Pub arguments, then buy each other a drink

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• 'You never talked to us about your Buddhism'

  In brief: Ajahn Brahm kept his non-Buddhist friends from Cambridge, and saw some at a reunion after 40 years. At the end of college he had asked…

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  I remember just with those friends I was at college and I kept them and they're still there and so we had a reunion last October seeing some friends I hadn't seen for 40 years and I remember just at the end of those College years when we were going our different ways and I've be a Buddhist for all those three years at Cambridge and I asked all my friends none of them was a Buddhist and I asked him afterward what did you think about me being a Buddhist and they said we respected you said why said because you never talked to us about your Buddhism that you just respected us for who we were and that's why we respected you for who you were

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• Annual visits with Abbot Placid of New Norcia

  In brief: A casual afternoon visit to New Norcia with a Thai guest monk grows into yearly exchanges between Bodhinyana and the Benedictine…

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  that was abber Placid of the benedic monastery in new noria it took a long while for us to actually establish that trust you know actually because he was a Christian ABT a benedic a Catholic I'm a Buddhist monk and the first time we went up there to new nor was just we had a visiting monk from Thailand and were just looking for someplace to take him you know just for an afternoon let's go and see another Monastery and they were just very welcoming and from that just opening know we we started getting doing things together and we started having this meeting with each other once a year they'd come down to bodhinyana Monastery the whole gang of them and know we'd go to their Monastery just the monks so we'd actually talk to each other and we we get to know each other as actually real friends there's not that many monks you know in in Western Australia so it doesn't matter they're Catholic and you know they're of we were monks and that gave us so much in common especially there's only two abbots in Western Australia know abber B actually can't say the nuns Monastery but that was very small in those days you know myself and the Abbot of the benedic monastery and it's amazing just how much we had in common you know the sort of problems which I faced you got no one else to talk no one knows what it's like to be an Abbot because you don't know what it's like to be an Abbott you don't know what it's like to be a monk but you know this guy did cuz he was the Abit of a Mony I was of a Monas you had these great discussions and then that friendship really took off and then we could really challenge each other and that was when it was really interesting because I was a Buddhist he was a Christian coming from a very different background but we could actually ask the toughest questions of each other passionately but there was that trust there look I don't matter how what you say about me or what you tell me even if you say I'm absolutely fo I know that you know you're my friend before this conversation you'll be my friend afterwards that's a given and no one's going to take that away and nothing you say can take that away and because of that trust and friendship was there we had some marvelous discussions and actually that let me allowed me to change some of my views cuz you know I was actually conditioned to being a Buddhist and I actually when I first understood just how that conditioning how your views how your influences they you know what you actually allow yourself to listen to who you allow yourself to meet does make my thoughts that's where my thoughts come from I realize if you know I have to actually be much wider in my friendship I had to cultivate deliberately non Buddhist friends just like you you may be a Buddhist and you may be sort of just have Buddhist friends and just come here here and on a Friday night and just go just listen to the talks on the website and just have you know go out to dinner with Buddhist friend marry you're Buddhist you know and just go to Buddhist Retreats that is unhealthy have a few Christian friends as well a few Muslim a few atheist friends they're going to keep you honest they're going to ask you the tough questions they're also going to influence you and I didn't Lally did that cuz I didn't want to be a brainwashed Buddhist I didn't want to be sort of an extremist a fundamentalist who just gets Buddhist ideas put into them but nothing else so I deliberately cultivated sort of people who would challenge me you know that's one of the nicest places I went to was was prisons you when you first go into a prison in Western Australia they they told me I remember the first time I went to prison I think was I no it was actually down in uh in bunby but I started going to freem manle prison when it was still open and I remember this guy came out to us and you know I was going to sit around a table and talk to him and he said look you know we don't care who you are but in this Jael no you know BS b u l s h i t I'm not I'm still not g enough to say that word but you want know what I mean that's what they said to me because this is a prison there's a sense of honesty in here straightforwardness you tell it how you feel you be honest and we'll listen to you you try and just make up or just be something you're not and just you might as well walk out of here because we won't listen and accept you and I really respected that thank you that's the sort of people I love talking with straightforward is not just going to listen and accept because I'm a monk some sort of priest which you have to follow no matter what it's not just respecting me because I've got a robe on and a b head because I've been ordained for so many years but what are you actually saying be truthful so when I allowed myself to actually to be influenced by so many different people I thought that was much safer so I couldn't be actually stuck in one particular type of view and have that being self-justified all the time so with those sorts of people that friendship was there for the beginning with abber plaid the friendship was there so we could argue we could argue passionately and I found that's actually where I learned so much from if you're listening to me today if you listen to me a lot it's nothing to do with me it's the condition in which I've got the training which I've had

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• Bernard Carr, the first Buddhist he met

  In brief: At 16 Ajahn Brahm wins his first school maths prize, is sent to Foyles for maths books, and instead buys Buddhism paperbacks from the…

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  Bernard was a very close friend because he was the first Buddhist I ever met. And the story is this. As a young man, we're going to school and about 16 years of age, I started to come good at the at the um secondary school where I was studying and I won my first school prize at 16 for maths. So they I asked, "What do I do?" Never had a school prize before. And my teacher said, "You go off to the bookshop and get books on mathematics so you could go even further in that field." So being obedient, I went to this bookstore in Charing Cross Road in London, Foils Bookshop. And I went in there the mathematics section and I looked at all these books on mathematics and I said to myself, I'm not going to waste my first school prize on that rubbish. I want something a bit more interesting. And I noticed on the opposite side of the road in the annex, annex is always interesting. In the very top floor, the attic, that is where they had books on the weird stuff, psychic powers. All the different religions were up there as well. And so I brought a whole mass of paperbacks and the teacher, you're not supposed to get paperbacks, but it's good value for money instead of getting a hardback. But we got to present something to you. Oh, present. That's good enough. So I think the book which was presented to me I think was absolutely true was the third eye by lob sang ramper the guy I think some celebrity or some important person I said what is this book this guy's getting but that was only one of them the rest of them was all these books on Buddhism that's actually where I became a Buddhist I read them I thought wow that's what I am that's how I think that's you know my personality And it was only when I went to university that they had all these clubs and societies and I just my eyes went wide when I saw there was a Buddhist club in university and I was just so excited. What you mean there's other Buddhists? I can actually, you know, join something. This was in 1969 I think. And so I went to the counter and there's this another student is on the other end of the counter. I said I want to join. He said no this is Buddhism. You don't need to join. Just come and test it out. I said I'm already a Buddhist. I want to join. No just after a few talks if you want to. And I slammed a£1 note which was a joining 518 on the table. Join me now. And he became you know a lifelong friend. That was Bernard Bernard Khr.

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• Mortal enemies who go out to dinner

  In brief: Jerry Hansen, who built the retreat centre, told Ajahn Brahm he would fight publicly with union representative Kevin Reynolds for the…

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  I remember know this I don't mind saying he told me this you know the fellow who built our Retreat Center Jerry Hansen you know he had his fights with Kevin Reynolds you know with the the union sort of Representative but he told me Percy said I yeah and we have these fights you know for the media but then we go out for dinner in the evening quite quite admired that you know the sort of you know what the what the newspaper say is mortal enemies but you know then they sort of they have dinner again they s establish a friendship

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