, life is so boring you could scream. Our minds are full of opinions and criticisms. We have built walls all around ourselves and we are trapped within the prison of our own lies and dislikes. We suffer.

Suffering is a big word in Buddhist thought. It is a key term and it should be thoroughly understood. The Pali word is 'dukkha', and it does not just mean the agony of the body. It means the deep, subtle sense of unsatisfactoriness which is a part of every mental treadmill. The essence of life is suffering, said the Buddha. At first glance this seems exceedingly morbid and pessimistic. It even seems untrue. After all, there are plenty of times when we are happy. Aren't there? No, there are not. It just seems that way. Take any moment when you feel really fulfilled and examine it closely. Down under the joy, you will find that subtle, all-pervasive undercurrent of tension, that no matter how great the moment is, it is going to end. No matter how much you just gained, you are either going to lose some of it or spend the rest of your days guarding what you have got and scheming how to get more. And in the end, you are going to die. In the end, you lose everything. It is all transitory.

Sounds pretty bleak, doesn't it? Luckily it's not; not at all. It only sounds bleak when you view it from the level of the ordinary mental perspective, the very level at which the treadmill mechanism operates. Down under that level lies another whole perspective, a completely different way to look at the universe. It is a level of functioning where the mind does not try to freeze time, where we do not grasp onto our experience as it flows by, where we do not try to block things out and ignore them. It is a level of experience beyond good and bad, beyond pleasure and pain. It is a lovely way to perceive the world, and it is a learnable skill. It is not easy, but is learnable.

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Ajahn Chah, Buddhist teacher of Thai forest meditation of Theravada Buddhism channel:


https://t.me/ajahnchah_buddhism
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Free Buddha Dharma ebook

Abhidhamma in Daily Life
By Ashin Janakavibhamsa

A treatise entitled "Abhidamma in Daily Life" is written for the welfare of people, with a view to assist them in acquiring good conduct.

The author's aim can be summarized as follows:

(1) For the reader to develop rightful attitude regarding the objects and senses perceived, to be always broad-minded, to live the way of (brahmacariya) noble living, and to conduct a harmonious life.

(2) For the reader to be always in good mood,develop an unwavering attitude towards life and to be able to live in grace whether they be wealthy and happy, being successful and prosperous, or whether they are poor and unhappy meeting with failure and calamity.

(3) For the reader to be able to fulfill the (parami) perfections such as dana (charity), (sila) morality etc. in this existence so that they may be reborn in happy abodes in the existences to come till the attainment of the supreme bliss of nibbana.

Free download available:

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===

Think about it: Who is there in the world for whom you feel ill will? Start out with people who are easy to feel goodwill for, and then go to those who are harder and harder until you get to the ones where you find it really hard. Then ask yourself: What would you gain, what would anybody gain, by seeing that person suffer? You think it through, and you realize that nothing would be gained.

Then focus on what you’re doing as you think these thoughts. You’re engaging in directed thought and evaluation. That’s verbal fabrication. And you hold in mind those images—the images of the bandits sawing you into pieces, the mother protecting her child—which are mental fabrications. Fabrications are things you have to do, to put together. So in working on goodwill, you begin to get more sensitive to how the mind has to create these mental states, and how it can create these states by learning to think in new ways, learning how to keep new perceptions in mind.

Basically, what it comes down to is understanding goodwill in the light of karma. On the one hand, there’s the karma of generating goodwill itself. Then there’s the karma that you’re thinking about as you think thoughts of goodwill. What does it mean, in the light of karma, to wish for people to be happy? It means you wish that they would create good karma, that they would be skillful. As the verse said just now, you wish, “May beings not deceive or despise one another or wish for another to suffer.” That’s goodwill in the light of karma, which makes it an extension of right view. As the Buddha said, if you have ill will for anyone, that’s a part of wrong view. Not just a wrong attitude—it’s wrong view.

So when you understand goodwill, you realize that it’s for the real world, and you’re dealing in realities when you try to make your goodwill universal.

It’s not magical thinking. It’s a genuine power in the real world.

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Thanissaro Bhikkhu is an American Theravada Buddhist monk trained in the Thai Forest Tradition. He currently serves as abbot of the Metta Forest Monastery in San Diego County, California and is a frequent contributor to Tricycle. His latest book is Good Heart, Good Mind: The Practice of the Ten Perfections. Thanissaro Bhikkhu’s talks, writings, and translations are all freely available at his website
www.dhammatalks.org
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Part 1 of 2:

https://t.me/wordsofbuddha/2953


Part 2 of 2:

https://t.me/dhammapadas/2017


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Dhammapada, beloved and favorite teachings of the Buddha channel:

https://t.me/dhammapadas
===

Goodwill for the Real World

A Theravada monk explores the application of boundless metta for a broken world.
By Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Part 2 of 2


The example the Buddha gives is of thieves who have pinned you down and overpowered you, and they’re cutting you into pieces with a two-handled saw. I’ve always liked that detail: the two handles. It means that at least two of the thieves are sawing away at you. The Buddha said that even in a case like that, you still need to have goodwill for them. In fact, you start with goodwill for them and then expand it out into the whole universe, so that you’re not focused on them and what they’re doing to you. You realize that your most important wealth is the state of your mind, and that you protect that above all else, even if it means you’d be faced with death. You protect that because that’s more important than your body.

One of the stories that comes from the forest tradition is of a monk who is sitting in his hut one night and an elephant comes and crashes through the wall right in front of him. Here they are, face-to-face, and the monk realizes that his only protection is goodwill for the elephant. So he spreads goodwill and speaks to the elephant in kind, gentle terms. Elephants are very sensitive to what you say to them, as well as to the tone of your voice. In that case, the elephant withdrew.

Last year, I was staying in a monastery in Thailand, and one morning an elephant started crashing through the monastery wall. Someone happened to be nearby. He spoke to the elephant in very kind terms. He said, “Big Brother, Big Brother, don’t do that. It’s bad karma.” The elephant stopped and walked away.

There’s also the story of Ajaan Lee out in the forest. The villagers had warned him that there was an elephant in rut who was running around, stabbing people with his tusks, and that he’d be wise to get out of the forest. But he wanted to test his determination not to be afraid of that kind of thing. And sure enough, one afternoon, he was sitting in meditation under a tree, and the elephant came into a clearing right in front of him. His first thought was, “If he comes at me, I’m dead.” So he reaches up for a branch. He’s going to climb up the tree, but something inside him says, “If you’re afraid of death, you’re going to keep on dying.” He sat back down in meditation, faced the elephant, and spread goodwill to the elephant. The elephant stopped, shook his ears up and down a bit, and then walked away.

For the forest ajaans, metta, or goodwill, is not a soft, tender, weak emotion. It’s strong. It’s a protection. It protects your genuine valuables. When they talk about having goodwill for all beings, it’s not an airy fairy world that they’re imagining or a “complacent Buddhist bubble.” You need real goodwill for the real world, because the dangers of the world are real, and this is one of your ways of protecting yourself from responding to those dangers in an unskillful way.

You realize that your most important wealth is the state of your mind, and that you protect that above all else, even if it means you’d be faced with death.

