Abhayagiri Talks

Ajahn Pasanno explains in more detail Ajahn Chah's simple description of the Buddha's teaching: "know, and let go." The refuges and precepts help lay a foundation for simplifying and relinquishment. Knowing things in their true light allows the mind to let go more easily.  Right view, both mundane (cause and effect) and transcendent (the Four Noble Truths), is the source of the other Eightfold Path factors. Like a cutting from sugar cane, whatever grows from it is sweet, delicious and satisfying. This talk was offered on August 11, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

Ajahn Pasanno reminds us that the vassa is a time for formal meditation practice and traditionally a time to develop the qualities of one who is peaceful. This is done by using two essential tools in meditation: vitakka vicāra—directed thought and evaluation—and right view. He encourages us to lift up in the mind either the meditation object in samatha practice or the subject of investigation in vipassanā practice. He refers to Sāriputta's list of five things that assist right view in liberating the heart: silā, sutta or learning, sākacchā, samatha, and vipassanā. This talk was offered on August 3, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

Ajahn Jotipālo recounts some stories and suttas involving his favorite disciple of the Buddha, Anuruddha. The three teachings directed to Anuruddha involve the eight thoughts of a great person. These are: "This dhamma is for one who is content, solitary, energetic, mindful, concentrated, wise, and who delights in nonproliferation." Special attention is given to the last one, since even with Anuruddha's expansive mind states and divine eye, he was still hindered by proliferation. This talk was offered on July 30, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

Ajahn Sucitto describes how the process of papañca (objectification, see MN 18) transforms initially holistic sense impressions into abstract nouns such as the future, other people, and me. Without skill and awareness, the resulting loss of empathy leads to internal dissociation from our experience and external disconnection from others. Ajahn Sucitto goes on to relate this process to racism, mistreatment of animals, and the massively skewed distribution the world's wealth. He concludes by telling a profound experience of connection he had while traveling Tibet. This talk was offered on April 22, 2016 at Prasada in Occidental and replayed at Abhayagiri on August 6, 2016.

Ajahn Pasanno contemplates our tendency to see a huge divide between sukkha (pleasure, happiness) and dukkha (pain, suffering). He reflects how often we are like children, who see the feeling of the moment, whether sukkah or dukkha, as something permanent and unchangeable, when in fact there is a very permeable wall between the two that we can move through – or really, beyond – if we practice with discernment and diligence. This talk was offered on July 27, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

As the vassa and vinaya study begin, Ajahn Jotipalo asks, "what is the training of a samaṇa or practitioner?" He uses the analogy of sewing robes to describe the training: confidence in the teacher's instructions, trial and error, evaluation, practice over the longer term. He discusses the Buddha's list of training for a recluse (MN 39): conscience about ones own behavior and its effects on others, sense restraint, moderation in eating, wakefulness, mindfulness, abandonment of hindrances, the jhanas, and wisdom leading to arahantship. This talk was offered on July 23, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

On the Āsāḷhā Puja night commemorating the Buddha's first teaching after enlightenment, Luang Por Pasanno urges us to engage this most important teaching on the 4 Noble Truths with a heart of faith and to investigate the experience of the arising and cessation of dukka. This teaching is the essence of how we all can be liberated. It is the Middle Way of practice and training and and the Middle way of view. Luang Por Pasanno suggests we use the experience of dukka to challenge our assumptions about suffering and ask: is craving or ignorance functioning here? He discusses the qualities of heart which can accomplish the cessation of suffering: relinquishment, release, giving away, shedding. This talk was offered on July 19, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

As the community prepares to enter into the vassa, a period of deeper practice, Ajahn Pasanno reflects on a section of the Buddha's discourse on Mindfulness of Breathing (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.118.than.html). He uses a simile of two types of trees in the monastery's forest to show us how, with the breath as an anchor, we can use our thoughts skillfully as tools of meditation (vitakka and vicara). This talk was offered on July 16, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

Ajahn Pasanno reflects on samatha and vipassana not so much as types of meditation practices but as factors of mind that can and should be cultivated at all times. He reminds us that the result of meditation is not to perfect a technique but to arrive at a state where one can see the distinction between the objects of mind and true mind itself. This talk was offered on July 9, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.

On American Independence Day Ajahn Pasanno reflects on the difference between a conventional idea of freedom – to be able to get and to have things – and a fundamental truth of the Buddha's teachings – that liberation comes from the deep understanding that all things are impermanent. This talk was offered on July 4, 2016 at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery.