WEBVTT 01:16.508 --> 01:17.409 Good evening everyone. 01:17.990 --> 01:21.295 Welcome to our live broadcast. 01:25.161 --> 01:32.011 Today we're looking at the Samaya Sutta in Kuturanikaya, Book of Vibes, No. 01:32.031 --> 01:32.732 54. 01:37.099 --> 01:44.911 So we stop here for a somewhat unique sutta. 01:44.931 --> 01:45.672 It's one of these 01:47.272 --> 01:54.562 teachings that stand out in their own unique way. 02:01.091 --> 02:14.089 We have the Buddha giving I don't know if you could call it advice but listing situations where it is 02:17.377 --> 02:34.080 Bhikkhu Bodhi says unfavorable, but the words the Buddha uses, or the text uses, are asamayo badanaya and samayo badanaya. 02:34.100 --> 02:38.185 Samaya means occasion or time. 02:42.711 --> 02:45.375 Asamaya means that which is not the time. 02:47.566 --> 02:48.547 not an occasion. 02:54.414 --> 03:05.507 So you might explain that by not being a good opportunity for something, or not being a proper opportunity for something. 03:07.609 --> 03:08.190 And for what? 03:08.250 --> 03:09.051 Well, padhāna. 03:09.171 --> 03:12.375 Padhānai means for striving. 03:15.157 --> 03:18.560 Striving being a term for Buddhist practice. 03:19.721 --> 03:22.103 Buddhism is considered to be a type of striving. 03:22.123 --> 03:27.048 If you ever come here to do a meditation course, you'll understand why that is. 03:27.989 --> 03:28.729 It's hard work. 03:31.632 --> 03:35.716 It's not like running on a treadmill or pushing rocks up a hill. 03:38.178 --> 03:42.402 But nonetheless, it's work that you have to do. 03:42.482 --> 03:43.543 It's a training. 03:45.194 --> 03:47.197 strenuous for the mind. 03:47.217 --> 03:53.567 It's quite hard work. 03:53.587 --> 03:59.215 You're striving to be free. 04:01.900 --> 04:06.827 And that's in a very literal sense, a very simple understanding of that. 04:07.268 --> 04:13.277 Striving that when you experience 04:15.130 --> 04:40.463 the objects, when you experience the world around you, to be free from them, to be free in regards to them, to not be enslaved by them, which is just a poetic way of saying to not react to them, 04:43.261 --> 04:46.586 Do not extrapolate or expand upon them. 04:48.128 --> 04:49.610 Let seeing just be seeing. 04:49.650 --> 04:50.932 Let hearing just be hearing. 04:52.194 --> 04:53.556 Let feeling just be feeling. 04:53.596 --> 04:54.918 Let thinking just be thinking. 04:56.260 --> 04:57.422 That's the striving we do. 04:59.545 --> 05:02.429 So understand that yes, striving is important. 05:03.610 --> 05:12.964 And understand that the only striving that is proper is the striving to be simply put, free. 05:16.252 --> 05:19.296 But again, it's not like free, like a jailbreak kind of free. 05:20.859 --> 05:35.020 It's free from the influence, free from the slavery of reality, free from slavery to reality. 05:36.782 --> 05:39.306 Do not be a slave of reality. 05:45.935 --> 06:00.007 So it's easy, we get the impression that, I hope you get the impression from some of the things I say that it's always good to strive, right? 06:00.027 --> 06:01.210 It's always good to practice. 06:02.843 --> 06:07.468 So here the Buddha is saying there are times for striving and not times for striving. 06:07.528 --> 06:14.877 And I have to question a literal interpretation of this. 06:15.337 --> 06:29.914 I have to hesitantly put my finger on this one and move the, I don't know what the phrase is, but I have to somehow qualify this one. 06:31.615 --> 06:33.097 Because the Buddha doesn't go into detail. 06:33.717 --> 06:41.807 He says, a time for striving and a not time for striving. 06:50.737 --> 06:51.818 And it's a list of five. 06:53.139 --> 06:56.323 Five good times for striving and five bad times. 06:57.248 --> 07:00.432 I'll go through them and then we'll discuss about what they actually mean. 07:00.993 --> 07:06.961 Or maybe I'll say something first about why I mean it's not to be taken literally. 07:06.981 --> 07:11.888 We'll talk about that first. 07:11.908 --> 07:26.108 Because the admission that there's a time for not striving is a sense that there might be a time where mindfulness would not be useful or would not be possible. 07:28.450 --> 07:35.721 And if you're looking at these lists, and I'll go over them, it doesn't seem like any of these are times. 07:35.961 --> 07:39.567 They don't refer to times when you're asleep, for example, or drunk. 07:41.149 --> 07:42.171 It doesn't talk about that. 07:44.815 --> 07:53.428 What it does talk about is what appear to be times where it would be more difficult to really apply yourself. 07:56.783 --> 08:17.593 And so the only understanding I can get out of this as to why this is actually an important teaching to keep in mind is that all of these are dangers that we have to face, that we may be in a position 08:19.058 --> 08:31.832 this position, this samaya, this occasion might come to us that we get into a situation where we can't practice, or where it's quite difficult to practice, more difficult to practice. 08:32.913 --> 08:41.082 And so the first lesson is not to take for granted a good opportunity to practice, to seize the opportunity. 08:41.103 --> 08:43.265 And you'll see why that becomes important when we talk about that. 08:44.626 --> 08:47.850 The other thing about a good opportunity 08:53.821 --> 09:02.000 I can't remember what I was going to say. 09:03.223 --> 09:08.455 Ah, yes, is that some of these can be avoided, not all of them. 09:10.595 --> 09:14.783 But at least four out of the five of these, right? 09:15.264 --> 09:17.669 Three or four of them can be avoided. 09:17.709 --> 09:23.861 So it may be that you find yourself in a situation that is unfavorable to practice. 09:24.663 --> 09:32.518 And so one of the things I take from this is extrapolate on this teaching. 