Ajahn Viradhammo: Freedom Now (1995)

0:00 Ajahn Sumedho has had to go to Australia for a little family business to help out one of our senior monks who's having some serious problems in his practice. So he compassionately decided to go to Australia. The Buddhist group there invited him to go. So he was on a plane last night and hopefully he'll be back in a week's time. So rather than cancel this talk, here I am. Report an error in the passage at 0:00 Highlight the passage at 0:00

0:32 It's hard to step into his big sandals, but I'll give it a go. My name is Vir Dhammo. I've been with Ajahn Sumedho for several years. Perhaps a bit of biography would help to place me in this situation. I ordained in 1973 in Ajahn Chah's monastery, and in 1977 I was invited to join Ajahn Sumedho in England. Report an error in the passage at 0:32 Highlight the passage at 0:32

1:06 So I was with him in the Hampstead Bihara. Then I was part of Chithurst and Harnham and other monasteries. In 1985, I was invited to go to New Zealand. I was part of a monastery there for nine years. And then I came back here last year. So I've only been here a year. I'm just sort of learning to fit in. Amaravati is a difficult place to figure out. Report an error in the passage at 1:06 Highlight the passage at 1:06

1:39 Ajahn Sumedho has asked me to be the abbot of Amaravati and neither of us knows what that means. I sort of asked for a job description and he scratched his head and I scratched my head. Report an error in the passage at 1:39 Highlight the passage at 1:39

1:53 But basically I wanted to, I really wanted to serve him because he's given me so much. I'm so very, very grateful. I feel very fortunate to know him and to be so close to him. this is going to, is that? Report an error in the passage at 1:53 Highlight the passage at 1:53

2:16 So I'm probably here for 20 years, and some of you will probably get to know me, and I'll probably be in this position quite a few times, so I might as well get used to it. Report an error in the passage at 2:16 Highlight the passage at 2:16

2:27 The topic is, I think, what was it, freedom now? I think that was the topic. So if you'll allow me to try to offer my reflections on that. Report an error in the passage at 2:27 Highlight the passage at 2:27

2:47 Freedom, I guess there's many ways we can look at that. One would be physical freedom, freedom in relationship into the physical world. So that would mean having the requisites to live one's life, having food, shelter, clothing, medicine, living in an environment which is not crippling or totally damaging or totally overwhelming. Report an error in the passage at 2:47 Highlight the passage at 2:47

3:22 So the way we relate to the physical world, there would be social freedom, freedom in a society, the freedom from oppression, freedom from violence, basically a society that lived by the five precepts in a positive sense of society where there was friendliness and cooperation and love. So that would be social freedom. Report an error in the passage at 3:22 Highlight the passage at 3:22

3:51 Emotional freedom. freedom. Report an error in the passage at 3:51 Highlight the passage at 3:51

4:05 to life. I suppose the fourth would be intellectual freedom, the freedom to clearly, understand nature, to understand the world from prejudices, biases, aversions, all kinds of other ways that Prevent us to function intellectually with clarity. So that would be freedom from greed, hatred and delusion. Report an error in the passage at 4:05 Highlight the passage at 4:05

4:33 There are four ways you might look at freedom, but what does freedom now mean? In the Buddhist teachings, you get this idea of instant enlightenment, which, I mean, we'd all like to go for that. Report an error in the passage at 4:33 Highlight the passage at 4:33

4:50 Shortcut to enlightenment, those kinds of books sell really well. You'll read things like... Report an error in the passage at 4:50 Highlight the passage at 4:50

4:59 You know, you read some Zen story maybe where some Zen master gets hit by a piece of bamboo and gets enlightened. And you think, oh, that's it. That's the one I want. I don't want to do all this hard slog and so on and so forth. But you don't read that that monk maybe had 25 years of practice behind him. Report an error in the passage at 4:59 Highlight the passage at 4:59

5:20 But he did a lot of... He was in the monastery. He was bored, fed up, tired, disillusioned. He went through all of that. I had a... I just did a 10-day retreat in Toronto and there was this character who had done a lot of intensive meditation practice and he had an experience 17 years ago which was very, very uplifting and a sense of emptiness and egolessness and tremendous compassion and oneness with all beings. Report an error in the passage at 5:20 Highlight the passage at 5:20

5:54 That was 17 years ago. He had been doing retreats ever since then and chasing the same experience. So his idea of freedom was this particular kind of exalted feeling, experience. But for 17 years he had been frustrated by that very experience, chasing it around. Report an error in the passage at 5:54 Highlight the passage at 5:54

6:19 So there's that idea, there's the idea that freedom is like instant enlightenment, that if you keep meditating, you know, you apply your technique, you sit in that retreat, you go to the monastery and you do this intense kind of work that somehow your head's going to blow open. I call it the Big Bang Theory and you'll be enlightened. And that would be really nice because then you wouldn't have to bother with life. Report an error in the passage at 6:19 Highlight the passage at 6:19

