Stagnation and Making Progress

0:00 Are you ready? Ready or not, it's going to happen now, so what to do? So, Happy New Year once again. And I think these times when we kind of go from one thing to another, moving forward from one year to the next, from one birthday to the next, whatever it might be, there's always a good time to sort of take stock. Report an error in the passage at 0:00 Highlight the passage at 0:00

0:23 Take stock of our meditation practice, our spiritual practice and all of these kind of things and ask ourselves if maybe we can do something better. How can we improve? How can we kind of add an extra kind of extra, what is it, right term? Extra kind of effort or extra factor for that path to work better or more powerfully. Report an error in the passage at 0:23 Highlight the passage at 0:23

0:48 So it's always a good way of thinking about things. It's easy to become a bit complacent. It's kind of the human mind. It's easy to kind of just follow the same old routine. But actually we need to investigate a little bit to figure out what is going on. If you are stagnating a bit, why might that be? Report an error in the passage at 0:48 Highlight the passage at 0:48

1:06 There's always a reason. The Buddha promised that if you practice in the right way, there will be results. If there are no results, it's because maybe you are missing something. So a good place to start. is always to kind of look at the world today because when you go into the new year you kind of think what is the year ahead going to be like and you know this is what a lot of people do if you read the newspapers or something like that they will kind of look at the past year and summarize it and tell you what's ahead and sometimes when you look ahead at the world you think Report an error in the passage at 1:06 Highlight the passage at 1:06

1:46 Do I want to be part of this or do I want to kind of step aside from the world a little bit and kind of do my own thing? It doesn't look kind of very nice right now. The world is kind of yucky. There's all kinds of things going on, politics and wars and climate stuff and all kinds of things. And sometimes you wonder what the future holds. Report an error in the passage at 1:46 Highlight the passage at 1:46

2:04 But actually, that is a great opportunity right there. Every kind of problem has an opportunity. You know that? Anyone here been to business school? Every problem has a potential opportunity to it. That's what they tell you in business school. If you get an MBA or whatever, that's what they say. But there's some truth to that, especially from a dharma point of view. Report an error in the passage at 2:04 Highlight the passage at 2:04

2:26 I think more true in the dharma than it is in business maybe. I don't know. I think in dharma it is really, really true. And the point is that if you see the problems of the world, it makes the spiritual path. Even more important, because the spiritual path is exactly a way of withdrawing from that world. The spiritual path is a way of going beyond it. Report an error in the passage at 2:26 Highlight the passage at 2:26

2:50 The spiritual path is a way of learning how to deal with those problems, not being kind of bowled over emotionally or whatever by all these issues in the world. Having a stability inside, a sense of independence from all of these kind of things. Isn't that great to be independent? Isn't that a wonderful thing? Doesn't everyone want to be independent? You can just see the world goes wrong. The world goes to the dogs. Let the dogs have it. Report an error in the passage at 2:50 Highlight the passage at 2:50

3:16 it. Report an error in the passage at 3:16 Highlight the passage at 3:16

3:18 That's kind of what you think. And it's okay, because you have something else. You have something more powerful. And so the idea here is that from a Buddhist point of view, the dangers in the world, the problems in the world are definitely an opportunity. It changes your focus. It turns your mind in a different direction. It allows you to find something far more meaningful than the world could ever give you in the first place. Report an error in the passage at 3:18 Highlight the passage at 3:18

3:46 So take these things, don't kind of sorrow too much, instead see them as opportunities, and then you're going to be on the right track. This is the first thing to remember, and when you remember that, then it kind of already, it lifts your mood a little bit straight away. Another thing to remember, sometimes, I think one of the problems on the spiritual path is that, especially if you feel you are stagnating a bit, oh, I've been meditating for so many years, where are the lights? Report an error in the passage at 3:46 Highlight the passage at 3:46

4:14 Where are these things that I want to have? Everyone talks about lights all the time in meditation. Forget those blooming lights. Just enjoy what you have. That's what I say. It's very easy to get a bit frustrated or disappointed or feeling we haven't done enough progress. Report an error in the passage at 4:14 Highlight the passage at 4:14

4:33 Sometimes we think that maybe that's the way it has to be in the future. But it doesn't. But everyone, you know, we have Report an error in the passage at 4:33 Highlight the passage at 4:33

4:38 This is a really important point. Don't get stuck in those things. As long as we can go beyond some of those bad habits and we can think about things in a new way, we can make remarkable progress. Every one of us here, every person here, can become a better version of ourselves. It's not that you become a completely different person, but you become kind of the best version of yourself sometimes by practicing the spiritual path. Report an error in the passage at 4:38 Highlight the passage at 4:38

5:04 And I sometimes talk about this amazing experiment Read about a while ago. And that was about people's ability to foresee the future. And how incredibly bad they were at foreseeing the future. And so what these experimenters found out, and you may have heard this before, but what they found out was that when people looked into the past, and they were told, okay, kind of look at your past ten years, from ten years ago until now, and what has happened in those ten years? Report an error in the passage at 5:04 Highlight the passage at 5:04

5:33 Can you see kind of your change and how you have... Things are kind of altered. You are now a different person from when you were then. Maybe you are a better person, but maybe you are changed in other ways. And they could say, yeah, yeah, I can see the change. It went like this, and it went that way a little bit, and it went kind of down and up again. They could see a lot of change in their lives and how their personality sometimes was dramatically altered as a consequence of those changes. Report an error in the passage at 5:33 Highlight the passage at 5:33

5:57 But then they were asked exactly the same thing for the future. So what about the future? Can you see change for the next 10 years? If you look 10 years from now, 2035 or 2036 now actually, it takes a while to get used to the new year, 2036, what would you be like then? And they weren't able to see the same kind of change. They weren't able to see that actually they could do all of these turns and go in all of these different directions. Report an error in the passage at 5:57 Highlight the passage at 5:57