When you think about it in those terms, it’s a lot easier to spread thoughts of goodwill to all. If it’s not there, you work on it. We’re sometimes told that goodwill is part of the innate nature of the mind. Now, it is possible for the human mind to have thoughts of goodwill, but remember, human goodwill is very different from Brahma goodwill, and Brahma goodwill is what we’re trying to develop. Human goodwill is partial. You have goodwill for the people who are good to you and not for the people who are not, but that’s no protection at all. It’s like building a fence around the front of your house but leaving the back of the house open. You want goodwill that’s all around.

Shwedagon Zedi Daw, The Shwedagon Golden Dagon Pagoda, Yangon, Myanmar.

Mindfulness in Plain English
Bhante Henepola Gunaratna

Chapter 1

Meditation: Why Bother?

Part 2 of 7

Go to a party. Listen to the laughter, that brittle-tongued voice that says fun on the surface and fear underneath. Feel the tension, feel the pressure. Nobody really relaxes.

They are faking it. Go to a ball game. Watch the fan in the stand. Watch the irrational fit of anger. Watch the uncontrolled frustration bubbling forth from people that masquerades under the guise of enthusiasm, or team spirit. Booing, cat-calls and unbridled egotism in the name of team loyalty. Drunkenness, fights in the stands. These are the people trying desperately to release tension from within. These are not people who are at peace with themselves. Watch the news on TV. Listen to the lyrics in popular songs. You find the same theme repeated over and over in variations. Jealousy, suffering, discontent and stress.

Life seems to be a perpetual struggle, some enormous effort against staggering odds. And what is our solution to all this dissatisfaction? We get stuck in the ' If only' syndrome. If only I had more money, then I would be happy. If only I could find somebody who really loves me, if only I could lose 20 pounds, if only I had a color TV, Jacuzzi, and curly hair, and on and on forever. So where does all this junk come from and more important, what can we do about it? It comes from the conditions of our own minds. It is a deep, subtle and pervasive set of mental habits, a Gordian knot which we have built up bit by bit and we can unravel just the same way, one piece at a time. We can tune up our awareness, dredge up each separate piece and bring it out into the light. We can make the unconscious conscious, slowly, one piece at a time.

The essence of our experience is change. Change is incessant. Moment by moment life flows by and it is never the same. Perpetual alteration is the essence of the perceptual universe. A thought springs up in your head and half a second later, it is gone. In comes another one, and that is gone too. A sound strikes your ears and then silence. Open your eyes and the world pours in, blink and it is gone. People come into your life and they leave again. Friends go, relatives die. Your fortunes go up and they go down. Sometimes you win and just as often you lose. It is incessant: change, change, change. No two moments ever the same.

There is not a thing wrong with this. It is the nature of the universe. But human culture has taught us some odd responses to this endless flowing. We categorize experiences. We try to stick each perception, every mental change in this endless flow into one of three mental pigeon holes. It is good, or it is bad, or it is neutral. Then, according to which box we stick it in, we perceive with a set of fixed habitual mental responses. If a particular perception has been labeled 'good', then we try to freeze time right there. We grab onto that particular thought, we fondle it, we hold it, we try to keep it from escaping. When that does not work, we go all-out in an effort to repeat the experience which caused that thought. Let us call this mental habit 'grasping'.
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Dhammapada, beloved and favorite teachings of the Buddha channel:

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If you’re mature, your attitude should be, “May this person see the error of his or her ways and be willing to make a change.” If there’s some way you can help them make that change, you’re happy to help. But you also realize that a lot of people won’t be willing to change. In those cases, you’re not going to do anything to harm them, but at the same time, you have to develop an attitude of equanimity.

Equanimity isn’t cold-heartedness. It’s just realizing that there are some people you cannot influence, no matter how intense your goodwill, so you have to focus your efforts on people who will respond to your goodwill.

There are stories in the canon of the Buddha extending intense goodwill toward individuals and changing their behavior, but that largely has to do with the power of his mind and with the individual good karma of those people. The power of your goodwill may not be that strong, but at the very least, it protects you. If, as you go through the day, you’re not acting on ill will, that makes it a lot easier for the mind to settle down in the evening: You feel better about yourself. So even though you may be angry at people for one reason or another, you don’t let it spill over into ill will. You’re careful not to let the anger influence your thoughts, your words, or your deeds.

You protect your goodwill, because it protects you. There’s that famous line in the Karaniya Metta Sutta: “Just as a mother would protect her only child with her life, you should protect your goodwill.” Some people read that passage as meaning that we should love everybody in the same way that a mother loves her only child, but that would be impossible. It gets into the world of unreality. The Buddha is teaching goodwill for the real world. There are cases where people are really going to misbehave, and it’s going to be a real challenge for you to have goodwill for them, but you have to protect your goodwill because, as I said, it protects you. That’s what the verse is actually saying: Just as she would protect her child with her life, you protect your goodwill with your life.
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Words of the Buddha channel:

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===

Goodwill for the Real World

A Theravada monk explores the application of boundless metta for a broken world.
By Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Part 1 of 2

Years ago, after the 9/11 attacks, there was a Buddhist teacher who said that the attacks had burst his “complacent Buddhist bubble.” That’s a contradiction in terms: “complacent” and “Buddhist.” After all, the Buddha said that all skillful qualities come from heedfulness, and heedfulness means having a very strong sense of danger. There are dangers in the world. There are dangers in your own mind. The reason we try to develop skillful qualities in the mind is that we see that we have to prepare for these dangers.

Now, it’s true that some of the Buddhist teachings sound like they’re not designed for the real world. One of them is “goodwill for all beings.” A lot of beings are really misbehaving, so it seems difficult or impossible to have goodwill for everybody, but actually, universal goodwill is not only possible, it’s necessary for our own survival: the survival of our goodness. If you act on ill will toward other people, you’re going to be creating a bad state of mind within yourself and bad conditions in the world through your karma. The first thought in generating goodwill has to be that you’re doing this for yourself so that you can protect yourself from your greed, your aversion, your delusion, and especially from your ill will.

The Buddha admits that there are a lot of people for whom it’s difficult to have goodwill. A chant from the Paritta Sutta describes a monk who was sitting out in the forest meditating when a snake fell out of a tree on top of him, bit him, and he died. The monks went to report this to the Buddha, and he responded that the monk had not spread goodwill to the four families of snakes. Then he proceeded to teach the monks that particular chant for spreading goodwill for beings with no feet, beings with two feet, beings with four, and beings with many feet. He goes through a list of all the creepy crawly things that there are out in the forest—and those are just the small ones. There are other places where he talks about having goodwill for little beings, big beings, short beings and long. Some of the big beings in the forest, of course, are pretty scary too: elephants, bears, rhinoceroses. There were also bands of thieves that might kill monks just for the fun of it. So the Buddha lived in a dangerous world.

Universal goodwill is not only possible, it’s necessary for our own survival: the survival of our goodness.