6:44 There'd be no hassles, there'd be no difficulties. But I've yet to meet anyone who's done it that way myself after over 20 years of practice. Report an error in the passage at 6:44 Highlight the passage at 6:44

6:55 Now in the Theravāda teachings there's a simile which talks about the way the ocean meets the shore. And one is that the shore is like a cliff. It falls steeply into the ocean. And the other is that the shore is like a sandy beach that slowly, gradually goes down into the water. And in Theravāda Buddhism, the practice is that second image. The second image of gradually the water deepening and the sandy shore going into the ocean. Report an error in the passage at 6:55 Highlight the passage at 6:55

7:31 So again, how does that apply to freedom now? Also in Theravāda Buddhism, we have the word bhavana. Development, where we cultivate wholesome practices, wholesome lifestyles. But what about freedom now? All Report an error in the passage at 7:31 Highlight the passage at 7:31

7:51 of us are, first of all, just for the first two, physical freedom and social freedom, you can see that if one doesn't have the requisites, if one doesn't have clothing and shelter and medicine and things like that, if one is living in Bosnia right now, It's pretty hard to contemplate. If my mother just got shot, it's pretty hard for me to spread mettā to the other side. We're asking a bit much. Report an error in the passage at 7:51 Highlight the passage at 7:51

8:21 We can be idealistic. So on a responsibility level for a Buddhist in society, it's always our responsibility to care for other beings, to speak out against injustice, to try to make sure other beings have the requisites. that they have the opportunity to contemplate, that they have the opportunity to investigate the way things are. But we, at least myself, might have this incredible opportunity. Report an error in the passage at 8:21 Highlight the passage at 8:21

8:55 I've lived, my parents were refugees from Latvia. I was born in Germany, ended up in Canada, left Canada in 69, ended up in England eight years, New Zealand nine years, now I'm here. What am I? I'm a citizen of the world, and my world has always been a very... Law-abiding world. It's been a world that I've had plenty to eat. I've had good clothing and shelter. So I've been very, very fortunate when I think about it now and just see the difficulties that the world has. Report an error in the passage at 8:55 Highlight the passage at 8:55

9:26 And yet, through all that good fortune, I haven't been free. I've suffered and I've made problems out of life and I've wanted more and I've been very unfree in the best kind of situations. And that lack of freedom, that lack of inner freedom is obviously something that I forgot Report an error in the passage at 9:26 Highlight the passage at 9:26

9:55 to ask him, unfortunately. But in terms of freedom now, It has, for me, it has to do very much with the whole, what we call, sakaya-ditti. And sakaya-ditti is what we call personality view. Report an error in the passage at 9:55 Highlight the passage at 9:55

10:27 And that has to do with this sense of ownership of our emotional and intellectual stuff. We tend to own our anger. We tend to, in the sense, we tend to take these things personally. And we, quite often in Buddhism, we get this idea, I am someone. Report an error in the passage at 10:27 Highlight the passage at 10:27

10:49 Who has a problem. I'm fundamentally warped in some way. And I need to do this practice so that I can become free somewhere down the road. I need to get rid of the anger and I need to develop more compassion so I can be free further down the road. Which sounds okay. And at one level that's alright. Report an error in the passage at 10:49 Highlight the passage at 10:49

11:10 But what Buddhism is trying to point to is the fact that the blockages of the heart, the lack of compassion, The anger and the fear that we experience as a human being are caused by historical conditions. We say they are dependently originated. Their origin is dependent on causes. The reason, like say for me, I experienced a lot of fear as a kid. And in that childhood, fear went on until I began to contemplate what fear was as a monk when I was 25 or something. Report an error in the passage at 11:10 Highlight the passage at 11:10

11:45 But that fear that came for various reasons, one of the reasons being maybe a refugee. I felt very kind of strange in Toronto society. And my brother used to get whacked about and they used to make fun of me and so on. So one can see how that fearfulness, childish fearfulness and shyness might have developed. And then taking on personality characteristics from that and developing a persona which is very much embedded with fear. Report an error in the passage at 11:45 Highlight the passage at 11:45

12:19 And then lo and behold, I'm 25 and I start to contemplate all that. What do I do with all that? So someone says, freedom now. So yeah, let's get rid of that. I'll have freedom now. I'll have freedom from this fear. It's what I want. But there's this whole package. There's this whole program. There's these years of conditioning which must be looked at, must be considered. Report an error in the passage at 12:19 Highlight the passage at 12:19

12:44 So if my idea of freedom now is that by doing something right away, right here and now, I'm going to be free from fear, it's not going to work. Not my experience. So my own experience, say, through fear was I'd do practices and I'd do mettā practice and I'd watch my breath and I'd concentrate and I'd do this and I'd do that, but the fear wouldn't cease because there was still the idea that I'm someone who has this fear and I have to get rid of this fear and be courageous and be fearless. Report an error in the passage at 12:44 Highlight the passage at 12:44