6:23 All they could see was basically it's going to be me, but maybe... Maybe I will have, I don't know, maybe, you know, I will be a little bit better in this area or whatever. But it was basically themselves with tiny kind of improvement in certain areas or maybe even decline in certain areas. And so we don't understand the potential for change. It is great. There's a massive potential there. If you get the dharma right, get the practice right, you can become a very, the same person in a... Report an error in the passage at 6:23 Highlight the passage at 6:23

6:55 Deep sense, but a far, far better version of that person it is possible to become. One who is truly compassionate. Someone who is truly loving. Someone who is truly caring for the world, for everything around you. Someone who maybe even has a lot of bliss and happiness in meditation. All of these things are available on this path. And all you have to do is to kind of move your mind in the right way. And as you do that, these things will happen. Report an error in the passage at 6:55 Highlight the passage at 6:55

7:24 So how do we make this happen? How can we become far better people than we are now already? And a lot of it is about the choices that we make. We have to make good choices. Avoid the bad ones, do the good ones instead. Report an error in the passage at 7:24 Highlight the passage at 7:24

7:43 When I say choices, what I mean, there's many levels of choices. We have the choices that are very large choices in life. Where am I going to live? Who is going to be my boyfriend or girlfriend? What kind of job am I going to have? What Buddhist society should I go to? Okay, this one. No, I was messing around. Report an error in the passage at 7:43 Highlight the passage at 7:43

8:04 Whatever, up to you. So all of these kind of big choices, right, which are kind of... Your whole life takes a certain direction when you make those big choices. But what I'm really referring to here, they are certainly important. But maybe more important, even more important, are the choices you make all the time, throughout the day. Report an error in the passage at 8:04 Highlight the passage at 8:04

8:24 The little things. When you meet somebody, how you speak with them. And sometimes the way we speak to people, it is as if we're not making a choice at all. It just comes out of our mouth. And before it takes you, what happened there? It came out of my mouth so fast. And you have no... You really sense that you even made a choice, but you did make a choice. It just happened so fast, you can't even see it. And these are the kind of choices that are really important, because this is where your morality, your ethics, your kindness, your compassion, all of these things are developed. Report an error in the passage at 8:24 Highlight the passage at 8:24

9:00 Every little thing, every little word that comes out of your mouth, every little action that you do, every little movement, every... Thought that you have actually matters. Imagine to have enough mindfulness that you're able to actually check every thought. Oop, I'm about to think that. Okay, let me go a different direction instead. Isn't that a nice idea? Report an error in the passage at 9:00 Highlight the passage at 9:00

9:32 direction, sometimes the mind, the momentum is very strong. It's like a freight train moving forward at a very fast speed. So the momentum is very strong, the mind is certainly going. Report an error in the passage at 9:32 Highlight the passage at 9:32

9:43 You know, you can actually check that momentum of the mind and you can hold it back and you can wait and you can allow a different solution to arise instead. And so this is the first idea for how to make better choices. One of the really important things, and as you may be aware already obviously, you need more mindfulness. Report an error in the passage at 9:43 Highlight the passage at 9:43

10:04 You need to have that awareness around what you're doing. And when you slow down a little bit, when you go a little bit more gently and softly in life you don't react so quickly instead of reacting you respond it's a very nice way of thinking about how we deal with all situations in life yeah don't react respond reaction is this habit it's automatic response is like okay reflect Be a responsive person, not a reactive person. Report an error in the passage at 10:04 Highlight the passage at 10:04

10:40 And to do that, you need a bit of mindfulness. And one way to gain that mindfulness, again, slow down. Don't act so fast. Wait. Give the mind time to sort of consider the situation. Yeah, so when you kind of slow down, you think, okay, I want to do this. This is kind of what my mind impulse or I feel compelled to act in a certain way, but maybe that's wrong. Report an error in the passage at 10:40 Highlight the passage at 10:40

11:05 Let me hold on a second. Wait, is there a better solution here? And the moment you stop, what tends to happen is that something inside of you tells you what is the right way forward. You have enough knowledge of dhamma. You have enough knowledge of what it means to be ethical and moral person. It's all there deep inside of you. You just need to give it time to arise. Report an error in the passage at 11:05 Highlight the passage at 11:05

11:28 You need to give it time to overcome. Come, all the habits, all the compelling thoughts and ideas that kind of force you to do certain things. Don't go with those compulsions. Instead wait, allow the dhamma to arise and then follow the dhamma. This is kind of the ideal way of doing things. So you wait, you slow down a little bit. Report an error in the passage at 11:28 Highlight the passage at 11:28

11:49 So how can we do that? Because it sounds easy to say, but in reality... Not always easy, right? So how can we do that? And I'll give you some incredibly simple tips. They are so simple, and you're probably not doing them, even though you already know you should be doing them, right? You know you should be doing them, but you're maybe not doing it already. And one of the biggest problems in life is how distracting the modern world is, especially mobile phones and internet and these kind of things. Report an error in the passage at 11:49 Highlight the passage at 11:49

12:21 And so be very careful how you use your mobile phone. This is kind of a very, very simple thing. But if you use your mobile phone more wisely, and I'll tell you in a second how to use it wisely. Actually, I don't really know because I haven't got a mobile phone. But anyway, I'll give you... I see other people and think, whoa, I've got to do something here. Okay, so I have some idea. So how can we use the mobile phone more wisely? Report an error in the passage at 12:21 Highlight the passage at 12:21

12:46 Okay, so I'll give you a few hints. So number one... Turn off the mobile phone, lock it completely, give it to someone else if you can't control yourself to hide away after a certain time in the evening. 8pm, I'm not going to check my mobile phone at all after 8pm. I'm going to give it to the dog to eat. He can swallow the mobile phone and hopefully it's out again by tomorrow morning. Report an error in the passage at 12:46 Highlight the passage at 12:46

