Being Mindful Stories

Analogy · Ajahn Brahm

One empty room for emptiness

As told by Ajahn Brahm in Entanglement | Ajahn Brahm | 17 March 2017

1 min read

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

it's my empty room well put something in it no it's for emptiness for freedom and now we can store stuff in it no it's empty that will be pretty radical to have one room which has nothing in it just for the sake of emptiness

▶ Watch Ajahn Brahm tell it from 21:51 (to 22:16)

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

Why fill every wall and corner? Ajahn Brahm suggests keeping one room deliberately empty, just for freedom, and never storing anything in it. That's hard, because we love complications. He teases parents eyeing another child, then praises cats and dogs. Leave some space in your home, and in your life.

In brief (our summary)

Analogy: why put a picture on every wall and a pot-plant in every corner? Keep one room in the house deliberately empty — a fashion statement for emptiness and freedom — and refuse to store stuff in it.

Teaching point

Celebrating emptiness needs a protected empty space, not more furniture.

When this story may help

  • clutter
  • afraid of empty space

Themes

Source & credit

Told by Ajahn Brahm in Entanglement | Ajahn Brahm | 17 March 2017 · 2017-03-17 · ▶ watch from 21:51 to 22:16 · Buddhist Society of Western Australia

Caption notes: YouTube auto-captions: unpunctuated, words left exactly as captioned.

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

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