If you were to ask people familiar with Buddhism to identify its two most important wisdom teachings, they’d probably say emptiness and the four noble truths. If you were to ask them further which of the two teachings was more fundamental, they might hesitate, but most of them would probably put emptiness first, on the grounds that the four noble truths deal with a mental problem, while emptiness…

Within oneself is peace to be found, not from another will a bhikkhu find peace. For one who is inwardly calmed, nothing is accumulated, how then rejected? Just as in the centre of the ocean no waves arise, but all is still; so, steadfast and free of lust, on what is there for a bhikkhu to build arrogance? (Sutta Nipāta 919-920) Spiritual peace is a subjective experience rather than an external r…

Come back, just come back. Be present while drinking that ‘cuppa’ and begin a new moment. Observe the mind’s restless thrashing – forever toppling us into the past and spilling us into the future. By stopping and returning to this moment, we create the right conditions to examine and feel our distress or rage with honest openness and understanding. That’s the balm we need for our festering wound.…

“What if I get it wrong? What if it doesn’t work? What if I’m left here alone?” Just look over the edge of that “what if.” Let your mind open up and realize that you’ve been running away from phantoms. Examine the attitudes you might have like, “What if I get it wrong?” We’ve been getting it wrong all our life—it’s no big deal! Everybody’s making mistakes and losing it. We’ve all been blundering,…

At that time, I’d heard teachers giving Dhamma talks about letting go, letting go, and I still couldn’t make much of it. Luang Pu Kinaree asked me to sew a set of robes. I went at it flat out. I wanted to get it over and done with quickly. I thought once the task was done, I’d be free of business and be able to get down to some meditation. One day, Luang Pu walked over. I was sewing out in the sun…

Throughout the course of any day, there are thousands of different situations either on the grand scale, like someone’s life ending, or on the minuscule level—“Where have I left that hammer? What am I going to make to go with the broccoli? Who is driving the truck up the mountain?” We don’t know. Instead of feeling frustrated because we’re anxious and without a plan, we simply can recognize, “I do…

I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Sāvatthī in Jeta’s Grove, Anāthapiṇḍika’s monastery. Then a certain devatā, in the far extreme of the night, her extreme radiance lighting up the entirety of Jeta’s Grove, went to the Blessed One and, on arrival, having bowed down to him, stood to one side. As she was standing there, she recited these verses in the Blessed One’s pr…

Virtue, meditation, and wisdom are the tools we use in training ourselves in how to relate to the world around us. This training will help us to see the qualities that bring true benefit to our society – the qualities of loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity. These are the Brahma viharas, or divine abodes. In a way, these can be considered a goal of social action: creating a…

The Buddha said there are only two things that manifest in the mind: the arising of suffering and the ending of suffering. A pretty miserable programme if you don’t see it from the right perspective of non-grasping. Where’s the joy and happiness in that? Well, there is joy and happiness, but it’s not the joy and happiness that comes from a deluded view. True joy and happiness come from the freedom…

Do things that honour and support a good heart, and live up to that in yourself. We can begin to see more clearly and intimately the difference between good and bad, wholesome and unwholesome, not from an abstract judgmental way. Feel the difference. Whatever makes you feel whole is wholesome. Whatever makes you feel bitter, regretful, unsettled, is unwholesome. No matter what people are doing to…