Interview with Ajahn Brahm
You seem to be fluent in Polish, have you ever been to Poland?
Ah, I have been not in this life, except in YouTube.
To be somewhere you don't need to be there physically anymore.
Do you have any relatives or any ancestors from Poland, that you know of?
Not that I know of.
But I remember... I still remember his name, from my primary school - Jerzy Suchocki (?)
Does that sound Polish?
One more time?
Jerzy Suchocki (?)
That's a six or seven year old how they pronounce his name. But he was from Poland.
Oh, did you play soccer with him?
Yeah!
Would you like to come to Poland?
My likes and dislikes are not part of the equation...
These days I have to do what is possible.
The Theravada Foundation that I represent, maybe we can send you an official invitation?
Yes, you can send an official invitation, but I just even couple of days ago
had a very strong invitation to go over to Vietnam, and I said I can't do that, because there are just too many invitations.
What they said was that: "Oh please, all your books are very popular over there
and there's lots of people who would really benefit from your teachings..."
And I think that's what you would ask me as well
So can you tell us how did Bodhinyana started?
It started when we were desperate for a cup of coffe!
We were looking at some piece of land quite a distance from here,
and on the way back we passed the real estate agent and the real estate agent here in Byford, close by,
the last time we went to ask if anything was there he gave us a cup of coffee.
So it was just trying to get a cup of coffee.
So when we had a cup of coffee and one of his friends was there, who said:
I remember this piece of land they could not sell a few years ago, no one wanted it,
and that migh be just the place for you. And of course it was!
So this is very good, anyone in business please understand that if you give your clients just a cup of coffe,
it's really good for business, especially with two Buddhist monks,
coming by, looking for something. So anyway, it's called the law of kamma.
You help other people then you get good rewards back.
So anyway there we were looking for land, so we've got this place,
and no one else wanted it and we couldn't afford it, which usually happens
and so we made an offer which should have been refused because it was way under what was asked for.
But the person there, he was an old fellow, he could not find his sheep and cows when they grazed here,
because it was just too hilly.
There were too many places here you can just escape and hide.
And that's perfect for what we were looking for so we got it, but that was the start of our problems.
Because we had no money, in fact we were in debt, and no places to stay.
It was just an empty land... Great for cows and kangaroos, but not for people.
So the first day I came here, I could not find where I'd put my place to stay so I slept under a tree.
Literally, no blankets, no pillows, nothing, just on the ground.
So just like the good old days we started from the very basics.
Little by little, we worked very hard, it was always one brick at a time.
We never had great plans how's it gonna be in the future.
In fact we just had a bit of money, we did some work and then we built little by little.
After many many years I think one of the first things that people found out that we were serious.
We weren't just gonna come in and then just disappear.
We were in this for the long term, so that's one of the reasons
why even the first buildings we build were really solid.
We could have got tents and caravans but that would be giving the wrong impression.
That meant that people after a while they realized that: "Yeah, these monks are gonna stay here".
We started giving teachings as well, and meditating.
It wasn't just teachings and meditating, it was just how we live those teachings in our life.
That we're actually practicing them and that impressed people.
So little by little we managed to build up a community here.
And then came Jhana Grove?
Jhana Grove, yeah because we did have some people meditating but the problem was
that here you have the monastic life as well and it could not be a meditation center
and monastery at the same time because there's other little things that we have to do like giving interviews,
which would disturb meditation center and you know our little ceremonies which we have to do.
And they're beautiful, the way that you may have seen that we have our lunch here.
Which is inspiring and quite often you ask them: "Why do you do this?" and they say:
"Because we get so much inspiration and joy out of this".
And it answers a question why is it that like with other monks, we could be self-sufficient.
We could just grow some gardens and cook our own food but that's missing out on something,
the connection and the beautiful act of generosity, of giving and receiving,
which makes this Theravadan system to work.
So we don't put up... well we've got a wall, but gates are always open. We don't seclude ourselves and have nothing to do
with the lay community and we come in for some times during the day to connect.
Which I think is very beautiful way of the Buddha set that we should depend upon the generosity of laypeople.
It also means there is the sense of...
if we don't provide a good service, if we are not good monks then people won't feed us.
So it's a little like a safety mechanism that if you misbehave then you'll get very thin.
Because we're doing such a good job that's why I'm very fat, it's just what you can expect.
So Jhana Grove?
So we wanted a meditation retreat center and so again, saw a nice place over there, and again as we collected some money for it,
again never enough, we bought the land and then later on we decided, yeah, let's build a retreat center.
And as usual, getting permissions and getting this and getting that it was just never enough funds.
I said "What the heck, let's just do it!" and the funds came right along.
As they normally do, at the last minute because I remember just looking after that,
and just getting this huge bill for about three or four hundred thousand dollars
"How the heck I'm gonna pay for that? Impossible!"
But then a bit of asking around here and asking around there borrowing from this and borrowing from that
we managed to actually get enough to pay the builder.
It was very tight at the last moment, but even the process was very beautiful.
