(9)Ajahn Ganha 10 Nov 23 (translated by Ajahn Tilo) This talk is given on the 10th of November in 2023 in the morning.

  1. All of us have to work, but we all have to work with happiness. Don’t think that we are forced to work, we are forced to study. This is wrong thinking. We really have to find our happiness in working. We really have to find our happiness in studying. and learning. If we don’t find our happiness in working, if we don’t find our happiness in studying and learning, we tend to have mental problems. We tend to be neurotic. We really have to prevent ourselves from having mental problems. which is not necessary to have them. If we have mental problems and we are neurotic, nobody will come and help us and nobody want to be with us. 


  2. 1:15 Everybody of us, we have to adjust ourselves to the time. Everything has its own time. When it’s time to sleep, you go to sleep. When it’s time to work, you go to work. When it’s time to wake up, you wake up. When it’s time to eat, you eat. And you have to adjust yourself to the Dhamma. This means you have to adjust yourself, your life to the Dhamma, and you have to adjust yourself to the present moment. Adjusting ourselves just to the time is not good enough. We really have to adjust ourselves to the… to the Dhamma. If we don’t do this because we are living our life with a sense of self, we living our life just for our ego, for ourselves. We really have to understand, there is no me, there is no mine, there is no self. If we living our life with a sense of self, we tend to have problems. 


  3. 2:00 Everything what happens, happens just because out of causes. There are causes in place, that’s why the effect happens. There is nothing else than cause and effect in this world. There is no me, there is no mine, there is no self. When there is a cause and place, the effect has to happen, there is no way around. So we have only just this cause and effect system in this world. When one thing arises, another thing will happen.


  4. 2:29 We all have to stop ourselves. We have to find our happiness in working. Everybody who is not happy with working, this means these are selfish people. Selfish people don’t like to work. They don’t want to go to work. But selfish people with a big ego, they are deluded, they are lost. Wherever we are, we have to adjust ourselves to the work and to the duties. Why is this? Because work is for happiness and happiness is for work. Work and happiness are the same thing. 


  5. 3:00 As a human being we have to sleep at least 6 hours a day. If we sleep less than six hours or we cannot sleep well at least for six hours deep good sleep, then our body tends to get sick. Nowadays the technologies are highly developed. Our life is convenient and very comfortable. And we get lost in this. We like to enjoy all of this. That’s why we actually don’t want to go to sleep. People are very good looking nowadays. The food is very delicious. All that we develop is very delicious, is very beautiful. We develop all of this. That’s why we are amusing ourselves with this and enjoying ourselves with all these things, with nice forms, other people and all this convenience and comfort we have with the food. All of it is so delicious. We are really enjoying this and getting lost in this. In our daily life we really enjoy all these things to the max, and then we are running around crying, “oi, oi, oi, oi, this is so good, this is so good”, and then we have no time to sleep. But if you don’t sleep enough, actually you get sick. This point you really have to understand. 


  6. 4:15 The monastic people here are really, really good, but you really have to start to correct your own self, you really have to start to solve your own problems. How do you correct yourself and solve your own problems? You think in a good way, you don’t think anything bad, and you have a good behavior. Observing the precepts, observing the rules and the discipline, this is for us to stop ourselves and to correct our own self. We don’t keep the precepts and we don’t have virtue that other people respect us. We keep these precepts to correct ourselves. 


  7. 4:53 If you keep these precepts just for other people to have faith in you and have trust in you and respecting you, this is the completely wrong way. This is the wrong way how you grasp the rules and the Vinaya. Because in this way you’re really deceiving the people. We are doing good 
things, we doing all the good things just to correct ourselves, not to delude other people and get praised by them or let other people like us. 


  8. 5:22 The peacefulness of mind you will get if you have right view, right understanding and always come back to yourself, find back to your body, come back to yourself and don’t live your life outside of you, with all your surroundings. You have to find back to yourself. This way you will find peace. Whenever you find back to yourself, this is where you will find peace. If you don’t live your life with a big ego, with your sense of self, wherever you are, you will be at peace. Even if you are surrounded by a hundred people, by a thousand people, by one hundred thousand people, it doesn’t really matter, because you have adjusted yourself to the Dhamma and you find back to yourself. The end of suffering and the peaceful mind is within us at every place at any time, wherever you are, wherever you go. If you find back to yourself and don’t live the life outside, this is where you will find peace. And this is where you end your suffering. If you do it in this way, then you will be really up to date. 


  9. 6:25 If we develop just the technologies and the science, and we don’t know really the truth of the things, we don’t know the truth of this world, then we will be deluded by these things, by this material world, we will be deluded by science, and we will be deluded by the technologies. You get lost in them, without even understanding them. The Buddha wanted us to develop the technologies and to develop the science for our convenience, so that we can have a comfortable life. But he didn’t want us to get lost in them, not understanding them. and getting deluded by them. That’s why we have to develop our mind at the same time, so that we don’t get deluded in them. We have to develop the technologies, the science, and the mind together, along with each other, so that we can use it to live our life, but don’t get lost and deluded by them. 