One of the things you notice about that chant of goodwill for snakes and creepy crawly things is that it says, “I have goodwill for you all, but may you all now depart.” Goodwill doesn’t mean that you’re going to be there for them or you’re going to be loving to them. There are lots of cases where goodwill basically means, “You’re looking for happiness in your way and I’m looking for happiness in my way, and as long as I can live in a world where I’m behaving in a skillful way, may we go our separate ways.” The snakes will be happier to be away from you anyhow, and you’ll be happy to be away from the snakes.

So goodwill doesn’t mean love. I read a while back someone saying that even the word loving-kindness is too weak a translation for metta, that the Buddha would want to have you have love, love, love for everybody because, of course, everybody loves love. Well, the Buddha didn’t teach anything just because people liked to hear it. The attitude he taught is goodwill: “May these people be happy.” But you have to think about it: What does it mean for a person or an animal to be happy? They have to behave skillfully—people especially. Your wish, basically, is, “May all beings behave skillfully.” That’s a wish you can have for anybody without hypocrisy, including people who have been really misbehaving, people you intensely dislike.

Then with the passing of those seven days, the Gracious One arose from that concentration. Then the Nāga King Mucalinda, having understood that the sky was now clear without a cloud, having unravelled his coils from the Gracious One’s body, and after withdrawing his own form, and creating the appearance of a young brāhmaṇa, stood in front of the Gracious One, revering the Gracious One with raised hands.

Then the Gracious One, having understood the significance of it, on that occasion uttered this exalted utterance:

“There is happiness and detachment for the one who is satisfied,
who has heard the Dhamma, and who sees,
There is happiness for him who is free from ill-will in the world,
who is restrained towards breathing beings.

“The state of dispassion in the world is happiness,
the complete transcending of sense desires,
But for he who has removed the conceit ‘I am’—
this is indeed the highest happiness.”


Udāna 2.1
Mucalindasuttaṁ 11

Mindfulness in Plain English
Bhante Henepola Gunaratna

Chapter 1

Meditation: Why Bother?

Part 1 of 7

Meditation is not easy. It takes time and it takes energy. It also takes grit, determination and discipline. It requires a host of personal qualities which we normally regard as unpleasant and which we like to avoid whenever possible. We can sum it all up in the

American word 'gumption'. Meditation takes 'gumption'. It is certainly a great deal easier just to kick back and watch television. So why bother? Why waste all that time and energy when you could be out enjoying yourself? Why bother? Simple. Because you are human. And just because of the simple fact that you are human, you find yourself heir to an inherent unsatisfactoriness in life which simply will not go away. You can suppress it from your awareness for a time. You can distract yourself for hours on end, but it always comes back--usually when you least expect it. All of a sudden, seemingly out of the blue, you sit up, take stock, and realize your actual situation in life.

There you are, and you suddenly realize that you are spending your whole life just barely getting by. You keep up a good front. You manage to make ends meed somehow and look OK from the outside. But those periods of desperation, those times when you feel everything caving in on you, you keep those to yourself. You are a mess. And you know it. But you hide it beautifully. Meanwhile, way down under all that you just know there has got be some other way to live, some better way to look at the world, some way to touch life more fully. You click into it by chance now and then. You get a good job. You fall in love. You win the game. and for a while, things are different. Life takes on a richness and clarity that makes all the bad times and humdrum fade away. The whole texture of your experience changes and you say to yourself, "OK, now I've made it; now I will be happy". But then that fades, too, like smoke in the wind. You are left with just a memory. That and a vague awareness that something is wrong.

But there is really another whole realm of depth and sensitivity available in life, somehow, you are just not seeing it. You wind up feeling cut off. You feel insulated from the sweetness of experience by some sort of sensory cotton. You are not really touching life. You are not making it again. And then even that vague awareness fades away, and you are back to the same old reality. The world looks like the usual foul place, which is boring at best. It is an emotional roller coaster, and you spend a lot of your time down at the bottom of the ramp, yearning for the heights.

So what is wrong with you? Are you a freak? No. You are just human. And you suffer from the same malady that infects every human being. It is a monster in side all of us, and it has many arms: Chronic tension, lack of genuine compassion for others, including the people closest to you, feelings being blocked up, and emotional deadness. Many, many arms. None of us is entirely free from it. We may deny it. We try to suppress it. We build a whole culture around hiding from it, pretending it is not there, and distracting ourselves from it with goals and projects and status. But it never goes away. It is a constant undercurrent in every thought and every perception; a little wordless voice at the back of the head saying, "Not good enough yet. Got to have more. Got to make it better. Got to be better." It is a monster, a monster that manifests everywhere in subtle forms.
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Words of the Buddha channel:

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Free Buddha Dharma ebook

Now is the Knowing
By Ajahn Sumedho

The Buddha said that the greatest gift is the gift of Dhamma. This small book represents the wish of some of those fortunate enough to have received Dhamma teachings from Venerable Ajahn Sumedho to share them with others. A certain amount of editing of the talks was felt necessary so as to translate the free form of direct speech into a more ordered printed record. This was always done judiciously and with great respect.

The second section, ‘Anapanasati’, is in fact composed of passages from three or four different talks on the subject of mindfulness of breathing. It seemed very useful to have so much pertinent advice gathered in a single place.

It is by sincerely using the Ajahn’s teachings as ‘tools to reflect on the way things are’ that we can begin to repay our great debt of gratitude to him. May we all constantly do so.

Free download available:
https://static.sariputta.com/pdf/tipitaka/215/now_know_pdf.pdf
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Matale Alu Viharaya, Sri Lanka

Sayadaw Nandasiddhi

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 13 of 13

In our lives, by cultivating vipassana meditation taught by the Buddha, we can transcend worldliness and attain holiness. May you all attain maggañāṇa, phalañāṇa and Nibbāna.

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This book is titled “Ayutāha Dhamma Sojournˮ in memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a monk. Really I am not an author.

I have been coming here from Myanmar since 1999 with 12 Vassa overseas. I have resided at Santisukharama, Kota Tinggi, Malaysia for six years, at Vimuttisukkharama, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah for two Vassa, at Nirodharama Meditation Centre, Ayer Tawar, Malaysia for nine years and Satipatthana Meditation Centre, Indonesia for one Vassa. While spending Vassa in other countries, I have tried my best to propagate the Buddha Dhamma, sharing my knowledge with those who approached me.

I was invited to conduct vipassana meditation retreats in several countries among those being an annual international meditation retreat at MBSC (Mula Buddha Sasana Centre) in Taiwan for ten years. Those retreats were led by Ovadacariya Sayadawgyi U Panditabhivamsa and me.

In 2014, Sayadawgyi was not able to come due to his age and health and then I lead the retreat for about 40 days.

After the retreat, many yogis wanted to have the Dhamma talks recorded by the MBSC. Although sound files uploaded on YouTube are easy to access, it is often difficult to spare enough time to listen to them, so they requested that these talks be made into a book.

I wished to fulfil their request but I have no ability to write as well as this resultant book.

Luckily, the right people were found to fulfil their wishes. Sayalay Abhijata, Sayalay Jinapali, Niec Li, together with their team have done a very good job to help the propagation of the Dhamma.