13:15 There was still me and this fear. And then I began to contemplate the historical context of my mind. The historical context of my heart, that this was nature. Just as now the trees are wilting because of the drought, that's going to have repercussions in the winter and in the years to follow. And so whatever the nature of this land is going to be next year is in the context of this year's drought, isn't it? It's not independent, it's dependent. Report an error in the passage at 13:15 Highlight the passage at 13:15

13:47 So for me next year to say I want all the trees to be alive, that's not possible. Some of these trees are dying. And that's the nature of it. So next year we'll have a different ecology here. Whatever it is, I'm not sure what it'll be. And in the same way, our hearts and our minds are conditioned through processes. Report an error in the passage at 13:47 Highlight the passage at 13:47

14:12 And the beginning and end of freedom now is to realize this historical kind of process and realize the causes for enslavement and the causes for freedom. And no longer perpetuate the causes of enslavement, but begin to manifest the causes for freedom. And that we can do now. That we can do now. So, say, in terms of my own fears as a human being, which was a very enslaving kind of worldview, which logically you can tell there's nothing to be afraid of. Report an error in the passage at 14:12 Highlight the passage at 14:12

14:48 And there was nothing to be afraid of, really. Safe. No one was attacking me. But still it was there. That perception was there. So the freedom, freedom now for me has always been the beginning of recognizing that this is nature. That this feeling of fear and this feeling of lack of freedom is actually okay. It's nature. It's the nature of the conditioned mind to be that way because of other conditions. Report an error in the passage at 14:48 Highlight the passage at 14:48

15:15 And until I could come to that step of acceptance, come to that sense of being free with this fear, being objective with this fear, Report an error in the passage at 15:15 Highlight the passage at 15:15

15:55 Seize to a great extent. But always the practice has been always timeless, here and now, accepting this is the way it is now. This is the feeling of fear. And when one accepts things as they are, but no longer makes the causes for suffering or attachment or enslavement, then those causes eventually, the results of those causes have to die. Report an error in the passage at 15:55 Highlight the passage at 15:55

16:18 So right here and now, I can look at something like fear. And I can be fully with that. This is nature. This is a feeling of fear. And be patient with it. Then its very nature is to die. Its very nature is to cease because I'm not putting anything into it for it to grow. Report an error in the passage at 16:18 Highlight the passage at 16:18

16:37 But what I did before was this fear would arise and then I'd try to do something about it. I'd try to get rid of it. I'd try to practice around it. Anything but actually fully be with it, fully feel it. In engineering school there was a phrase I always enjoyed. When all else fails, read the instructions. And I found that I had all my preconceived notions about what I was supposed to do with this stuff. Report an error in the passage at 16:37 Highlight the passage at 16:37

17:03 I had all my ideals and all the lovely stuff that you read about love and compassion and courage. And I'd read Krishnamurti and I'd read Ramana Maharshi and I'd read all the saints. So that was pretty clear. And then I'd try to be that. So there was a kind of prepackaged program of what I should be. And what my heart shouldn't be. And as long as I was coming from that and I wasn't reading the instructions, then no chance for freedom. But when I began to just read the instructions, and quite often this happens, at least in my own practice, it's like your back's against the wall, you can't get away, there's no distractions, and you're just faced with what's going on? Report an error in the passage at 17:03 Highlight the passage at 17:03

17:47 What is it like? And in that, that full looking at things, there's the insight. Because one is no longer distracting, running away, blaming. I'm not doing anything about it, but opening to the way things are. So I began to see, say, and I'm just using fear as an example, that the problem wasn't the fear, it was the grasping of the fear. Report an error in the passage at 17:47 Highlight the passage at 17:47

18:10 And the grasping arose as a fear of fear, as a denial of fear, whatever it was. And that was the problem. It wasn't the fear. So I began to see that the emotion's not the problem. It's the identity with the emotion. Report an error in the passage at 18:10 Highlight the passage at 18:10

18:26 For me, like one of the things I use in my practice, there's a huge difference between there is fear and all these people are looking at me. Report an error in the passage at 18:26 Highlight the passage at 18:26

18:39 These people are going to do something to me. Or I wonder if they like what I'm saying. That's what we mean by attachment. Report an error in the passage at 18:39 Highlight the passage at 18:39

18:52 But there is fear. It's not attachment. There's still that energy of fear because of conditionality is still there. But that's nature. It's just like a wilted tree or whatever you want to call it or a storm. That's its nature. Its nature is to be there. There's nothing right or wrong about it. It's just the way it is. So it's the grasping. And by grasping we mean the I, the identity with it, the ego thought around it, very much based around thought. Report an error in the passage at 18:52 Highlight the passage at 18:52

