Is Buddhism a Religion?

Is Buddhism A Religion? By Ajahn Brahm

Transcription

Going to the toilet is another way of practicing letting go. That's a nice thought. Somebody asked me just coming in here. This is just the start of talk and see where it leads to. Now, can you please let everybody know that Buddhism is not a religion? Because sometimes religion has got a bad name, a bad rap, as they say in Western culture, because religion has caused so many problems and difficulties. I mean, real problems and wars and a lot of abuse in the name of religion. So, you know, can we say that Buddhism is not part of that? And this is one of those questions which people often asked, Is Buddhism a religion? And to get that joke out of the way quickly, we always answer, yes, it is a religion for tax purposes. But is it really a religion for other purposes? And I was just reminded that I gave a talk yesterday at Mental Health Institute some spirituality and mental health. And quite a few of the presenters were very religious, and one of them reminded me of the meaning of the word. Religion comes from a Latin word meaning to buy the tie you up, and sometimes is a Buddhism. Does it tie you up if it is you misunderstanding it? Because the purpose of Buddhism is actually to free you, not to bind you, but dirty to give you freedom. And this important part to understand is that this is real Buddhism to free you. So if it binds you up, in other words, you have to do these obligations to some deity or to the church, or even if you think you have an obligation to the monk or to the nuns, then you're missing the point. So first of all, the Buddhism or the Dharma or the true spirituality is supposed to liberate you, free you from obligations. Which is why you don't have to pay to get in here. You have no obligations at all. I offer. People often ask me, do you have to pay to get in? He said, no, you have to pay to get in at all. You have to pay to get out. You don't even have to do that either. So there's no obligation to supporting this donation boxes there if you want to. But you can see that as we have got some of the smallest donation boxes anywhere in the world. And sometimes any of you can visit our monasteries, you see that sometimes you can't find the donation box. People go searching for them, whereas in other places they got big neon signs. Science donation pop stopped here. So we're not really into actually forcing this, because that would be like an obligation. That would be like a religious obligation. I know that in Christianity is supposed to pay a tithe, which is 10% of your income pre-tax. I don't know why anybody does that, because you get much better teachings, much better service here for far less cost. This is cut price. We have cut price airfares. This is cut price spirituality. But it's also a high quality as well. But we're not doing this you know, because of markets or anything. It's not a business. It's freeing. So everything is done not to bind you and obligated, but to free you. So everything is for free here. And sometimes people wonder, where does all this place come from and where does the temple come from? We get a big retreat center coming in a week or two's time. $5 million worth of retreat center. And it all comes from kindness, non obligated generosity. And I think that's one of the most important things I think, in our modern world, too often, you know that you have a can in front of you and you're so forced to, you know, or you, you send messages sort of in the emails about in positive. We don't do that here. And I was actually taught by my teacher at one time, if you're going to be a monk at John Brahm and especially a teacher, first thing, don't ask for anything. And there was a story in the ancient term Vinaya. This is. Anxious scriptures of the Buddha about monks 2500 years ago, who were asking people things. They were actually building their monastery. And they were asking just for small things, like an axe or some wood or, you know, some metal or something. And they were asking so many things from the poor laypeople. The laypeople got so afraid of monks that when they saw brown cows coming in the distance, they hid in their houses and closed the doors and windows, and kept, because they thought the brown cows were monks, come to ask for more things. They gotta be careful there. Don't ask for anything. This is generosity. This is freedom with no obligation. So you're not bound to do anything when you come here. Now, as I was saying last week, some people bow. Some people don't. All right. You are most welcome, whatever you do. Of course, within reason. I'm talking about bowing or not bowing. And sometimes how you bow. It's really funny being a monk, seeing the way some people bow or some some Westerners of bowed. I'd never seen that ever before. It's probably the first time in 2500 years anybody's ever bowed like that. You make good buddy makes me laugh, but you're free to do that. The most important thing about the Buddhism is your search is free to take responsibility. And this is the most important part of the fact that Buddhism is not a religion, because it doesn't, but doesn't tell you what to do. It doesn't tell you what to believe. It tells you how to find out. It puts the responsibility on to you. A monk is not like a priest who is your conduit to a higher authority. You can only get to that higher authority. Through this conduit, this priest. Which is one of the reasons why priests are there. You can't get to a God or Jesus or other. I'm not sure. Whoever except through, I think not through Islam. They don't have those conduits of priests. You can't get to them except by this man, usually, who knows all the rituals. And that means that you're not free. You can't do things you want to do. But in Buddhism we always have open doors. So if anybody wants to come in, you can always open them. We don't want people set by mistake. So anyone can walk in all sorts of weirdos. I'm not talking about the mark, are you? But, you know, we do get some strange people sometimes on a Friday night and even in our monastery as well. But the point is, there is a sense of, like, this