Lastly just to have the ambience of the place.
Nice and peaceful little Island surrounded by forest, and if you look at the aerial picture,
you can understand that it's an island of an open area and just forest on all sides.
And it has got beautiful Feng Shui nice views over the ocean, it's a very peaceful place, people love it there.
And then was Dhammasara?
Dhammasara that was the next thing that we had though: "Where are the women?"
It doesn't make any sense to me and it's also the fact that these days,
actually even the old days there was still equity and fairness.
Is it's not just a modern movement even in the time of the Buddha:
"May all beings be happy and well" - you know it's always all beings it's not just men,
it's not just Asians, it's not just the healthy, strong beings, it's all beings!
There's a lot of little idea there that you should never
discriminate according to gender, sexual orientation or even just health or age.
If the person can do it, obviously give him a chance.
So because of that I decided it should really as much as possible
open the doors to all beings and with that came the the idea of
just knowing in tradition there has always been the case whenever there is a women's community
alongside of men's community, it was always men who dominated.
We didn't want that to happen, we just wanted the women to prove,
that they could do whatever the men could do, so give them their own community,
and they've really lived up to my hopes and given their own little community.
It's also at the same time it means that this place is the south of Perth, south of the city.
The Dhammasara nun's monastery is to the east of the city
so we're spreading ourselves around,
so we can serve the greater part of the community in Perth.
With Dhammasara it was just building the place first of all and then the again the next part was
the ordination of the nuns, which was resisted by the narrow parts of Buddhism.
And I will not say by the traditionalists because what I always say
I am a traditionalist Theravada buddhist.
When you quote that from the earliest texts you know what the Buddha would do and how the Buddha set up everything.
I'm more fundamentalist so I go back there and justify everything.
The other ones are just pandering to parts of Buddhism,
or rather culture which came much later, not the time of the Buddha.
What they think is tradition, actually just lasts for 200, 300, 400, 500 years
So that was wonderful to have the bhikkhuni ordination here and that made a lot of people even more inspired and respect Theravada Buddhism.
We were showing leadership in areas which needed leadership, especially to have equity and respect for all genders.
So can you say that this Buddhist monastery and the BSWA is the avant-garde of the Theravada?
No, we're just so traditional, harking back to the original teachings of the Buddha.
By doing so it's fascinating that it is regarded as avant-garde,
it's regarded as progressive is regarded as respecting modern times.
It's respecting modern times and ancient times!
Compassion has got no age limits, it's not fashionable in one area and unfashionable in another area
Meditation just works, no matter what sexual orientation what age, or anything.
So the heart of Buddhism is timeless,
ageless, beyond fashion. It's just basic kindness, compassion.
So you can say by going back to the early stage you're actually moving forward?
Exactly!
Bhante, you had some problems with with the ordination can you describe how it was?
The ordination there was just reactions to the ordination, and so you did get it...
The word was at the time can't be called excommunicated, that's what they thought it was.
Because that's not done according to the the rule of the Vinaya
Some people call it expulsion but these days I call it "liberated",
from sort of a group which was well-meaning but really not well informed.
They're living their tiny world because of that I think little by little they start to see that's not really a tenable way
to live their life and to make Buddhism popular
which is part of our job. Budha said to go and by the same way for the benefit and happiness of all living beings.
Maybe we can talk a little bit about meditation?
Yes.
You've been giving so many stories so I'll give a short story.
There was a Polish monk in 2011, he went to your retreat and he tried really hard to get the jhānas.
You probably have heard so many stories like that, and at the end of the retreat
he was like: "I'm a failure", classic right?
You're welcome into Western psychology.
Right, then he went back to the kuṭi in his monastery and just sat there and just
Gave up...
Gave up and then he saw breath in the body and that was a very good meditation.
But the question is - because you, Bhante, you are teaching the jhānas,
I call it classical jhānas, which is like nimitta and no senses.
In Kāyagatāsati Sutta in Majjhima Nikāya
there is this passage were there are jhānas and they are in the body you might say...
But they use the word body but it's the same as Ānāpānasati
the breath, but when you go deep into the meditation
you're not watching the breath anymore, you know, you're watching the pīti-sukha
just a joy, you're watching the citta and then liberating all of these things.
There are some times that people need to really get their heads around Pāḷi.
And also all of the idioms and often actually caught, made sort of comparisons
I don't know much about Polish but with English and the crazy idioms they have in English.
It rained cats and dogs, so that means in England you get a big shower
and all these kittens and these puppies and these dogs come down from the sky.
Of course it doesn't mean that because the word means different things in different contexts.
There is one of the things which comes up,
because it was a crossword puzzle the other day, you have the word "thrush" - what is thrush?
It's a bird and it's also a disease of the throat. So they are different context it means totally different things.
So that's why that sometimes the word "kaya" and it's something which has totally different meanings in different contexts.
I've talked to many people who were having a good meditation and their base was body.
The thing is and this is me talking from a compassionate point of view,
that they might strive really hard to get the classical jhānas...