19:21 Again, there's a huge difference between me thinking No one likes me. They're all looking at me. What's going to happen? Anxiety, fear-ridden thoughts. Me, me, me, me, me. And there is anxiety. Anxiety feels this way. Emotion's the same. Attitude's different. And that attitude, for me, is freedom now. Or enslavement now. Report an error in the passage at 19:21 Highlight the passage at 19:21

19:45 Now, the corollary to that is that when we fully witness to something like fear, and we can fully embrace that, fully feel that, Then the nature fears that it ceases. And we have the idea of nirodha. So when we read about the Buddha's enlightenment or we read about saintly beings, they're obviously pretty clear beings. Report an error in the passage at 19:45 Highlight the passage at 19:45

20:10 They're not neurotic, fearful types usually. Otherwise we wouldn't get inspired by them. So that's certainly a possibility. And that's the possibility that we all yearn for. We want to be better people. We want to function from compassion. But how to do it? How to do it? To do it as an ideal, to set up an ideal. Here's compassion. Here's courage. Here's love. Report an error in the passage at 20:10 Highlight the passage at 20:10

20:40 Here's generosity on one side. And here's this other stuff. The dark side, the shadow. Here's fear. Here's anger. Here's jealousy. Get rid of all that and organize it. Towards the positive side it will work. And that seems a very logical kind of thing to do. But I never found it worked. Because the very denial and identity with the dark side kept the dark side strong. Report an error in the passage at 20:40 Highlight the passage at 20:40

21:06 The very distraction of it. Like say before I became a monk, then if fear came up, I would organize myself so I didn't have to face the fear. Maybe not so consciously, but I mean I wouldn't be crazy enough to give a public talk. Report an error in the passage at 21:06 Highlight the passage at 21:06

21:36 lo and behold, when the situation changed and I couldn't manipulate it anymore, I couldn't reorganize the furniture according to my sense of comfort, when that couldn't be done anymore, then it came up. Report an error in the passage at 21:36 Highlight the passage at 21:36

21:50 then it began to arise. So sometimes we can... I think, you know, everything's all right. Well, like in Thailand, I remember like the Thai monasteries, most of us who have been in Thailand in the early years, talk in these ways, but the Thai monasteries are very, one goes sort of, undergoes this sensual deprivation where there's no music, very few people spoke English. Report an error in the passage at 21:50 Highlight the passage at 21:50

22:19 The first rains retreat I spent in a monastery, And I had a book on how to learn Thai and everyone spoke Laotian. It made me very lonely, actually. So there was no distraction, no intellectual distraction, no food, one meal a day, all foreign kind of food, which I wasn't used to. Now before I got into the monastery, I thought, well, food, take it or leave it, hamburger, milkshake, whatever, no problem. Report an error in the passage at 22:19 Highlight the passage at 22:19

22:54 Vegetarian. The thing is, I always had the access. If I wanted, I could eat what I wanted, when I wanted, basically. Then all of a sudden, the monastery, I didn't have access to food when I wanted. Plus, I didn't have access to music. I didn't have access to books. I didn't have access to relationships and all kinds of other things. Report an error in the passage at 22:54 Highlight the passage at 22:54

23:17 And all of a sudden, that whole outgoing energy in which I had found some kind of fulfillment was blocked. And so I felt incredible frustration and incredible anger and incredible greed over, you know, just like an extra bit of sugar or a banana or a bigger mango. And I always like to talk about this because it was so ridiculous. I was, at Ajahn Chah's monastery, I was number 70 of 70. So, and the way the food, the food was passed out and Report an error in the passage at 23:17 Highlight the passage at 23:17

23:58 And I was a novice, you know, I'm about six foot tall, and the novices are all little boys in Thailand. So the novices were about four foot five, and there was this huge westerner at the end. Report an error in the passage at 23:58 Highlight the passage at 23:58

24:11 Now I'm a serious meditator, and these little kids are getting bigger mangoes than me, and I'm getting really angry at them, and yet trying to be mature and together and, you know, show them how really wise I am, yet the emotions are very, very childish. Report an error in the passage at 24:11 Highlight the passage at 24:11

24:31 The beauty of that is that I could see how absurd it was, and yet it was very real. And this is ridiculous. Come on now, just don't make it a problem. What about that banana? It's just gone. Report an error in the passage at 24:31 Highlight the passage at 24:31

24:48 And that was actually quite good because I could see. But what I'd like to indicate here is that all that which had distracted me on the level of craving, So what came up was tremendous discomfort, tremendous sense of being like frustration. And it wasn't the banana. It was because I had lived a fairly 1960s life and kind of did what people did at that time and basically did what I wanted to do. Report an error in the passage at 24:48 Highlight the passage at 24:48

25:24 I could do what I wanted to do. And then when that wanting was stopped, then there was still the wanting. Report an error in the passage at 25:24 Highlight the passage at 25:24

25:41 thing, food. That was the only kind of sensual delight that kind of occurred. was in one monastery where over ten months' time had Pepsis and a glass of sweet tea in ten months. Report an error in the passage at 25:41 Highlight the passage at 25:41