It is my wish that those who come across this book will come to appreciate the great wisdom of the Buddha’s teachings and whatever little knowledge they get from this book will benefitthem in one way or another. Then, our aspiration in compiling this book has been fulfilled.

I humbly apologize for any errors or omissions which have inadvertently occurred in the course of compiling this book. You may correct any mistakes you come across as if it is your own book.

May you and all sentient beings be able to understand the reality of the nature of the Dhamma.

May you all be well, happy, peaceful and enjoy practicing the Dhamma.

May you all reach liberation and the highest goal.

Sayadaw Nandasiddhi

Nirodharama Meditation Centre
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Buddha dharma teachings channel:

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https://t.me/lorddivinebuddha/1123

Dambulla cave temple also known as the Golden Temple of Dambulla is a World Heritage Site in Sri Lanka. Dambulla is the largest and best-preserved cave temple complex in Sri Lanka.

Pure jade and gold Buddha statue

Free Buddha Dharma ebook

The Skill of Release: Teachings of Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo, translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu.

A selection of Ajaan Lee’s teachings, including a few full talks, some short passages, and sometimes even half-thoughts, if they seemed provocative enough. Although the passages presented here have been arranged so that the book will stand on its own, they are also meant to fill in some of the gaps left by Ajaan Lee’s other writings.

Free download here:
https://www.dhammatalks.org/Archive/Writings/Ebooks/TheSkillofRelease_181215.pdf
===

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 12 of 13


When the meditator observes a series of body and mind phenomena that pass away rapidly, he becomes terrified. This is knowledge of awareness of fearfulness (bhayatu paṭṭhāna-ñāṇa).

As the meditator becomes terrified of the misery of life, the knowledge of the contemplation of misery (ādīnavānupassanā-ñāṇa) is acquired.


After understanding about the misery of life and discovering that all phenomena will deteriorate, the meditator develops disgust and unhappiness. This is knowledge of contemplation of disgust (nibbidānupassanā-ñāṇa).


A mind that wishes to be liberated arises as a result of disgust and such a condition is known as knowledge of desire for deliverance (muñcitukamyatā-ñāṇa).


To fulfil one’s wish for liberation, the meditator will need to cultivate satipatthana in order to attain liberation. This is knowledge of re-observation (paṭisaṅkhā-ñāṇa).


In order to be liberated from suffering one becomes diligent and as a result, effort, satisfaction, zest, tranquillity, concentration and equanimity arise. Under the state of equanimity, it is known as knowledge of equanimity about formations (saṅkhārupekkhā-ñāṇa). Balance is re-established as mindfulness becomes extremely agile, picking up objects quickly before the mind can be perturbed by pleasantness or unpleasantness. There is a sense of coolness and steadiness in the absence of reactions.


Continuing to note arising and passing away, when the Five Spiritual Faculties and the Five Spiritual Powers are balanced, is evidence that insight wisdom is mature and one will see nibbāna immediately. At this time, knowledge of adaptation (anuloma-ñāṇa), maturity knowledge (gotrabhū-ñāṇa), path knowledge of stream-entry (magga-ñāṇa) and fruition knowledge of stream-entry (phala-ñāṇa) will arise sequentially. The meditator sees Nibbāna and become a stream-entrant.

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Dhammapada, beloved and favorite teachings of the Buddha channel:

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===

Big Buddhas of Wat Pha Sorn Kaew Buddhist temple, Phetchabun, Thailand

We, however, don’t yet have anything else to depend on, which is why we can’t let go. We first have to create a refuge for ourselves. At the very least, we should try to keep buddho, buddho, in mind. When we really reach buddho—when the mind is really a mind awake—then we can depend on it.

At the moment, though, we haven’t reached the mind awake. We’ve reached nothing but the demons of defilement, and they keep haunting us. We’re embroiled with nothing but demons; we lie under their power. For instance, maccu-mara: the demon of death, whose followers—aging and illness—we fear so much. Kilesa-mara: delusions and defilements. These are all demons. Khandha-mara: our attachments to the five aggregates are all demons.

Abhisankhara-mara: The thoughts we create, good or bad, are all demons if we fall for them—meritorious creations, demeritorious creations, imperturbable creations. These are the subtle demons, the demons that bedeviled the Buddha on the way to awakening, dressing themselves up as this and that. If we’re going to let go of these things, we first need something better to hold on to. At the very least we need jhana, levels of mental stillness more refined than what we have at present.

So we should all try to give rise to the refined levels of peace and ease I’ve mentioned here. When we get disenchanted with turmoil, we can enter a state of stillness. When we get disenchanted with defilement, we can cleanse the heart and make it bright with the dhamma. We’ll have our home in the dhamma, in concentration. The heart can then delight, with rapture and ease as its food. We’ll have no desire for coarse food. When we let go of the blatant aggregates, we enter the Brahma level of refined rapture and ease.

Even the sensual devas don’t eat coarse food like ours. As for the Brahmas, they’re even clearer than that, more radiant within themselves. Their jhana is pure, and their concentration radiant. The food of this concentration is the rapture and ease they experience. Even here on the human level, when we gain rapture from concentration, we feel full and happy. If we abandon the blatant aggregates, leaving just the mind in its attainment of concentration, imagine how much pleasure and ease there will be. We’ll no longer have to be involved in these heavy burdens of ours. We won’t have to worry about the five or the eight precepts because we’ll be in a pure state of jhana, with no thought of getting stuck on anything defiling. The mind will be bright.

When you understand this, focus back on your heart. Examine it carefully. Be intent on practicing heedfully, and you’ll meet with prosperity and ease.

The article was excerpted and adapted from Fistful of Sand, by Ajaan Suwat Suvaco, translated from Thai by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
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Phra Ajaan Suwat Suvaco (1919–2001) was an abbot in the Thai Forest Tradition. In the 1980s, he came to the United States, where he established his four monasteries: one near Seattle, Washington; two near Los Angeles; and one in the hills of San Diego County (Metta Forest Monastery).
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Words of the Buddha channel:

https://t.me/wordsofbuddha
===

When you investigate in line with the Buddha’s dhamma, you’ll see the truth for yourself in every way just as the Buddha did. For it’s all right here. You’ll gain discernment and intelligence, no longer deluded into grasping hold of suffering and making it your self, no longer grasping hold of inconstant things and making them your self. Whatever’s inconstant, leave it as inconstant and don’t make it you. Whatever’s stressful, leave it as stressful and don’t make it you. There’s no you in any of those things. When you aim your investigation in the direction of seeing this clearly, the mind will let go and attain peace, inner solitude, free from clinging.

It’s as when we carry something heavy on our shoulder. We know it’s heavy because it’s weighing on our shoulder. But when we put it down, it’s no longer heavy on us. In the same way, when we see that birth is stressful, aging is stressful, illness is stressful, death is stressful, then we should examine those things as they arise to see that they’re not us. Then we’ll be able to let them go. We should look after our mind to make sure that it doesn’t give rise to the assumption that any of those things are us or ours, or that they lie within us. Those things are just objects, elements, and we leave them at that. Stress then has no owner on the receiving end. It’s just like when you put down a burden: There’s nothing heavy about it at all.

