Stories for family
4 Buddhist wisdom stories for family from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- Jeremy Horner — overnight monk, Pali Text auntieStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Backpacker Jeremy Horner visits a NE Thailand monastery where Brahm is staying, asks to spend one night, and next morning shaves his own head and begs to ordain — 12 hours after…
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from Singapore he went North into Thailand and in Bangkok he met a couple of English people who were working in the refugee camp of ubor in Northeast Thailand so why didn't it come up here not many people come up here so they he went up to there with these doctors and when he was in this this place there was no other westerners about around except in this Monastery there's a few Western monks in this Monastery I was one of those Western Monks at that time so he said no I'll just go for a look so he went for a look and he would like to enough he asked the Abbott can I spend the night so he got permission to spend the night he wasn't a Buddhist you know he was just a student a Backpacker he spent the night there in the morning he shaved his own head and begged to be a monk isn't incredible experience just no preparation at all and 12 hours after he first came into a Buddhist mon the first Buddhist he ever saw you know he wanted to become a monk and now he's been a monk for about 30 years now and interestingly sort of it comes from a very interesting family because I remember his lay name Jeremy horer and they said Horner CU I knew that name it was the head of the Pary Tech Society Pary is a Buddhist language and there's this professor over in camb was translating all these Buddhist books and I said are you any relation of hers he said no I've never heard of her when he went home he checked out with his father and it was his father's sister his auntie and they never said anything about her cuz she was like a black sheep of the family
- Mr Jones — afternoon off for WembleyStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Scary disciplinarian primary teacher Mr Jones. Dad has two World Cup England–Poland tickets at Wembley and lunch with Brahm; the boy asks for the afternoon off — totally against…
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Mr. Jones his name was and he was a very scary teacher. But I still remember one of my experiences with Mr. Jones. [snorts] My father, this is very worldly but please excuse this. My father had the afternoon off work and I uh went home for lunch and my father sort of saw me in uh you know my mother's little apartment just close by and my father said, "Oh, it's a shame you have to go to school this afternoon. I got these two tickets for a World Cup soccer match against Poland at Wembley Stadium. And he said, "It's a shame you have to go to school. You could have come with me to watch the match." Now you know what in places like UK and even Poland a soccer match is like this is World Cup qualifying match. And so I said, "Oh, you never know. You can always ask." So I had the guts to go up to Mr. jokes and I asked him, "Uh, please, sir, can I have the afternoon of school to watch a soccer match?" That's totally against the rules. But he told me, he said, "Well, you're doing okay. Off you go
- Mum kissed his scraped knee betterStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: As a boy playing soccer in the London streets he falls, scrapes the skin off his knees, and runs to his mother crying. She kneels down and kisses it better — and it works every…
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used to play soccer in the streets in London if I fell over I scraped the skin from my knees I'd run to my mother crying and all she would do is kneel down and kiss it better it worked every time
- The last animal I killed — a warm mouseStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Age 16, just after father dies: traps and kills a mouse for terrified mother. Decades later still sees it — warm, beautiful — stroked it on the way to the rubbish bin; still…
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the last animal I ever killed in my life was a mouse just after my father died. I was just 16 and my mother was staying alone and a mouse was in the house and she was terrified of mouse of mice and then I caught it in a trap and killed it and to this day I felt so bad about that. That was how many 50 46 years ago. Is that right? Yeah. No, 56 years ago. And I can still see that mouse, a mouse or not quite sure which, but it was a beautiful animal. It was still warm when I took it and took it to the uh the bin where I supposed to go. And I felt so guilty for that. I was stroking it when I was taking it to the the rubbish bin. And I shouldn't have done it. Shouldn't have killed it. And if I did kill it, I shouldn't have taken it to a rubbish bin