09:33.950 --> 10:02.016 is that sometimes you should change your situation sometimes you shouldn't just accept your situation Buddha talked about avoiding avoiding certain things if they're going to get in the way of your practice it's true that there are certain examples of things to be avoided or even abandoned and left behind Buddha did talk about in other suttas if you practice somewhere and you don't 10:03.295 --> 10:10.684 You don't gain positive qualities from being there. 10:10.744 --> 10:13.668 Your mind isn't able to focus. 10:14.529 --> 10:17.072 Then maybe you should think about going somewhere else. 10:18.954 --> 10:23.900 So let's go through these five things that are useful to know about anyway. 10:23.920 --> 10:27.244 It's not a terribly deep teaching, but it is a good teaching. 10:28.566 --> 10:29.387 There's no question. 10:31.544 --> 10:33.768 of value here. 10:33.848 --> 10:40.078 So the five are jino hoti, jaraya bibhuto. 10:43.283 --> 10:55.083 Someone is old and is jaraya bibhuto, become great and become overcome with old age. 10:56.766 --> 10:57.687 Abhibhuta. 11:03.404 --> 11:07.449 This is a time, this is a asamayopada, not a good time to strive. 11:08.289 --> 11:12.194 And so this one really rings home the fact that you have to work. 11:15.097 --> 11:16.178 You have to work while you're young. 11:17.740 --> 11:20.323 So the question immediately arises, what about old people? 11:20.363 --> 11:21.164 Can they not meditate? 11:21.224 --> 11:21.725 Absolutely. 11:23.346 --> 11:31.015 But there's no question that a person who is negligent when they have strength, when their body is fit, 11:32.733 --> 11:51.964 It's not going to be easier when your body becomes weak and frail and you're bothered by all sorts of the aches and pains and the fatigue, the problems of old age. 11:53.606 --> 11:59.095 It doesn't really just mean getting old, it means getting arthritis and 12:00.796 --> 12:15.227 I mean, there's even, now we have to deal with things like dementia and the many sicknesses that come with old age that make you tired, that make you dizzy. 12:16.085 --> 12:20.710 Some of these could even be, like arthritis, for example, could be a good object of meditation. 12:20.750 --> 12:23.974 There's no question there, but it's much more difficult. 12:24.034 --> 12:30.201 Another big thing about getting old is that you've had that much more time to cultivate unwholesomeness. 12:30.281 --> 12:38.650 If you haven't practiced cultivating wholesome qualities in your youth, you've got that much more to deal with. 12:41.178 --> 12:47.888 Young people often get this wrong impression in their minds, oh, when I get old, then I'll go off and do something spiritual. 12:48.730 --> 12:50.873 Right now I'm young, I should enjoy life. 12:53.096 --> 12:55.360 I get caught up in this idea of enjoying life. 12:56.662 --> 12:57.363 Enjoy life. 13:01.870 --> 13:02.431 Enjoy life. 13:05.015 --> 13:07.759 Funny thing about enjoying life is it's not all that enjoyable. 13:11.013 --> 13:38.151 think about it think about the times when you enjoyed life did they make you happier as a person did they make you more content what did you get out of it looking back at all the happiness we've striven for all the yearning and seeking for pleasure are we now more content because of that 13:39.667 --> 13:50.099 And when you come to meditate, you realize, actually, I'm just a lot more attached to those things now that I've had them than before. 13:51.281 --> 13:52.041 So that's all you get. 13:52.242 --> 14:02.073 If you go through your whole life enjoying life until you get old to the point where you can no longer enjoy life in many of the ways that you used to. 14:02.994 --> 14:04.376 You can no longer play sports. 14:04.456 --> 14:05.577 You can no longer dance. 14:06.458 --> 14:08.020 You can no longer have sex. 14:11.425 --> 14:19.139 Then you start to come and meditate, and you find that you've got some pretty serious attachments, pretty serious habits built up. 14:19.239 --> 14:20.661 They get quite ingrained. 14:22.184 --> 14:24.228 They seem to be very much a part of who you are. 14:24.248 --> 14:30.599 And so your whole outlook on the meditation practice is skewed. 14:31.421 --> 14:35.087 For young people who come and meditate, I think you should be able to appreciate this, 14:35.067 --> 14:59.978 you're able to cut through a lot of your bad habits and become fairly objective because your bad habits are weak but if you talk to people who are who've come to the meditation later in life their habits are actually more ingrained sometimes they have very good habits but any bad habits are really that much harder to deal with i don't want to discourage old people 15:01.645 --> 15:06.549 And I think the Buddha was not completely trying to discourage. 15:07.170 --> 15:08.351 It was sensitive, I think. 15:08.992 --> 15:10.553 I don't think it was insensitive of that. 15:10.633 --> 15:15.257 And it wasn't a sense that, you old people are useless, go away, don't come and meditate. 15:15.337 --> 15:26.027 But there's certainly some admonishment here to be made that we've wasted so much time not meditating. 15:30.651 --> 15:31.332 And... 15:34.248 --> 15:40.838 It behooves us as young people, as young as possible, get people meditating when they're three years old, five years old. 15:41.999 --> 15:46.987 They might not become enlightened, but they'll start off on the right foot. 15:47.748 --> 15:54.578 Teach your kids not to kill, not to steal, not to cheat, not to lie, not to take drugs or alcohol. 15:55.839 --> 15:56.560 Don't go there. 15:59.324 --> 16:00.767 Help them on the right path. 16:01.508 --> 16:02.449 Encourage them. 16:05.534 --> 16:07.817 so that they don't cultivate bad habits. 16:07.858 --> 16:09.180 That's what you see when you meditate. 16:10.421 --> 16:12.445 You see all your bad habits, old age. 16:13.767 --> 16:14.428 It's too late. 16:15.069 --> 16:19.135 It's not too late, but it's that much more difficult. 16:22.900 --> 16:23.642 That's the first one. 16:23.682 --> 16:30.512 The second one, related, vyadhitohoti, vyadhinabhibhutto, 16:33.108 --> 16:33.790 One is sick. 16:35.053 --> 16:36.598 One is overwhelmed by sickness. 16:38.684 --> 16:40.649 It's also not a good opportunity for striving. 16:40.729 --> 16:44.380 Now, sickness can be a good object of meditation. 16:45.222 --> 16:48.130 When a person is sick, they can be mindful of the sickness. 16:50.253 --> 16:55.981 that really assumes that they've got some kind of training to help them deal with the sickness. 16:57.303 --> 17:11.183 One of my old friends in Jomtong, one of my teachers, one of my first teachers, I'm not really on good terms with him, but I still respect him. 17:11.203 --> 17:17.172 We were talking about, Mahasi Sayadaw says you should meditate like a sick person. 17:18.383 --> 17:21.509 When you meditate, you should behave as though you're sick. 17:23.032 --> 17:30.247 And the idea was, it's a way of, it gives you the idea of being very mindful, because sick people walk very slowly. 17:32.472 --> 17:34.836 So he said, when you walk, you should walk like a sick person. 17:34.977 --> 17:36.139 You shouldn't walk around 17:39.629 --> 18:08.674 mindlessly every act a sick person when they the point is a sick person when they walk they do it very intentionally because they're in great pain and it's very hard for them to do the point being that they do everything very intentionally very gradually very carefully because they don't want to disturb the sickness in the body they're very weak and in pain so meditators should to some extent be like that should look like and act like 18:09.498 --> 18:11.340 From a totally different reason. 18:12.142 --> 18:15.065 The reason is not because it's supposed to be painful, absolutely not. 18:16.628 --> 18:18.730 Because we have to be as careful as a sick person. 18:19.732 --> 18:22.596 But for a different reason, of course, so that we can be mindful. 18:23.777 --> 18:28.343 If you run around like a child, your potential to be mindful is much reduced. 18:29.485 --> 18:35.092 A sick person, if you walk around like a sick person, everything you can be mindful of. 18:35.112 --> 18:37.075 Brushing your teeth, eating your food. 18:39.687 --> 18:46.603 Some meditators, he was, Mahasi Sayadaw in this passage, he was praising these meditators who were doing everything very slowly. 18:48.267 --> 18:49.510 He said, you know, we should be like them. 18:51.113 --> 18:55.002 Doing everything very methodically, very intentionally. 18:55.363 --> 18:56.987 And so as a result, very mindfully. 19:00.308 --> 19:08.058 But the point of the story is he joked about this and he said, but you know, sick people are some of the least mindful people out there. 19:09.360 --> 19:16.590 And it's true, most people when they're sick, they're just whining and complaining and unable to be objective whatsoever. 19:18.853 --> 19:22.097 And so this is what the Buddhists, I can only assume, thinking of. 19:24.085 --> 19:25.449 I was certainly thinking of it. 19:27.594 --> 19:29.740 Sick people have a very hard time being mindful. 19:29.800 --> 19:32.006 When you're sick, all you want is to relieve the pain. 19:33.711 --> 19:36.137 Just give me something to get over it. 19:37.467 --> 19:46.857 Once when I was in Thailand, I refused to take painkillers, but I got this, what I later found out was probably amoebic dysentery. 19:47.098 --> 19:47.698 Dysentery. 19:49.300 --> 19:50.862 Dysentery is an interesting disease. 19:50.942 --> 20:03.596 It's not like a, it's like the stomach flu where you get food poisoning or something, or bacteria in your stomach, a virus, I don't know, something in your stomach that makes you throw up or makes you have diarrhea. 20:04.918 --> 20:07.120 But it's so much worse. 20:08.382 --> 20:09.744 It's almost instantaneous. 20:09.804 --> 20:16.332 Within about five minutes, you're lying on your back or you're hunched over the toilet. 20:18.154 --> 20:19.355 And it goes on for hours. 20:19.575 --> 20:22.679 And you have pain from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. 20:24.381 --> 20:25.182 You feel like you're dying. 20:25.422 --> 20:25.923 You really do. 20:25.943 --> 20:27.305 You can't eat anything. 20:28.666 --> 20:29.648 You can't drink anything. 20:29.668 --> 20:31.690 The only thing I could take was salt water. 20:33.239 --> 20:37.784 And I knew instinctively that that I could take. 20:37.824 --> 20:41.608 And so I asked for someone to get me some hot water with salt in it. 20:43.330 --> 20:45.853 That somehow helped. 20:46.233 --> 20:49.316 But I ended up taking half of a paracetamol because I just couldn't take it. 20:53.701 --> 20:57.746 Many years ago in Thailand. 20:57.766 --> 20:59.027 Very hard to be mindful. 21:01.437 --> 21:22.741 But on the other hand, the Buddha has said elsewhere that sickness, he said, or one of the commentaries said that sickness is, I think the Buddha said it, it's called someone who becomes enlightened with the, they free themselves from sickness and they free themselves from defilements at the same time. 21:22.841 --> 21:24.863 So they overcome sickness and defilements together. 21:27.020 --> 21:30.264 meaning I guess the sickness helps them get rid of defilements. 21:30.665 --> 21:33.548 It's an instigator, helps you to let go. 21:33.568 --> 21:35.151 And I see that as well. 21:35.231 --> 21:48.488 I think anyone who's been sick, any meditator who's fallen sick, is able to see actually the benefit and how it tests you and challenges you. 21:48.508 --> 21:54.816 But the definite point here is that not to wait until you're sick or to be conscious of the fact that sickness 21:56.045 --> 22:00.614 makes it more difficult. 22:00.634 --> 22:02.257 And the point being that, well, you're healthy. 22:04.381 --> 22:05.262 Make the most of it. 22:05.683 --> 22:11.734 So this whole idea of live your life, carpe diem, it's actually good, you know. 22:12.696 --> 22:15.842 Yes, live for the now because tomorrow you may die. 22:17.982 --> 22:19.784 It's just a question of what that means. 