  10. 7:10 If you are deluded like the Americans, you are deluded by all the technologies and by all the science, then you just start and you’re living a life of big ego. You’re not just building bombs, you’re building weapons to destroy other people in other countries. You’re completely deluded by these technologies. You’re deluded and what you’re doing, you’re just fighting for the rubbish of the world, for the garbage. This is what you’re doing when you’re deluded. Every war happens because just out of delusion, of not knowing. In this world nobody needs weapons. In this world nobody needs bombs. If everybody would just find back to themselves, there would be peace, within everybody. We will be happy in fixing our own problems and correcting ourselves. This is where we find inner peace and this is where we find inner happiness. 


  11. 8:08 But actually nowadays everybody just studies, everybody just learns to correct other people and to solve a problem with other people, not our own ones. The Buddha wanted us to correct our own selves, not other people. And he wanted us to use the technologies to help us to correct ourselves. So they are a supporting cause. If we are doing this, so that we can be doing this, so that we can be happy with work, we can enjoy our work. If you practice like this, then we have the safety and the security of the country, of the people, of the monarchy and of the religion. … 


  12. 8:53 But all the countries in this world actually take the sense of self and the ego as principle to live their life. That’s why they are at least 50% is just black color. And if you just follow what your friends are telling you, actually what you’re doing, you’re going into the gray zone. So the gray zone, when you follow your friends, this is actually around about 49%. But the white zone, where you’re doing the right thing, you’re doing the good thing, actually is no more than 1% in your life. 


  13. 9:25 All religions in this world, all religions, are actually just the same. They are nothing else than dhamma. Everybody who has a correct attitude towards religion will not argue with each other, will not fight with each other, will not go into war with each other. Everybody who has a religion will never do something like this. Religion actually should make people love each other the most in the whole world: it is the most important thing in the whole world to love each other and to respect each other. This is religion. Because all religions are teaching you about the problem of your likes and your dislikes. And actually they are teaching you the way out to find true happiness. If you stop your likes and your dislikes, this is how you will find the air-conditioning in your heart. If you are being air-conditioned in your heart, this means you will be really happy. …And you will also have a warm heart towards other people. And then you can stop running around and crying, “OI, OI, OI, this is so good, OI, OI, OI, OI.” 


  14. 10:50 So wherever you go, when you walk, just breathing in happily and breathing out happily. Enjoy your breath going in, enjoy your breath going out. And when you work, work with happiness, put joy into it, really enjoy your work. 


  15. 11:00 Some people ask Luang Por, “if I have no sense of self, if I don’t live my life for my ego, just for myself, how can I find any happiness?”But if you have no sense of self, if you have no ego, this is the end of your suffering. 


  16. 11:18 Your happiness, your unhappiness or your suffering is nothing else than mental proliferation in your head, just you building stories in your head. That’s all there is. And when you stop this, this is the end of yourself. If you’re looking for happiness in this way and try to run after this and think in this way you can end your suffering, this will not work. You’re creating even more suffering for yourself. This is not the end of suffering. The end of suffering comes if you stop your sense of self, if you stop your ego, and if you stop your mental proliferations and the stories in your head. If you stop them, then you will end your suffering. The Dhamma is, when you stop your mental proliferations. The Dhamma is, if you stop all the stories in your head. With very stop. This is the Dhamma. The Dhamma is, you don’t need to cut something out and you don’t need to add anything. Everything is just as it is. Nothing to add for you, nothing to take out. This is the Dhamma. Without any mental proliferation. Every moment just as it is. If you have right view and you understand in the right way and you practice accordingly, this is when your mind get peaceful. This is Nibbana. 


  17. But if you want to go to Nibbana, then you really ask for mental problems, then you really ask for neurotic problems. Nibbana is nothing else than Samma Ditthi. It’s nothing else than right understanding, right view, seeing things as they truly are. This is Nibbana. If you see things as they truly are, you have right view, right understanding, and you practice in the right way. Then human beings will have a lot of happiness if we practice in this way. So please everybody correct your own problems, correct your own self, not other people. 


  18. 13:06 Everybody has the right to be a monk. The monk It’s within you. If you have right understanding, right view and right practice, this is how you can be a monk. Everybody, is within you. If you have no ego, no sense of self, then you are a monk. Even you are a lay person. You don’t need to be ordained to be a monk. If you live our life having an ego and a big sense of self: welcome, you have mental problems. You’ll be psychotic and neurotic. This is what happens, if you have a sense of self and you have an ego. 


