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Ceramah ini membahas tentang pentingnya menjadikan Dhamma-Vinaya sebagai prioritas utama dalam kehidupan monastik dan praktik. Ajahn Ñāṇiko membuka dengan pengalaman melakukan 108 kali E.T.B. (chanting) yang awalnya sumbang namun membaik seiring waktu, yang dijadikan analogi untuk kehidupan komunitas dan latihan, termasuk pentingnya mengatasi rasa kantuk dan ketidaknyamanan demi manfaat latihan. Ia menegaskan bahwa Dhamma Vinaya adalah prioritas tertinggi, bukan menyelesaikan proyek atau hal duniawi. Vinaya melatih tubuh dan ucapan, sedangkan Dhamma melatih pikiran, dan ukuran kemajuan adalah meningkatnya kualitas bermanfaat dan menurunnya yang tidak bermanfaat. Sebagai abbot, ia membagikan lima prioritasnya: Dhamma Vinaya, menjaga latihan sendiri, keharmonisan komunitas, memberi dorongan kepada orang lain, dan menyelesaikan pekerjaan praktis. Ia menekankan bahwa keharmonisan komunitas sangat didukung oleh latihan pribadi yang baik. Selanjutnya, ia merenungkan evolusi para praktisi dari anagarika hingga bhikkhu senior, yang melalui masa sulit dan penderitaan. Ia menekankan bahwa penderitaan adalah bagian dari proses, dan kita harus bertanggung jawab atas kebahagiaan dan penderitaan kita sendiri. Mengenai pelepasan, ia menjelaskan bahwa melepaskan tidak bisa dipaksakan, melainkan muncul dari kebijaksanaan dan pemahaman akan ketidakkekalan. Ia memberikan tips praktis seperti mengambil napas dalam sebelum merespons, dan menekankan pentingnya merespons dengan terampil dalam situasi sulit. Terakhir, ia membahas bagaimana kehidupan monastik dirancang untuk 'menggali kedalaman neraka'—mengangkat masalah yang terpendam. Ia juga mengamati bahwa kondisi tempat tinggal mencerminkan kondisi pikiran, dan pentingnya menemukan keseimbangan antara kerapian dan ketegangan. Pesan utama ceramah ini adalah bahwa Dhamma-Vinaya harus menjadi prioritas utama dalam segala aspek kehidupan, dan dengan latihan yang tekun serta kebijaksanaan, kita dapat mengatasi penderitaan dan mencapai kemajuan spiritual.
It's the 25th of July, 2026, of Aguirre Monastery.
And we did 108 E.T.B. So chanting from 1 to 4 p.m.
And I thought it was an interesting kind of analogy for living in community.
And that at the first round of 27, so we would do four different rounds,
take a break in between each round, 27 rounds of E.T.B. So each time.
And then the first round was extremely out of tune.
It was some of the worst I've heard, actually.
So at the end, I went kind of, well, maybe I'll try to harmonize with as much as I can,
but it was out of tune enough that I couldn't, by bringing my chanting up or down or whatever,
I tried, it was still very out of tune.
So then, okay, let's stop quick chanting class.
Let's all get out of the way.
And then it was much better.
The chanting class worked.
And it got better.
And then by the end, we were harmonizing quite well.
But the issue with doing 108 E.T.B. So's is the voice gets ragged.
The voice box.
The voice box gets tired when you chant a lot.
I think for myself, at least mine does, I start coughing and my voice box gets very tired.
The muscles in there actually get very tired and they can't keep going.
So, but I think for people who talk a lot that they can do it longer.
Like if people just talk nonstop, then you have stronger voice box
and you can do the 108 E.T.B. So's without your voice going ragged.
So that might be a good thing.
That might be the benefit of just being someone who never stops talking.
There are benefits.
You have very, very strong voice box muscles.
But yeah, quite, I find it, it's enjoyable.