compassionate sense of freedom. But the most important thing here, not telling you what to believe or what to do, but encouraging, leading, helping, serving and helping you find out what to do. The most important thing here is because there's no obligation, because there's no telling, because there's no control. It means you are free. So Buddhism is a religion of freedom, of external freedom, first of all, giving you that choice and whatever you do. For those of you who've come here for a long time, you're never criticized or shouted at. You know, even though sometimes I say that sometimes it's hard to resist. Criticize someone. But you don't because it's not Buddhist. And even when some of you come on retreats. And those of you who come on retreats, you have interview times with the teacher. And when you have an interview with the teacher, those of you who've been on retreats with myself. Sometimes you say, oh, I had a terrible day today. I slept all day. I ate too much. And I've been thinking about girlfriends or whatever. And I said, very good. I never get criticized. And it's an important meaning behind that because we don't have blame. Because blame criticism is one other means of controlling people. So we don't have control. We have freedom instead. But everyone who comes to a place like this, to take whatever they want from their teachings and to use it in any way which they want. They take responsibility for their bodies, feet and mind. And however much responsibility you take, how much you understand is whatever you do with this, you still be welcome and you still have the friendship and the respect of the people sitting up here. And hopefully you respect one another so there's no force or compulsion. It's not a religion which binds you. It's a teaching which, if you understand it well, frees you. So the freedom is an important part of Buddhism. And the interesting thing with that word freedom I used at the end of the meditation, it's many people just don't understand what freedom means. And because we don't understand the meaning of freedom, we can never have the experience of real freedom. We think we live in a free society. But when we look at the freedom of our society, do we really feel liberated and at ease to come and go and do whatever we want? Or do we feel sometimes we're in a box? We're constrained and controlled and we can't get out of this box, which is called our life. Do you really feel free? Now. It's strange for me being a monk. A monk with 227 main walls and thousands. We can't count them of minor walls, which we have to keep. There's so many things which I cannot do. And sometimes people think, wow, being a monk, you must feel just so hemmed in on all sides. But the experience of being a monk is that you feel incredibly free. And all these little things which are supposed to control you, actually, you don't feel controlled at all. You feel quite liberated and quite free. And this is what happens also when new guys and girls, you come and stay in a monastery for a short time and you'll be surprised when you come and stay in a monastery or you go on a retreat. You have to keep many of the same rules that the monks and nuns keep, such as not eating in the afternoon, no TV, no radio, no cell of entertainment. You can't wear makeup when you come on over a tree. The only things you just can't do as you're used to. But people, actually, they don't feel that these rules are hemming them in, that you feel they're made free by these rules. Because what the lifestyle, what the path, what the method is doing is giving you a real freedom. And that I've mentioned this before, and it's a very profound point. It goes to the heart of what Buddhism is teaching. It's called the freedom from desires rather than the freedom of desires. There's two different freedom, the freedom of desires where you can do whatever you want, eat whatever you want, whenever you ever want. You get on fox tail. I think it's cool. I didn't get so many different programs and movies. Whatever you want, whenever you want it, you can get on the internet and buy whatever you want, see whatever you want, whenever you want it. Our whole Western culture and eastern culture, again, has done a lot of work giving you more places to go, more things to see whenever you want to see it or go there is giving you more freedom of desire. However, when you have freedom of desire. It's no freedom of thought at all. There's no freedom for you. You have all these different things and choices. I remember when I grew up in London. There was only two channels, BBC and ITV, and you wouldn't believe the arguments we had in the family and whether we should have BBC or ITV. And there was only two channels. I don't know what you do. There must be wars in-house when there's so many channels to watch. And of course, what's the solution is have a TV for every person in the house so there's can watch whatever they want, which means a lot of separation and loneliness because we don't do things together. But even going into shopping malls had to go in a shopping mall. Was it yesterday? And the amount of stuff which is on sale there? It must just drive you guys crazy. Go to places like this. I remember when I used to go to shops as a as a lay person. You know, if it was like muesli, there's maybe two brands of muesli. I'd choose this one or that one. Even baked beans, you know, just have so many different brands of baked beans. Baked beans with chili. Baked beans with no salt. Baked beans with it. Must drive you guys crazy. I remember a story. This was many years ago of this guy who came from the Eastern Europe. This was before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Where in the communist countries, they had very, very few things. And when he went into his first supermarket, this guy from Eastern Europe was just amazed at the amount of product that was available to people. What he was really amazed that, you know, he saw, first of all, milk powder, because, you know, in the Eastern Europe we get milk from a cow. Here is a packet of dust. And to just add water and you get milk. So wow, these Westerners are so clever. No, just