Stories about senses
3 Buddhist wisdom stories about senses from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- The comfortable prisonAnalogy · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Simile: someone born in a modern prison does well at prison school, works hard, gets a bigger cell with nice things and holidays in other wings, marries another prisoner and has…
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sometimes it's like a person is born in this little place and you know, they're fed well, they're treated well. They go to school and they do well at school. They work hard and they save some money and they get a nice little place where they can stay and they can mess around inside where they're living. They can't go too far because a place where they were born and living is called prison, a jail. You have in prison, it's uh it's a modern prison. So, it's there both genders. So, this little prisoner meets another prisoner of a different gender or maybe the same gender and they get married and they have other little baby prisoners and they do very well. If they work hard and behave, they get a nice cell, a big cell with many things in there, and they can get lots of nice food, and they can just go on holidays to other parts of the prison if they wish. And they think that prison is very nice, but they don't call it a prison. They call it planet Earth. You're confined here and you don't know anything else. So you think that that's as good as it gets cuz you don't know anything more.
- The emperor in five garmentsAnalogy · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Simile he says he usually keeps for retreats: a powerful emperor is completely covered by boots, trousers, a jacket, gloves and a helmet, so you can't tell whether it is male or…
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imagine there's an emperor and this Emperor is a very very very powerful being and you know it affects you what this Emperor does this Emperor is clothed he's got boots or it's got boots you don't know if it's a he or she it's got boots which cover its feet and go right up to its thighs it's got trousers which cover the top of his boots and go halfway up his waist he got a jacket which covers the top of his trousers go to the elbows and go up to the neck and it's got these gloves which cover all the hands that go halfway up the arm and last it's got a helmet and this helmet just covers the hold of the face and halfway down the you know overlaps the tunic so the five pieces of clothing completely cover this Emperor so much so you don't know who this Emperor is whether it's male or female whether it's old or young whether it's African Caucasian Chinese or what and this is like the mind this mind this Emperor within you is covered with the five senses of seeing hearing smelling tasting and touching and that's why sometime we don't know what this mind actually is in a Buddhist way we want to try and unclothe the emperor take off these five senses of seeing hearing smelling tasting and touching to get to this six six sense the Mind
- The mushy peas that explodedStory · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: Every year Ajahn Brahm spends 15 days alone in his cave, not talking, just meditating. On the first day out, the first spoonful of food at lunch — ordinary mushy peas — explodes…
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I did my 15-day retreat in my cave every year it's my holidays my vacation and of course no not giving any talks not talking not doing anything just meditating all day and every day for 15 days in a row not saying anything you get really deep meditation and of course after you get that you get really powerful mindfulness so the first day out lunchtime I always remember the first the first piece of food I put into my mouth was a spoonful of mushy peas and it was it exploded honestly it just wow that was such incredible flavor and taste I never ever tasted mushy peas like that all it was was that my mindfulness was so incredibly strong you could have tasted anything it tasted a carrot and that carrotness would be so intense just an ordinary carrot