The Tibetan monk who never got to speak

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• Ten pounds for the Sikkim orphanage

  In brief: As a student who dozed through talks by professors and monks, Ajahn Brahm never forgets one by an old English woman, a Tibetan Buddhist…

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  But I remember one of the talks which I heard which I would never forget, it didn't say very much about Buddhism at all. Not as I'd expected it, it didn't say about Four Noble Truths or seven enlightenment factors and all these other stuff which you can read in books anyway. It was just this old English woman, who was a Tibetan nun who was running an orphanage with very poor kids in Sikkim. And the way that she described her compassion was really inspiring. I realised from that time that Buddhism isn't a theory, Buddhism is actually what you do, how you behave, just your kindness, your virtue, your peace, your forgiveness, that's what Buddhism is. It's not what you find in the books. What you find in the interaction between two very kind and caring people. I didn't realise at that time but she taught Buddhism more eloquently than any professor or any monk at that time which I knew. So that's why, the day after, I was so inspired, I went to my bank and took 10 pounds out of my account. Now this was in 1969, I was a very poor student, that was 2 weeks food money for me. So I went hungry. I make up for it these days. But you know, [laughter], I was really hungry, I wasn't starving but I didn't have as much as I would normally have, and it hurt. And because it hurt, I got so much happiness out of that, so much joy, I put 10 pounds for this little orphanage for poor kids. That was meaning, that was purpose, that was something which made life have a resonance, and something very solid which I could respect. It was a pointer to how I could find deeper meaning in my life.

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• “Whatever those monks are on, I want some”

  In brief: A past president of the Buddhist Society, Rachel Green, first came only to learn meditation for panic attacks and anxiety. Seeing the…

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  There's - one of our past presidents, she is not here this evening, so she was here about two or three weeks ago, that's Rachel Green. She won't mind me telling her name, because she wrote a little book about, her spiritual story. And the part which I like, well, I got to be honest, it was about me. And it's actually really about how she became a Buddhist. She was suffering from panic disorders and anxiety attacks. Like many of you know, if you actually come and do some meditation, it really helps overcome anxiety disorders and panic attacks. Meditation is a beautiful method of overcoming that. And many people know that, many people actually are sent by their GPs to places like this to learn meditation, so they can overcome their anxiety disorders and panic attacks - and it works very well. But anyway, she came along, just to learn some meditation to overcome her anxiety disorders, and then she saw these monks, and this is the Armadale group, always seem to be peaceful and happy. She wrote in her book, that when she first saw these guys, she thought they're just acting. Just a face you put on in public, and behind the scenes, you know you're just like anybody else - you know, grumpy, arrogant, selfish. So actually, she decided to try and visit our monasteries, and "check us out", to see whether this was real, or whether we're just faking it. And of course, now I really try hard to make everybody open, so you can come and see as many times, see us y'know, when we're off-guard, not in public, and hopefully, I think you'll probably see that as you see us now, is actually as we are at all times. When she saw that, she realized, "I don't know what those monks are on, but whatever they're on, I want some of it."

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• The cremation pyre exploded — and Ajahn Liem went to bed

  In brief: Ajahn Liem, long Ajahn Chah's acting abbot, builds the crematorium for his teacher's royal funeral — a structure that still stands as a…

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  and when aena died he was in charge of all the funeral services and the king of Thailand attended this this was a big show so this monk built actually the funeral the crematorium for him which actually doubled as a as a stoer a monument which is still there now and he put all this time and money into building this place where his Great Master would be cremated and I was there at the time you know I went there ad cha was there my predecessor and AD made all these monks and the King was there and when they lit sort of the P inside this box the Box exploded Flames came out from everywhere it was a disaster and there were with hoses trying to hose the thing down and people were running around it was just a complete mess and what the mount responsible this agan Le what did he do instead of worrying about anything he took one look and then went to bed had to sleep I thought wow now that's a real monk I wish I could do that when everything goes wrong oh never mind just go and have a nice rest can you do that no you worry and worry and run around what can I do how can I fix this and he said ah just never mind he did his best doesn't matter his master won't get crated that day can always do it tomorrow

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• A loose guitar string

  In brief: Simile: the tighter a guitar string is stretched, the higher it pings when something hits it; less stretched, a lower sound; not stretched…

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  I gave it another simile of being like a guitar string and when a guitar string is stretched the tighter it is stretched stretched when something hits it it really makes a high-pitched sound and when it's not stretched so much it makes a lower pitch sound when it's hardly stretched at all it makes a very low sound when it's not stretched at all it makes no sound at all that's like people's resilience the way they react to some of the unpleasant things which happens in life

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