add water. We get milk. And then he saw it. Eastern mashed potato. Again. Just powder. Just add water and you get potatoes. You know, if the old days had to peel the potatoes and boil them up and smash them before you get mashed. Potatoes are amazing. But what really surprised me, I thought, wow, these Westerners, they're just so incredibly intelligent to know how they could do this, because they saw, after seeing the milk powder and the mashed potato powder he saw on one of the stores. Baby powder. Just that water. And he didn't realize that there were baby powder beads, but. Be much easier because there's a few people here just giving birth to their new babies. So nine months and all that labor pain would be wonderful if you did have real baby powder. Just wanted the baby. They could just decide the sex, know the nationality, whatever, and just add water. Well, that's another thing one does have to remember, but the amount of choice said, do you feel free with so much choice? And the reason why people feel more free when they're on a retreat, staying in a monastery or becoming a monk or a nun is because in a monastery we have freedom from desire. We don't want it so much. We feel an enormous sense of freedom, not having the money to buy things, not having the rules to stop us choosing things. Imagine what it's like being a monk, getting up in the morning and thinking, what should I wear today? We don't have to look at fashion magazines like Vogue, or I don't know what the other ones are. And when I can remember, you notice there are no are these these magazines for months and nuns. We don't have to look at the latest robe or the latest fashion. We don't have to spend thousands of dollars getting like a fashion designer robe made by Gucci or made by Versace. It's so easy getting up in the morning and not having to worry what you wear. Even your hairstyle. And then we would do this for 2500 years. You just save your hair. You don't have to go to the hairdresser and think, what's the latest style? What can I wear today? What color should I dye my hair? Shave it all off. It's much cheaper and much better. And you don't have monks and nuns. Never ever have a bad hair day. So easy. So you can see how many freedoms we get. Now, the story behind this, and many of you probably know this story. Some of the stories I have to keep repeating because they just fit in in the right place at the top. What do you mean by freedom or why? Buddhism is not a religion which binds you, but which frees you from desires is the story of you know, what enlightenment is? And the usual way I describe this, the best way is the old story of the five children playing the wishing game. The reason I tell this story is because people who come to places like this, they say, you know, we're trying to become enlightened, but what does that mean? What is enlightenment? And it's important to have a good understanding of what we're doing here. And to get that good understanding, we don't want to give you, um, gobbledygook understandings. Even yesterday at one of the at one of the presenters of the mental health segment, I told me that from Teilhard de Chardin, he was saying, God is the ground of all being that inspiring. But what do you mean by the ground of all being? I know what the ground where we're putting the the pipes in our retreat center, that ground. I know what that ground is making me really dirty and stepping in it. What do you mean by the ground of all being? Explain yourself. And when you actually ask mystics, sort of, you know, what do you mean by these things? They just say another mystical word, the ineffable, is beyond words. And that never convinced me. It was one of the reasons why I turned away from Christianity or God building to believe in the God, or not to believe in a God. What is this God I'm supposed to believe and are not believe in any way? And I remember when I was at school going to the school chapel, I got a scholarship to go to this good school in West London. I had a chaplain there and ask him, What is God? You know, it's important. You know, you're you're supposed to be the expert. You're the chaplain. Let me know what God is. And he said, you know that God is the Alpha and Omega. He got to know Greek or to understand what that means. You know, it actually means you know, the A to Z. So I thought God was like the local street directory, because in London that A to Z was a street directory. Telephone book. The alpha and omega. It was beyond words. Infinite. The ground of all being. The essence. What do you mean by that? It could never give me a straight answer. There's something you can you can grab onto. And one thing which I always had in mind, and this was confirmed by other people, if you know what you're talking about, you can explain it to other people. And this is actually a quote of any scientist here from Werner Heisenberg. No. You know him of the Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, but he did a huge amount of work on quantum physics, so-called one of the most complicated theories of physics we've ever had. And he was on record as saying, if you cannot explain quantum physics to the barmaid. This was in 1940. Something to the ladies serving you beer behind them in the pub. You can't explain it to her and make her understand it. You don't understand it yourself. It's a great quote. He's saying if you understand something, you can explain it to anybody. So for me, it meant that Chaplin did not understand what God was. So that's one of the reasons why I couldn't find anybody who gave me a decent understanding. So then I became a Buddhist, and then I went to temples. I listened to talks. And then one day I asked a monk, Nibbana. What is enlightenment? Nirvana? What is it? And he said, it is the ground of all being beyond words. I said, I've heard that before somewhere. And there's still a lot of monks and nuns and teachers that don't understand what Nibbana is. But I got this great explanation of what Nirvana is, and this fits into what, you know. Is Buddhism a religion? What's its goal? It's not. So going to heaven and being with a father that's patriarchal for