Working backwards from the solution

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• The haematologist who made room for kindness

  In brief: The year after Ajahn Brahm received a Curtin University medal, he attended the award for Professor 'Joofi' (as captioned), head of…

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  I remember just oh one of my heroes in Perth. It's weird having all these different types of heroes. One of them I you know some years ago I got this medal from John Curtain University you know for starting off a really good community here and supporting women. but also that the next year I went to this um medal award for professor Joofi. He was the head of hematology at the time in Charlie Gardner's Hospital. And when I went there when I went there for his awards ceremony cuz I won the the award the year before I was so inspired by him. He was a top doctor had immense sort of uh academic qualifications but you know he noticed something which was wrong in a hospital system and that was that everybody got the best chemotherapy, radiation therapy, surgery. You know what was missing? The kindness and care. I don't know the last time you've been in the hospital, but do actually people spend time talking with you, caring for you? You may be really sick in the bed and holding your hand. Sometimes people afraid to hold the hand. They might get sued or catch something. Oh, for goodness sake. That kindness is one of the best parts of therapies. And anyway, this top doctor, he was the one who decided to put aside his scientific credentials and invite uh he got a few rooms in that hospital and he invited uh invited raiki therapy, homeopath homeopathy, uh acupuncture, anything which he said was weird, which hadn't been scientific. ifically totally 100% proven. You could get there for free, you know, after you'd come out of the hospital and had some radiation therapy or whatever. Even things like reflexology, you know, foot massage. I remember talking to him. And he said the reason he was doing that, you know, at the time there's no real scientific evidence that it was going to help, but just he knew if you went into a hospital and you were just almost like unfortunately people don't have the time to do anything better. Treated a bit like a robot, just a client, not a person. But then in this place afterwards, you could be treated like a person. Somebody was being kind to you, just gave you a foot massage. And that kindness is so important. And that kindness was having a huge effect on the recovery rate of those people. People were caring for them, not just giving them a sort of radiation therapy and then moving on to the next person. They had time for you. And that was really important. It took away their fear. The results were that people got much better results. The healing rates improved and he made that sort of little sacrifice of risking his reputation by doing something which wasn't proven. What happened in the end? So he got a prize for that.

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• From prison to 'Reservoir Dogs'

  In brief: A boy who fled an abusive Los Angeles home at six becomes a career criminal. Near release in his late 40s or 50s, his case officer gets…

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  about this young kid, six years of age is when he ran away from home in Los Angeles I think he had one of these very abusive families, beating him, not really looking after him. So he left home and lived on the streets from the age of about six years of age. It's incredibly he survived but you know the only way to get by was petty crime and you get sort of arrested every now and again and from petty crime to bigger crime he became a career criminal and what changed his life. He’s in his late 40s or 50s was when he was shortly to be released from another spell in jail. He had a case officer who was trying to find him a job. How can he get a job? You know, once you've been in prison most of your life, who would employ you but she was very resourceful, she found just the right job with his life experience qualifications cos she knew a friend of a friend who was making a movie about gangsters and they wanted someone who really knew how true criminals spoke and acted. He was about to be released so she got him a job as a consultant in this gangster movie that he was highly qualified for that. But once the director saw him, he was so authentic, he gave him a part in the movie and he became one of the stars. The movie was called Reservoir Dogs it was a breakthrough movie of Quentin Tarantino. And this guy, he wrote this article, he was only six months out of jail he made this movie and he was sitting in a mansion in Malibu somewhere with more money he had ever had in his whole life. Because this movie was a success and he married that case officer he couldn't believe just how life changes so quickly, six months ago he's in prison with no money and prospects now he had more money than he could deal with and he was free and married and happy.

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• The noisy breather on the Sydney retreat

  In brief: On a nine-day retreat in Sydney one man breathes so loudly that a meditator complains. Ajahn Brahm explains he has a terminal tumour…

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  At meditation retreats I always remember this one man when I was teaching a Meditation Retreat in Sydney many years ago and a 9-day retreat. You know that people are supposed to be quiet when they are meditating but this man (Ajahn breathing noisily) He was breathing so heavily through every meditation sitting so much so that someone came up to me to complain Can you please tell this person to keep quiet. I am trying to meditate. He had a tumor in his nasal passages blocking both nostrils. It was terminal; the doctor had given up surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy So the doctors have abandoned him and he came to the meditation retreat as a last resort So when I told all the meditators that, they felt very embarrassed and guilty that they were complaining about somebody who got only few weeks to live. He told me that; on the last day of the retreat (Ajahn making the sound) breathing loudly again but not thinking being silent; he had a 'pop' He said he could breath again. That's what he said 'a pop' as his nasal passage cleared but only for about 5 or 10 minutes then it closed again. That was an amazing thing which happened I thought that meditation was working but he left it a bit too late. I never thought he would survive. Few years later teaching meditation in Sydney, this guy came up to me 'do you remember me?' I said 'of course I don't remember, who are you? ' As a monk I am honest He was that man. He cared with his meditation and his nose had cleared and now he was going around teaching people how to be peaceful, how to be silent. because his cancer had got into regression even though he should have been dead years ago.

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• Cough once, get eight bottles of medicine

  In brief: Once in Australia Ajahn Brahm coughs at the start of a talk. By the end there are eight or nine bottles in front of him — Ayurvedic,…

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  this happened once when I was in Australia I coughed in public the beginning of a talk by the end of the talk there was about eight or nine bottles of medicine in front of me and people said you must take this this is Ayurvedic it's very good this is homeopathic it's much better this is horrible you have to take this I took this this is no usual medicine you've got to take that had so many medicines and now being compassionate and watching people to you know to make merit I said yeah I'll take that I'll take that so I had to take every of those bottles of medicine and that really made me sick

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