Miriam asked, what if you're not able to go on retreats?
Then try to do a retreat at home, maybe with Bhante, with a Skype teaching, or with the booklet and the videos, that's possible.
if you don't have that time to do a retreat at home then at least try to meditate every day according to the instructions and try to ask as many questions as possible that you don't have so many questions arise during your meditation practice so make sure that you have kind of feedback
that is helping you over your hardships or over your problems.
And another thing is, well, there has to be a background to your question.
Well, many people are not able to go on retreats, but that doesn't bother them.
So the question is, what is your goal?
Let's get to the point.
What is your goal in life?
if your goal in life is to become free from suffering and to become enlightened, if your goal in this life is enlightenment, or in however many lifetimes it takes, then I would say really the answer, if you're not able at all, is to start changing some things, start moving in that direction, start
making a determination, whether it be in this life or in the next, to get yourself in a situation where you can go on a retreat.
It's not really as difficult as we think it is, but it takes a lot of letting go.
Sometimes it takes
a change of lifestyle, if you really think that, if you really have an appreciation of the Buddha's teaching or appreciation of the truth, the simple truth, for example, that nothing is worth clinging to, nothing in the world, nothing at all is worth clinging to, then you'll start to
let go of any concern for physical or social welfare, you'll come to realize that
No matter what or how you live your life or what you experience in life, in the end it's only seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, feeling and thinking.
Whereas before you would have thought living without a job or even going without food for a day is unthinkable.
Living in poverty
is impossible.
It's just unfathomable.
I mean, maybe not living in poverty, but adjusting your life so that you're more hard up and you don't have the luxuries and the lifestyle that you have otherwise.
But when you realize that in the end it's still the same set of experiences as before, then you're able to give up much of your life and much of your comfort and able to raise really not that much money to, for example, take a plane to Sri Lanka or so on.
or at the very least to arrange your affairs and your family members in such a way so that you have time to take a retreat closer to home.
One way or the other, find some way and if it's not in this life, if you have children or if you have a family and you have responsibilities or you have debts or so on, then
put your effort into coming to a situation where not only can you join a retreat, but you can actually dedicate your life to this, because that's really what, it's a sliding scale, you know, or it's a matter of degree, you know.
In the end, the best thing you can do is to go off into the forest, or come off to our forest and practice meditation.
But it is a matter of degrees how far you're willing to take it.
If your question is coming from the basis of how can I live my life just as I'm... What can I do if my current life
doesn't let me practice meditation, or how can I find a way to practice in my current life, without changing anything about my life, if that life doesn't let me go on retreats?
I mean, if it were that kind of question, then you would have a real problem.
We'd have to say, like what Paul and Yanni said, well, then do as much as you can, but with the qualifier that
you shouldn't then expect quite profound results.
It's quite likely that you will only gain superficial results or results in a very short, a very...
very minor, gradual results.
And it will take a long time to really
significantly change anything about your life.
Maybe not to be so negative about it, because even just a little bit of practice can have a significant impact on your life.
But understanding that it's really up to you.
If you're not able to take a retreat, well, if a retreat is something that you want to do, then make it happen, because the universe has endless potential.
This is what it means to say that there is no purpose in life.
You choose your purpose.
If you want to go on a retreat, make it happen.
It may not happen in this life, but it's pretty hard to imagine it not happening for someone who, in some life to come or in some time in the future, for someone who is dedicated enough to anything really.
So you have to keep that in mind.
Make it happen.
If you want to go on a retreat, make it happen.
It all depends what you want.
I think she was asking because Jens mentioned how to go.
But it should be fleshed out, I think.
Okay.
Yeah.