First days at Rhombhodhidhamma Temple

Written Oct. 19, 2012 - posted later...

It’s 8:18 as I sit down to type this. It’s been dark for quite a while now, since seven or maybe a little before. The sound of crickets is loud in the trees and my open windows face onto a small thinly cemented common area between several small buildings. A couple of monks are sitting outside one of them, talking by candle light, their voices carrying over the sound of the crickets. It’s never still or quiet in Thailand, I have discovered. There is always noise and activity in the forest, especially at night.

I’ve been here 4 days now. Ning (a nun here) was planning to have me stay in a small house but that plan fell through and so I’m back in the room I stayed in last time, at Ajahn Nu’s house. It’s a fairly nice room actually, about ten feet square with a tiled floor, a small shelf, and a raised wooden platform for a bed. I brought my camping air mattress with me. The first two days I thought I’d try doing without it and just use the thin pad that’s on the bed. My hip bones got sore though and I wimped out and blew up the camping mat.

There are quite a few more people here than when I was here last year. There are about 240 monks staying through the Buddhist lent period which runs from the beginning of August to the end of October, during the rainy season. There are also 140 nuns, give or take a few, and quite a few laypeople like me. We all meet at the meeting place, or “lantam” twice each day – in the morning at 6:30 and in the evening at 6:30. The lantam is a large cement floor covered by a slightly larger roof made of bamboo, scraggly looking sticks and Thai style thatched roofing. Thin mats are rolled out to sit on when we are there.The front includes a raised place for Luang por – the teacher and spiritual head of this place – to sit, and a higher place with a large gold Buddha statue.

In the mornings we meet, do a bit of chanting (which is new since I was here last), Luang por (pronounced something like “lung pa”, at least to my ears; a respectful title) comes and talks for a while, and then we get breakfast. Breakfast is served on four rows of tables and consists of a big pot of white rice, a big pot of some sort of soup, sometimes with chicken or fish or eggs in it, and a couple of sorts of vegetables or other dishes like bamboo shoots in a spicy sauce or noodles with things in them. Monks have two tables and nuns have two tables and monks and nuns eat first, (monks before nuns if push comes to shove) then people who wear all white clothing since this denotes a certain degree of commitment, and then those of us who are left. I usually end up pretty near the end of the line so sometimes some of the better stuff is gone. However, I make out pretty well since Ning feeds me quite often and people still give me food now and then, even though I’m not a monk anymore.

People have been exceptionally kind and welcoming to me, and I find the people here to be very gentle and generous. One of Ning’s neighbours likes cooking and she sent over some steamed banana cake made with rice flour today, and some rice soup with mushrooms and vegetables. Another one makes tofu and she sent over some tofu with cabbage, which doesn’t sound very good but actually was.

I’ve already had several lectures from monks who are eager to talk about the philosophy here. The teaching is really pretty simple, but in the way of simple things it’s also really difficult to fully grasp and even more difficult to live in a practical way. Besides this paradox of simplicity and complexity, there isn’t much else that’s considered fit to talk about, so monks tend to expound at length. It’s a bit of a monk thing, I think, to do quite a lot more expounding than listening. However, it does have the effect of giving one many viewpoints and different ways of understanding what is being taught.

The main idea, as far as my understanding goes, starts with the Buddhist premise that everything changes and there’s nothing we can do about that. Since everything changes, there’s not much use in fighting change or trying to hold on to things. It’s also based on the idea that we tend to make things difficult for ourselves and get in our own way by doing a lot of judging things and people and taking stuff personally. We like this, don’t like that, want something else and get all tied in knots when we get what we don’t want or lose what we like. All of this judging and taking things personally centers around the idea of “I” which, says Buddhism, is somewhat of an inconvenient fiction.

So, in order to be happy and well, all we have to do is stop making all of these judgments, stop taking things personally and stop getting so concerned about this “I” idea – what “I” have, don’t have, feel, think, experience, etc.  It’s all going to change anyway. As Ning said, we’re all on this train ride together. We know where it started, we don’t know where it’s going to end, but we do know that it will end. We don’t have much (or any) control over the train, so we might as well just relax and enjoy the ride.

So, that’s what they teach here. Relax, don’t try to make things happen, let go of judging and wanting and striving and just be happy with what, where and who you are, as you are. Simple right? Ning and I were discussing it and I brought up the example of a map vs. a GPS navigation system. I thought the GPS was a bit like religion – it leads you along and gets you where you’re going, but you have to be willing to follow it somewhat blindly. It generally doesn’t give a big picture overview of all of the different roads and pathways. A map does give an overview, but is less specific. Both are ways of getting from where you are to the goal – where you want to be. A day later, Ning said she woke up with the thought that here at the temple the teaching isn’t a map or a GPS. It’s just a “Stop” sign… There isn’t a goal to get to, and there isn’t a need to try, strive, or do so much.

Of course, all this simplicity gets pretty complicated, and there are also undercurrents to all of this. The Buddhist universe is quite large and includes a lot of different levels of existence, different dimensions and beings, reincarnation and repeated cycling in and out of embodiment, Karma (the law of cause and effect) and especially in this particular temple, a fair bit of belief in what we would think of as being the supernatural in Canada (at least most Canadians would I believe). I’ve not seen very much of that since I arrived – just a couple of nuns apparently speaking for beings who don’t currently have physical bodies but want to ask Luang por some questions. It’s all considered pretty normal and nobody pays too much attention.

The Vastness of it all can sneak up on you though. Tonight I walked from my room to the lantam at sunset. Down the tree lined road, take a left and walk along a small lake while the pastel pinks and oranges play in the sky and on the water and orange robed monks or white robed nuns glide silently in the gathering darkness. Fish moil near the surface of the water with an occasional splash, and lights from a arriving vehicles throw shadows through the trees.The chanting starts and it has a sweet sound, gentle people singing a gentle pledge. Luang por arrives and sits quietly. Four hundred people sit in silence while the stars peek out, the crickets sing, the warm air breaths gently past. A dog growls somewhere and stops. There is a feeling of peace that seems to radiate out like a cooling breeze and things seem to change inside. It is harder to hold on to troubled thoughts or feelings. They don’t all go away – my mind has been rather busy and I’ve been feeling somewhat rebellious today in particular. All of this peace and slowness and gentleness can get annoying at times, but it calms me down a bit as well.

It’s when the calm starts to sink in, though, that the vastness can sometimes jump out and scare you. The quiet and stillness can drive wedges into cracks in one’s perceptions and tear rips in one’s carefully constructed reality. Sometimes this is exciting, freeing, opening. Other times, it can be frightening.

I just noticed that now it’s 9:18. It’s been an hour since I started writing and this is getting long again. I guess it’s time to stop for now.