22:20.825 --> 22:29.336 The best way to live your life is not to be indulgent, indolent, careless, heedless. 22:30.157 --> 22:37.225 The best way to live your life is to bring your mind to the fullest. 22:38.847 --> 22:40.469 Live to your fullest potential. 22:42.832 --> 22:45.435 Strive to find freedom. 22:46.397 --> 22:47.618 Now you have the chance 22:51.040 --> 22:51.561 Number two. 22:53.904 --> 22:54.625 Number three. 22:54.765 --> 23:08.004 Let's go to the English. 23:09.886 --> 23:11.869 There's a famine, a poor harvest. 23:12.110 --> 23:13.892 I don't think that's quite what it says, is it? 23:15.610 --> 23:19.556 To become Hoti. 23:20.919 --> 23:22.461 It's hard to get food. 23:26.908 --> 23:30.173 This might be a fairly specific problem. 23:30.214 --> 23:33.639 Not one that... 23:35.863 --> 23:37.365 It's one that monks run into. 23:38.442 --> 24:06.964 and there's a sense here that you do have to somewhat be careful if you don't have a lot of food well then don't push yourself at least physically too hard it also says that you need to eat there's no question that we rely to some extent on our body and we're trapped to some extent by our body if our body is not healthy it's often our body is not 24:09.239 --> 24:17.808 energetic and find it difficult to cultivate mental energy because they rely on each other. 24:17.848 --> 24:21.432 The mind is very much trapped by the nature of the body. 24:24.935 --> 24:26.497 Not entirely, but to some extent. 24:28.879 --> 24:31.041 So bhikkhu bodhi translates unfavorable. 24:31.542 --> 24:31.802 Yes. 24:35.466 --> 24:37.068 I don't suppose there's too much to say there. 24:37.128 --> 24:37.508 We're not 24:39.091 --> 24:40.533 We're not really in danger of this. 24:40.593 --> 24:45.279 But another point would be that any danger can come to us. 24:46.400 --> 24:47.261 Not just famine. 24:48.943 --> 24:50.325 Our house could be burnt down. 24:51.867 --> 24:52.728 And that's the fourth one. 24:52.768 --> 24:56.513 The fourth one is there could be peril, turbulence in the wilderness. 24:57.414 --> 24:57.834 War. 24:59.857 --> 25:02.781 Times of war, conflict. 25:02.801 --> 25:04.002 So many different problems. 25:08.048 --> 25:09.009 The future is uncertain. 25:10.010 --> 25:21.343 We've just apparently passed 400 parts per million of carbon in our atmosphere, which is sort of the level that scientists hoped we could have avoided passing. 25:22.264 --> 25:24.747 Another one of those landmarks, and we just whipped past it. 25:26.429 --> 25:34.478 And some people are saying we'll probably never see, we'll never see less than 400 parts per million. 25:37.057 --> 25:41.001 So congratulations, another landmark in the evolution of humanity. 25:42.943 --> 25:55.237 What that means is we're looking at some hotter times, flooding, mass displacement of peoples. 25:56.358 --> 26:04.286 So we're definitely looking at famine and hardship, war, a lot of suffering in the future for a lot of people on earth. 26:06.048 --> 26:06.709 Could be us. 26:09.338 --> 26:10.820 We might feel privileged now. 26:12.322 --> 26:13.604 Might be us in the next life. 26:16.147 --> 26:18.090 Might be us in this life. 26:18.110 --> 26:20.273 Lots of uncertainties about the future. 26:21.034 --> 26:22.596 Lots of uncertainties about the present. 26:25.219 --> 26:28.904 Another guy went into a public school to shoot people. 26:31.007 --> 26:37.776 Which is always confusing, but... 26:40.642 --> 26:41.664 definitely possible. 26:45.150 --> 26:47.454 What's going to happen to us in our future, we don't know. 26:47.494 --> 26:54.726 And it will be very difficult to meditate when you're being shot at, when your house is being burnt down. 26:57.731 --> 27:04.843 Compared to the luxury that we have, the great opportunity that we have to 27:06.697 --> 27:11.144 Really make the most of our good luck, the goodness that we have. 27:13.287 --> 27:14.669 And the Buddha said, this is the time. 27:16.411 --> 27:17.733 Make use of the opportunity. 27:20.458 --> 27:21.980 Don't let the moment pass you by. 27:25.846 --> 27:27.528 So that's numbers three and four. 27:29.872 --> 27:32.856 And number five is also somewhat specific. 27:34.270 --> 27:39.957 When the community is arguing, and there's another lesson to be learned here. 27:41.359 --> 27:48.748 When the community is broken up, when everyone's fighting, the lesson to be learned here is don't fight. 27:50.450 --> 27:56.657 And this works, this is probably a good lesson for, well it is certainly a good lesson for large monasteries and meditation centers. 27:57.979 --> 27:59.721 I've been in some places, I tell you. 28:00.916 --> 28:06.062 I remember, I don't know if I told this story online, I tell this story often to my students. 28:07.804 --> 28:19.899 I became a monk and then I went back to Canada because part of my agreement with my parents was that if I become a monk I'd still go back to university. 28:21.581 --> 28:23.143 So I went back to university as a monk. 28:25.216 --> 28:26.499 Oh, I'm doing that now as well. 28:26.539 --> 28:28.262 But yeah, I did it way back when as well. 28:28.302 --> 28:30.206 It didn't really work out all that well. 28:31.328 --> 28:33.914 Anyway, I ended up deciding that that was a bad idea. 28:34.375 --> 28:35.236 It wasn't going to work. 28:35.256 --> 28:39.445 And so I reneged on my agreement and went back to Thailand. 28:41.011 --> 28:42.773 It's a little more complicated than that. 28:42.813 --> 28:44.274 But anyway, I moved back to Thailand. 28:44.294 --> 28:55.124 I just got back to the monastery and I was thinking, you know, I'm back in Asia and now I can really, now I'm in a community and I'm surrounded by these wonderful people. 