Being Mindful Stories

Analogy · Ajahn Brahm

Sit still under the mango tree

As told by Ajahn Brahm in 'Out of Control' | by Ajahn Brahm

2 min read

The story — as told by Ajahn Brahm (verbatim captions)

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

▶ Watch Ajahn Brahm tell it from 47:54 (to 50:10)

A reflection (in the spirit of Ajahn Brahm's talk)

Ajahn Chah said the way to get mangoes isn't to climb or shake the tree but to sit still beneath it with an open hand. Ajahn Brahm thought it mad, then found it true. Stop shaking the tree of life and trying to control your partner. Sit quietly, open your heart, and good things fall in.

In brief (our summary)

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 will fall. Climb the tree, shake it or blow it up and you won't get them. Ajahn Brahm thought it mad at first, then found it true; he reads the open hand as kindness — open the door of your heart.

Teaching point

Deep meditation comes from stillness and non-wanting, not effort or bargaining.

When this story may help

Themes

Source & credit

Told by Ajahn Brahm in 'Out of Control' | by Ajahn Brahm · 2012-06-27 · ▶ watch from 47:54 to 50:10 · Buddhist Society of Western Australia

8 other tellings of this story

Caption notes: Manual (volunteer) captions; occasional misspellings kept as is. 'Ajah Chah' = Ajahn Chah.

The narrative is Ajahn Brahm's own telling, quoted from the talk captions. The summary and reflection are Being Mindful Stories's editorial notes. Please credit the teacher and link the original talk. Markdown version

  • The boy who stretched his seedlings

    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…

    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

    Open story page·Watch this telling

  • Toothache in the night

    In brief: In his first year at a Thai monastery, with an empty medicine cabinet and no telephone, Ajahn Brahm has a terrible toothache. He can't…

    Read full story

    I told the story of very very very bad tooth ache which I had in the jungles of Thailand. I don't know why I am focusing on teeth this evening [laughter] but this was a very bad toothache. And again there was no telephone, no dentists for miles around, you're in the jungles. And there's no way of getting anywhere: no cars, no transport in the middle of the jungles, away from everywhere. And it was such a poor monastery there wasn't even any Aspirin or Paracetamol in the medicine cabinet, there was nothing to take at all. I don't know why it is when you get these pains, I know actually why it is now, When you get these pains they always get worse at night time. Why is that? I think it's because the fear grows at night time. And the fear makes that pain even more intense. But anyway as it got very very late the pain in my jaw was so intense.. I have read afterward, and the dentist will say, this is true, some of those pains, infections, in your teeth can get so incredibly strong, they can affect the brain, they can drive you crazy. And I thought it was really going to drive me crazy that was the worst toothache I have ever had in my life. Nothing else has matched that anywhere close. Intense pain. And I was trying everything I could to try and overcome that pain. First of all my meditation. But my meditation at the time I tried to suppress the pain. Tried to get rid of it with the force of the will Trying to move my mind somewhere else so I couldn't experience that pain. Never try that! Never try focusing somewhere else when there is a pain in one part of the body, trying to focus on other part. You won't be able to succeed If it really is an intense pain. The pain will keep compelling you to watch it. So I couldn't even meditate, the pain was just too strong. We have another type of meditation which we do called walking meditation. We very slowly mindfully walk backwards and forward on a path. Eventually I tried that but I had to give up that because I was not doing walking meditation I noticed I was doing running meditation (laughter) Because whenever you are in great pain you are so desperate you can't do anything slowly; everything is jerky and fast. I was running backwards and forwards. The last thing I tried was doing some chanting. Sometimes we have all these superstitions, if you do some special chanting miracles can happen. I never believed that at first because remember I was a scientist before theoretical physics at Cambridge University we don't believe things that easy. All this rigmarole of superstitious chanting I never really believed that at all. By I tried it anyway. Which is what you do when you are desperate anything you will try. I tried the chanting and I had to stop that after a few minutes because I realized I was shouting at the top of my voice and I was afraid I'd wake up all the other monks in this monastery because again when you are desperate you can't do anything softly even when you speak, you're shouting. And I had one of those wonderful experiences when your back was against the wall as Ajahn Chah used to say "you can't go forward, you can't go back you can't stay still. You're really.... everything is just hopeless. And those experiences, if you ever have those experiences you can't go forward, you can't go back and you can't stay still. Those are brilliant moments in your life. The opportunities to see things in a different way And the only thing I could think of was those words "just let go" And I did it. I let go! Because I had to; there was no choice. And as soon as I let go his is one of the great experiences of my life immediately, not just after second or two immediately the pain vanished. It just wasn't there anymore. And in its place was this incredible delightful bliss I was actually happy. It was such a weird experience that that could actually happen You could have intense pain and then let go, really let go. And it was just beautiful peace. Even though it was in the middle of the night Couldn't do anything else, except just meditate for a little while and then just lay down not really go to sleep but have a very light sleep because you are just too happy. Woke up in the morning and then I had a toothache not that bad Went to see the dentist afterwards The amazing thing was you can take an intense pain and just by letting it be, it vanished. What had happened was I had taken away the emotional, mental part of that pain. the physical part was there but it was tiny compared to the emotional. "I don't want, I can't stand this" It taught me that what you add what human beings add onto the physical feelings of pain is more than 90 percent

    Open story page·Watch this telling

  • The matchbox on the head

    In brief: A malnourished young monk in steamy north-east Thailand — sticky rice with a boiled frog, under four and a half hours' sleep, up at 3 a.m.…

    Read full story

    when I became a monk who was in the jungles of Northeast Thailand I was malnourished one meal a day sticky rice I was a vegetarian I sometimes sticky rice and a frog on top that's all we had sweet yeah for a boiled frog no garlic no sauce notice abortive glutinous sticky rice with a fork on top that was all the villagers had in fact they gave us the best Fox it was disgusting but I was malnourished and in the morning we would get up but we only supposed to meditate to sleep for hours and nights I could never get below four and a half so three o'clock in the morning will be up in the hall to meditate steamy jungles I was made in England I was not used to such hot weather such sticky weather malnourished not enough sleep of course I was sleepy so I had the tricks what we tried to do first of all no use effort didn't work so then I tried a matchbox you take the cover off the matchbox you put the tray on your head because it means if you start nodding you see the matchbox fall on the ground you'd hear it only about three or four days I'd overcome my slot and talker I could put the matchbox on my head for one hour meditate in the morning it never fell off at all amazing until one of my monks took me aside and said this is why the matchbox is not falling off you're still sleepy but instead of doing this you're doing this their mind is so sneaky and tricky so after a while I started contemplating look made in England I'm not used to that climate are not enough sleep not enough our food it's natural so I decided to let go when I let go there's not much energy in my mind so you are dull but you knew you adult and little by little just like when the Sun comes up in the morning and it had evaporates all the mists that burns off the mist because I wasn't wasting energy fighting my sleepiness but just letting it be being kind to it opening the door of my heartless my energy started coming back again him my back straightened up my head lifted up naturally and I was peaceful

    Open story page·Watch this telling

  • Meditating through the flood

    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…

    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.

    Open story page·Watch this telling

All stories·Find a story for your situation