13:11 No, I'm messing around. But you know what I mean. Something was very, very hard to get hold of that mobile phone. And then in the morning, the same thing again. I will not use it until a certain time in the morning. I don't know, 7, 8, 9, whatever, I don't know what your life is like. And so you have that kind of gap. And the evening time is a very important time. It's very important because it's a time where you want to relax, you want to be at ease, you want to have a sense of mettā, because if you have mettā... Report an error in the passage at 13:11 Highlight the passage at 13:11

13:41 Kindness and love when you fall asleep, you're going to sleep really well. And if you sleep well, you're going to wake up in the morning full of energy straight away so you can get that mobile phone right away. Not that kind of energy, the energy which doesn't want to see the mobile phone. The energy of peace, the quiet kind of energy, the non-restless energy. So this is a very simple way. Report an error in the passage at 13:41 Highlight the passage at 13:41

14:03 Most people don't do that. I hear most people, the last thing they do at night, check their mobile phone. The first thing they do when they wake up is check their mobile phone. It's a very, Bad idea. And it's kind of a very addictive thing, right? It's incredibly addictive when you think about it like that. So don't fall for these stupid addictions. Report an error in the passage at 14:03 Highlight the passage at 14:03

14:21 This is number one. Number two, when you go for a walk somewhere. I was just in Singapore. I came back from Singapore a few days ago, two or three days ago. And I went for some walks in the city. And I was horrified. Everyone was walking with a mobile phone. Everywhere. I don't know what. What they're doing on that mobile phone. But everyone was glued to the mobile phone as they were walking around. And I've seen similar things here in Perth, by the way, on previous occasions. Report an error in the passage at 14:21 Highlight the passage at 14:21

14:48 I wasn't too surprised when I saw it. And it was very rare. And I kind of like to walk. I don't have a mobile phone with me at all. So I walk around and I kind of see, can I get contact with anyone? Report an error in the passage at 14:48 Highlight the passage at 14:48

15:01 Really hard, right? No one makes eye contact. Everyone is kind of in their own little world. And so I said to myself, okay, I'm going to... Report an error in the passage at 15:01 Highlight the passage at 15:01

15:25 Or was this weirdo over here saying hello to me? And sometimes they would just turn away. They wouldn't respond. But other times... They would respond and you can see they were almost delighted. Yeah, it's like a human touch. Someone saying hello, but in a nice kind of way. I try not to do it in a harsh way, obviously. Report an error in the passage at 15:25 Highlight the passage at 15:25

15:43 Say it in a nice way and they go, oh, hello. And some people really engage, right? Oh, hello, good morning. Yeah, nice to meet you. And they kind of go Anjali and all these kind of things. And so it was actually very interesting. And sometimes I would see people who were really kind of in a bad way, sleeping under a bridge or something. And I was there during Christmas. Report an error in the passage at 15:43 Highlight the passage at 15:43

16:03 Poor person sitting on the bridge, say Merry Christmas to them. And they will look up, oh, Merry Christmas. Yeah, it's nice. And I feel in the modern world we're losing so much of that human connection. We need a human connection. It's so important. We should bring it back again into our society. So when you go for a walk, leave the mobile phone. Report an error in the passage at 16:03 Highlight the passage at 16:03

16:24 At home, don't take it with you, especially when you go in nature. Just enjoy the walk. Observe what is happening around you. Observe how the rest of the world is completely engulfed, engrossed in the mobile phone, whereas you have let it go. Yay, me! Be happy about yourself. Not kind of a big ego, but feeling good about yourself because you are moving in the right direction in a positive way. Report an error in the passage at 16:24 Highlight the passage at 16:24

16:49 What a marvelous thing that is. When you have a meal with your family, no mobile phones, right? Tell your children, or maybe if you are the children and your parents are naughty, tell your parents, Dad, Mom, I demand no more mobile phones at the dinner table. It's bad for the family. That's the time when you're supposed to meet, have a chat, get to know each other. You shouldn't have any mobile phones at that time. Report an error in the passage at 16:49 Highlight the passage at 16:49

17:15 So these are some of the ideas. Already, if you do that much, you will find there is more space in your mind. It will open up something inside of you which gives you greater opportunity to respond rather than react in the world. And you will feel that throughout the day if you live in this way and you do a bit of meditation on the top of that, that it will change kind of your... Report an error in the passage at 17:15 Highlight the passage at 17:15

17:39 outlook, the way you're able to deal with the situations in life. So simple, yeah, but most people don't do this, and that is why simple things can also be very, very useful. Report an error in the passage at 17:39 Highlight the passage at 17:39

17:54 One of the things that... I should really talk about, even before I talk about the mobile phone, which is kind of even more fundamental in a certain way, I'll come back a little bit more to the mobile phone later on, is the importance in the spiritual path of the idea of being around the right kind of people. Report an error in the passage at 17:54 Highlight the passage at 17:54

18:23 When I was in Singapore, I was just doing a long retreat, a nine-day retreat, and we were looking at the sutta called the Mahamangala Sutta. And those of you with a Buddhist background, and those of you who don't have, but who are a bit knowledgeable about the Dhamma, you will know about the Mahamangala Sutta. Report an error in the passage at 18:23 Highlight the passage at 18:23

18:38 Mahamangala means, like, great blessings. And those, it's a kind of a series of eleven blessings, one after the other, like each one is a verse. And the first of these verses goes as follows. Report an error in the passage at 18:38 Highlight the passage at 18:38

18:58 Pretty good, right? So what does it mean? Some of you know what it means already. So what it means is that you should not associate with fools. You should associate with the wise. You should have respect for that which is worthy of respect. This is the greatest blessing. This is where it starts out. This is the beginning of the whole thing. And then it goes through all other things and it ends up kind of with enlightenment at the end. But this is where it starts. Report an error in the passage at 18:58 Highlight the passage at 18:58

19:27 That's always incredibly interesting that it starts with the idea of who you should hang out with, who you should associate with, who should be your friends, who you should deal with in this life. It's incredibly interesting. And because one of the things that the Buddha says, please come in. Please enter. Report an error in the passage at 19:27 Highlight the passage at 19:27

19:48 Ooh, okay. This is now, this is a chance to practice dhamma. Yeah, this is kind of the good thing about these things. So, just do it in the right way. Yeah, okay. So, probably people usually have some problems, you know, and then they kind of have some suffering in their life and then these things happen. Report an error in the passage at 19:48 Highlight the passage at 19:48

20:07 So, yeah. Okay. Report an error in the passage at 20:07 Highlight the passage at 20:07

20:14 Being escorted away. Okay, that's good. Okay, let's carry on. Yeah, okay. Report an error in the passage at 20:14 Highlight the passage at 20:14

20:21 Are you ready to carry on? Okay, good. It's a little intermesso, that kind of always makes things interesting. So I was just saying about the importance of following the good kind of people, not following the fools, but following the wise ones. Report an error in the passage at 20:21 Highlight the passage at 20:21

20:39 So here this person, he had an opportunity to hear some wisdom, but he left too early, so it was unfortunate. Maybe next time he will come back. If we treat him nicely, maybe he will come back again in the future. But it matters enormously. And one of the things that you find in the suttas, in the word of the Buddha, he talks about the wise and the fools. Report an error in the passage at 20:39 Highlight the passage at 20:39

21:00 And he talks about the danger of following the fools. And he says specifically that all the dangers in the world, all the kind of upheavals in the world, all the calamities in the world, they are a result of fools, not of wise people. So if there are problems in your life or problems in Perth or problems in politics or problems in war or whatever, it comes from the fools in the world. Report an error in the passage at 21:00 Highlight the passage at 21:00

21:26 That's where the problems arise. And your own life also tends to get very problematic if you hang out with fools all the time. It's the same kind of issue. So for that reason... Know the danger of fools. Understand that it leads you in the wrong way. And of course the wise people is exactly the opposite. That leads to all the happiness in the world. Report an error in the passage at 21:26 Highlight the passage at 21:26

21:50 The wise people lead you to do the good thing. And the wise people ultimately, if you hang out with them long enough, leads you all the way to awakening itself. And so this is kind of what wisdom does. Wisdom leads you to the best things in the world and foolishness leads you in the exact opposite direction. And so this is why The company that we choose in life, where we go, whether we go to the Buddhist society or what we do, who we have as our friends, who we work with, all of these kind of things actually matter. Report an error in the passage at 21:50 Highlight the passage at 21:50

22:20 What are the influences on our life matters enormously. Report an error in the passage at 22:20 Highlight the passage at 22:20

22:28 So this is one of the things I recommend you. Report an error in the passage at 22:28 Highlight the passage at 22:28

22:39 One of the things I recommend you. It's to be very careful with these things. How do you, who do you hang out with? Who do you kind of take as your friends? Who do you make as an important part of your life? This actually matters a lot. So think about this in a new year. Can you spend more time, more quality time with wise people? And then actually you will find that it actually helps you, life, to take a different direction as a consequence. Report an error in the passage at 22:39 Highlight the passage at 22:39

23:09 So how do you know who is wise? How do you know who is foolish? And the Buddha gives, of course, advice. He gives advice on everything. One of the things I like to say is that everything is found in the suttas. If you want to find an answer to any question at all, pretty much, it's there in the suttas. Report an error in the passage at 23:09 Highlight the passage at 23:09

23:26 How do you recognize the fools? By the way they speak, act and think. Kind of obvious, because that's the external conduct is really how we see these things. They speak in ways that are unskillful, in ways that are unwholesome, in ways that are immoral. They act like that, they think like that. And so that's why they are problematic. Report an error in the passage at 23:26 Highlight the passage at 23:26

23:46 The wise people in the world are the ones who speak with wholesomeness. In a moral way, they act morally. They think moral good thoughts. They tend to see the good in other people. All of these kind of things. So it's quite simple, really. To decide who are the fools in the world and who are the wise people. Of course you can argue that maybe you don't know all the way. It's very hard to know whether someone is fully enlightened or not. Report an error in the passage at 23:46 Highlight the passage at 23:46

24:10 But you have some idea of measure of where you should go. And in the long run you will be able to kind of see fairly clearly who are the really wise people in the world and who are the foolish people in the world. Then you can make much better choices. Some move towards the wise people. So to give you another idea around this, it was a little sutta I was reading out to the monks at the monastery here on Wednesday. Report an error in the passage at 24:10 Highlight the passage at 24:10

24:38 We have a dharma talk every Wednesday. Ajahn Brahm was here at Dhammaloka. You got Ajahn Brahm. The monks had to deal with me here. That's pretty... See how lucky you are? That's a pretty good deal, right? So you get the... So I thought I was going to... Say something about the sutta that I was reading, because it was kind of interesting. It had some details to it that you may not normally hear. And so this sutta was talking about seven things that lead to improvement in your life. Report an error in the passage at 24:38 Highlight the passage at 24:38

25:09 Actually, sorry, it leads to the long-lasting longevity of the dhamma in the world. Seven things lead to longevity of the dhamma and if you don't do them then obviously it leads to the short life of the dhamma in comparison. So what are these seven things? And some of them are quite obvious. But all of them are around the idea of respect and reverence or respect and deference. Report an error in the passage at 25:09 Highlight the passage at 25:09