a start. You know who wants to be with a father but with a mother or the grandparents or whatever? But, you know, it doesn't really make much sense. But I wanted some, which really made sense. And this explanation of Nirvana also fits in to what we mean by freedom and the gold of life. That's a great story, but like most stories, it's simple, amusing, and it comes across, in the end with a very profound message. Don't ever assume that because it's easy to understand. It's not profound. Real religion. Truth should not be rocket science. It should be easy to understand. One of the reasons that some of the stories I say there may be amusing, and it may be easy to understand. And people think, oh, it can't be profound because I can understand it. No, it really is profound. You do understand it easily. Why should truth be mystical or difficult? That's an assumption we make in the West, which is unfounded. Truth should be easy to understand, and I'm not going to demonstrate it for you. Five children playing the wishing game. The great story, the wishing game goes like this. Every child has to think of a wish. And a child who comes up with the best wish wins the wishing game. So the first child, a young boy, was thinking and said, yep, if I had a wish, I would wish for a Big Mac with double fries and ice cream afterwards and a Coke because my mother never allows me. She's a Buddhist. She comes to temple vegetarian. She never asked me to go and have a Big Mac. So that was his wish. Fair enough. And asked the second girl, what's your wish? And the girl was thinking. And she heard what the boy said. Had a bit more time. Bit smarter than the boy. And said if I had a wish, I would wish for a McDonald's restaurant. When I've got a restaurant, I can have many burgers whenever I want and fries and everything else because I owned a joint. So that will be my wish for McDonald's restaurant, and obviously a much better wish for the third child. A boy had a girl longer to think. And he thought he was a very smart guy. He said if I had a wish, let's put away this, this restaurant. Let's go big time. I made a wish. I would wish for $1 billion us. And it's going up again now. It was it. Which is worth more? No, actually, it is euros worth more now? Okay, €1 billion. Because with €1 billion, I can buy my own McDonald's restaurant. That'd be. First of all, have you plenty of money left? The next thing I will buy, said the boy, was my own video game store. I love playing video games. I can get whatever video game I want. But thirdly, my mother is always stopping me playing video games saying I should do my homework. So the third thing I will buy is my own school. Because when I own the school, I can always give myself top marks. I buy the teachers and at the end of my school career, I spend all time playing video games and no homework because I own the school. When I graduate from my own school, I sell the school, buy my own university, got lots of universities in the United States where, you know, they can give you degrees for anything. So I buy my own university and at the end of 2 or 3 years, give myself a first class honours degree or whatever, and I can spend all my time doing video games. And he said, with $1 billion, when I grow up, I still have billion euros. Sorry. I still have many, many millions left to do whatever else I want, whenever I want it. Because $1 billion you just cannot spend in a whole lifetime. And so the third child was a child with a $1 billion. We. Beat that saying $2 billion or 3 billion, is it? It's not beating at all. It's the same. It means like as much money as you can ever spend. So the fourth child, the girl, had to think very deeply. How can I do better than €1 billion? Whit, she was really clear that I can beat that. She said if I had a wish, I would wish for three wishes. That's a wish for my first wish. I'd have the McDonald's restaurant. My second wish I'd have the billion, billion euros. And for my third wish, I'll have three more wishes. That way I can go on forever. Be there. So the fourth child was the child with the infinity of wishes. Can you do better than that? The fifth child won the wishing game. Maybe he managed to think of a wish which was clearly superior, than having a infinity of wishes granted. Whenever you wanted a wish, it was granted for you. That said, if I had a wish. I wish I was so content. I never needed any more wishes ever again. So content. I don't need any more wishes. There was a child who won the Washington. That's what enlightenment means. So content. Your desires and cravings are gone. You don't need them anymore. It's called the freedom from desire. The freedom from craving. You just don't need things anymore. They can't be fine. They don't come. Fine. You're free from craving. Free from desire. And that means that Buddhism is not so much behind you. To craving and to wanting and having to consume and having to possess and own and control. It's freeing you from all of those things, which is why we call it letting go. His freedom. Not binding for the whole part of Buddhism is learning how to be free and the ultimate freedom. So content you don't need any more desire. Imagine that. It means you want nothing. You have enough. How wealthy are you? Have you got enough yet? Is there anyone here who's got too much money? No one will admit that. Even though other people say yes, you have, but no one thinks they've got too much money. Everybody thinks it's not enough. Why? It's because you still have more cravings, more desires, more things you want. Now, that will never give you any peace in mind. Whenever there's cravings and desires, where will you ever find a place to rest and have peace? In two weeks time. We're opening up our retreat center to grow. I've been working my butt off and all the other monks for the last. No, least the last seven days since I was last year trying to finish it off. But who knows? Will it be finished in time or not? Isn't it exciting? And it reminds me of one of the great stories of contentment being free from desire. This was a monastery in Thailand many, many years ago. This monk died a long time ago and he wasn't