25:58 So You imagine when that Pepsi came, what my mind did? Report an error in the passage at 25:58 Highlight the passage at 25:58

26:06 And they were actually such good lessons. Because it was just so obvious that this is not very important. But the craving mind, the craving mind just was really, really seeking some kind of outlet, something to get reborn into, anything except this boring, peaceful monastery. And so there was the sense of, so what is freedom now within that? Report an error in the passage at 26:06 Highlight the passage at 26:06

26:02 did. Report an error in the passage at 26:02 Highlight the passage at 26:02

26:29 I really want something and I can't get it. And it seems like you're not free to get what you want, doesn't it? And I used to think, maybe I'll go to a monastery where they have your own fridge or something. Report an error in the passage at 26:29 Highlight the passage at 26:29

26:48 Or maybe I'll develop practice on my own. So is freedom the opportunity to always follow our desires? Is that freedom? Because I had that opportunity. I had, you know, kind of living a very carefree life and traveling around the world for three years and all the kinds of opportunities, but I didn't find that I was free. Report an error in the passage at 26:48 Highlight the passage at 26:48

27:12 In fact, I was more addicted to becoming and absorbing into all kinds of externalities. When that was frustrated, then certainly that didn't feel like freedom. It didn't feel like freedom. But actually, I began to have the freedom to watch desire. Report an error in the passage at 27:12 Highlight the passage at 27:12

27:32 So this was a very important insight for me that initially I felt freedom was the opportunity to do what I wanted, when I wanted, and where I wanted. Then I began to see how commitment, structures, forms, disciplines, was the freedom to observe the mind. So say taking on monastic life as a particular kind of commitment, I'm very contained by a pretty clear set of rules, by a particular style of a monastery, by my responsibilities here, and so on and so forth. Now there isn't the freedom to do what I want all the time, but there's this incredible freedom just to watch. Report an error in the passage at 27:32 Highlight the passage at 27:32

28:15 meditation. Fine, I come. I don't want to come to the morning meditation. Fine, I come. Report an error in the passage at 28:15 Highlight the passage at 28:15

28:23 And there's a freedom. There's a freedom to watch that. I mean, not blindly. If I'm sick, I don't kind of crawl in here on my hands and knees and come to morning meditation. But you see, the idea of freedom being the ability, or the freedom to watch, rather than being victimized by the craving mind. So then sometimes craving can be, I can follow cravings. Report an error in the passage at 28:23 Highlight the passage at 28:23

28:43 So if someone offers me some juice, I can have some juice. And that's okay. I can watch that. It's not that craving is wrong. But if I think that by getting what I want all the time, that's freedom, does it really work that way? And the Buddhist teachings say no. Because it's the very idea a very belief in craving that is the problem. Report an error in the passage at 28:43 Highlight the passage at 28:43

29:07 I often talk about a skin disease, which is one of my best analogies for craving the freedom from craving. In Canada, we have a plant called poison ivy. Poison ivy is an interesting little thing. It's a bush, and when you touch it, it has an acid in the leaf. When you touch the leaf, The acid goes on to your skin, your bare skin, and then that forms blisters. Now those blisters itch. Report an error in the passage at 29:07 Highlight the passage at 29:07

29:42 They itch, they really itch. I once fell asleep in a bunch. So when you have an itching skin disease, what do you do? You scratch it, right? So there's the blisters, there's the itch, and there's the scratching. Oh gosh, that feels good. And scratching does feel good. Problem is with poison ivy is having scratched it, you break the blisters, and for some reason you get twice as many. Report an error in the passage at 29:42 Highlight the passage at 29:42

30:13 So for three blisters, you get six. All right? And you get twice as much itching. So then you think, got a scratch. And then you scratch. Oh, God, that's great. It's like a dog scratching. All right? Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch. Oh, that's better. That feels better. Oh, that's good. And then, of course, you've got 12 blisters. You've got a problem. You've got a skin disease. And so somewhere along the road, along the line, you begin to see that although short-term scratching gives a nice feeling, it doesn't put an end to the disease. Report an error in the passage at 30:13 Highlight the passage at 30:13

30:54 And you begin to stop scratching because you're more interested in long-term health. Now, that's the problem with craving is that Scratch, scratch. Scratching does feel good. So when I had fear, running away felt really good. Who wants to look at fear? And I got very clever at scratching fear. But it didn't put an end to the fear. So I would avoid situations. Report an error in the passage at 30:54 Highlight the passage at 30:54

31:26 Escape that one. Got out of that one. That feels good. There's no fear there. But then I began to develop a relationship to fear. Itching, scratching, itching, scratching, and the disease got stronger. When I began to just say, well, okay, got to look at this. And this is where containment and responsibility and commitment and precepts and all of these things that we are involved with was so helpful for me. Report an error in the passage at 31:26 Highlight the passage at 31:26