28:55.164 --> 29:02.631 And I was in there two weeks and we're sitting in the, it just gives you an example of the sorts of things you do. 29:02.691 --> 29:10.798 We're sitting in the dining hall eating breakfast and suddenly there's a clang and 29:12.365 --> 29:20.936 one of the monks, we all turn and look, all 40 of us, there was like 40 monks, 30 monks, sitting eating breakfast, very mindfully, very quietly. 29:23.099 --> 29:32.712 And suddenly one of them stands up and starts wailing on another one, pounding him in the face, blood everywhere, his nose is broken. 29:34.914 --> 29:40.422 So I got up and grabbed the monk around. 29:40.982 --> 29:42.304 Out of all the monks, I got up 29:44.866 --> 29:48.451 And it's not something to brag about. 29:48.471 --> 29:51.255 I mean, the other monks, I think, were all thinking, what's this guy doing? 29:51.295 --> 29:54.440 Can't he just be mindful and, you know, let go? 29:54.540 --> 30:06.237 But, you know, the stupid westerner gets up, grabbed him around the chest and, you know, tried to pull him away, stop him from beating this other guy up. 30:07.478 --> 30:09.121 That's the way we deal with things in the West. 30:11.504 --> 30:13.607 All the Thai monks are just watching. 30:16.793 --> 30:42.582 seeing seeing something like that anyway yeah fights break out it makes it somewhat difficult to meditate potentially yeah it's just one example but when you live in a community where there's infighting and everyone's obsessed with so many different things people can get obsessed with but it's a good lesson not to let 30:44.350 --> 30:46.814 Not to let your irritation grow. 30:46.834 --> 30:49.818 This will happen in meditation centers as well. 30:49.838 --> 30:53.984 Obviously, we don't have the problem here. 30:54.044 --> 30:58.110 It's a part of the reason why we don't like meditators to chat with each other. 30:59.312 --> 31:00.433 It's fine to talk. 31:03.017 --> 31:03.738 It's okay. 31:04.559 --> 31:11.529 I always say that the best way is if you don't even learn the names of the other meditators. 31:11.549 --> 31:12.771 I would often point and say, 31:14.287 --> 31:18.671 You've already gone too far if you know the names of the other meditators. 31:18.691 --> 31:24.077 I think that would be a good challenge if you could go through your whole meditation course. 31:24.097 --> 31:30.043 I think it would be admirable if you could go through your whole meditation course without knowing the names of all the other meditators. 31:30.784 --> 31:32.765 Because in order to learn their names, you have to chat. 31:33.526 --> 31:35.068 What use is it to know their name? 31:35.168 --> 31:35.989 What good is it to you? 31:37.190 --> 31:38.792 It's only good if you want to chat with them. 31:40.593 --> 31:44.277 And usually it involves useless 31:45.590 --> 31:46.732 Just those concepts. 31:47.654 --> 31:52.864 So it would be a good measure if we could sort of institute that as a suggestion, recommendation. 31:54.708 --> 31:57.513 Because you could still say, hey, are you done with the bathroom? 31:59.016 --> 31:59.818 Are you done with that? 32:01.942 --> 32:03.665 And you could talk to each other. 32:04.306 --> 32:05.689 You wouldn't learn each other's names. 32:06.471 --> 32:10.759 Because I find it's funny, sometimes the meditators know each other much better than I know them. 32:11.700 --> 32:14.706 They know details about each other more than I know details about them. 32:15.888 --> 32:18.173 Sometimes I don't even remember meditators' names. 32:19.976 --> 32:21.098 And then the meditators do. 32:26.140 --> 32:27.702 So it was part of that. 32:28.504 --> 32:34.734 Because if you start chatting, then you feed each other's defilements. 32:34.754 --> 32:40.383 Because we all have issues, we can upset each other. 32:40.423 --> 32:41.685 And this happened to me as well. 32:41.705 --> 32:50.038 We were meditating and some guy, a real troublemaker, he started talking about his child abuse at 32:50.339 --> 32:53.985 going on and on about how he was abused as a child, and it totally shook the rest of us up. 32:54.005 --> 33:00.377 We're sitting there, and we're trying to deal with our problems, and suddenly we have to think of this guy and all the horrible stuff he'd gone through. 33:00.857 --> 33:04.083 It turns out he was a bit of a, as I say, troublemaker. 33:05.025 --> 33:11.436 He had serious issues that made it hard for him to meditate, so he liked to sit around and talk. 33:15.719 --> 33:19.184 But yeah, there are many aspects to communal harmony. 33:19.585 --> 33:22.129 It's not easy to find a community. 33:23.931 --> 33:28.018 It's easy to take for granted a well-organized meditation center. 33:28.839 --> 33:30.461 It's not an easy thing to organize. 33:31.984 --> 33:38.454 It takes a light touch, but it takes some kind of a touch and some kind of planning. 33:38.514 --> 33:44.022 And it takes commitment by all of its members, by all the meditators, by the teacher. 33:45.436 --> 33:50.782 commitment to cultivating a beneficial atmosphere. 33:52.965 --> 33:54.827 Because otherwise it makes meditation difficult. 33:59.392 --> 34:00.514 That's the Dhamma for tonight. 34:02.035 --> 34:03.257 Just another one of those things. 34:03.457 --> 34:05.540 Something good to point out. 34:06.380 --> 34:11.967 Going through the Anguttara Nikaya gives me a chance to point out, hey look at this, hey look at this. 34:13.516 --> 34:19.324 It's like we're traveling along the path and I turn and I can show you guys some flowers by the side of the road. 34:21.447 --> 34:25.252 How's that for poetic imagery? 34:26.573 --> 34:27.755 All right, that's it. 34:29.397 --> 34:30.499 Do we have any questions? 34:35.405 --> 34:37.007 Let's see, Robin, are you still here? 34:37.128 --> 34:37.448 You're there. 34:43.385 --> 34:44.229 I'm here, Bhante. 34:44.249 --> 34:45.797 Sorry, I was muted. 34:46.400 --> 34:47.184 We have questions. 34:47.647 --> 34:49.456 All right. 34:49.476 --> 34:51.808 Hit me with your best shot. 34:55.265 --> 34:58.309 Most of the time I cannot feel the rise and fall of the abdomen. 