building a retreat center. He was building his main meditation hall in his monastery. And as he was building his hall, it came to the rainy season retreat. The three month retreat period would repeat this that year and that three month retreat. The monks and nuns go back to their monastery. If we don't come and give talks here. Those of you who've been around a while know that from mid-August, mid-July to October we disappear. So by the time this retreat was about to start. The hall wasn't finished. It was not complete. The builders were slow. Things went wrong. And the day after day after the retreat started. A person, a visitor, came to see this map and just ask what casually. When is your hall gonna be finished? And among said, sir, the hall is finished. What do you mean is finished? Said the visitor. There's no glass in the windows. The bamboo floor hasn't been installed yet. There's bricks all over the place. There's no room. There's no doors on. What do you mean, it's finished? Are you going to leave it like this? And this monk said something which shows what Nibbana is and how it can be free from desire. He said, sir, what's done is finished. And then he went off and had a nice meditate. Isn't that a beautiful attitude in mine? What's done is finished. Otherwise, when will you ever get anything done in life? So when you really understand this, what's done is finished. He understood the importance of just resting, having a retreat. Now we'll finish it later on. But right now, what's done is finished. Now I can give myself some peace. I am not controlled by my desires and having to get into it. So if I retreat said then in serpentine is still things missing by in fortnight's time. I'll just tell thee. The building inspector from the Shire Hall. Was that his? And the health inspector? Well, you know the toilets are connected yet, Albert, what's done is finished. Well, maybe there's some things you can't do there, but here you can give your life. If you are always in a power and controlled by desires, you find you'd never have any freedom. And you'll just get stressed and more stressed and more stressed in your life. What is the purpose of craving and desire anyway? Why do you want things? We want things so we can have some peace and some comfort in life. Always remember what the purpose of things are. Why do you want class? Why do you want a house? Why do you want a car? What's the purpose of it? That's why. Retreat center. What's the purpose of a retreat center? Allowing people to be peaceful. So if I stress out and get upset and angry, I'm missing the point of what we have in the retreat center for the retreat center. So we can have a peaceful, compassionate, and kind place to meditate. And if there are mistakes, actually any of you go to that retreats that you find lots of mistakes there. They're put there on purpose. To show you that life is not perfect. That your wife has got lots of mistakes in her. Your husband has got lots of mistakes. Life has got lots of mistakes. Welcome to reality. So every mistake anyone sees in that retreat set, you know, is there for a purpose to teach you how to be content with imperfection. If the mattresses are lumpy, if this cockroach is crawling under the bed at nighttime, it is. This is lie. Look, when I was in Thailand as a monk, we went. Cockroaches were at the problem. Tarantulas were the problem. There were claws on the rafters and they dropped down on you. As they ran across, your bare chest grows hot. Many times I had tarantulas running over my body. They were equally successful. They didn't lie. So the purpose of this. What's done is finished. Imperfections are there in life. What is a problem? The problem is when we think it should be different, which means we have desires to control and change things and make it perfect. We try and do it the best we possibly can, but no more than that. Doing the best you possibly can. That is perfection. It's not the outcome. It's how it's done. It's where perfection lies. That's why Buddhism is the religion of freedom. But it really is a path, not a goal. It's a path. It's how things are done, not what is achieved. If you're an achievement based person, then go to heaven. Get in line. Get psychic powers. Be able to walk on water and fly through the air and leave the body with astral travelling. That's nothing to do with Buddhism. Not the goals. But the process, the part. That's why most people understand Buddhism. The middle path, the middle way. That's Buddhism. It's the path. It's the road, not the destination, not what you achieve, but how you do it. It's not what you gain best is desire is being at peace with this. Peace is a path, not a goal. Compassion is a way of living, not something you want to get later on. It's what you're doing now. Understanding this, we also understand the importance of things like the law of karma. What is karma? Calm is nothing about explaining just why you've got a cough, or why you're blind, or why you're sort of. You've got a bad arm because you punch the enlightened saint when your last life. That's not the law of karma. The law of karma means now is where you're making future. Karma is the actions you're doing now. It's a path you're treading in. This moment is most important. Not where you're headed to, but the path you on right now. What are you doing right now? How are you doing it right now? Good karma. The Buddha said very clearly. Is your intention not what you're doing? But why are you doing it? The intention is the most important is the essence of karma. Karma? Come on. What I'm saying in Bali. Notice the note tells you people. I do actually know what the Buddha actually said. Sometimes people think I just make it up. But no. Chad Alahan, come on with me. This intention, I say, is karma. It's not. What you do is why are you doing it? Where are you coming from? So just think, last week questions like abortion is not what you do so much as why are you doing it? Intentions behind it. And that makes things much clearer to you and makes it's not the act which makes it bad or evil or good or whatever it is. Why are you doing it? People can give a donation. Wow, isn't