Not necessarily the whole time, but I find doing the 108 E.T.B. So's chanting is enjoyable
in terms of the benefit to practice and pushing through the kind of post-meal,
tiredness, drowsiness, and then the mind getting brighter.
And so even though the mind isn't bright at first, I found it got brighter a little bit later on.
And that is how it is also when we practice through the afternoon.
There's that kind of period of 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. where if we go back to our kuti,
the inclination will usually, at least for myself and I think probably for everybody else,
the inclination is to,
I want to lie down, take a rest, but then if we actually do put forth effort in that
post-meal period, even though it'll feel unpleasant, then we reap the results of that
later in the day where the mind becomes much more bright.
And so it's kind of the blessing of maybe in the past days, people who practiced with
Lung Por Cha, that he would push them in that way.
And then it would be unpleasant.
It would be unpleasant, but the mind became very well-trained.
And so training, it's all about training.
It's not about being tense or tight.
We say upright, not uptight.
But it's not about being tense or trying to get everything perfect, trying to get everything
just right, or hold the precepts absolutely perfectly, or even being as austere as possible.
It's not about any of that.
It's about Dhamma Vinaya.
So if we can be, it's like when the Mahaparinibbana Sutta and the Buddha's about to pass away,
who should you take as your teacher when I'm gone?
Take the Dhamma Vinaya as the teacher.
And he didn't appoint a successor, although there were various great disciples of the
Buddha over the centuries, millennia.
All of those greatest of disciples held.
that up as the teacher, the Dhamma Vinaya. So I was reflecting a couple days ago at the
morning reflection, just reflecting on what my priorities are as the current abbot of
this monastery. Very sometimes people ask, what's it like to be leading a monastery or
what's it like to be an abbot? And one is just, I try to hold it in a way that I'm not
really somebody ultra special, but just one of the members of the community that we're
all in this together. We're all disciples of the Buddha. We're all taking Dhamma Vinaya
as the teacher. But I can see that my priorities have changed in this current position that
I'm in. Because in the past, say as a junior monk and I could get involved in projects
in the monastery or something.
Or sewing or things that I enjoyed doing. And my priority would tend to be getting things
done. I would be maybe engaged in a work project, wanting to help the monastery in some way.
And we used to have these little solar systems. So before we had a bigger solar system that
we have now up the hill, we have an off-grid system up the hill that powers all sorts of
probably about...
powers about 15 kutis in a large building, the monk's utility building and so on. And
before we had that, we had these little standalone sheds. So I remember being involved in building
these little solar sheds that had little batteries in them and inverters. These kind of basic
systems that you could run some lights and whatnot at the old Black Rock kutis and at
the yurts, the lower, middle and upper yurts when they were built.
And there was one also for the old 8x8 and the 10x10 kutis, which are now the Pamoja and the
Vultures Peak kutis since they've been rebuilt. So they used to be these little standalone solar
systems just for running some lights and basic low wattage things. And I remember being involved
in building those and wanting to do a good job, wanting to...
get them done. I work on them quite a lot. So my priority at that time was getting things done.
But I can say that now, even though getting things done is nice, that's fairly low on the list.
Getting things done is fairly low on the list. And I would say the top priority is Dhamma Vinaya
and really holding the line with trying to live in a way that is in line with Dhamma Vinaya.
Dhamma meaning the...
the teachings of the Buddha. The Vinaya is the discipline.
So the Vinaya deals with body and speech. And you don't, except for one or two very,
very unlikely circumstances, you can't break a Vinaya rule with just your mind.
There has to... it has to be body or speech. So like if we have defiled thoughts or bad thoughts,
yes, we need to be able to do that. But if we have defiled thoughts, we need to be able to do that.
But that's Dhamma. So the Vinaya deals with body and speech. And the Dhamma deals with the mind.
And Dhamma Vinaya taken together is the training of body, speech, and mind.
And Dhamma practice is the training of body, speech, and mind to pull away from the unwholesome
and go toward the wholesome. And a gauge of if our Dhamma practice is working is,
if wholesome states are increasing and unwholesome states are decreasing.