34:58.929 --> 35:00.651 I'm not sure if this is due to stress. 35:01.392 --> 35:04.215 I mainly note sitting or other things that I experience. 35:05.076 --> 35:09.882 After a few minutes, if I don't feel any rising and falling, I place my hand on my abdomen. 35:10.983 --> 35:16.309 This seems like I'm looking for an experience to note and not focusing on more obvious objects. 35:17.230 --> 35:20.714 Also, I tend to lower my hand after a few minutes because it stops helping. 35:21.355 --> 35:22.116 Is this correct? 35:24.425 --> 35:28.349 Yeah, most likely due to stress. 35:30.411 --> 35:36.236 If you lie on your back, this is how you confirm what I'm saying, lie on your back and try it. 35:37.517 --> 35:43.303 You should, if you're an ordinary human being, I mean, I suppose there's examples, you should really feel it then. 35:45.225 --> 35:47.847 And that's because you're relaxed when you lie on your back. 35:47.887 --> 35:51.951 But when we sit up, our brain starts to stress. 35:54.428 --> 35:58.873 We spend a lot of our time sitting these days, so sitting becomes the time when we do our work. 36:00.815 --> 36:02.637 And to some extent that has to change. 36:03.619 --> 36:06.662 I remember my first meditation course was very much like this. 36:06.902 --> 36:10.106 I was breathing through my chest, I didn't feel anything in the stomach. 36:10.126 --> 36:13.530 But then at one point it just went, just dropped. 36:14.511 --> 36:15.332 I did it by itself. 36:15.833 --> 36:20.658 Oh yeah, then I could feel my, but it was like a weight was lifted off. 36:20.678 --> 36:21.499 I was very tense. 36:23.251 --> 36:25.394 So over time, it will get better. 36:26.976 --> 36:31.703 As far as putting your hand on your stomach, I mean, don't be at all concerned about looking for experience. 36:31.723 --> 36:32.945 Yes, you're trying to. 36:33.005 --> 36:37.311 You're putting an effort into this one because we want to get a base. 36:37.572 --> 36:45.343 I mean, you could put effort somewhere else, but it is good to some extent to work on making the stomach... 36:46.792 --> 37:11.095 making the stomach clear and so that means looking for it to some extent and in the beginning in the beginning you're doing everything wrong anyway you're just learning how to do it right so don't worry too much about that once you get used to it and once you start to settle down you know become more clear now it's never going to become predictable or stable it's always going to be 37:11.075 --> 37:38.348 unstable sometimes there sometimes not so a big part of the practice is to learn to roll with the punches and be flexible if it's not there you can just say sitting sitting or something and then go back and look at it again but it's there's a lot of potential for frustration and that's important because we're learning how to deal with difficult situations and not react 37:39.813 --> 37:44.984 So one of the big reasons why the rising and falling stops is because you've reacted and you've gotten all tense. 37:46.006 --> 37:47.349 And so that's something you would note. 37:47.369 --> 37:49.855 If you feel tense, you would switch and say tense, tense. 37:49.875 --> 37:56.910 And once your mind stops tensing up, the rising and falling should often come back. 37:58.730 --> 38:00.332 But it's meant to be challenging. 38:00.472 --> 38:02.654 It's not meant to be something you can rely upon. 38:03.335 --> 38:04.136 Be clear about that. 38:04.196 --> 38:05.978 There's a reason why we're using the stomach. 38:07.259 --> 38:09.362 And it's not because it's easy to rely upon. 38:09.402 --> 38:11.504 It's not something that's going to be comfortable. 38:12.145 --> 38:15.508 It's meant to be uncomfortable, to take you out of your comfort zone. 38:21.915 --> 38:23.317 Robin, did you click on the question? 38:24.758 --> 38:25.159 I did. 38:25.839 --> 38:26.340 Did it work? 38:27.417 --> 38:28.118 I think so. 38:30.882 --> 38:35.990 I'm not sure that it clicked right in the beginning. 38:36.050 --> 38:39.996 My screen was a little frozen, but it was clicked before it was over. 38:41.839 --> 38:46.306 Do some enlightened beings just retreat into solitude? 38:46.987 --> 38:51.854 Obviously the Buddha didn't do that, but do you think he would consider that decision respectable? 38:52.656 --> 38:53.577 Yes, absolutely. 38:54.637 --> 38:56.841 The Buddha did do that, actually. 38:56.861 --> 38:58.363 But then he was invited to teach. 38:58.443 --> 38:59.826 He was asked to teach. 38:59.946 --> 39:02.110 That's how the texts portray it. 39:02.130 --> 39:05.595 That if he hadn't been asked to teach, he would have just retreated into solitude. 39:05.636 --> 39:07.559 It's definitely respectable. 39:07.579 --> 39:09.742 There's lots of monks who did it, arahants who did it. 39:11.065 --> 39:15.492 They still would often be confronted by people wanting to learn. 39:15.973 --> 39:17.255 Sometimes they wouldn't say anything. 39:17.576 --> 39:18.417 They wouldn't teach. 39:19.865 --> 39:21.347 They wouldn't throw people away. 39:22.388 --> 39:26.212 Some monks would just go off into the forest where it was very difficult for other people to come. 39:26.272 --> 39:30.457 Not because they were trying to escape, but because they felt comfortable. 39:31.979 --> 39:36.584 It was somehow a part of who they were. 39:36.624 --> 39:47.897 The Buddha was quite clear that there are many different ways to live as a monk. 39:49.092 --> 39:59.461 I'm not trying to suggest that all ways are proper, all ways are equal, but there is no, to be clear, you don't have to do that, and it's not wrong to do that. 40:00.922 --> 40:07.128 This kind of question, the answer is definitely yes, that it's all, many different ways are respectable. 40:08.589 --> 40:11.892 The most important is that you're keeping proper practice. 40:14.374 --> 40:18.778 Of course, for an enlightened person, that's a moot point, but it happens, yeah. 40:22.403 --> 40:25.733 Oh, we're not going to answer that one because it's not about Buddhism, about our Buddhism. 