that good karma? No, it's not necessarily good karma. Why are you doing that? But what is your intention behind that? That's what makes it good. It's the process of path, not the actual, the goal. So understanding that makes morality much easier to understand. It makes it much closer to people's heart. Killing. Is that wrong? Stealing. Adultery. Is that wrong? Abortion. Euthanasia. Is that wrong intention? Why are you doing that? What's behind that? That's where you find whether the thing is right or wrong. And that is how you feel. If somebody takes their their grandmother over to the was a Dignitas clinic in Switzerland to have euthanasia. Is it wrong? Was it right? Why are they doing that for? If their grandmother was in great health or was very rich and the, you know, you wanted, there will of course. No. You can see that's greed and that be very well. And everyone would agree to that. If that grandmother was suffering from some terrible disease and was in great pain and had no quality of life and no hope for any improvement, no realistic hope. I would say that was wrong. It was coming out of real compassion, wise compassion. And the Buddha said, karma is the intention. It has to be wholesome. And this is actually understanding something much deeper. It's not whether she dies or lives. It's why you're doing it. The path, the calm you're doing now, because we understand the law of karma is is an amazing thing. If you are to be kind, generous, I mean real, generous, selfless, peaceful acts right now. You know, it has to give good results in the future. If you're a result orientated person, you know the path is the most important part of the result. What you're doing now, how you're doing it. It is the process. So the retreat center two weeks time, that is not so important. How it turns out. For me, what is more important is how we build it. Not the result, but how it's built and how it's made. That is the most important thing. I care a commitment, the love, the energy. That is our retreat center in the building. Is the retreat not in the completion? The same when you meditate. People who meditate because they want peace. They want to get genres. They want to get in line. They want to see the Buddha. They want to have psychic powers. That is not the point. It's how you're meditating right now. If you want Nibbana, you never get it. If you are content, focused on the path, the process, the mean. Be content. Be peaceful. Be kind. Be gentle is what you're doing. Not where are you going to get to? Now that is understanding. What? What is the best is the karma. What I've called meditation. Karma. If you want to have brilliant states of mind, wanting them is more desire, more craving. This makes it more tense. Instead, be kind. Be gentle. Be peaceful. Let go. Be content with being happy where you are. That is where the banner lies. That's how you find the freedom from desire. One of the famous stories. I spend a lot of time teaching in prisons. I get very busy these days, so I given that to other monks to do. Even this evening, one of the monks forget which one it is. This evening is going to be teaching over Incarnate Prison for these two monks who taught there last Friday, as he taught him last Friday. So because I can't teach her anymore, we sent out our monks, and one of the monks went teaching in Casuarina prison, and he got a new name now. But in Casuarina, the big high security jail down there. And he'd been teaching a meditation class for a few weeks. And I asked him, can you stay behind? We want to sort of talk to you and find out who you are. No, we like you, your friend. We got some tea and some stuff for you the week. So he stayed behind for a half an hour. Then I started asking him about life in a monastery. And some of you know this story. I'll do it in brief, just to get to the punchline as quick as possible. What's it like in a monastery? Is it in a monastery? In my monastery, you get up at 4:00 in the morning. 4:00 in the morning, said the prisoner, not even in solitary confinement. You have to get up at that time of the morning. And the monks were actually actually getting up at 4:00 in the morning. In Bulgarian, a monastery is optional. You can always get up earlier if you want to. That's the only option. And what do you do? He told the story of the day. You know, just meditating all through the morning, you know, TV to watch the late night movie, the breakfast. You just get like a guy, get a cup full of porridge, and that's it. Hardly any choice. And just just a small amount. Just because we work really hard in the morning. And then what you do. We work so hard. If you actually see a lot of the monks, how they work and how hard work, we work much harder than the professional workers who get paid. Sometimes if you saw how hard I make my monks work, you probably, you know, complain to Kevin Reynolds and I would get the monks unionized, and I've in big trouble. As I exploit the workers, but they just love doing it and I love doing it as well. We work really hard. And the prison said, you never, ever get prisoners to work that hard. We got rights that when we sort of say, what do you have for lunch? You said, you know, you've been to the monastery. Only one bar all gets locked in together, and sometimes it does get mixed up. Sometimes I'm quite careful to try and separate things, but I give my bowl to somebody else to take upstairs. And by the time it gets upstairs, you know, the custards on the curry, the ice creams on the spaghetti. And that's my life. That's where I get to eat or gets mixed up. And they said, even in prison, in the worst prisoners, even murderers, they give, like, a little tray. And you can put your sweet potatoes over here, your carrots over there, and you go trazer with separation. Not in a monastery. That's terrible. But what do you do in the afternoon? The game, a soccer game, a footy or something? No, monks don't do sport. What do you do in the afternoon? Meditate. Well. God. So you must hang out for dinner. We don't have dinner, you know. We just eat in the morning. No dinner in evening. That's disgusting. They don't feed you in the evening. What