“If only my house were this small”

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• Walking off with everything he owned on his back

  In brief: After five years as a monk in Thailand (around 1979) Ajahn Brahm leaves his monastery to wander on foot. Nothing can be stored, so he must…

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  One of my most memorable experiences in my training as a monk after 5 years being a monk in these monasteries in Thailand you are expected, encouraged to actually leave the monastery, just go wondering on foot. Its a great opportunity to visit other teachers' You have been in a one monastery and to see how the other teachers teach To get a wider experience or may be go and find some solitude in the jungles or the mountains That was after five years--what would that be 1979 or something; somewhere around then. I left the monastery; and the rule was you couldn't store anything there. You can give it away but once you gave it away nothing would be kept for you. So everything which was yours you had to carry with you. And of course if you are walking especially through the hot tropics carrying lots and lots of stuff is just really really unpleasant. It was reminding you how much a burden your possessions were. So after a couple of days, you gave this away and you gave that away and you are down to the absolute minimum you needed Once you got down to that minimum, my goodness it was so light. You can imagine the experience. Just put yourself in that experience that everything you own you are carrying on your back and it's light. And you can dance, there is hardly any burden there at all. Because as a monk we knew that, there are monasteries everywhere any place you go you can get a bed for the night. If you don't get a bed for the night you can sleep under a tree. Its the tropics, it is easy to do. You can go anywhere, you get something to eat, not delicious food but enough to keep you going through the day, there is waters in the well. There was this total sense of freedom freedom from possessions. And that was just like being in heaven. You didn't have any worries at all. You had cloths to wear, you had this little mosquito net umbrella which you could park anywhere to sleep at night. And the best thing about it; you had no appointments. Your future was blank. I could go anywhere I wanted. Every cross road, you can go left, go right, turn around, go forward, stay still No one was asking you to go anywhere, to do anything or be anything. That was one of my wonderful experiences of being free from attachments at all.

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• “What day of the week is it?”

  In brief: As a forest monk he lived without calendars or clocks and sometimes didn't know the month or year. In the first months in Perth, at the…

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  but then the first few months when i came to perth we were staying in a small house in north perth you know lynn knows that she was there at the time and even erica you know you went there there was she's around here somewhere and uh there was a nepalese man who came to visit he had a um you know buddhist background and he had an epileptic epileptic fit just in front of the house so he called the ambulance and then uh first thing the ambulance guy said to him is what day of the week is it and why do you ask that so what if you don't know what day of the week it is they take you away straight away so oh my goodness if you ask me i'd be in big trouble so from that time on i realized i better always at least know what day of the week is

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• Move huts every two years — by wheelbarrow

  In brief: Bodhinyana rule: monks may stay in a hut only two years, then must move — no tractor or car, only a self-pushed wheelbarrow — which…

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  every two years as a monk in voting down a monastery we have to move we have to move huts so you're only allowed to stay in heart for two years and what when you move you cannot use the tractor you cannot use a car you can use a wheelbarrow but you have to push it yourself

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• The tycoon's mansion that felt like a prison

  In brief: Visiting a Kuala Lumpur tycoon's mansion to give a blessing, Ajahn Brahm passes machine-gun guards, huge walls and CCTV everywhere, and…

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  I just remember just going to give him in a blessing and his mansion It was over in Kuala Lumpur somewhere I won't say which guy this is I went to his mansion and there were guards with machine guns the guy You know he was a private person just a tycoon Guards at his gate huge Huge walls see CCTV ninety-three two seats CCC saw something TVs and guards everywhere And I thought this is like going in a prison And it was like a prison He reminded me of a prison, so these guys are very very wealthy actually lived in their own private prisons And they couldn't go anywhere by themselves Always had to have somebody take them around Bodyguards everywhere and so what type of life is that?

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