So stress is nothing more than things coming together to make contact. Suppose that we have a big hunk of limestone. When we lift it up, it’s heavy. But if we burn it in a fire, pound it into dust, and the wind blows it away, then where’s the heaviness? It’s nowhere at all. Before, when the limestone was still in the ground, they had to use explosives to get it out. It was so heavy that they needed cranes to lift it up. But now that it’s pulverized, the heaviness is gone.

It’s the same with suffering and stress. If we investigate them down to the details, so that we can see them clearly for what they truly are, there’s no self there at all. We get down to the basic elements of experience, and we see that they’re not our self in the least little bit. If we look at the hair of the head, it’s not self. Fingernails and toenails are not self. Look at every part of the body in detail. Or look at its elementary properties. Exactly where are you in any of those things? There’s no you in there at all.

The same is true when you look at feelings. There’s no you in there at all. There’s simply contact, the contact of objects against the senses, that’s all. If you let go so that the mind can come to rest, none of these things will touch it in a way that weighs on it. Only deluded people grab hold of these things, which is why they feel weighed down. If we let them go, we don’t feel weighed down at all.

When we let go of the aggregates (khandhas), they’re not stressful. But we don’t know how to let them go because of birth. Like the mental state you’ve given rise to here: You’ve created it so that it will take birth. Once you’ve given rise to it, then—unless you’re given a good reason —there’s no way you’ll be willing to let it go. It’s the same as when someone suddenly comes to chase us out of our home. Who would be willing to go? We’d go only if we were offered a better place to stay—a safer, more comfortable place to stay. If we were offered such a place, who would be willing to stay? If we had a better place to go, we could abandon our old home with no problem. In the same way, if we’re going to let go of the blatant aggregates, we need a better place to stay, a home for the mind: a state of concentration. Just like the Buddha and his noble disciples: When they let go of the blatant aggregates, they entered cessation, they entered jhana (Sanskrit: dhyana). When they fully let go of all aggregates, they entered nibbana.

A Home for the Mind

If you’re going to let go of defilements, you first need something better to hold on to.
By Phra Ajaan Suwat Suvaco, translated from the Thai by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

“Knowing the dhamma” means knowing the truth. Where does the dhamma lie? Not far off at all. Where are rupa-dhammas (physical phenomena)? Are there any physical phenomena within us? Are any nama-dhammas (mental phenomena) within us? They’re both within us, but we don’t know how to read them, to decipher them, because we haven’t yet studied them. Or even when we have tried to study them, we still can’t decipher them in line with the standards set by the Buddha.

So let’s try to decipher our body, our actions in thought, word, and deed. Our actions don’t lie anywhere else. They show themselves in the activity of the body. So we use the body in line with the dhamma, abstaining from the activities that defile it: killing, stealing, engaging in illicit sex. When we abstain from these things, we’ve begun practicing the dhamma. We abstain from telling lies, from divisive speech, from abusive speech, from idle chatter. When we’re mindful to show restraint in what we say, we won’t encounter any dangers coming from our speech. There are no dangers when we practice in line with the Buddha’s way.

As for the mind, we cleanse it by meditating. We use mindfulness to look after the heart, to make sure it doesn’t get involved in anything defiling or unclean. We keep it cheerful, blooming and bright in its meditation, in investigating the dhamma, knowing the dhamma, seeing the dhamma, until it settles down in the stillness that we’ve developed and kept composed. We keep it blooming and bright. Wherever you go, this is how you should practice. Make your composure continuous. The mind will then gain strength, so that it can let go of its external preoccupations and stay focused exclusively within: at peace and at ease, bright and clear, staying right here.

Then, when you want to gain discernment, you can investigate. Focus mindfulness on keeping the body in mind, and then investigate it. This is called dhamma-vicaya, investigating phenomena. You investigate the physical phenomena in the body to see them in line with the four noble truths. You look at the arising of physical phenomena right here. You look at the aging, the illness, the death of phenomena right here within you. If you really look for it, you’ll see that the body is full of death.

How do we see death when the body is still breathing and able to walk around? We can see it if our discernment is subtle and precise. The Buddha saw death with every in-and-out breath, so why can’t we? He once asked Ven. Ananda how often he paid attention to death in the course of a day, and Ananda answered, “One hundred times.” The Buddha’s response was: “You’re still too complacent. You should pay attention to death with every in-and-out breath.” What kind of death can you look at with every in-and-out breath? Whatever fades away, ends, and disappears: that’s death. As for the death of the whole body, that comes closer every day, closer with each in-and-out breath. This runs down, that wears out. We have to keep creating things to replace what gets worn out. And whatever we create keeps wearing out too.

So we should keep track of the wearing out—what’s called vaya-dhamma, degeneration. The Buddha saw this with every moment. This is the sort of seeing that allows us to see the noble truth that birth is stressful, aging is stressful. There’s no ease in aging. Look so that you see this clearly. Pain and illness are stressful, death is stressful, all the affairs that come with birth create hardships, turmoil, and stress.

He once asked Ven. Ananda how often he paid attention to death in the course of a day, and Ananda answered, “One hundred times.” The Buddha’s response was: “You’re still too complacent. You should pay attention to death with every in-and-out breath.”

Free Buddhism Dharma ebook

Stories of the Enlightened Beings
Jatakas 101 - 150

By Kurunegoda Piyatissa Maha Thera

Free download here:

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https://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN402.pdf

https://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN258.pdf

https://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN404.pdf

https://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN405.pdf
===

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 9 of 13

(3) Delight in not sleeping (na niddārāmā)


Meditators that develop delight in not sleeping (na niddārāmā), will easily achieve positive progress in their meditation. Four hours of sleep is sufficient for a meditator. However, if one does not sleep the whole night resulting in mental fatigue, it is difficult for meditation to progress further. When the mind is distracted, sloth and torpor will arise, but if the meditator truly notes, sloth and torpor will not arise easily. Meditators that indulge themselves in sleep will regress easily.


(4) Delight in keeping away from others (nasaṅgaṇikārāmā)


Meditators that develop a delight in keeping away from other people (na saṅgaṇikārāmā) will not regress easily. If the meditator likes to make friends and inquire after people’s well-being, this will form an obstacle to meditation.


(5) Resisting the power of cravings (na papicchā)


Meditators without evil desires do not crave things and are soon satisfied. Accordingly they will not regress easily in their cultivation.Acalculative and picky person who is notsatisfied and mentally craves for many things, does not find it easy to achieve improvement in cultivation. Our goal that justifies the letting go of minor affairs, is the supreme destination of Nibbāna.

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Tibetan Buddhism - Vajrayana, Tantrayana and esoteric Buddhism channel:

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Vajrayana Tantrayana Buddhism channel:

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===

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 8 of 13

The Seven Conditions that prevent Decline


During the process of training the mind, sometimes we will feel bored and lazy and as a result, our meditation will regress. The Buddha taught us the seven conditions that prevent decline. These are recorded in the Aṅguttara Nikāya, Sattaka Nipāta. We should cultivate diligently so that we will not regress in our practice.