would you do then? Don't tell me. Meditate. Yeah. That's right. We have a cup of tea between 6 and 7. So what do you do afterwards? Can you sort of play a game of cards or monopoly? What do you do in the evening? Meditate. What time do you go to bed? Well, actually the bed. We don't have bed. We sleep on the floor. You know those of you who visited my cave, I sleep on the floor. We don't have beds. I set up all those. Said even the worst criminal. They always give me a cot to sleep on. And they were so disgusted. Surprised at how monks lived. But one of them. This was their friend. They got to lie. This guy, one of them, completely forgot where they were and said, that's so terrible in your monastery. Why didn't you come in here? Is they with us? Is that. He was actually invited to stay in town. The prisoners had a point. It was much more comfortable in any Australian prison than it is in our monastery. Why is it that many of you have actually volunteered to stay at bodyguard, a monastery, or let down the nuns monastery? Why is there a waiting list of people wanting to join a monastery? And a waiting list of people trying to leave a prison? What is the difference? This is a main part of the story. What's the difference between a prison and freedom? Very clear. A prison is any place you don't want to be. Does it matter if it's got no brick walls? Concrete walls with razor wire? Or is this got a monastery where you can come and go whenever you want? If it's any place you don't want to be that is a prison. Any place you want to be is a monastery. Freedom. As hell hole. The only difference between freedom and prison. You want to be there? You're free. You don't be there. You are in prison. That opens up a great insight into a lie. How often do you feel? Are you in a prison? You don't want to be here. How many of you are in a job you hate? And your job is like a prison for you? Just don't want to be there. Some of you, unfortunately, are in a relationship which is like a prison for you. You don't want to be there. Some of you are in a sick, an elderly body, and your body feels like a prison for you. Some of you, and I hope very few, are sitting in this hall and don't want to be here. It means this hall is a prison for you. You can't wait till it's finished to get out. How many times in life do you feel you're in a prison? You haven't got freedom. You'll find that every time. It's because you don't want to be. That's called as is. Meaning I do escape in the prisons of life. You don't have to get rid of your job. You just change your attitude to wanting to be here. After all, they're paying you. Salary is another word for a bribe to make you do something you'd rather not do. If you really enjoyed your work. Tell your boss and he'll cut your salary in half. I enjoy my work. That's why I don't get salary. So when you want to be here, you're free. How does your relationship not become a person? When you want to be here with that person you're sitting next to? If you want to be here, you feel free. In life, in meditation. How do you get rid of the feeling you're in a prison? Enclosed. You can't change life. Life is imperfect. Like our retreat center. Like me. Like my stupid jokes. Like you. And all your imperfections as well. I never yet met a perfect person. In that sense, that there's no faults in them. If they were perfect, they would be like a plastic model. Unreal would mean to be no reason to love them. The reason we have love is so we can accept and embrace imperfection. That's what love means. To embrace the imperfections of another person, of ourselves and of life. So to be free, we're happy to be here. It's amazing. You'll be happy to be anywhere you feel so free and at peace. Because when you're happy to be here, you experience the freedom from desire. When you don't want to be here. Have all these desires of what you want to do, where you want to go and how you want to get there. Happy to be a place, how we spend some time in our life learning from them. Happy to be here with all of your problems and difficulties. One of the times we want to get rid of difficulties. That's why we never understand that. Happy to have difficulties. As I said in the mental health seminar, one of the great insights which I got from Buddhism was if you are in the medical profession or if you're a psychologist or a psychiatrist, a nurse or any other counsellor, a monk or a nun, your job is not to heal. Doctors should never look upon themselves as healers, because if you always want to heal, you get frustrated and disappointed many times. And the person you're looking after gets more sick or even die. Your job is not to heal. Your job is to care. You can't always heal anybody. Somebody you can always care for them. You can't always solve the problems in life. You can always be happy to be here, to care for them. To love. Be an imperfect person in an imperfect world. That's something you can do. That's the meaning of peace. Freedom. It doesn't bind you to having to do something. It doesn't have binding you to have to find solutions to everything. It doesn't have to find you to change this world into some sort of heaven like existence. This is not a utopian. This is learning how to make peace with life. Freedom from desire. Loving life as it is. You as it is. You. You are your partner. As he or she is. And your monks as they are. With all their stupid imperfections. Idiosyncrasies. Ways of doing things. Now this is understanding what real perfection is. Perfection is never gained by following desire. We will never make a perfect retreat. You'll never find a perfect man. You'll never make yourself perfect. If you think the spiritual life is getting rid of all of your foibles and defilements. You're going to be wandering around some soul of a lifetime. It's not about getting rid of things. It's about making peace with things. Especially making peace with life with a stupid nine year old body. A silly ways of doing things. When we content, we're just happy to be here. Peace. We are now free to feed upon desire. Happy to be content. Needing no more wishing. At least you can do that for a little time in your