  19. Nowadays when people go to the doctor, the doctor just gives us medicines to calm us down, to calm down our mental problems, so that we can have a rest and can sleep properly. But it’s actually far better to take the medicine of Dhamma, to come back to ourselves, and practice accordingly and having right view. You find back to yourself, you stay with your breath, you’re breathing in and you’re breathing out. This is how you calm down and how you come to inner peace and inner happiness. This is the right way to do. You work with happiness. You really enjoy your work. This is how you fix all the problems. Please understand this point. Medicine will not fix the problem. Right understanding, right view, finding back to yourself and really enjoying the work: This will fix all your problems. 


  20. 14:33 The problem is nowadays we all stay with our agitated restless mind and we always running around “Oi, oi, oi”: running from one climax, from one orgasm to the next. All people nowadays, the children up to the even old mummies and daddies up to the grandmas and grandpas, everybody is running around with mobile phone: everybody is completely deluded by them and got completely restless agitated mind. But what you are doing if you’re really old? What you are doing if you are sick in the hospital? Can you play the mobile phone? Will it help you? Can you do it? So train yourself when you’re not old. Train yourself when you’re not sick. This is the time you have to train. The mobile phone will not help you. The television will not help you. The sensual pleasures will not help you. So we have to understand the religion. We have to understand the teachings and the sasana. 


  21. 15:30 The religion and the teachings of the Buddha have nothing to do with the material world. There’s nothing about this. The teachings of the Buddha, the sasana, the religion is nothing else than right understanding, right view and right practice accordingly. People who work for the government: actually what they are doing, they call them governments but actually it’s just a brand, it’s a label what they are using. If you’re being a politician, actually all politicians are just using this as a brand name, as a label. Even if you are an ordained person, you are using to be ordained, or you call yourself a monk, it is nothing else than a brand name, than a label. 


  22. But the right way is, in all of these cases, if we have right view, right understanding, we have no sense of self, we have no ego, this is the right way to do things, not using these things as a label, as a brand. Do you agree? But it is not difficult to do, it is pretty easy to do. But nowadays in monastics we just teach about Samadhi, sitting meditation. That’s all we mostly teach. But Samadhi is actually nothing else than Hinduism. It comes from the Brahmas. The Buddha actually is a descendant from the Brahma family. He comes from a Hindu background. But the Buddha realized that if you have just Samadhi, this is not sufficient. Your mind cannot enter Nibbana. 


  23. 16:51 That’s why he developed his paramis to the utmost that he could discover and explain the Noble Eightfold Path. Eightfold Path, not One-Fold Path. All of us we are fortunate because the Buddha taught this Noble Eightfold Path. And we all can practice this Noble Eightfold Path to correct ourselves and to solve our own problems. Luang Por actually is trying to teach you the easy ways that you understand easily with the same way as the Buddha was teaching. Every Arahant will teach you exactly in the same way. And Arahat will never ever teach you, “just give more, give more donations, make more merit, make more merit, give us more, give us more”: this is not the end of suffering. Because the end of suffering lies if everybody is fixing his own problems, is correcting himself and not other people. But we all have to be selfless. We have to renounce. We have to be a giver. We have to serve. 


  24. 17:55 We all have to be selfless. We all have to renounce. We all have to give. We all have to serve. Then we will be with Dhamma in the present moment and nothing else. And we have to find our happiness in this. This is how we end our suffering. We all really have to love Dhamma. We all have really to love and to practice. Because this will help us. So the technologies are a good thing if you know how to use them. You can see the Dhamma talk Luang Por is giving you now today here, this can go now around the whole world and this can help the whole world to make the world happy, to make everybody happy and to end the suffering of everybody. So don’t think technologies are a bad thing. If you know how to use them, there are a lot of benefit in them. The technology should be used to bring us all together and the whole world, not to separate us, but to bring us together. And when the bhikkhuni is going back home, please, teach all the lay people about this, so that they know how to end their suffering. 


  25. 18:53 Please, once you understand how to practice, also do it, really put everything into the practice to correct your own self and to end your suffering. Luang Por knows that Luang Por Chah, he listened to the teaching from Luang Por Mun only two, three, four times. And then he knew what to do. And then he put it into practice. And when he practiced in this way, this made him to a noble one. This is how he achieved the Dhamma. So he understood and then he practiced accordingly. And Luang Por Chah said, he is teaching other people maximum 5%, 95%, whatever he is doing, he is just teaching himself. 


  26. 19:33 If you have no sense of self, if you have no ego, then you can be really clever, then you can be really smart. If you have an ego, if you have a sense of self, you are really living in darkness. In absolutely darkness. The bigger your ego, the darker it is. Because your ego makes you living in darkness. It’s just the ego. Please understand in this way, your ego is the problem. So Luang Por today is teaching the Westerners and is teaching the Thais in the same way, at the same time. So yesterday Luang Por let the group of Westerners go on a little tudong tour, a little walk through the forest. And even we are completely tired and it was a long way, but it’s the right thing to do. Because afterwards we’re getting far more happy than before. So in the present moment you really have to get the point. what is the right thing to do and what is the wrong thing to do. But it always has to happen in the present moment. If you want to do this, you have to adjust yourself to the time. So you have to adjust yourself to the Dhamma. You have to live in the present moment and everything has to happen at the right time. Don’t allow yourself to be late. Don’t allow yourself to go off in the past or go off in the future. 


  27. 20:51 If you have problems and if you have difficulties, this is completely correct. Then you have the right practice. If you have no difficulties and no problems, you cannot progress. If difficulties and obstacles arise, this is perfect. This is where you will find progress. Luang Por himself practiced like this. That’s why he can teach professors, which he can even teach PhDs. Because Luang Por is teaching just the present moment, the Dhamma of the present moment. That’s why he can do it. Because all you read in the books is just the past, has nothing to do with the present moment anymore. Please get the point, understand this point. All your studies, all what you learn is all in the past. All the books, everything you have, just happened in the past. You have to stay in the present moment. This is where the wisdom lies. Some monks from Luang Por don’t really give importance to the present moment. They don’t understand how important this present moment is. That’s why they allow themselves to come late, or doing things at the wrong time. In Asia we are not so well developed. They don’t develop the science and the technology so far like the rest. That’s why we don’t want to adjust ourselves to the time. That’s why we allow ourselves always to be late. Luang Por can see that the Westerners, the Western world, they are far more developed, and they adjust themselves to the time far better than the Asian people. But they adjust themselves to the time just for the sense of self, just for the ego, and just for the science. Actually, because of this practice, they adjust themselves to the time just for themselves, for their ego and for the technologies. They get pain and they get stress at least 30-40%. 30-40% of all their stress and all their pain is actually just coming from this. They are adjusting themselves to the time just for their ego. 


  28. 22:47 But actually we should adjust ourselves to the time, so that we can be happy with working. We really enjoy the work, we love to go, we want to go, we’re really enjoying it. This is how we adjust ourselves to the time in a correct way. Not for our sense of self, not for our ego. But we not just have to adjust ourselves to the time, we have to adjust our mind too. We adjust our mind to the Dhamma, to the truth of things, and to correct our own self in the present moment. If you do this, you have fully confidence and faith in you. If you just adjust yourself to the time and to the work, because you think if you don’t do it, other people might call you lazy or might blame you, this is still in the wrong way. Those still don’t understand, You still practice in the wrong way. Because everybody has to adjust to correct ourselves. We don’t need to correct other people. We don’t need to worry about what other people think about us. We adjust ourselves to these things to find our own happiness. If you do this, you will be a westerner, a farang, who is really the most clever person in the whole world. If you practice in this way, then your price for the air ticket is not wasted. Luang Por now talks to a mae chee. If you have a big ego and have a big sense of self, maechee, this cannot be. 


  29. 24:27 Don’t take your wealth and your money for certain. It’s not sure. It’s uncertain, your wealth and your money. You can’t take it as your security. Rich people like to think in this way, but thinking in this way is not very clever. Because every single day in our life we are getting older and older and older. You have to understand this. Nothing is sure. Nothing is certain. Only when you are getting old, you are getting sick, you will get pain and you will die. And you will be separated from all what you love and what you like. Everything you have to lose. This is certain. But everything else is uncertain. Not sure. Understand this point. So please everybody fix your own problems, correct your own self. Don’t think that you are safe, don’t think that you are certain, don’t think you are too good already. 


  30. 25:21 So adjust yourself to the time and adjust yourself to the Dhamma to find the end of suffering and to find your happiness. Because in your life nobody ever can practice for you. You have to do it by yourself. You have to find your own happiness and you have to end your own suffering. Nobody will ever be able to do it for you. The more selfless we are, the more happy we will get. The more ego we have, the more suffering we add to ourselves. It’s that easy. 


  31. 25:55 If you have a sense of self, if you have an ego, then you will do one thing. You will argue with your husband, you will argue with your wife, you will fight and argue with everybody. People with a big ego like to argue. And even ordained people, when they have an ego, once they are ordained, they still argue and fight with other monks. So we all have to stop this. Please give this practice up of arguing and fighting each other. This is just your ego. Let it go. So please everybody practice in this way. Stop arguing, stop fighting, don’t try to correct other people, don’t try to solve problems of other people. Please correct your own self and stop arguing and fighting. This way you will find your happiness. Everybody who has right view and right understanding will do nothing else than correct them themselves.