It’s Because Things Can’t Be Fixed…

Ajahn Sucitto

It’s Because Things Can’t Be Fixed…

Tonight some of you have dedicated the chanting to your departed relatives.

You did it voluntarily: there has been no instruction to do that. What makes it something so natural and spontaneous that you overcome whatever self-consciousness may be there to write down a dedication with your name on it and put it right up here? What gives you the authority to do that? Where does that come from?

When you really touch into what is very important, you can move forward with courage and faith. You are not doubting. You are not thinking, ‘I don’t want to disturb anybody by asking for a dedication. Is it right? Is it proper? I don’t want to take up your valuable time.’ Where is your strength? You see how much strength there is in us, in the quality of compassion – the great heart.

I don’t think anybody is expecting a dedication to bring their mother back from death. What is important is to bring forth one’s great heart, and other people help us to do that.

…Those dedications are the indication of how absolutely necessary it is for us to be able to find a way to express our compassion. And it’s not just for the other person, although that’s certainly the aim, but in your compassion you become grand, big, large, rich, fruitful, skilful.

Suddenly, everything starts to click. It’s not panic. It’s not even trying to make things better. There’s nothing we could do that would bring these people back from death. We may delay it, but there’s nothing we could do that would prevent each other dying. Compassion is not to ‘fix’ things. It’s because things can’t be fixed that we experience compassion.

Of course, we may very well act upon that to cherish, to nourish, to support, to do what we can. But the most important thing is to experience compassion and to be able to present it. Then we are finding ourselves in a relationship that is really worthy of us and brings forth our strength, our grandeur, our beauty. When you are filled with that, there are things that you would do that you would not do from any other basis, efforts you would make that you would not make on another account, things you would give up that you would not give up otherwise: you would give up your time, you would give up your precious sleep!

That’s a very powerful quality for us.

This reflection by Ajahn Sucitto is from the book, The Most Precious Gift, (pdf) pp. 406, 408.

An Elephant Is Like…

Ajahn Thiradhammo

An Elephant Is Like…

The Buddha relates a story of a king who had all the people in his realm who were born blind assembled together and introduced to an elephant. The king then asked them what an elephant was like. ‘Those blind people who had been shown the head of the elephant replied, “An elephant, your majesty, is just like a water jar.” Those blind people who had been shown the ear of the elephant replied, “An el…

Saccanurak

Ajahn Jayasaro

Saccanurak

I read something in a book about the Jatakas the other day that really struck me. In the Jatakas, the bodhisatta, the Buddha-to-be, through his countless number of lives throughout the myriad realms and different kinds of birth, broke every kind of precept except for one. The Buddha-to-be never told a lie or spoke a mistruth. There is no Jataka story, as far as I am aware, where you find the bodhi…

One Thing We Can Do Right Now

Ajahn Sumedho

One Thing We Can Do Right Now

Those who live in awakened awareness see the suffering of others but do not create additional sorrow around it. We acknowledge the contact with this human experience of life’s inevitable suffering and the questions that immediately arise: what can we do about it? How should we regard this? The answer of course is mindfulness. With mindfulness, we feel what is impinging on our mind as unpleasant or…

Conducive to Reconciliation

Ayyā Medhānandī

Conducive to Reconciliation

Across the globe, political and religious extremists are spreading terror and causing trauma through increasingly desperate acts of violence. The typical response is more of the same – reprisal following aggression – whether between nations, families, or individuals. What happens on the outside goes on within us, too, and the spiral of hatred escalates. Where does it stop? Though we may feel power…

An Impeccable Mind

Ajahn Viradhammo

An Impeccable Mind

These precepts point to a sense of impeccability as the standard of the spiritual life. The ethical teachings encourage us to understand the laws of the land and to support those laws, because if we don’t, who will? This is our commitment to community. It is not just taking the easy way out or just going with the popular mood of the day: ‘Well, everyone else is taking things off the back of the lo…

“Yes, I Am, But I’m Not"

Ajahn Chah

“Yes, I Am, But I’m Not"

Power, possessions, status, praise, happiness and suffering - these are the worldly dhammas. These worldly dhammas engulf worldly beings. Worldly beings are led around by the worldly dhammas: gain and loss, acclaim and slander, status and loss of status, happiness and suffering. These dhammas are trouble makers; if you don’t reflect on their true nature, you will suffer. People even commit murder…

The Slippery Mind

Ajahn Sundara

The Slippery Mind

‘Buddha’ means ‘one who is awake’. But being awake is not easy to talk about. As soon as we start speaking, we complicate everything. We enter another field of understanding, which is the intellect. Looking at the mind, dealing with the mind, is slippery business. We have at our disposal an array of tools and skilful means to liberate the mind, but they are competing with the incredible complexiti…

Skillful Contentment

Ajahn Jayasaro

Skillful Contentment

Buddhism teaches contentment. But if everyone was content with their life, how would human progress ever be achieved? Virtues taught by the Buddha are to be understood within the overall context of his path to awakening. Whenever the Buddha spoke about contentment, he paired it with an energetic quality such as diligence, persistence or industriousness. He was careful to make clear that contentmen…

Mindfulness, The True Monarch

Ajahn Sucitto

Mindfulness, The True Monarch

Mindfulness is sometimes likened to a monarch. This monarch is surveying, supervising, impartial, aware, connected. They are not pulling, not struggling, not trying to hold things, not arrogant. It is the true monarch – the true king or queen. The false monarchs are the inner tyrant who keeps bullying you and the braggart who becomes cocksure when they get a little bit of something good. Mindfulne…