(1) Delight in decreased activities (na kammārāmā)


Meditators should develop a delight in a decreased level of activity (na kammārāmā). The fewer the chores, the better it is, as too many activities will affect meditation. Sometimes we feel like performing chores such as sweeping the floor and helping out with various affairs etc. If we perform such activities, our minds will not be able to note, which is a condition that results in decline. The Buddha says shaving the head, trimming nails and washing monastic robes are all obstacles, so let go of these chores! During training, there should be less chores.


(2) Delight in not talking (na bhassārāmā)


Meditators should develop delight in not talking (na bhassārāmā), so that their meditation will improve easily. If you like to talk and discuss personal experiences and reports during the interview, this may cause your meditation to regress.

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Buddha dharma teachings channel:

https://t.me/lorddivinebuddha
===

Free Buddhism Dharma ebook

The Illustrated Dhammapada
By Venerable K. Sri Dhammananda

The stories recorded in the Dhammapada give us a vivid picture of the Supreme Teacher. Among the Buddha's lay disciples were kings like Bimbisara and Pasenadi; millionaires like Anātha Pindika, courtesans like Sirima, together with a host of ordinary citizens: barbers, goldsmiths, elephant trainers, acrobats, slaves, hunters, fishermen, florists, butchers, weavers and boatmen. Many benefited from his teachings. Some went on their own way, unable to gain anything.

The stories of the Dhammapada have touched the hearts and minds of mankind because they deal with true human feelings. They have pathos, as when Patacara lost her whole family in a series of accidents: they have humour as when we are told that a monk who repeatedly rejoined the Order had his head shaved so many times that it was 'like a whetting stone'; they have romance, as when Nanda pines for the bride he has left behind to join the Order; they have intrigue, as when the heretics employ a courtesan to accuse the Buddha of adultery and as when Magandiya successfully plots against the death of saintly queen who is a follower of the Buddha; they have politics, as when the Buddha's relatives are poised for battle on both sides ofthe Rohini river because of a quarrel over irrigation and they have drama, as when Devadatta tries repeatedly to battle the Buddha for supremacy and meets a woeful end.

Free download available:

https://ftp.budaedu.org/ebooks/pdf/EN214.pdf
===

Monks walk towards Bayon temple, Cambodia

How to overcome fear
Meet a Teacher: Phra Ajahn Suchart Abhijato

Like many Thai Forest teachers before him, Ajahn Suchart eschews scriptural study and places emphasis on meditation, including concentration practices like anapanasati (mindfulness of the breath) and repeatedly chanting Buddho (“Buddha”) as a mantra. “Dhamma that comes from just studying is different from Dhamma that comes from meditation practice,” Ajahn Suchart writes. “We call Dhamma that is the result of meditation practice ‘genuine Dhamma.’ ”

“I never laid out a plan or my life’s goal.… My destination is the coffin. How I get there is another matter.”

Every Saturday, Sunday, national holiday, and Observance day, Ajahn Suchart gives a dhamma talk outside his kuti (meditation hut). Some of the talks are recorded and distributed freely on his website, along with his books. In addition to his work at the monastery, Ajahn Suchart also hosts weekly Zoom meetings to answer questions in Thai and English for domestic and international audiences alike. But beyond these brief windows of communication, Ajahn Suchart chooses not to interact with the outside world, spending most of his time practicing instead. “When the day’s Dhamma talk is over, my day is done. I do not further engage with anyone,” he writes.

Despite receiving numerous offers to travel and teach abroad, Ajahn Suchart seems content doing exactly what he’s doing, exactly where he is. “I never laid out a plan or my life’s goal.… My destination is the coffin. How I get there is another matter.”

Q: How do you overcome fear?

By teaching yourself the truth of the three characteristics: anicca (impermanence), dukkha (suffering), and anatta (nonself). When you know that you will die one day, you will not be afraid. We are afraid because we want to live forever. We don’t want to die. We cannot accept the truth. Once you see that life is like the rising and setting of the sun, you will not be afraid of dying; it is like the setting of the sun. You have to teach yourself all the time that one day you will die, using this as your meditation object. It will make your mind calm and peaceful.

Monks live in the forest in order to be close to life-threatening situations that will spur us to let go of our attachment to our bodies. When we have truly let go, we will not be affected by whatever happens to the body. It’s better to live without fear for one day than to live with fear for a hundred years, because fear is very damaging to the mind. You can get rid of fear by accepting the truth through the practice of meditation.

You will need a calm mind to reflect on this truth. If your mind is not calm, you will be prevented by your aversion from contemplating this truth. Aversion is delusion’s protective mechanism, but the truth will liberate you from it.

You must first calm your mind by concentrating on your breathing. Once you have achieved some calm, you can then contemplate the three characteristics of existence, the fact that you will die one day. You may be able to do this for a while. But eventually, the calm will disappear and the delusion will come back, bringing with it an aversion to the truth. You must then meditate to calm your mind again. When the mind becomes calm, you can then return to contemplating impermanence. Go back and forth like this until the truth sinks deeply into your mind, and you will find that accepting it is more beneficial than denying it.

Denial of the truth will always cause you to be afraid. But once you have accepted it, you will never be afraid. That’s all there is to it. The problem is in your mind. You can’t change external things. Whether you think about it or not, you will die anyway. But by thinking about it and accepting it, you will get rid of your fear; if you don’t think about it and deny it instead, you will always be afraid.
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From Dhamma for the Asking Volume 2 by Ajahn Suchart Abhijato.
===
Dhammapada, beloved and favorite teachings of the Buddha channel:

https://t.me/dhammapadas
===

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 7 of 13

(4) Ignorance of Causality (paccaya-sammoha)


Ignorance of causality (paccaya-sammoha) means the lack of understanding about cause, condition and effect. When there are causes, there will be effects. For instance, during walking meditation, we raise the foot, push forward and lower the foot. If there is no intention, the foot will not produce the action of raising. In every single moment, when there are causes, there will be effects that are produced. The mind needs many causes and conditions in order to arise, as does the arising of eye and ear consciousness. If we lack even one of the causes and conditions required, the mind will not arise.


If we do not develop penetrating insight about causes and effects, we will believe that a creator creates the mind and soul. The Buddha explained about the different conditions in the universe and the world in Paṭṭhāna. We can examine and comment on it through reading and learning. Among the virtues of the Dhamma, it is mentioned that; “the Dhamma is directly accessible by the wise (paccattaṃ veditabbo viññūhī)”, as one can experience it personally through practice.


(5) Ignorance of Nibbāna (Nibbāna-sammoha)


Ignorance of Nibbāna (Nibbāna-sammoha) means that one is ignorant of the concept of Nibbāna.


Those that have previously experienced Nibbāna have become stream-entrants. A stream-entrant will not be born for the eighth time in the desire realm, as their rebirth is limited to a maximum of seven times. Some stream-entrants may only experience rebirths once or twice before attaining Arahantship. For stream-entrants, the door leading to the four realms of misery are closed, as bad kamma produced in the past will not generate karmic retribution. For one to be reborn in the realms of misery, defilements are required as a condition. If there are no defilements, then the kamma is cancelled out. Just like Aṅgulimāla, who killed many people, generating karmic retribution that would lead him to hell, because he attained Arahantship in this life and extinguished all defilements, he no longer needed to be reborn, as for him there was no next life.


