The teachings of Phra Ajaan Lee

The teachings of Phra Ajaan Lee

I was very ardent in my efforts to practice meditation that rainy season, but there were times I couldn’t help feeling a little discouraged because all my teachers had left me. 

Occasionally I’d think of disrobing, but whenever I felt this way there’d always be something to bring me back to my senses.

One day, for instance, at about five in the evening, I was doing walking meditation, but my thoughts had strayed toward worldly matters. A woman happened to walk past the monastery, improvising a song—’I’ve seen the heart of the tyd tyy bird: It’s mouth is singing, tyd tyy, tyd tyy, but its heart is out looking for crabs’ — so I memorized her song and repeated it over and over, telling myself, ‘It’s you she’s singing about. Here you are, a monk, trying to develop some virtue inside yourself, and yet you let your heart go looking for worldly matters.’ 

I felt ashamed of myself. I decided that I’d have to bring my heart in line with the fact that I was a monk if I didn’t want the woman’s song to apply to me. The whole incident thus turned into Dhamma.

A number of other events also helped to keep me alert. One night when the moon was bright, I made an agreement with one of the other monks that we’d go without sleep and do sitting and walking meditation. 

(That rainy season there were six of us altogether, five monks and one novice. I had made a resolution that I’d have to do better than all the rest of them. 

For instance, if any of them were able to get by on only ten mouthfuls of food a day, I’d have to get by on eight. If any of them could sit in meditation for three hours straight, I’d have to sit for five. 

If any of them could do walking meditation for an hour, I’d have to walk for two. 

I felt this way about everything we did, and yet it seemed that I was able to live up to my resolution. This was a secret I kept to myself.)

At any rate, that night I told my friend, ‘Let’s see who’s better at doing sitting and walking meditation.’ So we agreed, ‘When I do walking meditation, you do sitting meditation; and when I do sitting meditation, you do walking meditation. Let’s see who can last longer.’ When it came my turn to do walking meditation, my friend went to sit in a hut next to the path where I was walking. 

Not too long afterwards, I heard a loud thud coming from inside the hut, so I stopped to open the window and peek in. Sure enough, there he was, lying on his back with his folded legs sticking up in the air. He had been sitting in full lotus position, gotten sleepy, and had simply fallen backwards and gone to sleep. 

I was practically dropping off to sleep myself, but had kept going out of the simple desire to win. I felt embarrassed for my friend’s sake—’I’d hate to be in his place,’ I thought—but at the same time was pleased I had won.

All of these things served to teach me a lesson: ‘This is what happens to people who aren’t true in what they do.’

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From The Autobiography of Phra Ajaan Lee, translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu

https://www.dhammatalks.org/.../AutobioAjaa.../Contents.html

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If you’re going to be competing with other people, compete in being virtuous, compete in being generous, in having conviction, in being wise. 

Ajaan Lee tells a story about when he was a young monk competing with his other young monk friends to see who could sit longer in meditation, who could walk longer in meditation, who could do with less food. 

It may seem kind of childish but it did develop good qualities. He eventually got over the need to be competitive, to measure himself against other people, but when you live in society it’s hard not to measure yourself against other people. 

So learn to measure yourself in terms of the right standards.

There’s another passage where Ananda is talking to a nun and says: “We’re practicing this practice to overcome conceit, but conceit has its uses.” ^1

You see that other people are practicing and you say: “They are human beings. I’m a human being. They can do it. I can do it.” 

So as long as there’s going to be conceit in your mind—i.e., the idea that you define yourself in a certain way and you define yourself against other people in a certain way—try to use standards that are wise. 

Look in terms of generosity, virtue, conviction, discernment. 

At the very least be your own best friend in terms of your values and try to keep those values clear and articulate so that you notice when you’re deviating from them. 

So that even though we’re living here in a land of wrong views, you try to create an island of right views around yourself.

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In the Land of Wrong View by Thanissaro Bhikkhu 

https://www.dhammatalks.org/.../ePubDham.../Section0032.html

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Note 1:

“‘This body comes into being through conceit. And yet it is by relying on conceit that conceit is to be abandoned.’ 

Thus it was said. And in reference to what was it said? 

There is the case, sister, where a monk hears, ‘The monk named such-&-such, they say, through the ending of the effluents, has entered & remains in the effluent-free awareness-release & discernment-release, having directly known & realized them for himself right in the here & now.’ 

The thought occurs to him, ‘The monk named such -&- such, they say, through the ending of the effluents, has entered & remains in the effluent - free awareness - release & discernment - release, having directly known & realized them for himself right in the here & now. Then why not me?’ 

 Then, at a later time, he abandons conceit, having relied on conceit. ‘This body comes into being through conceit. And yet it is by relying on conceit that conceit is to be abandoned.’ Thus it was said, and in reference to this was it said.

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"Bhikkhuni Sutta: The Nun" (AN 4.159), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu at https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN4_159.html

Photo from 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-uRIEAwrLo