How to always be at peace (Ajahn Chah)

Ajahn Chah (ajahnchah.org) via Ven. Sujato, Ellie Askew, Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly —

If only we could hold "mind" in hand!

Some people complain, "I can't meditate! I'm too restless! Whenever I sit down I think of this and that... I can't do it! I've got too much bad karma. I should use up my bad karma first then come back and try meditating."

Sure, just try it. Try using up your bad karma... This is how people think. Why do they think like this? These so called hindrances are the things we must study. Whenever we sit, the mind immediately wanders and goes running off.

We follow it and try to bring it back and observe it once more... Then it goes off again. This is what we're supposed to be studying.

Most people refuse to learn their lessons from nature...like a naughty schoolboys who refuse to do their homework. They don't want to see the mind changing. How are we going to develop insight-wisdom?

We have to live with change like this. When we know that the mind is just this way, constantly changing, when we know that this is its nature, we will understand it.

We have to know when the mind is thinking well and ill, changing all the time. The good, the bad, we have to know these things. If we understand this point then, even while we are thinking, we can be at peace.

For example, suppose at home we had a pet monkey. Monkeys don't stay still for long, They like to jump around and grab onto things and cling to them. That's how monkeys are.

Then we come to the monastery and see a monkey here. This monkey doesn't stay still either. It jumps around just the same. But it doesn't bother us, does it? Why doesn't it bother us? It doesn't because we've raised a monkey before; we know what they're like.

If we know just one monkey, no matter how many places we visit, no matter how many monkeys we see, we won't be bothered by them, will we? This is one who understands monkeys.

If we understand monkeys then we won't become a monkey. If we don't understand monkeys, we may become monkeys ourselves! Understand?

When we see it reaching for this or that, we shout, "Hey!" We get angry. "That damned monkey!" This is a person who doesn't know monkeys.

One who knows monkeys sees that the monkey at home and the monkey in the monastery are just the same. Why should we let ourselves get annoyed by them?

When we see what monkeys are like, that's enough; we can be at peace.

If mind is not mine, what the heck is?

Peace is like this. We must know sensations. Some sensations are pleasant, some unpleasant, but that's not important. That's just their business.

Just like the monkey. all monkeys are the same. We understand sensations as sometimes agreeable, sometimes not: That's just their nature.

We should understand them and know how to let them go. Sensations are uncertain. They are transient, imperfect, and ownerless [anicca, dukkha, and anatta]. Everything that we perceive is like this.

When eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind receive sensations, we know them, just like knowing the monkey. Then we can be at peace.