And another gauge for our practice is if we have gratitude or not. And I remember kind of being
a little bit floored when Lompur V said, how do I know my practice is working? I'm grateful.
That's how I know it's working. Because if it wasn't working, I wouldn't be grateful.
So, oh yeah, right. Of course, wisdom is so obvious when you say it like that.
And gratitude can't be forced. It's not like you should be grateful. Look at what I've done for
you, keeping this monastery open. But it's not actually about keeping the monastery open.
It's about Dhamma Vinaya. So yeah, if we look at the monastery, if we look at a Bayagiri in a
worldly way, we might think, oh, wow, these facilities are worth a lot. Really, whoa, that
would be awful.
If it didn't keep running, what would happen? So if we view it in a worldly way, we might think,
yeah, we better do whatever we can to keep it running. But then that's a worldly way of looking
at it. The Dhamma way of viewing these things is Dhamma Vinaya. Let's just keep going with Dhamma
Vinaya, with the training of body, speech, and mind. Wholesome states increasing, unwholesome
states decreasing. So I would say that's like not tough.
That would be top priority, I think, for me, at least ideally. I think that's what I try to make
the top priority. And then number two would be looking after my own practice. And number three
would be communal harmony. And number two and three are connected, because I feel like if I,
if I, in a position of leadership, don't look after my own practice and make that a very high
priority, and how am I...
Using my time, am I continuing to train my own mind, my own heart? Am I kind of
continuing on in a good direction? Or is there some sort of degeneration? Is there ways that I can
adapt and change that will cause wholesome states to continue to increase
and unwholesome states to continue to decrease? So looking after my own practice and then
and I think,
for,
for any place where an abbot's not looking after their own practice, there's not going to be
communal harmony. There's a very strong correlation there. So then, but then that focus on communal
harmony, that would be next in terms of, you know, at Portland Friends of the Dhamma, that they're
asking, you know, how can, how can the lay people support an abbot in any monastery? How can lay
people support a leader in any monastery? And I said, get along with each other. If you get along
with each other, that is incredible.
supportive for, for anybody who's a leader, who's an abbot, because that becomes the biggest burden.
The biggest burden is when people are in conflict with each other. So communal harmony,
a community in harmony lives happily. And when the community is not in harmony, that can be a
big burden on the heart. So to try to do what we can to live harmoniously,
and that goes for the monastic community as well. It's not just lay people who have conflicts with
each other, the monastic community. We all live with each other day in and day out. And there's,
I've, I think a biagary is special in that it can accommodate a large range of different
personalities. And it doesn't just have to be, you know, we all, we only want anger types,
or we only want greed types. You know, it doesn't have to be either. It is a pretty good
balance here.
We only want faith types. So, but there's a wide range of different personalities
that I think it's, it, it's something we can always learn from. There's always going to be
challenges. I've heard the community life being likened, it's like the rock tumbler. So that
we tumble against each other and it breaks off all the rough edges.
And smooths out all those rough edges. So, and I think it is, it is good for wisdom,
for discernment, to be able to live with each other harmoniously. And we, we give each other
space too. We, we are alone together in that we do find time to go back to our kutis, practice
sitting, sitting meditation, walking meditation, or just even if we're not doing engaged in some
sort of formal practice, at least carving out space, a good chunk of space,
every day to be on our own. That's important. I would say next on the priority list probably is
encouraging others or trying to help others, trying to help others, whether it's looking after
senior monks or, or looking or helping to encourage the newer members of the community.
The lay people, I would say that that number four on the list is giving encouragement to others.
And then number five is getting stuff done.
So number five would be getting stuff done, getting practical things done and getting stuff
done is still important. You know, we rely on the work monk and the community and to get stuff done
to fix water lines. We had this earthquake and the water line broke in various places.
