This Rains Retreat I don’t have much strength; I’m not well, so I’ve come up to this mountain here to get some fresh air. People come to visit but I can’t really receive them like I used to because my voice has just about had it; my breath is just about gone. You can count it a blessing that there is still this body sitting here for you all to see now. This is a blessing in itself. Soon you won’t…

I’m sure that everyone here can find some things to feel glad about. Even if there are not very many things, we can make much of the few, rather than pushing them to one side, saying, ‘No, they don’t really count; that’s nothing really – but look at all these terrible faults I have!’ We are very good at doing that – but how good are we at looking at the goodness, the beauty of our lives? Everyone…

“These five are a person of integrity’s gifts. Which five? “A person of integrity gives a gift with a sense of conviction. A person of integrity gives a gift attentively. A person of integrity gives a gift in season. A person of integrity gives a gift with an empathetic heart. A person of integrity gives a gift without adversely affecting himself or others. “Having given a gift with a sense of con…

The bliss of concentration is an acquired taste. It’s a specific kind of happiness, which the Thais call santi-sukha, which literally means the happiness of peace. This is a basic level of well-being that we tend to overlook because it carries no excitement, no thrills. It’s just a basic sense of ease that’s steady, like the flame of an oil lamp. For most of us, we notice pleasure and pain because…

Back in Chithurst years ago, I was living with a small group of nuns at Āloka Cottage down by the river near the beautiful forest of Hammer Wood. We were just five or six nuns living and practicing together, working hard and giving ourselves to the Path. A short walk up the hill was the monks’ monastery. They were a larger community, and we would join them for meals and evening meditation. One day…

Apaṇṇaka dhammas are ways of practicing that the Buddha described as incontrovertible. By practicing them, we can be sure of being on the right path and that they will lead to awakening. These teachings are: indriya saṃvara, restraint of the senses; bhojane mattaññutā, moderation in eating; and jāgariyānuyoga, devotion to wakefulness. Once we start working with the apaṇṇaka dhammas, we begin to se…

One of the themes in Buddhist practice that I get questioned on by Westerners is that of ‘making merit.’ What they see is people coming to the monastery with bags of food and other requisites, making a formal offering (sometimes with Pali chanting) to the Sangha who then responds with some chanting in Pali. Some of these people will ask that the merit (puñña) of their act of generosity (dāna) be s…

Saddhā is often translated as faith, confidence or conviction. The Buddha said that faith comes from having seen that the human condition is unsatisfactory. It is imperfect, wrought with dissatisfaction, discontentment, pain, grief, fear and anxiety. Having seen that, then the mind naturally seeks a path out of that state. It questions the meaning of life and how to find inner happiness. So this f…

Is there anyone, any person or any condition that is absolutely right or absolutely wrong? Can right and wrong, or good and bad, be absolute? When you dissect it, when you really look at it in terms of the way it is now, there is nothing to it. It’s foam on the sea; it’s soap bubbles. Yet this is how we can get ourselves completely caught up in illusions. We’ll sacrifice our life for an illusion i…