31:55 So then I was contained and I could look at some of the major itching and scratching issues that I had in my life. So like for me around, if I'm talking about the issue of fear, Then I had to start to give public talks. And again, it was quite humorous. It was in Hampstead. And Ajahn Sumedho said, OK, Viradhammo, give a talk. Report an error in the passage at 31:55 Highlight the passage at 31:55

32:13 I said, you can't do this to me. And I said, I've only been a monk for three years and it says in the text, five years before you teach. Report an error in the passage at 32:13 Highlight the passage at 32:13

32:24 And then he would leave and Ajahn Ananda would leave and I'd be the only one. And the funny thing is, you know, there'd be like four people come to a talk. I knew them all very well. But as soon as I had to give a talk, I was petrified. What am I going to do? Now, then of course the itching and scratching came up. Report an error in the passage at 32:24 Highlight the passage at 32:24

32:46 Okay, I'll prepare notes. I'll really give them an incredibly good talk. Ajahn Chah always taught us to not prepare notes. They just come from your heart. So I'd prepare notes and I'd make a whole hash of it. Then I'd prepare it in my head. And then I'd have emptiness the wrong time. My mind would go empty, right? In all these different ways until... And that was the... It was still the itching and scratching, wasn't it? You know, anything but read the instructions. Report an error in the passage at 32:46 Highlight the passage at 32:46

33:18 And I said, when all else fails, read the instructions. Why do you suffer? And so we get to the Four Noble Truths. Why am I suffering? Because I have to give this damn talk, that's why. No, no, no, no, no. That's not it. Why are you suffering? Because I don't want the fear. I don't want this fear. And I don't want to go into that room and be terrified and look like an idiot. And as I began to see what the real problem was, it was not wanting the fear, I began to see what the scratching was. Report an error in the passage at 33:18 Highlight the passage at 33:18

33:46 And I began to see, well, you have to welcome the fear. Welcome it. It must be crazy. And that was a very foreign thing to do. It was a very, very, very strange thing to do to welcome fear into the heart when my whole programming for so many years had been to do something to not have it conscious. And this is quite often the case in freedom now, is it doesn't feel right. It didn't feel right to welcome fear. It felt much more appropriate to get rid of it. Report an error in the passage at 33:46 Highlight the passage at 33:46

34:16 But then contemplating that and watching that wasn't working. So then like changing the strategy to see what is the problem. When all else fails, read the instructions. What is the itching and scratching? What is it now that I want to get rid of or I want or whatever it is? What is the wanting? And as I began to do that, Then I began to realize some space around fear. I began to see it objectively. It still, you know, it could still shake my body and it could still tremble a lot. Report an error in the passage at 34:16 Highlight the passage at 34:16

34:44 But at least now there was mindfulness. And that was, you know, we can say mindfulness, you know, be mindful of things, but it's not that easy sometimes because we have these different kinds of programs of getting rid of and denying and distracting and so on and so forth. But then as I found in my own practice as the awakening to the whole feeling of fear. And I began to see that non-attachment was this awakening. Report an error in the passage at 34:44 Highlight the passage at 34:44

35:15 And non-attachment again, we use this word, but how non-attachment sometimes sounds like you shouldn't have any feelings. But I found that actually being fully open to something like that allowed it to run its course, allowed it to be liberated through the heart. And then, so as I practice with that, a lot of that fear has ceased. So freedom now, then as I keep practicing that freedom now, freedom now, freedom now in each moment, then the tendency towards fear has a chance to die. Report an error in the passage at 35:15 Highlight the passage at 35:15

35:45 And the heart has less and less overlays of fear. And it's not me being courageous or fearless. It's just the fear has ceased more and more. You see? It's not a kind of ego trip. It's a difference. Report an error in the passage at 35:45 Highlight the passage at 35:45

36:02 So that's just, say, one example of, say, how I've worked, but the pattern of first and foremost acceptance, awakening, how is it now, and to somehow drop all the ideals. The ideals are good, not to drop them, say, but to see that to have aspiration, to aspire to be a better person, to aspire to live in a compassionate and generous way is wonderful. Report an error in the passage at 36:02 Highlight the passage at 36:02

36:31 Otherwise we'd be monsters. But to attach to that and not read the heart, to attach to the ideal and not really read the instructions means we'll just feel frustrated. Report an error in the passage at 36:31 Highlight the passage at 36:31

36:43 So the aspiration is there. So all of us, well, the heart's blocked in some way. There isn't freedom. What is freedom, say? For me it would be like, in the inner level, the ability to really perceive a person, say, without all the overlay of... My prejudices and biases and fears and desires with all the manipulativeness and all of that which can get into perception. Emotionally, it can mean like a stillness of heart which can function in an intuitive way. Report an error in the passage at 36:43 Highlight the passage at 36:43

37:14 A stillness of heart which can respond to the world from intuition rather than react to the world out of old programming. Report an error in the passage at 37:14 Highlight the passage at 37:14