25:34 So respect means that you kind of look up to something in a certain way because of the good qualities. And so you listen a bit more. Deference means that you kind of take after what they say. You follow good advice and these kind of things. Respect and deference. So what are these seven things that you have respect and deference for? So the first ones will not be very surprising. The first one is the Buddha. Report an error in the passage at 25:34 Highlight the passage at 25:34

26:00 So do you like to hang around the Buddha? Where is the Buddha? Is that the Buddha? Not really. I think this is a fake Buddha. There's no very unexpressive Buddha. But it represents the Buddha. And that's kind of the nice thing about this Buddha. It represents the Buddha. It represents some of the qualities of the Buddha. And that's why we bow down to these images, because they represent something. Report an error in the passage at 26:00 Highlight the passage at 26:00

26:26 And then by bowing down to them, we are kind of growing those qualities within ourselves. But you can still... Hang around the Buddha. And the way to hang out with the Buddha is the second thing that you should have respect and deference for, which is the dhamma, the teachings of the Buddha. When you read these teachings, when you hear them here at the Buddha Society, it's like the Buddha is talking to you. Report an error in the passage at 26:26 Highlight the passage at 26:26

26:51 These are the real teachings of the Buddha. You may think that when you come here you hear Ajahn Brahm talk and that is a teaching. Or you may think that you hear a teaching from some other monk or nun. But the suttas, the word, the dhamma teachings that are given when we read the suttas are the teachings of the Buddha in exactly the same way. Report an error in the passage at 26:51 Highlight the passage at 26:51

27:11 And sometimes you need to kind of live, kind of make them come alive, to make them more real. So remember when the Buddha gave these teachings 2,500 years ago, he wasn't just teaching the people there and then. He was also teaching people in the future. The Buddha from the very beginning had this idea that he was teaching, he was setting in motion the wheel of the dharma for future generations and future cultures. Report an error in the passage at 27:11 Highlight the passage at 27:11

27:39 And so this wheel sort of rolls out into the world, rolls out from culture to culture, from era to era. And so the Buddha I had this grand vision, this big kind of vision about what the Dhamma was supposed to do in the world. So we are also the disciples of that Buddha, in the same way. So think about that when you read the suttas. Report an error in the passage at 27:39 Highlight the passage at 27:39

28:01 Think about that when someone actually teaches from the suttas. Now it is the Buddha talking to you. You are in the presence of this enlightened mind because these are the words of someone who is enlightened, someone who has seen the deepest truth of what it means to be a human being. Someone who has developed compassion and kindness to the very highest level. This is what the Buddha is. It's something extraordinary in the world. And to be in the presence of the greatest spiritual master in human history is something extraordinary. Report an error in the passage at 28:01 Highlight the passage at 28:01

28:32 You, every one of us, little me, can be the disciple of this awe-inspiring person. Isn't that great? Isn't that kind of something astonishing? And it's something we don't often take on board properly. But that is what it means to read the suttas, read the word of the Buddha, and to engage with that word, those words, in the right way. Report an error in the passage at 28:32 Highlight the passage at 28:32

28:53 And what I'm talking about right now is actually one of those suttas. And then, so you respect the Buddha, have deference to the Buddha, to the suttas, and then the saṅgha. The saṅgha means usually the Aryan saṅgha, the noble saṅgha. And usually they are represented by monastics. Sometimes you find lay people who also are part of the Aryans, but usually it's represented by the monastics because usually it is among the monastics that the spiritual path is taken the furthest. Report an error in the passage at 28:53 Highlight the passage at 28:53

29:20 Not always, it depends on where you are, but usually. And that's why, that's kind of the representation there. Especially those members of the Saṅgha who really are special. You can feel that they have some special things to add. Like my favorite monk. It's not me. Report an error in the passage at 29:20 Highlight the passage at 29:20

29:39 My favorite monk is Ajahn Brahm. Ajahn Brahm has always been my hero. That's why I came to Perth. I came all the way to Australia just to meet Ajahn Brahm. It had nothing to do with Australia. you know. Report an error in the passage at 29:39 Highlight the passage at 29:39

29:50 I apologize. I don't mean to say anything bad about Australia. I think Australia is great. But I actually came here for Ajahn Brahm. That's why I came here. Anyway, there you are. It's a pretty good choice anyway, right? You would agree with that? It wasn't a bad idea. And then, once you respect these three things, then... Report an error in the passage at 29:50 Highlight the passage at 29:50

30:08 The fourth one you're supposed to respect is the training. Because the training that comes out of the Dhamma, out of the teachings of the Buddha, that is what leads you to become an Aryan, a noble person. The person who is part of the Saṅgha, if you like. You become one of these enlightened people. So you have great respect for that training. The fifth one, and this is kind of where it gets really interesting. Report an error in the passage at 30:08 Highlight the passage at 30:08

30:32 Are you ready for the fifth one? The fifth one is, Samādhi, stillness, deep meditation. This is kind of really important. If you don't respect and have deference or reverence for deep meditation, you're actually contributing to the short life of Buddhism, of the Dhamma. And this is kind of really interesting because you'll find that in many parts of the Buddhist world, that is kind of what is happening here. There's too much focus. Report an error in the passage at 30:32 Highlight the passage at 30:32

31:02 I mean, it's good to focus on other things in the dharma, but not at the exclusion of samādhi here. Because samādhi is what actually brings the whole training together. Samādhi is the final factor of the Noble Eightfold Path. Samādhi is the culmination of practicing all of these factors. Samādhi contains within it. Report an error in the passage at 31:02 Highlight the passage at 31:02

31:21 All the other factors. And that's why it is kind of picked out in this way as something special, as a thing we should have reference and deference for. So Samādhi. What is the sixth one? The sixth one is called Appamada in Pāli. This is going to be a little bit of a Pāli course for you, so I hope you are ready to learn some Pāli words. Report an error in the passage at 31:21 Highlight the passage at 31:21