life. Why not extend that lifetime? Being happy. Being content to try your very best. And that's perfect. Not what you achieve, but how you do it. The process. The path. The middle path. The way, not the goal. Buddhism is a process, not a destination. So that's what Buddhism is not a religion which binds you, the one which frees you totally. There we go. What is the end of that? And now you know what Buddhism is. You don't have to come here again. So you're free and I'm free as well. Okay, so that's a talk. Hopefully you enjoyed some of it. Uh, most of it, but hopefully, most of all, you're happy to have been here while I was being set aside, as I said. So now, are there any questions or comments on this evening's talk? Yeah, it is wonderful. Lawrence over there. Thank you so much and very happy you're asking a question. And now that. Yeah. I suppose the word religion is saying that religion can have another mean of actually binding you or other, collecting you to the present moment, collecting your energies together. Yes, but I always like this more like a collecting is actually almost like a bit of force. It's like you'd never actually collect yourself in a person where you let go and the present moment happens. It's actually collecting, gathering things up together. Sounds a bit too controlling to me. It's the same way that how we meditation is not concentration. Many of you have heard me say this before. Anyone who thinks meditation is concentration, you're missing the point. They're all similarly. You've seen this before, Laurence. I can now hold this glass of water. Absolutely. Still, I'm going to concentrate and collect all my powers and energies and make this absolutely still. Is it still yet? You're the closest. That's not. So what should I do? Try harder. Are you trying hard? Thank you for that. Now, obviously, it's still moving. I tried this many, many times. I've never been able to hold this still. Any doctor here would tell you that. You know, the the muscles in your arms, the metabolism metabolizing all the time. There's always going to be some movement in there. It's impossible to hold this still. So how do you achieve stillness with a glass of water is very easy for it. Not collecting things, but freeing things. Not holding, not doing free. And now that water is more still than I could ever hold it. For those of you ever tried meditation. Remember this simile. If you try and make your mind still, you'll never achieve it. You just get frustrated and tired. You know how to let things go to free. Be content. Put things down. The water becomes thin all by itself. That is freedom. That's religion. Not holding, not even collecting energy for free. Anyway, that's something to consider. Okay. Thank you for that question anyway. Lawrence. Great guy. Yeah. Another question. My goodness. Yes. I agree with one. Consciously or not, if I don't like it, I'm really. Impressed. One. Of my sons had. This freedom as. It's talking about one of the other differences of being in a prison. In a monastery, you can choose to go there and you can choose to leave there. And in a prison that you have no choice, you get sent there and you have no choice. How long you have to stay there? In a sense, yes, but a lot of times people make the choices in life and know what they're doing, and then in a sense, they choose that path which they should know was going to lead to jail. And those people are already in jail. If they got a good enough lawyer, they can choose to get out. But that's not really the main point. The main point is people don't want to be in prison when they're there. How they got in there is not the point. Now they're in there. They don't want to be there. Some people in a monastery don't want to be in there. That's why in our tradition, we don't have life bars. If you have a life that it actually puts you in a prison because, you know, you may have, like having a monk now 35, 35 years now. And if I only was a monk because of something I said and did 35 years ago, you changed your mind. Sometimes it'd be terrible if there were live vows, and I didn't have the freedom to leave whenever I wanted. But because you have that freedom to leave whenever you want. You don't want to leave. You're happy to be there. So the main thing is the prison is any place you don't want to be. And that can be just sitting in that seat now, and it can be just waiting at the airport for the plane. You don't want to be here. I want to be on the plane. How many prisons do you know in life? You're at the red traffic light. You don't want to be there because you got things to do. You are now in a prison in a red traffic light. You don't want to be there. That's the most important part of the story. How many prisons we make in our life and how freedom is always there for us. Don't have to change the traffic light to green. Just have to want to be there. Standing in. Sitting in queue. Waiting for the car in front of me. Happy to be here. Okay. Oh, okay. The last question we have today. Okay. So you shouldn't try to concentrate. How do we understand the right concentration as the last factor of the past summer? Samadhi. These days, I never say concentration. Remember, these are terms with how a hundred years ago, the first translators know from the Sanskrit or the party into English. They tried these words and is the bad word. Samadhi means stillness. The X factor, the eightfold path. Right. Stillness. Not concentration. Right. Stillness. Do you understand that word? Stillness. It makes it quite clear how to achieve stillness. And what is the obstacle to stillness? Anything which agitates your mind is an obstacle to stillness. Letting go. Letting go. That which agitates, which moves, which stirs up. That is the path to stillness. Third factor. The eightfold path. That leads to deep stillness. It's an effort. An effort to stop. Say no to this lane. Not an effort to do so much harder. Won a much more refined one. In our world, we are great doers and controllers. We know how to put effort to achieve. Few of us know how to stop. You've only got an accelerator. You forget where the brake is. Okay. Thank you for your question.