The Buddha guides us towards the treasures of Dhamma and this is why we should train ourselves according to the Dhamma, in order to acquire the benefits.

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Story of Angulimala:

https://t.me/wordsofbuddha/2873
===

Monks holding flowers circumambulating "pradakshina" the great stupa at the peak of Borobudur temple, Java island, Indonesia.

Free Buddha Dharma ebook

The Heightened Mind: Dhamma Talks of Ajaan Lee Dhammadharo, translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu.

In previous collections of Ajaan Lee’s talks, the main focus has been on technique. Here the focus is more on attitudes to bring to the practice of concentration. As he once said, the three trainings are like posts supporting a bridge over a river. The posts on the near shore and far—virtue and discernment—are not that hard to set in place, for they lie in shallow water away from the main current of the river. The posts in the middle of the river—concentration—are the ones requiring special effort, and so they need to be treated in depth.

Free download available:

https://www.dhammatalks.org/Archive/Writings/Ebooks/TheHeightenedMind_181215.pdf
===

Story of Angulimala

So I have heard. At one time the Buddha was staying near Savatthi in Jeta’s Grove, Anathapindika’s monastery.

Now at that time in the realm of King Pasenadi of Kosala there was a bandit named Angulimala. He was violent, bloody-handed, a hardened killer, merciless to living beings. He laid waste to villages, towns, and countries. He was constantly murdering people, and he wore their fingers as a necklace.
Then the Buddha robed up in the morning and, taking his bowl and robe, entered Savatthi for alms. Then, after the meal, on his return from almsround, he set his lodgings in order and, taking his bowl and robe, he walked down the road that led to Angulimala.

The cowherds, shepherds, farmers, and travelers saw him on the road, and said to him, “Don’t take this road, ascetic. On this road there is a bandit named Aṅgulimāla. He is violent, bloody-handed, a hardened killer, merciless to living beings. He has laid waste to villages, towns, and countries. He is constantly murdering people, and he wears their fingers as a necklace. People travel along this road only after banding closely together in groups of ten, twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty. Still they meet their end by Aṅgulimāla’s hand.” But when they said this, the Buddha went on in silence.

For a second time … and a third time, they urged the Buddha to turn back.

But when they said this, the Buddha went on in silence.

The bandit Aṅgulimāla saw the Buddha coming off in the distance, and thought, “Oh, how incredible, how amazing! People travel along this road only after banding closely together in groups of ten, twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty. Still they meet their end by my hand. But still this ascetic comes along alone and unaccompanied, like a conqueror. Why don’t I take his life?”

Then Angulimala donned his sword and shield, fastened his bow and arrows, and followed behind the Buddha. But the Buddha used his psychic power to will that Aṅgulimāla could not catch up with him no matter how hard he tried, even though the Buddha kept walking at a normal speed.

Then Angulimala thought, “Oh, how incredible, how amazing! Previously, even when I’ve chased a speeding elephant, horse, chariot or deer, I’ve always caught up with them. But I can’t catch up with this ascetic no matter how hard I try, even though he’s walking at a normal speed.”
He stood still and said, “Stop, stop, ascetic!”

“I’ve stopped, Angulimala —now you stop.”

Then Angulimala thought, “These Sakyan ascetics speak the truth. Yet while walking the ascetic Gotama says: ‘I’ve stopped, Angulimala —now you stop.’ Why don’t I ask him about this?”

Then he addressed the Buddha in verse:

“While walking, ascetic, you say ‘I’ve stopped.’ And I have stopped, but you tell me I’ve not. I’m asking you this, ascetic: how is it you’ve stopped and I have not?”

“Angulimala, I have forever stopped—I’ve laid aside violence towards all creatures. But you can’t stop yourself
from harming living creatures;
that’s why I’ve stopped, but you have not.”

“Oh, at long last a renowned great seer, an ascetic has followed me into this deep wood. Now that I’ve heard your verse on Dhamma, I shall live without evil.”

With these words,
the bandit hurled his sword and weapons
down a cliff into an abyss. He venerated the Holy One’s feet, and asked him for the going forth right away.

Then the Buddha, the compassionate great seer, the teacher of the world with its gods, said to him, “Come, monk!” And with that he became a monk.

Excerpts from Majjhima Nikaya 86: Angulimala sutta
===
Words of the Buddha channel:

https://t.me/wordsofbuddha
===

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 5 of 13

(8) Right Thought (sammāsaṅkappa)


Right thought (sammāsaṅkappa) means to focus the mind on the object.Themind should be fixed on the object continuously so that it will know the object with utmost clarity. Right view and right thought belong to the study of wisdom.


Five Types of Ignorance


If we do not know the Noble Eightfold Path, our minds will be confused and dazed. Ignorance in Pali is “sammoha”, with its ultimate (paramattha) Dhamma being “delusion” or “ignorance”. Ignorance means lacking understanding of the truth of natural phenomena or a wrong perception of the truth.


There are five types of ignorance:


(1) Ignorance of Kamma (kamma-sammoha)


Ignorance of kamma (kamma-sammoha) refers to the lack of understanding about the law of kamma and uncertainty about whether it is possible to achieve enlightenment in this life time. Due to the presence of ignorance, no ordinary person can truly know about their kamma. If we continue to cultivate and gradually reduce our level of ignorance, we can experience the wisdom of insight and see our path of cultivation clearly. This is considered good progress.

Many people do not know about kamma, or whether the kamma created is wholesome or unwholesome. For instance, some people believe that killing cows is a form of wholesome kamma, which is definitely not the case. Their misapprehension is due to their ignorance of kamma. Some feel that smoking and drinking liquor is wholesome kamma and again this mistaken idea is due to their ignorance. Some people are confused and cannot differentiate between right and wrong, good and bad, what is beneficial and what isnot, what can be done and what cannot be done. All these confusions are as a result of ignorance of kamma.
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Ajahn Chah, Buddhist teacher of Thai forest meditation of Theravada Buddhism channel:


https://t.me/ajahnchah_buddhism
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Puxian Samantabhadra riding elephants, Mount Emei, Sichuan, China.

Free Buddha Dharma ebook

Mahasatipatthana sutta
by U Jotika and U Dhamminda

Please practise in accordance with this Mahàsatipathàna Sutta so that you can see why it is acknowledged as the most important Sutta that the Buddha taught.
Try to practise all the different sections from time to time as they are all useful, but in the beginning start with something simple such as being mindful while walking, or the mindfulness of in and out breathing. Then as you practise these you will be able to practise the other sections contained within this Sutta and you will find that all the four satipathànas can be practised concurrently.
A sutta should be read again and again as you will tend to forget its message. The message here in this Sutta is that you should be mindful of whatever is occurring in the body and mind, whether it be good or bad, and thus you will become aware that all conditioned phenomena are impermanent, unsatisfactory and not-self.
The original Pali text of this Sutta can be found in Mahà-vagga of the Digha Nikàya.