31:43 Pāli is one of these ancient Indian languages, but the Buddha talks something like that. Appamada means something like heatfulness. Heedfulness means you are careful. It means you are diligent. It means that you... Keep on practicing in a smart way. You can see why that is important. A pamada is very similar to another famous Pāli word called Yoniso Manasikara, which means like wise attention or wise application of the mind. Report an error in the passage at 31:43 Highlight the passage at 31:43

32:10 These are very closely related to each other. So to be able to reach samādhi, to be able to practice the path properly, one of the most important factors is this idea of being diligent and being heedful, being careful in your practice. Report an error in the passage at 32:10 Highlight the passage at 32:10

32:24 Now we come to the seventh factor. And this is really why I'm talking about this. This is the seventh factor. And this is kind of the most interesting one of all, in my opinion. So we have Buddha, Dhamma, Saṅgha. You had training. You had samādhi, the stillness of the mind. You had apamada, the heedfulness. All of those kind of make good sense. Report an error in the passage at 32:24 Highlight the passage at 32:24

32:46 You can see why they would be there. But factor number seven always baffled me. I remember reading this and I thought, wow, surely here someone made a mistake. This kind of doesn't make any sense. Because the seventh factor is hospitality. Report an error in the passage at 32:46 Highlight the passage at 32:46

33:02 Yeah. It's like, you know, straight away you think about hospitality. You think about going to a hotel or going to a bar and getting a drink or something like that. But that's obviously not what is meant, right? That cannot be what is meant here, because, you know, five precepts and all that. So it's not about drinking, yeah, or whatever. Report an error in the passage at 33:02 Highlight the passage at 33:02

33:22 So what is it? What does it mean? And what it means, I think, and the way it fits in with the rest of the suttas, is that we are hospitable towards those people in the world who have special spiritual qualities. Yeah, we're hospitable to be those so that they can stay with us for a long time. We look after them so we don't lose them again in the future. There's a beautiful part in the famous Mahaparnibbana Sutta, which is a great sutta on the Buddha's passing away, where the Buddha says that the dhamma will last a long time. Report an error in the passage at 33:22 Highlight the passage at 33:22

33:55 The monks and everyone will grow in good qualities as long as you welcome the arahants to your country. Yeah, you welcome the... Enlightened ones to your country. And when they come, you look after them. And so you're hospitable towards those people who lift every one of us up spiritually because they have this incredible ability to express the Dhamma through words, but also through the very action, through how they live their lives. Report an error in the passage at 33:55 Highlight the passage at 33:55

34:24 So hospitality, yeah, it's a beautiful idea. So, yeah, look after. And also I think it is about the Saṅgha as well. The Saṅgha is a monastic community that should live in harmony. We should be hospitable when there are monks and nuns who come from outside maybe and they want to stay with us for a while. Report an error in the passage at 34:24 Highlight the passage at 34:24

34:42 It's also about that because that creates a sense of harmony or whatever. But the primary reason I think is to enable those people who are really special to stay for a long time. To ensure that they will last for a long time. And I sometimes think about this, yeah, slightly selfish perhaps, but I often think, how can I make Ajahn Brahm last as long as possible? Report an error in the passage at 34:42 Highlight the passage at 34:42

35:06 So, and it's true, yeah, I don't know about you, but I've known Ajahn Brahm now for, what is it, 31 years plus, yeah? This is how long I've been, I knew about him even before that, but I didn't really meet him until 31 years ago. And, you know, he's one of these kind of possible, yeah. Report an error in the passage at 35:06 Highlight the passage at 35:06

35:25 To my mind, one of these treasures in the world. This kind of person with very special qualities, very difficult to find. And so more and more I try to look out for how I can be of assistance. Report an error in the passage at 35:25 Highlight the passage at 35:25

35:36 So, you know, if you have a chance to be of assistance to Ajahn Brahm, take the opportunity. Anyway, it's really good merit. You help Ajahn Brahm a little bit. It's a very positive thing, very nice thing to do. So, regardless. So this is the idea of hospitality. And when you have that hospitality, you get to be around wise people because you invite them. Yeah, please come. Report an error in the passage at 35:36 Highlight the passage at 35:36

35:58 Sometimes you can invite someone to your house. Actually, sometimes you can't because it's just too difficult to arrange. But you can come to the monastery. You can look after a little bit. You can support a little bit. You can bring maybe some nice food that Ajahn Brahm likes. or maybe. Maybe. I have to be careful what I say because sometimes these things kind of backfire in a very strange way. Report an error in the passage at 35:58 Highlight the passage at 35:58

36:25 But yeah, you know what I mean. And then you get this beautiful relationship with someone like Ajahn Brahm who is very... way. Report an error in the passage at 36:25 Highlight the passage at 36:25

36:32 Interesting and extraordinary person. And there are other monks and nuns as well who are developing really well and have really good qualities. It's not just Ajahn Brahm. Ajahn Brahm is kind of exceptional, but there are others as well. And so this is one of those wonderful things that here in Perth we have this. Report an error in the passage at 36:32 Highlight the passage at 36:32

36:51 Take this opportunity. You have a chance to be around the wise. You have a chance to get that basic support in your life. That enables the whole path to work for you without the whys. When you are just surrounded with fools, it makes it very difficult. But the wiser the people are, the more this path kind of takes off by itself and it just works. Report an error in the passage at 36:51 Highlight the passage at 36:51

37:14 So this is number one. So make sure you hang around fewer fools. And more wise people in your life. See if you can make a little bit of a shift. Don't do anything drastic. Don't throw people out of your life. Be compassionate to everyone. But just make gentle shifts in your life and see what happens. Maybe you're already very wise in the way you are with other people. That's great. Report an error in the passage at 37:14 Highlight the passage at 37:14

