Brian Josephson found it in meditation

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• The wall that disappeared

  In brief: As a young theoretical physicist, Ajahn Brahm sits at a Zen monastery in the north of England, in a converted cowshed, told to meditate…

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  I usually bring up this experience I had when I was a lay person. when I was meditating wherever I could find a place to meditate and this was in a Zen monastery in the north of England and in this Zen monastery I didn't know what I was supposed to do they just you know in the little hall which is a converted cow shed that we sat down and we had to meditate with our eyes open it one of the first times I'd meditated with my eyes wide open I didn't know what I was supposed to do but I just meditated. But because I'd done some meditation before and I knew how to be in the present moment and stop this inner speech, as I was just with my eyes open, just being very peaceful, very calm, a strange thing happened. One of those weird experiences which show you there's more to this world than you'd thought. And at this time I was a theoretical physicist when I just looked at this wall just a whitewashed wall. Then suddenly without warning the wall disappeared. It vanished. It just wasn't there anymore. Which was so weird. One minute there was a wall solid and now there was nothing there. And of course instead of getting scared or think I was going crazy I used know what we do in Buddhism called insight. What's happening? And it soon became very clear to me that this is just the nature of the physical senses especially the sense of seeing sight. If you watch something, put your full attention on watching and what you observe doesn't move or change. It disappears. The sense of sight turns off.

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• Mrs. Calm and Mr. Insight climb the hill

  In brief: Mrs. Samatha (calm) climbs a hill for its peace; her husband Mr. Vipassana (insight) climbs it for the view. At the top she finds the view…

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  Once upon a time, Mrs. Samata that means calm and her husband Mr. Insight, Mr. Whipasa decided to go on a walk up a hill. Mrs. Samita, Mrs. calm went up to the top of the hill cuz it was so peaceful on top of that hill and Mr. Weipasa her husband Mr. Insight he went up there because he had a beautiful view on top of the hill now they both went up there for different reasons but when Mr. Sam got up the top of the hill Mr or Mrs. Yeah, you'll know what I mean. They had a sex change halfway up the hill. Probably they went Mrs. Sam go the right way. Mrs. Sam, Mrs. Peace got to the top of the hill. Oh, she enjoyed the peace. It was so calm on top of the hill away from the town and the city and the roads. But it was not only calm up there, she saw the view as well. And when Mason, Mr. Insight, when he got to the top of the hill, oh, he enjoyed the view cuz that's what he went up there for. But you also experience a beautiful peace because on the top of the hill the peace and the view always coexist.

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• Omega equals one — from a T-shirt

  In brief: Science talk of Omega equals one (nothing excess; coming from nothing and going back) — Brahm notes how such insights arrive in unexpected…

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  Omega equals one." In science they always have these numbers and figures, and symbols for stuff so that is the case. There is nothing here, no universal life energy, but that is just a device of division. Then coming from nothing and going back to nothing, wow, I think that is really cool. One of the reasons why it's amazing just the insights and understandings which you get in the most unexpected places. This one I got from a T-shirt

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• “Whatever those monks are on, I want some”

  In brief: A past president of the Buddhist Society, Rachel Green, first came only to learn meditation for panic attacks and anxiety. Seeing the…

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  There's - one of our past presidents, she is not here this evening, so she was here about two or three weeks ago, that's Rachel Green. She won't mind me telling her name, because she wrote a little book about, her spiritual story. And the part which I like, well, I got to be honest, it was about me. And it's actually really about how she became a Buddhist. She was suffering from panic disorders and anxiety attacks. Like many of you know, if you actually come and do some meditation, it really helps overcome anxiety disorders and panic attacks. Meditation is a beautiful method of overcoming that. And many people know that, many people actually are sent by their GPs to places like this to learn meditation, so they can overcome their anxiety disorders and panic attacks - and it works very well. But anyway, she came along, just to learn some meditation to overcome her anxiety disorders, and then she saw these monks, and this is the Armadale group, always seem to be peaceful and happy. She wrote in her book, that when she first saw these guys, she thought they're just acting. Just a face you put on in public, and behind the scenes, you know you're just like anybody else - you know, grumpy, arrogant, selfish. So actually, she decided to try and visit our monasteries, and "check us out", to see whether this was real, or whether we're just faking it. And of course, now I really try hard to make everybody open, so you can come and see as many times, see us y'know, when we're off-guard, not in public, and hopefully, I think you'll probably see that as you see us now, is actually as we are at all times. When she saw that, she realized, "I don't know what those monks are on, but whatever they're on, I want some of it."

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