37:26 But to realize that intuitive still heart, we can do it in any given moment. We can do it when we begin to not believe our thoughts, be obsessed by our thoughts. We can begin to do that when we go out into the nature and we just look at an oak tree and our mind stops and we receive the oak tree and we're centered and still. Report an error in the passage at 37:26 Highlight the passage at 37:26

37:50 We begin to touch something which is intuitive. But often that's very difficult because often life is just so complex. And often what we're working with is all kinds of, it's like me with the extra banana. We're working with our karmic predicament. And so that if in your life, say, you find that you're Report an error in the passage at 37:50 Highlight the passage at 37:50

38:16 like in psychology to say when you get out of your comfort zone, when something challenges you and you feel irritated or you feel fearful or there is some kind of greed or lust or something like that or anxiety going, then actually that is a chance. For liberating the heart from those tendencies or asavas, as we say. But how is that done? How is that done? It's done by going to the heart and feeling this stuff fully. Report an error in the passage at 38:16 Highlight the passage at 38:16

38:44 So say for me, again, like I came to Amaravati and then Ajahn Sumedho asked me to take on certain responsibilities. And as I realized what those responsibilities were, I began to worry. Oh no, what have I done? Report an error in the passage at 38:44 Highlight the passage at 38:44

39:00 And so that's the arising of a tendency, right? Now, that tendency, because of causes, it begins to manifest onto the maintenance program, the funds we have to keep these buildings up, and the needs of the monks and nuns, and the lack of space that the nuns have, and maybe we need more monks, and the mind just could go on and on and on. Report an error in the passage at 39:00 Highlight the passage at 39:00

39:28 And they're very real problems. You know, the things that have to be dealt with, no denying it. Oh, it doesn't matter, I'll just go swim with a fish or something. It wasn't that. They're very real problems. But they're also somewhat invested with anxiety and worry. So to take on responsibility, to take on commitment, and then within that, use that very responsibility to purify the heart. Report an error in the passage at 39:28 Highlight the passage at 39:28

39:55 Now, when I began monastic life, I thought, oh, well, if I have responsibility, it's just going to be a hassle. If I live in a cave, I'll be really happy. It's that kind of running away mentality. And that was, I mean, I did a bit of that and it was very good to practice that way. But now I see that, like I say, having a lot of responsibility can trigger off feelings of worry. Now how can I, on one hand, be responsible and try to be creative and try to communicate and talk through solutions and yet liberate the heart from anxiety? Report an error in the passage at 39:55 Highlight the passage at 39:55

40:30 And it's that very situation actually which helps me to liberate the heart from anxiety because it's the situation which brings up the anxiety. The situation brings it up. If it didn't bring it up, I could be comfortable. You know, maybe I'd be somewhere where anxiety wouldn't be brought up. But it's a situational thing. Report an error in the passage at 40:30 Highlight the passage at 40:30

40:49 But give me the right responsibilities, the right factors, and that anxiety might come up. But then it's an opportunity actually for not scratching it. Then there's an opportunity for doing the best I can and then cultivating something to balance that out, like trust, devotion, some kind of practice. Report an error in the passage at 40:49 Highlight the passage at 40:49

41:07 So what I'm finding more and more is that the very situations which trigger off the seeming enslavement of the heart are the very situations which can purify the heart. You see what I mean? The very person who I feel intimidated by in the monastery. If I feel intimidated, let's say, that's the very person who can help me get beyond that, presses my button, helps me to purify. Report an error in the passage at 41:07 Highlight the passage at 41:07

41:38 The very situation that causes anxiety or fear, whatever, is a possibility for freedom. But also, it's a possibility for being more embedded in that delusion. So the very thing that causes me anxiety can also be the thing that creates more anxiety and gets me more wrapped up in that kind of enslavement. Report an error in the passage at 41:38 Highlight the passage at 41:38

41:58 Or, It's the possibility of freedom from anxiety. And the difficulty with that is that I tend to project onto the world my anxieties or worries or fears or greeds. And I fail to look at the very nature of anxiety. So I can be anxious about the roofs, the monks, the nuns, Ajahn Sumedho's health, my health, lack of rain. Report an error in the passage at 41:58 Highlight the passage at 41:58

42:23 I can be anxious about a myriad of things, right? But what is the nature of anxiety? What does anxiety feel like? And if I do that, then I can liberate the heart from anxiety. The things that we are angry at, the things we are greedy for, the things we fear, those are the enslavements of the heart, right? Report an error in the passage at 42:23 Highlight the passage at 42:23

42:42 And if we believe in those projections, then we can never be free. If I really believe that the reason I'm anxious is because of Amaravati, how can I ever be free? Because there's always going to be stuff at Amaravati. It's really complex. Report an error in the passage at 42:42 Highlight the passage at 42:42