The earthquake also helped our water system and that it caused all of our springs to just start
gushing with water. And it caused the,
the creeks to rise up and somehow it pushed some water from deep underground into all the
springs at this area, which is nice. And the neighbors are also experiencing the benefits of
that. I haven't thought further than five. I was trying to think what is, what would six, seven,
eight, nine, 10 be. But, uh, I think that's, that's the top five priorities,
for the time being. But Dhamma Vinaya is, is all important. It's so important to be looking after
our own practice. And over time, as we practice, there's a maturation or a evolution that takes
place. And that's quite special to see it happening. And in just three days, we're going to
have a summoner ordination and I can watch the evolution of the Anagarikas.
And starting out, they're kind of, you know, bumbling along and tripping over themselves and
falling face first in the gravel. And I mean, not literally, but figuratively.
And, uh, and then watching them become stronger is quite gratifying. And, and now practicing our,
the, the chanting, the ordination procedure for novices, the Papaja, the going forth,
practicing that on a daily basis. And,
and seeing it come together and seeing that they're very ready to become novices.
And there is this progression that happens. And it doesn't just happen though, for the monastics.
It also happens for lay people who live here for a longer period of time. They go through a monastic
style path as well. So there is this evolution that happens and to even to make it through an
Anagarika year is considered extremely difficult. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and,
and it's no small thing. It's no small feat to keep those eight precepts and keep them well.
And, and then for people who become novices, it's no small thing to make it through that novice year.
And people who become bhikkhus, it's no small thing to make it up through the ranks through
Majima, Tara. So middling monk would be, we call Navika as the new monk, which is zero to five.
And then Majima is,
five to 10 and then 10 is a Tara or elder and you get to 20 and then that's
Maha Tara or a great elder. And then above that, it's,
it differs on the individual, usually about 30 Vasas,
you get called Lungpa. And then from there,
it was like a Lungpa Damrong, he said, he's called Lungpu now.
And in his talk, the senior Lungpa Damrong, he said,
now people call him Lungpu, which means he's almost dead.
So when you're really old,
then you'll get called Lungpu as a monk.
But there is this, this evolution and
see certain patterns and difficulties and sufferings that people go through.
And for myself in say the position I'm in now,
I wish people,
people didn't have to suffer as Anagarikas as novices as Nubukus.
I wish they didn't have to suffer.
I wish I could do something to lessen their suffering,
but they just have to go through it. They just have to go through it.
That's just the way it is. And they will learn from it.
Hopefully learn a lot from it.
I remember one monk who was he was two Vasas and
he like wrote something in his journal one time. He,
ended up leaving the monkhood at eight vases, but he remembers being two vases and thinking to
himself, never forget how difficult this is, and never forget how difficult this particular period
of time is in one, two vases. And it just, it stirs up the old kamas, it stirs up the defilements,
it stirs up all the baggage. So one way to think of this is dredging the depths of hell
and that's one way to think about ordination. It's not at all just like these Thai cutesy
novices that you see, like these cute little cartoons of kind of very happy monks and novices
and they're all smiling and loving each other. Well, hopefully we're not hating each other either,
but like it's not at all like that. It's, yes, perhaps there is this,
this idealized version of the kind of cutesy monks and novices, just, just always happy,
always smiling, never a bit of suffering, but actually it's, it is really like being in the
trenches. And as Ajah Mahabu would say, it's like Mara's trying to mow you down with a machine gun
all the time and you're just doing what you can to survive. That's, that's more what it's like
in the lived way. But then over time,
it's, it's amazing. There's this brightening and, and evolution. I love that word evolution.
And we start to take responsibility for our practice and take responsibility for our own
suffering and our happiness. And then we start to see, oh yeah, that I have a say in this. I can
do something about this. I can do something about this suffering that I'm experiencing. It's not
just coming from somebody else. It's not just coming from the community members,
sitting next to me, who's eating lettuce too loud every day. And he's doing it again and he's doing
it just to make me angry. So it's, it's actually is coming from myself. It actually is coming
from the inside. And it's, it might seem like it's coming from somebody else. It might seem
like the suffering is coming from outside, but it is, nobody can actually make us suffer in a,
on an ultimate sense. Nobody can actually make us,
experience suffering. It's really the way we're reacting to situations. So when we say letting go,
and it's also not a good thing to say to somebody else, by the way, don't say just let go.