40:27.157 --> 40:29.424 Why doesn't the Theravada school believe in who we are? 40:30.447 --> 40:30.969 Clever there. 40:31.370 --> 40:34.118 I was almost going to think about answering that one, but no. 40:38.722 --> 40:42.526 Dear Panthe, I am feeling less and less attached to the physical world. 40:43.247 --> 40:50.154 I know many years ago during university I would desire to become a monk in this lifetime after practicing meditation. 40:51.115 --> 40:52.577 I feel the time is coming near. 40:53.197 --> 40:54.959 I have absolved my student loans. 40:55.620 --> 41:01.406 I have money saved and many possessions I can sell and give away to make my travel to Sri Mangala. 41:02.247 --> 41:06.872 I am happy to abide by the rules for staying at Sri Mangala you outlined last night. 41:06.852 --> 41:09.655 am I missing anything before I make my final decision? 41:17.464 --> 41:27.755 Yeah, I mean, no, but you have to understand that meditation is a challenge, and it challenges your outlook. 41:27.775 --> 41:29.297 So it may very well change your mind. 41:29.597 --> 41:30.598 That often happens. 41:30.798 --> 41:33.762 People come here, do a course, and realize they're not ready to ordain. 41:35.063 --> 41:36.825 I wouldn't put any 41:38.442 --> 41:42.270 of your...waste any of your effort on the idea of becoming a monk. 41:43.132 --> 41:58.864 That's not true in other traditions, but our tradition is somewhat specific and it's not something...it's not really... 42:00.346 --> 42:05.355 It's a tough path, you know, and it's a streamlined path. 42:06.237 --> 42:10.164 So we go quite deep quite quickly. 42:10.184 --> 42:23.248 And the outcome, the person who comes out of the course may have a somewhat different outlook on things from the person going into the course. 42:27.278 --> 42:30.665 Maybe I don't have to be so dire sounding. 42:32.008 --> 42:35.015 Sure, you want to come or meditate, become a monk, fine. 42:35.957 --> 42:42.030 Another thing I would say is that being a monk here, I'm just talking to, you saw... 42:43.985 --> 42:45.227 I've forgotten his name now. 42:45.647 --> 42:46.148 Alexander. 42:46.168 --> 42:47.530 He was just sitting there. 42:49.092 --> 42:49.973 We were just talking today. 42:49.993 --> 42:52.757 He wants to become a monk and I have no qualms about him becoming a monk. 42:52.777 --> 42:55.041 He's finished two courses now, really doing well. 42:55.922 --> 43:00.048 I have no doubts about his ability to survive as a monk. 43:03.052 --> 43:10.262 So what I said to him is he should come and stay here for a while and he can help out in the monastery. 43:10.242 --> 43:11.987 And then I would ordain him. 43:12.027 --> 43:13.993 Never done that before. 43:14.274 --> 43:15.538 At least ordain him as a novice. 43:15.578 --> 43:16.320 I've done that before. 43:17.283 --> 43:19.049 But maybe ordain him even as a full monk. 43:21.416 --> 43:22.800 And then we could send him somewhere. 43:24.367 --> 43:27.651 Because if he ordains here, it might be easier to go other places. 43:27.911 --> 43:34.880 If you go to other places and ask them to ordain you, well, they don't know who you are, and nowadays they're very cautious about immediately ordaining someone. 43:35.581 --> 43:38.144 But because he's already done the prerequisites with us. 43:39.286 --> 43:39.926 So that's an idea. 43:40.187 --> 43:45.033 But staying here as a monk, you see, there's no monastic community here. 43:45.453 --> 43:52.382 I mean, personally, even I'm not, I don't feel comfortable with my ability to provide a 43:52.362 --> 43:55.509 well-rounded monastic education because I never really got one. 43:56.953 --> 44:06.675 I can give the basics and I know quite a bit about the Vinaya but relatively speaking I don't touch money which is better than a lot but 44:08.883 --> 44:19.665 I'd rather you consider spending your early monastic life in a place that is more traditional, because we're just in a house here. 44:20.827 --> 44:23.112 We've got rooms just for meditators mostly. 44:24.712 --> 44:29.318 So, if your plan is to come here and live as a monk, that's not really what I'd recommend. 44:29.918 --> 44:33.923 But, that being said, we can help sort that all out, I think. 44:34.183 --> 44:37.828 I think this could be something, a project Sri Mangal could start to take on. 44:37.888 --> 44:45.717 Advanced meditators who want to become monks, we could help them find placements where they could go, because that's common. 44:46.158 --> 44:48.381 Monks would not always stay with their preceptor. 44:48.421 --> 44:51.124 Their preceptor, even in the Buddhist time, would send them elsewhere. 44:51.104 --> 44:52.566 go learn from this teacher. 44:52.606 --> 44:54.930 And then they come back and say, okay, now go learn from this teacher. 44:57.814 --> 45:04.543 It wouldn't mean you couldn't stay with your preceptor, but from time to time, it's good to send them off to teachers who would teach different things. 45:08.790 --> 45:12.555 So that's what I have to say about that. 45:19.235 --> 45:27.347 I've noticed I am able to maintain my noting more consistently if I engage in muscle relaxation exercises before meditating. 45:28.168 --> 45:31.473 In my case, would you recommend I add this in routinely? 45:31.913 --> 45:32.695 What do you think, Robin? 45:33.796 --> 45:34.016 No. 45:34.117 --> 45:34.838 What's my answer? 45:35.098 --> 45:35.398 No. 45:36.160 --> 45:40.446 Your answer is you're not looking for shortcuts. 45:40.606 --> 45:42.869 You're not looking for things to make it easier. 45:42.889 --> 45:44.051 Make it easier, yes. 45:44.372 --> 45:45.333 You want to make it easy? 45:45.413 --> 45:45.834 Go ahead. 45:45.874 --> 45:46.795 Lie down in bed. 45:48.783 --> 45:51.333 Or sit in one of those massage chairs. 45:53.000 --> 45:53.241 Right? 45:54.004 --> 45:55.088 Put on some good music. 