37:36 But most of us can probably do better. him so that is point Point number one. The second point I wanted to make is how to, again, develop this idea of actually being more kind. It's hard to be kind all the time. It's hard to develop this. Once you have the input of the wise people, you're already on the right track. But how can we add something more about kindness? And this is where all the things I was talking about before, about mobile phones and going more slowly, all of that comes in. Report an error in the passage at 37:36 Highlight the passage at 37:36

38:07 It allows the mindfulness to expand. which allows you to respond rather than react. This makes you already a more kinder person because that ability to respond actually allows you to do what is right rather than what is wrong. So already you are very much on the right track when you do that. But you want to take it a bit further. And one of the things that I would recommend all of you to do a little bit, do a little bit of mettā meditation in your life. Report an error in the passage at 38:07 Highlight the passage at 38:07

38:37 Mettā is like love. Or kindness. Love and kindness mean largely the same thing. Love is maybe a bit more strong, but they are kind of similar kind of words. So mettā is a kindness meditation, or loving kindness meditation. Do a bit of that, because it can have a very transforming effect on you. It's very simple, very easy to do. You can just be like a mantra, like a sentence that you repeat. Report an error in the passage at 38:37 Highlight the passage at 38:37

39:03 In your mind, like may all beings be well. And you can say that for ten minutes. But you have to mean it. It has to come from your heart. Report an error in the passage at 39:03 Highlight the passage at 39:03

39:13 And then as you do that, it can sometimes, over time, give rise to a transformation in your mind. And at certain times, you will feel a powerful sense of joy and happiness, even if that kindness and that mettā really comes up in your mind. Very, very powerful thing. And the great thing about that, Is that sometimes it can be hard, even if you are mindful, it can be difficult to do the right thing. Yeah, you can sometimes mindfully do the wrong thing. Report an error in the passage at 39:13 Highlight the passage at 39:13

39:45 Yeah, sometimes you think that something is right. You are mindful, but there's some deeper delusion in your mind. So yeah, oh, I'm mindful. Actually, I need to tell this person off and this has to be done. I will do it very mindfully and carefully. And actually you're getting it really kind of messed up because you don't really know what is... Report an error in the passage at 39:45 Highlight the passage at 39:45

40:02 Still there is some underlying problem there. And so because of that, sometimes mindfulness isn't enough. And what we have to do then is to purify the mind at a deeper level. And that deeper kind of purification happens when you do things like mettā meditation. You can do it... A few times a week. It doesn't have to be very long. 10 or 15 minutes is sometimes enough. If you can do 20, even better. But just a little bit to get you going maybe at the beginning of the day or at night before you go to bed so you have a good night's rest and all these kind of things. Report an error in the passage at 40:02 Highlight the passage at 40:02

40:36 And you build up a certain reserve inside of you of goodwill. Towards the world around you. And then when you have built up this kind of reserve of goodwill inside of you, especially in the morning, when you go out into the streets, you want to say hello to everyone. You want to say good morning, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, whatever. And those bad things don't even come to your mind anymore. And gradually, that whole development of the mind within in this way It starts to express itself in what you are like as a human being. The way you speak is different. You speak more gently. You speak more carefully. Report an error in the passage at 40:36 Highlight the passage at 40:36

41:17 You become more sensitive to other people around you. You start to act in a different way. You actually want to help. You want to be of service to the world. One of those wonderful things is to be of service. It's far better to be of service than it is to be served. Report an error in the passage at 41:17 Highlight the passage at 41:17

41:34 Usually, it depends a little bit on the circumstances, I suppose, but usually it is better. And I think if we, in the Buddhist community, we should all think of ourselves as being of service to each other. And when we are of service to each other, we build a very harmonious and beautiful community. Everyone coming from kindness. Everyone acting from mettā. Report an error in the passage at 41:34 Highlight the passage at 41:34

41:57 What can I do today to help? The Buddhist society, the people around me, what little thing can I help? Okay, my job today is to talk, even though someone tried to stop me. So that is my service, right? I do this, I don't get any salary for this. And then I go back to the monastery, and then people come to the monastery every day, lots of people. Report an error in the passage at 41:57 Highlight the passage at 41:57

42:21 Meals on wheels, Ajahn Brahm calls it, coming to the monastery every day. And I'm amazed. This is kind of the mutual support we have between the monastic community and the lay community. It's a very, very beautiful thing that we have built up. And this was all laid down by the Buddha and laid down by the ancient Indians two and a half thousand years ago. A samana culture, a culture of ascetics and this relationship between householders and ascetics. Report an error in the passage at 42:21 Highlight the passage at 42:21

42:49 So be of service in your life. Being of service is such a beautiful thing. This is where you start to feel real meaning. Now you are contributing. And the greatest beneficiary of all that service that you're doing is you. You will eventually gain joy and happiness because of that service. You will eventually, if you go around saying good morning to the poor person under the bridge and kind of give them a little thing because they obviously seem desperate. Report an error in the passage at 42:49 Highlight the passage at 42:49

43:18 If you do random acts of kindness and generosity in your life in this way, what will happen is that gradually, gradually, gradually something inside of you grows. You become a more happy, contented, Joyful person as a consequence. And then, eventually, when you come to Jana Grove, when you do a meditation retreat, wherever it is, that benefit will really ripen. Report an error in the passage at 43:18 Highlight the passage at 43:18

43:46 You close your eyes. You feel good about yourself, not in a kind of egocentric kind of way, but just a natural way. You know that you are a good person, so why shouldn't you feel good about yourself? There's nothing wrong with that. You feel good about yourself, the joy starts to bubble up, you start watching the breath, and it's so easy to watch the breath. Report an error in the passage at 43:46 Highlight the passage at 43:46