... but they are getting nowhere.
People are just...we're almost brainwashed into thinking that to get anywhere you have to strive.
Now it's the case that even the history of Buddhism should actually give you some examples of that, some indication.
There was Siddhattha Gautama, six years striving getting nowhere, just getting frustrated.
Almost about to give up and part of the striving was just being really the tough-guy.
And so he decided to eat properly and just become a bit more compassionate to his body.
And then his friends thought he just given up.
He stopped striving and that's actually where that he found his other path that Middle Way.
It wasn't about striving, it was about using the wisdom power and the kindness power.
And that is so important because it's a striving which actually stops you
attaining those jhānas, that is a problem, striving, because to strive, you're under control.
The jhānas you have to let go
Two totally different paths and the problem is that people are just scared of letting go.
We think: I'll just fall asleep, or everything will fall apart,
oh my mind will be all over the place and so you know they let go and it does go all over the place
to start off with, you do get lazy to start off with, but carry on, wait for a little while.
See what happens. I mean that's all the teachers used to say that.
Ajahn Chah he'd wave his hand up and down like this and say this is a leaf on a tree.
It only moves because of the wind. If the wind stop it wouldn't stop straight away.
It will just take some time and then it'll become perfectly still.
That's the nature of the human mind: it's if you want something that's the wind.
Craving, wanting, in fact craving is far too hard a word, usually like wanting.
Desire, even if it is something good, that causes our mind to move.
So you don't get anything except frustration.
But if you can have the courage to let go and part of letting go is kindness, loving kindness, metta,
compassion, just open the door of your heart to what is happening now
and just after a little while the mind stops, becomes very still.
When that becomes still, it's from stillness you get disappearing, that's the cause of no desire, stillness, things disappear.
One of the things which disappear of course is your five senses,
with your body so you close your eyes and sight disappears smell, taste easier to let go of.
And the physical feelings of the body and sound those are two hardest.
Physical feelings of the body and just by a lot of time, using the breath
is one of the best ways, doesn't have to be the breath. Sometimes you can let go of the body.
Allow it to be so still but also the breath is one of best ways.
Cause you focus on the breath that's all you've got,
can't find anything else in your body until eventually once the breaths gets
very soft that disappears as well. And that's why even the Buddha said that
the thing which can block getting into the first jhāna is sound.
Just because it is that defense mechanism put into our mind that if we always warned
of the approaching tiger or the snake through the slither of the leaves in the forest.
It's always the sound which is our last form of defense.
And it's sound which can take us out of coma, which can actually wake us up from the sleep.
That's why we have the bells and they ding-ding-ding for fire alarms.
So because of that, it's really clear to me that
to be a jhāna, the five senses have to vanish.
It's not about will, because if you're willing if you're doing something, you're trying. That doesn't work.
Just to make it clear if people who have... they claim that they have jhāna
and the body is the base, you would say it's upacāra samādhi?
Not even that! It's just nice feeling, nice, pleasant and peaceful.
Calm, pleasant, but it's not the jhānas
I think it's Ajahn Brahmali said - and he follows my teachings or Buddhist teachings I would say,
and to say that: "Ah, you are just making it too hard for others, you should be more compassionate!"
But look, you can't sort of say like "enlightenment".
Like anything is enlightenment or anything is a stream winner
That's missing the point, you can't say an aircraft is a bird.
There is an aircraft flying in over at the moment.
You have to be truthful and it's not making things difficult for people it's actually making things possible.
And it works after a while because the problem is now that
for years many people just stopped even talking about jhānas.
They thought it wasn't necessary and monks like myself come along,
saying: "it's really necessary" now you show that it's really necessary to have jhānas.
to get stages of enlightenment. And now at least people who understood:
"yeah it's part of the Eightfold Path, you can check it out for yourself it's necessary".
Now that we've managed to win that sort of battle, that this is really important,
everybody's coming onto the bandwagon say: "Yeah, jhānas are necessary, I've got jhānas!"
I mentioned that I went to two very prominent teachers in the United States and they wanted a talk to me.
"I thought you were the vipassana junkies?" they said: "No, no, because our teachers now confirm that jhānas are necessary,
and so we're talking about jhāna LITE".
That was the first time I'd heard that. What it really is is just accepting the jhānas are necessary
but lowing the bar to something is really not.
You can't do that, it's just both intellectual dishonesty but it's also
it's not treating the people you're teaching with respect.
Of course you can do it, but eventually just you find that trying to get there, wanting it,
that's the obstacle! So what you do instead?
You just sit here and let go, and have the patience to actually let it happen.
Don't get frustrated because that's more self, more me: "I'm a failure, I'm great, I'm hopeless, I'm better"
That's the sort of stuff which forms the basis of letting go.
Simple things like kindness, compassion, beautiful basic teachings of the Buddha.
Be kind to yourself, and kindness is a part of letting go, and everything starts to happen.
You get very peaceful and people attain these things, when they stop trying.
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