45:56.333 --> 45:57.799 No, we're not trying to make it easy. 45:57.819 --> 45:59.907 We're trying to make it as difficult as possible. 46:00.578 --> 46:02.962 No, we're not trying to make it as difficult as possible. 46:03.022 --> 46:06.327 That would be, what's the other thing called? 46:07.930 --> 46:10.074 Right, we're not trying to make it purposefully difficult. 46:10.094 --> 46:12.157 I don't know about that. 46:12.477 --> 46:14.340 We're trying to leave ourselves open for challenge. 46:14.441 --> 46:16.825 So yeah, we're not trying to make it difficult. 46:16.845 --> 46:18.487 But the difficulty is important. 46:18.888 --> 46:21.031 But it's like a natural difficulty. 46:21.051 --> 46:21.512 Absolutely. 46:21.532 --> 46:24.477 We're not trying to cultivate artificial difficulty. 46:24.457 --> 46:29.907 But the fact that it's difficult is an awesome thing. 46:30.548 --> 46:32.872 Yes, you're not able to maintain your noting consistently. 46:32.892 --> 46:33.714 Do you know what that means? 46:34.275 --> 46:35.557 It means you're not in control. 46:35.617 --> 46:47.038 It challenges our conception of being able to force things, to being in charge, to making things stable, satisfying, controllable. 46:50.191 --> 46:52.055 There's no way around that. 46:53.077 --> 46:55.342 We should absolutely not try to make it easier. 46:55.522 --> 46:59.069 We're always trying to find tricks and ways of making it easier. 46:59.110 --> 47:03.298 The challenge is part of the practice. 47:04.942 --> 47:08.669 And it's overcoming that challenge that is really going to build character. 47:08.710 --> 47:11.355 To borrow a Western phrase. 47:19.537 --> 47:23.224 I know you talked about sickness as being a barrier when it comes to meditation. 47:23.284 --> 47:25.348 What about chronic illness? 47:25.849 --> 47:27.051 I have had a chronic illness. 47:28.353 --> 47:32.821 I have had a chronic illness easily treated with an IV infusion. 47:32.861 --> 47:38.111 However, without the medication, I'd be unable to walk and be in a lot of pain. 47:38.672 --> 47:43.080 I was just wanting your thoughts on medication and meditation in that case. 47:43.718 --> 47:51.106 Yeah, I mean, I have no problem with the idea of taking that sort of medication, especially if it makes you able to walk. 47:52.628 --> 47:59.295 It is good to deal with pain, so you don't want to take medication to dull your pain, for example. 47:59.315 --> 48:04.921 And people, we have one, Elaine, who's taking, I don't know, I should talk to people. 48:04.941 --> 48:06.163 I'm not supposed to mention people. 48:06.884 --> 48:09.567 No, I can't talk about her because I mentioned her name. 48:09.587 --> 48:12.730 Anyway, yeah, so people deal with... 48:16.692 --> 48:18.317 You should be willing to deal with pain. 48:20.001 --> 48:28.525 We have one meditator here who was talking about pain and she's really picked up on that. 48:30.040 --> 48:33.004 They're actually dealing with pain instead of trying to escape it. 48:33.024 --> 48:39.632 So that's one that you generally want to try not to avoid, because pain is a great teacher. 48:39.672 --> 48:47.201 But extreme pain, there's an argument to be made for trying to be free from that. 48:47.501 --> 48:52.487 And certainly any debilitating condition that makes you unable to walk, for example. 48:52.467 --> 48:53.809 There's something wrong with it. 48:54.109 --> 49:00.216 And the point of being careful about medication is avoiding challenges, avoiding difficulties. 49:03.640 --> 49:08.806 And medication that dulls your ability to practice. 49:08.826 --> 49:12.730 Medication can very much get in the way of your practice. 49:12.750 --> 49:14.592 So sometimes you want a happy medium. 49:14.672 --> 49:19.017 Sometimes you maybe take not as much medication as you might otherwise. 49:20.439 --> 49:20.719 I don't know. 49:22.775 --> 49:27.643 But yeah, medicine is something the Buddha allowed, so you don't have to be afraid of medicine. 49:28.684 --> 49:30.026 I'm skeptical. 49:30.046 --> 49:42.986 I think as Buddhists we have to be somewhat skeptical of painkillers, for reasons I've explained. 49:43.006 --> 49:44.829 And you're all caught up on questions one day. 49:44.989 --> 49:45.250 All right. 49:45.270 --> 49:48.835 Well, there's someone coming to visit me in about five minutes, so I should probably go anyway. 49:48.855 --> 49:49.356 Good timing. 49:52.137 --> 49:58.153 I had a good conversation with one of my classmates from religious studies. 49:59.116 --> 50:04.932 We talked for about two hours this evening about God. 50:06.751 --> 50:07.954 I was trying to pin her down. 50:08.014 --> 50:11.523 She's very good at eluding me. 50:11.543 --> 50:14.450 She's got excellent, a really great outlook on life. 50:15.433 --> 50:20.766 But she believes in, she has this, she knows that God exists. 50:21.427 --> 50:22.350 She knows there's God. 50:22.951 --> 50:23.713 She knows God. 50:25.803 --> 50:26.864 But she's slippery. 50:28.426 --> 50:34.294 Her definition of God eludes my ability to pin her down and cut off the head of the snake. 50:35.716 --> 50:36.196 Slippery. 50:37.158 --> 50:37.698 Like an eel. 50:39.681 --> 50:42.745 It's an interesting dialogue. 50:43.606 --> 50:44.407 Really good person. 50:45.248 --> 50:46.630 She's older than me. 50:47.943 --> 50:54.229 One of the nice things about going back to university is talking to older students who are back and have a different outlook. 50:54.309 --> 51:02.597 And we have a similar outlook in terms of coming there, trying to gain some skills and challenge our minds. 51:05.019 --> 51:06.881 So right now the two of us are taking French together. 51:06.941 --> 51:09.684 And we're helping each other. 51:13.627 --> 51:15.169 Thank you everyone for tuning in. 51:15.189 --> 51:16.310 Thanks Robin for your help. 51:16.910 --> 51:17.511 Have a good night. 51:18.402 --> 51:19.381 Thank you, Bunty. 51:19.401 --> 51:19.890 Good night.