Stories for meditation practice
4 Buddhist wisdom stories for meditation practice from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- Meditating through the floodStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: An Indonesian monk Ajahn Brahm knew and questioned tells him that as a layman wanting to be a rishi he went deep into the Javanese jungle to meditate. A star came into his mind…
Read full story
There's one of these monks I knew. He has passed away now. But when he was alive, I met him, talked with him, checked out what he was up to, and this wasn't one of those real things. He was an Indonesian monk. Anyone here from Indonesia, from Java? There's a few people here anyway. They're not omitting it. But anyway, this guy, he wanted to be a rushi. And I remember this story because we got a book about Rishies a few days ago. And so he went in to a very remote place in the island of Java into a jungle and he went there and sat meditation. He was a lay person, not a monk yet. And he told me, this is what he said to me. His English wasn't the best, but it it made a lot of sense. He was sitting there got very peaceful and this like star came into his mind and I love the way he said this he married that star like united with it and then when he came out of his meditation he noticed he didn't know how long don't have clocks or watches he noticed the jungle looked very different to when he first started to meditate, there'd be lots of damage to the trees and the branches and lots of leaves where they shouldn't be. But anyway, he got up and he walked to the nearest village and they were surprised because where he had sat the damage was there had been a flood for many days and he'd been underwater about four or five days. He didn't know a thing about it. He would just blissing out inside.
- Sit still under the mango treeAnalogy · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Ajahn Chah's simile, taught in a monastery that was a mango orchard: the only way to get the mangoes is to sit perfectly still under the tree and hold out your hand, and a mango…
Read full story
I'm going to finish off with one of Ajahn Chah's profound stories which I usually only give at retreats but now I think it's good time to share it here I was telling this in Thailand many people, they have read books by Ajah Chah but this is not in any of those books. The great teacher was telling me how to meditate and get enlightened. How to be at peace with myself, how to be free And this is the essence of the talk which I have just being giving about no authority. One of the reasons why Buddhism is growing in our modern world. He said when I first went to his monastery about 38 years ago now. He said his monastery in this forest in the middle of the Northeast of Thailand; he said his forest was a mango orchard. He said those mango trees were planted by the Buddha himself. He said those mango trees are now mature; and there’re thousands of ripe juicy sweet mangoes hanging off the branches and twigs of all those trees. He said, "you monks, nuns, men and women in these days; you don't need to climb the tree to get a mango you don't need to shake the tree, you don't even need to throw a stick up at the tree to get a mango All you need to do to get a mango is just to hold out your hand, open our palm and a mango will fall into it". When I heard that I thought that's absolutely stupid and crazy. I have known mango trees; if I sat under a mango tree with my hand open way before, it would probably be hours before a mango fell anyway, if it did fell; knowing my luck it would fall on my head. (laughter) Never in my hand. But that was Ajahn Chah's simile. You know what he meant now.. Stop shaking the Mango Tree. Stop trying to control your partner. Stop trying to climb the tree of life. Sit underneath it, Open the door of your heart to the beautiful peace and happiness freedom whatever you want in life will just fall into it
- The boy who stretched his seedlingsStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: One of Ajahn Brahm's first meditation teachers recalls planting seeds with his father at five or six. After three days with nothing showing he complains; his father explains the…
Read full story
there's a story of one of my first meditation teachers in Thailand he told me I usually tell this on the meditation Retreats not usually on a Friday night he told me when I was starting out my meditation career that when he was a young boy in Thailand that his father gave him some seeds to grow in the garden he was only about five six years of age and this was the first time he grew anything so this little five or six put his little seeds with the help of his father underneath the ground underneath the soil and he would water them every day after 3 or 4 days he saw no result said where are my plants where my flowers is three days now can't see anything his father had to tell him that when you have seeds when the water gets to them they germinate they split the seed a little green shoe comes out it's probably under the ground right now pushing its way to the surface just wait for a little while and you'll see a shoot be patient and he took his father's advice and fortunately at the end of two days a tiny green shoot was appearing above the Earth so so he decided to water those flowers two times a day he was getting excited and those flowers grew grew grew until about 2 in high and that's when he lost his patience he decided to stretch them to make them grow faster and he killed every one of them but he learned a wonderful lesson you can't stretch nature nature takes its time to grow
- The monk they crematedStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: From the suttas: villagers find a monk meditating in the forest so still he doesn't seem to breathe. Thinking him dead, and not wanting animals to eat him, they build a funeral…
Read full story
There was this monk who was meditating in the forest and then these two villagers came past and they saw him is meditating so still they couldn't even see him breathing. They took one look at him and thought, "Oh my goodness, this venerable monk is dead." That's one of the problems there. Why monks please don't go and nuns don't go meditating in the forest by yourself in some countries because you might end up like this monk ended up there were you know devout Buddhist so they thought we can't leave this monk to be eaten by the jungle animals that's disrespectful we're in the forest anyway there's lots of wood around so they got lots of wood together and they made a funeral p And they put this venerable monk on top. They didn't know much chanting, but they did whatever chanting they knew. Wouldn't you do that for me if I was meditating family just sitting there so still in the forest? You check the pass, there's no pass or whatever. A bomb's dead. They put this mark on top of this funeral p. They lit it. And once the flames were strong enough, they realized, you know, just the job's done. Now the flames will look after the rest. And they were busy people. You know, you don't have much time in your life, do you? So many things you have to do. So having lit the fire, flames were very strong. So they went off to collect some mushrooms or whatever. And you can imagine what they felt when the following morning that monk walked in the village for his arms round. Not even his robes were charred, fully alert and alive.