Free download here:

https://static.sariputta.com/pdf/tipitaka/787/maha-satipatthana-sutta-translated-by-u-jotika-u-dhammindapdf.pdf
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Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 4 of 13

(4) Right Effort (sammāvāyāma)


Right effort (sammāvāyāma) is a mind that strives on resolutely. When effort arises, we will be able to focus our minds on the object and note the object clearly.


(5) Right Mindfulness (sammasati)


Right mindfulness (sammasati) means to be aware with clarity. If right mindfulness and right effort arise simultaneously, our minds will not be distracted and as a result will be able to focus clearly on the object.


(6) Right Concentration (sammāsamādhi)


Right concentration (sammāsamādhi) refers to the mind focusing on the object. Unfortunately, our minds are used to distraction, just like a monkey jumping here and there, so it is not easy to control our minds. Thus, we must train this mind.


Right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration belong to the study of concentration. These are the methods that we use continuously to train our minds during an intensive meditation retreat.


(7) Right View (sammādiṭṭhi)


Right view (sammādiṭṭhi) means correct opinion. Those that walk on the Noble Eightfold Path will reach Nibbāna and become sages. By cultivating vipassana meditation, our wisdom will gradually improve, even though we do not possess the great wisdom that leads us to enlightenment. During the Buddha’s era, many disciples were able to let go of everything after listening to the Dhamma and thus they were easily liberated. We may listen and understand the Dhamma, but we still harbour too many attachments. Our eyes of wisdom are obscured by delusions and so we cannot achieve enlightenment. However, we must persist in our cultivation. This is like sweeping — as we sweep, we will be able toeliminate some dust and if we continue, eventually all the dust or delusions will be swept away. This is the method of the Noble Eightfold Path.

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Dhammapada, beloved and favorite teachings of the Buddha channel:

https://invite.viber.com/?g2=AQBLD6phsgvP%2F061YjEM3K%2BNeH1Yb372b9mtfQX2EmuBpgoLUoc99BDMfzHghrme
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Instructions for Metta Meditation

Jack Kornfield on beginning the time-honored, heart-opening practice of metta (loving-kindness) meditation.


In our culture, people find it difficult to direct loving-kindness to themselves. We may feel that we are unworthy, or that it’s egotistical, or that we shouldn’t be happy when other people are suffering. So rather than start loving-kindness practice with ourselves, which is traditional, I find it more helpful to start with those we most naturally love and care about. One of the beautiful principles of compassion and loving-kindness practices is that we start where it works, where it’s easiest. We open our heart in the most natural way, then direct our loving-kindness little by little to the areas where it’s more difficult.

First, sit comfortably and at ease, with your eyes closed. Sense yourself seated here in this mystery of human life. Take your seat halfway between heaven and Earth, as the Buddha did, then bring a kind attention to yourself. Feel your body seated and your breath breathing naturally.

Think of someone you care about and love a lot. Then let natural phrases of good wishes for them come into your mind and heart. Some of the traditional ones are, “May you be safe and protected,” “May you be healthy and strong,” and “May you be truly happy.”

Then picture a second person you care about and express the same good wishes and intentions toward them.

Next, imagine that these two people whom you love are offering you their loving-kindness. Picture how they look at you with concern and love as they say, “May you too be safe and protected. May you be healthy and strong. May you be truly happy.”

Take in their good wishes. Now turn them toward yourself. Sometimes people place their hand on their heart or their body as they repeat the phrases: “May I be safe and protected. May I be healthy and strong. May I be truly happy.”

With the same care let your eyes open, look around the room, and offer your loving-kindness to everyone around you. Feel how great it is to spread the field of loving-kindness.

Now think of yourself as a beacon, spreading the light of loving-kindness like a lighthouse around your city, around the country, around the world, even to distant planets. Think, “May all beings far and near, all beings young and old, beings in every direction, be held in great loving-kindness. May they be safe and protected. May they be healthy and strong. May they be truly happy.”

The Buddha said that the awakened heart of loving-kindness and freedom is our birthright as human beings. “If these things were not possible,” he said, “I would not teach them. But because they are possible for you, I offer these teachings of the dharma of awakening.”
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Jack Kornfield is a founding teacher of the Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock Center and one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. He is a former Buddhist monk, a clinical psychologist, and a husband and father.
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Words of the Buddha channel:

https://t.me/wordsofbuddha
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Golden Rock, Kyaiktiyo Pagoda, Mon State, Myanmar.

Ayutaha Dhamma Sojourn (memory of the ten thousand days of my life as a Buddhist monk)
By Sayādaw Nandasiddhi

Chapter 19

The Noble Eightfold Path

Part 3 of 13

(2) Right Action (sammākammanta)


Right action (sammākammanta) refers to the avoidance of committing unwholesome deeds. Unwholesome deeds are killing, stealing and sexual misconduct.

During an intensive meditation retreat, we uphold the Eight Precepts and thus we will not commit unwholesome deeds such as killing, stealing and sexual misconduct. If you borrow something from a friend knowing that he won’t mind, this is not stealing. But, if your friend is looking for the item that you borrowed, you should not keep quiet, you should return the item you borrowed, as this is honest behaviour.

If we no longer commit these three types of unwholesome deeds, then we have perfected our actions. Precepts can prevent unwholesome kamma associated with our body and speech, but our minds are not controlled by precepts. When we can distance ourselves from unwholesome kamma related to the body and speech, we have practiced two of the Noble Eightfold Paths.


(3) Right Livelihood (sammājīva)


Right livelihood (sammājīva) refers to making a living in the proper way. In Aṅguttara-nikāya, Pañcaka-nipāta, five types of improper ways to make a living are mentioned:

(1) Selling poisons, including insecticides that are toxic to living beings;

(2) Selling drugs, including alcohol and producing alcohol;

(3) Producing and selling knives, guns, arms and ammunition;

(4) Human trafficking;

(5) Raising and selling animals meant for slaughter.


If you do not commit the three types of unwholesome kamma related to the body and the four types of unwholesome kamma related to speech, then your life is pure. Meditators eat whatever is prepared by others and receive offerings freely. Such easily satisfied minds are the purest form of life, known as “right livelihood”. During an intensive meditation retreat, our lives are very pure.


The same applies to our mundane lives, where we should only use items that we have acquired through legitimate means. In other words, we should not use items that are acquired illegally. In business, if the cost of something is 10 dollars and you sell it for 12 dollars, this is acceptable. But if the cost is 10 dollars yet you sell it for 120 dollars, this is not right. We can make a legitimate and reasonable profit, but should not be so greedy that we inhibit the benefits to others, which could invite trouble upon our lives. We must be sincere and should not deceive others, this is important. Do not violate the three types of unwholesome deeds related to the body and the four types of unwholesome deeds related to speech. Work hard with sincerity and make a legitimate living; this is right livelihood.


Right speech, right action and right livelihood all belong to the study of morality. Meditators that practice these three noble paths during an intensive meditation retreat will acquire full points!

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Words of the Buddha channel:

https://invite.viber.com/?g2=AQAFqzqlj7FmI061PX17rxWMAtZ%2BRuso%2FH2KmHKZSgnv7v9DD8X0bDkKnZDr9JDq
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