If you see somebody suffering, just let go. What are you doing? Just let go. We can't just let go
by an act of will. It takes wisdom, wisdom, and the insight into impermanence. Only then can we
start to drop things. If we use an act of will to let go, or we try to will ourselves into happiness
or will ourselves into the end of suffering, we're not going to be able to do that. We're not going
to be able to do that. We're not going to be able to do that. We're not going to be able to do that.
The mind might temporarily achieve that, but it's just going to jump to something else. It's just
going to grab something else. So, so don't say just let go. Don't say, just be mindful to your
friend. That's, uh, that's not a good thing to say. But letting go is more like skillful response.
So how do we skillfully respond when we get criticized? How do we skillfully respond
when our coworker or family member,
or parent or kid criticizes us or does something unpleasant or pushes our buttons?
How do we respond? So it's skillful response using mindfulness as an awareness for skillful
response and the heart that starts to develop wisdom through the insight into uncertainty and
impermanence through the practice. As we mature into that, as we evolve into that,
and we'll find more and more, we're able to respond skillfully with a wholesome mental state.
And when the mind is very wholesome and we don't put up that unwholesome resistance to situations
that are unpleasant, then it can become like spiritual Aikido or spiritual Qigong, where we
can diffuse situations very quickly, or we can, we can move in a way that will not exacerbate a
situation.
And there's also kind of,
of tips pro tips we can use we we develop little tips and tricks over time as we practice one is
just if if something unpleasant happens or somebody stirs us up just one deep breath before responding
before having that knee-jerk response it is just just a and then respond and that can really
diffuse a situation so if we experience some sort of suffering in the monastery it's also
normal for people to feel very good when they come to the monastery at first and then
the monastery longer than to think that perhaps the defilements have increased
that's a very common experience very normal experience and that's good the monastery is
designed to dredge the depths of hell dredge these things up so we're here to really see things that
we've just swept under the rug or sometimes it's to the point where we have to look at it because
we have to look at it because we have to look at it because we have to look at it because we have
We've, like one of these cartoons where they sweep something under the rug so much
that there's just this giant bulge in the rug,
and it's better to just lift it up, look at it, see what's there.
Ajahn Chah would say that if you wanted to know somebody's mind,
you don't have to have psychic powers, but you just peek into their kuti,
peek into their dwelling place, and you'll see their mind.
And sometimes people might have a very,
the kuti or the dwelling place might be very messy,
so there's that sense of just maybe ignoring things
or not really wanting to deal with things, wanting to just push things away.
Or the dwelling place might be very clean, but everything's just stuffed into cabinets.
You go and open a cabinet, and it's just absolutely jam-packed.
And so it's just kind of pushing things down, just repressing things,
not really dealing with things.
Or it might go into a kuti, and it's just,
two.
It's too neat.
Everything is in perfectly sized cubes that were measured with a tape measure.
All the clothing is in a perfectly measured cube,
and it's like stacks in decreasing order of height,
and that might show that there's some tension.
It's not just right.
It's beyond just right.
It's too tense.
It's too perfect.
So finding that balance, finding that subtle balance,
of ease and well-being and peace,
where things are pleasing and nice and functional
and beautiful and useful
in a way that helps the mind to become more wholesome
and less unwholesome.
So Dhamma Vinaya includes all these qualities,
kindness, generosity, patience.
There's all these different qualities that the Buddha talks about in the Dhamma teachings.
And we need to be cultivating all of these.
Faith, goodwill, compassion.
All of these qualities that will help us to mature as practitioners as time goes on.
So I'll leave that as some reflections this evening.