42:55 So if I don't take that primary responsibility that Amaravati and the very problems of it is the way I can be free, then I can never be free. And this whole thing becomes, oh gosh, Amaravati. Right? Say like, I made a determination like coming here and taking on this responsibility of being abbot. I said, I'm going to do this for me. I'm going to do this as my practice. Report an error in the passage at 42:55 Highlight the passage at 42:55

43:20 Rather than me saving the world or helping Buddhism or helping Ajahn Sumedho or helping the monks and nuns, all that kind of smarmy overlay. Because if I did that, if I said, I'm going to help everyone and all that kind of stuff, then what happens? When it doesn't work, I say, it's not fair. And I could blame Ajahn Sumedho. I could blame the monks and nuns. Report an error in the passage at 43:20 Highlight the passage at 43:20

43:44 All this is making me unhappy. And that's what we sometimes do with responsibilities. and say, it's the responsibility that's making me unhappy. If we use it the right way, if we use it the right way. Now I can certainly come up with the martyr whinging. I can certainly say, oh, it's too much work and all that. But I can also say, shut up. Report an error in the passage at 43:44 Highlight the passage at 43:44

44:28 Get on with it. And there's something about that kind of maturity in the practice, is where if I'm suffering, it's in here. The enslavement is in here. And that's always that sense of freedom now. You know, the possibility for freedom is now in this heart. And it comes, again, coming back to this basic structure that there is suffering. Report an error in the passage at 44:28 Highlight the passage at 44:28

44:49 There's a cause of suffering, there's the end of suffering, which is freedom now, and we see it that way. And the other way is, it's not fair, it's not right, they don't like me, what's going to happen? The I thought, the ego thought, which goes on and on and on. So for freedom now, we need to listen to our thoughts and really see, are those thoughts skillful thoughts? Report an error in the passage at 44:49 Highlight the passage at 44:49

45:12 Are we attending skillfully? Are we just addicted to the ego thought? And if I learn to listen to my thoughts and I see my thoughts just creating more fear, I can say, yeah, but what does fear feel like? That's freedom now, right there, because that's acceptance. And then from that, the fear can cease. Or if I'm averse or angry or jealous or whatever it is, if I believe in the I thought, you did that to me and I'm going to get you. Report an error in the passage at 45:12 Highlight the passage at 45:12

45:42 Or resentment, you did that to me 20 years ago and I'm still going to get you. And so on and so forth. That very I thought is enslavement, isn't it? I'm enslaved to the feeling of resentment. How many of us have carried around stuff? Someone does you a bad turn, stabs you in the back ten years ago, and then every time you see them, you want to stab them in the back. Report an error in the passage at 45:42 Highlight the passage at 45:42

46:08 Every time that memory comes up, you're just churning up. And the liberation from that is to allow it to churn up, but to no longer believe in it, to fully feel it. This is a feeling of resentment. Resentment feels this way. But if I take that feeling of resentment and then think wrongly, and this is where enslavement is, and I keep thinking, it's your fault, it's your fault, it's your fault, it's your fault, it's your fault, there's no freedom. Report an error in the passage at 46:08 Highlight the passage at 46:08

46:32 But if I take that feeling of resentment, ooh, that really hurt. And maybe I think, may you drop dead, but I don't believe it. Because I will think that. I mean, most of us do, I hope. This is nature. But I don't believe it. If I don't believe it, rather than taking that thought, may you drop dead, and enacting it, and going back, yeah, now that's a thought of hatred. Report an error in the passage at 46:32 Highlight the passage at 46:32

46:58 What does hatred feel like? I'm not denying the hatred. I'm not denying the resentment. But I'm fully feeling it. That's freedom now. Finally. And then that resentment can cease. But I'll never get to that point of acceptance and knowing. How can it cease? It can't cease. It can't cease, can it? There can be no cessation, and the heart can not really... Report an error in the passage at 46:58 Highlight the passage at 46:58

47:18 Realize its potential for compassion because it will always be blocked by this resentment or this fear or this thing, whatever it might be. So that's why I say the way Ajahn Sumedho teaches it, this is the way it is now, seems a very ordinary thing but it's very profound. It's like really awakening in a very deep way to our feelings, to how life is affecting us and no longer identifying with that. Report an error in the passage at 47:18 Highlight the passage at 47:18

47:47 Okay, I'll leave that for reflection. Perhaps we could... reflection. Report an error in the passage at 47:47 Highlight the passage at 47:47

47:53 Break for a cup of tea and meet in about half an hour. I've never done one of these things before but I understand that Ajahn Sumedho would field questions after about half an hour. May I suggest that if anyone has any questions that they write them down on a piece of paper and maybe put them up here and it gives me a chance to ponder them and gives you a chance to ask a question. Report an error in the passage at 47:53 Highlight the passage at 47:53

48:22 Okay, so let's take a break for half an hour. Report an error in the passage at 48:22 Highlight the passage at 48:22