1 post tagged “ajahn brahmavamso”
A series of rather interesting things happened last Sunday. I met up with some friends for a party. I haven't seen them for some time and it was nice spending my Sunday afternoon catching up with each other as friends do after a long time of not seeing each other. One of my friends, Yean Nyok, is quite spiritually inclined and so we had a chat about the books I've been reading and how much I enjoyed applying what I've read recently. She's read all of the books I've read, from Eckhart Tolle's excellent The Power of Now to Caroline Myss' Anatomy of the Spirit and Advanced Energy Anatomy. We talked about how positive and negative energy not only affects your spiritual health, but also your biological well-being.
Later that Sunday night, I was chatting online with my brother Leonard and he mentioned that he and Yew Yen had been listening to this guy who has been a Buddhist monk since he was 23 (he's now 55) who is an English man who graduated from Cambridge University in theoratical physics named Ajahn Brahm (short for Brahmavamso). Ajahn Brahm had weekly podcasts of Dhamma talks at his monastery in Perth, Australia and Leonard said that this guy's talks were really good, better than Sunday mass any time. "You should give it a go", Leonard said. Leonard said that the latest podcast he had listened was about Buddhism and Homosexuality.
Curious, I went to the website of the Buddhist Society of Western Australia and downloaded a couple of Ajahn Brahm's Dhamma talks.
I was born and raised as a Catholic but in my adult years, I have found myself increasingly at odds with the unbending and oftentimes hypocritical teachings of the Catholic church, especially with regards to its position on women priests, abortion, divorce, birth control and homosexuality. I do believe in a divine being, and feel that this being is the same thing by whatever name humanity calls it, but I feel myself growing increasingly distant from the church.
I downloaded and listened to a couple of Ajahn Brahm's Dhamma talks on anger and compassion, being patient, conflict resolution and the ending of relationships, the recurring theme of compassion, kindness, forgiveness and positive thinking resonated with me. His Dhamma talks, liberally interspersed with gentle humour, on these every day dilemmas and issues imparts wisdom with points of reference to Buddhist teachings. His teachings make sense and they resonate with me because they are so simple to understand in relation to life's seemingly intractable issues, yet so you can't deny the truth in what he says because they are true.
Anyway, back to my story. Last Monday night I saw Yean Nyok online and thought she might enjoy Ajahn Brahm's podcasts so I contacted her on Yahoo Messenger and asked "Have you heard of a Buddhist monk by the name of Ajahn Brahm?" And to my surprise, Yean Nyok said," Yes, he's a very good speaker, and he'll be at the Brickfields Vihara to give a talk this Wednesday, you should come, I'm going to be the emcee at the event tomorrow."
Coincidence, you may say. But I've recently realised that there is no such thing as a coincident. I somehow felt that I simply had to go to Ajahn Brahm's talk while he was in KL, because it just seemed so uncanny that I talked about spirituality to Yean Nyok on Sunday afternoon, got introduced to Ajahn Brahm on Sunday night, spent the next Monday morning and evening on the commute to and from work listening to Ajahn Brahm's podcasts and the learning on Monday night that he was going to be in KL to give a talk on that very Wednesday night
.I left Cyberjaya extra early yesterday but because of the rain it took me about 2 hours to get into Brickfields. I've never been to that part of Brickfields before where the Vihara is located. It was a most pleasantly curious location; right next to the Vihara, there was, I think, a Lutheran church, and next to that, an evangelical church. And a stone's throw from that church, was an Indian temple and then a mosque. I've never seen such a concentration of different religious buildings in small square mile and it was nice to know that in that little corner of KL, different religions can co-exist together.
I got into the main hall of the Vihara 30 minutes before the Dhamma talk and it was already quite packed. The temple authorities had erected 2 large white tents with 2 big white screens so that the people who sat outside could watch the live telecast of Ajahn Brahm's talk. He spoke about Coping with Loss, how to deal with the pain when our loved ones die. He said that we shouldn't grieve when they pass on because we should instead celebrate their life, in the same way we feel a high after we've attended a great concert. We don't weep after the end of the concert but instead feel happy that we've been a part of that experience and keep the happy memories of that concert forever.
I enjoyed his Dhamma talk and am very glad that I made it despite the heavy rain, the bad jam and the hunger I felt since I didn't have dinner until after the talk ended. I didn't stay through out the Q&A session after the talk because I was already so hungry. It's been a spiritually interesting 72 hours since last Sunday, especially how events unfolded from Sunday afternoon till yesterday night and I can't help but think that there is something out there that wants me to learn more about what Ajahn Brahm teaches. These past 2 months have been an intriguing journey of self discovery and personal growth and I must say that it's been an enjoyable and enlightening ride thus far.