44:07 How come I've been fighting with the breath for so long? It's actually so easy. Why? Because your mind is ready. The mind is clear of the clutter and you have the joy and happiness instead. And then from that you gain kind of the deep samādhi and all of these kind of things. And then you can start practicing the mettā in an even deeper way. Report an error in the passage at 44:07 Highlight the passage at 44:07

44:29 Then, when you do mettā meditation, you will find that your mind kind of starts to expand. Your mind starts to encompass larger and larger areas until eventually there is no one in the whole universe that you do not have mettā for. Yeah, it is this beautiful expansion of the mind. And then, when you go back into society after that, you are unable. Report an error in the passage at 44:29 Highlight the passage at 44:29

44:58 before. Now you know what kindness is and you become a real blessing for the world and a real blessing for yourself as a consequence. Report an error in the passage at 44:58 Highlight the passage at 44:58

45:10 These are my little words for you on the second day of the new year, just to wish you all happy new year in the Buddhist kind of way. So once again, happy new year, and if you wish now we can take some questions and things. Report an error in the passage at 45:10 Highlight the passage at 45:10

45:26 Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu. Well done, okay, great. So my question when it comes to the dharma, in particular when practicing the dharma in life, Once you've gone through those steps, is the outlook and attitude to have when it bubbles up, that wisdom that you talk about, and how to act on the dharma, and how to bring that more into practice. Report an error in the passage at 45:26 Highlight the passage at 45:26

45:56 So for example, with you, in that instance of just someone coming and walking in, and you showing kindness to that person, even though that person was quite rude. And where do you find that faith? And that confidence to practice that. I think for me now it's just so ingrained. I cannot know that responding to someone like that with ill will or with negativity is just going to backfire. I know that straight away. And that's reason number one. Report an error in the passage at 45:56 Highlight the passage at 45:56

46:30 Reason number two I do it because I feel bad if I get upset. For me it feels bad. If I can have compassion for that person I feel good all the time. Even while he is saying these things. And thirdly, I think it's true. It is true that that person deserves compassion. Yeah, it is a troubled person. Yeah, you don't do that in an assembly like this unless you have some trouble in your life. Report an error in the passage at 46:30 Highlight the passage at 46:30

46:50 There's some deep suffering there. And so that is kind of the ultimate reason why you do it, because it's true. So when it comes to starting that practice on the level, and let's say when you were beginning to become a monk, And developing that capacity and faith. How did you start that journey? In the micro way, you would be asked to do a talk, for example, for your first talk. Report an error in the passage at 46:50 Highlight the passage at 46:50

47:20 And where you had that confidence to speak in front of people, I'd ask. Right. Okay. So it's just a gradual kind of thing. It basically, a lot of it comes from the teachings of Ajahn Brahm, obviously, but it comes from the word of the Buddha. And so I've read the word of the Buddha a lot. I've translated from Pāli into English. I've done a lot of work with it. And there is so much good information there in how to deal with these kind of things. Report an error in the passage at 47:20 Highlight the passage at 47:20

47:47 And one of the suttas in there, it talks precisely about when someone has bad conduct by body speech. And mind, well, we saw speech conduct wasn't great, yeah? And then you should have that kind of person, you should regard them as a sick person. Yeah, that's what it says in that sutta. Why are they sick? Because there's something mentally wrong with them. There's a problem in the mind, yeah? And when you regard them as sick, well, then you have sympathy for them. Report an error in the passage at 47:47 Highlight the passage at 47:47

48:13 Then you have compassion for them. Because that's what we have for sick people. We don't blame sick people for their illness, right? But we have compassion for them instead, yeah. And if I might ask a second and final question, when it comes to our own conduct in particular of past actions that we've done that were not according to these seven factors and forgiving ourselves of these particular sicknesses, as you say, with mettā, for example, what is the outlook and attitude that we can have, whether it be from our past wrong speech or wrong action or wrong perspectives of the past to people and how do you forgive that self of the past but also view how you've treated So what you do is that you understand that every human being is trapped by their conditioning. Report an error in the passage at 48:13 Highlight the passage at 48:13

49:11 Trapped by the habits, trapped by the past. It feels like we have free will, it feels like we can navigate our life, but the Buddha says basically that's largely an illusion. We are basically conditioned by the past. And so you, the person you are, and the actions you do, is because of that past. That past may be in this life, it may be in previous lives, it may go a long, long way back. And so it's very hard to understand all those causes and conditions that work on you. And once you understand that, Then you can forgive yourself completely because you realize, actually, I couldn't have done anything else. These other cause and conditions made me do that. But lo and behold, I found something else. Report an error in the passage at 49:11 Highlight the passage at 49:11

49:49 Yay, now I can do that. And then you make a determination or you try your very best, an aspiration or whatever, to do better in the future. And you kind of move forward. And after a while, those bad actions, they don't trouble you anymore. They become diluted by all the good actions that you do. And after a while, you kind of forget about them completely. Report an error in the passage at 49:49 Highlight the passage at 49:49

50:09 And a final, final question. How do you give a blessing to that person that you have felt that you have done wrong by or give them something of gratitude and love? Go and ask for forgiveness first. Okay. And once you have asked for forgiveness and asking for forgiveness is a very beautiful thing to do. Report an error in the passage at 50:09 Highlight the passage at 50:09

50:31 Sometimes you can do it even if you are not necessarily all that guilty because it actually tends to It dissolves something, it breaks the ice, because it shows that you are very sincere about moving forward. Go and ask for forgiveness and bring a little gift as you suggest as well at the same time. It's a nice thing to do. Thank you very much, sir. Thank Report an error in the passage at 50:31 Highlight the passage at 50:31

50:58 you. By some coincidence, you were just talking about hospitality just before he came in and you offered him a seat. So that is hospitality, isn't it? Yes, absolutely. Report an error in the passage at 50:58 Highlight the passage at 50:58