Learning Opportunities at the Wat

Monks are Teachers

Let your visits to the temple become opportunities to learn from the monks.

Meditation Practice

The Steps of Breath Meditation — Forty Dhamma Talks

Begin with this linked article from the middle then go to the top of the page and read them all!

A Meditator's Tools

A Meditators Tools – A Study Guide on the Ten Recollections by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Ajahn Geoff has also compiled a study guide on the Ten Recollections. Worth careful reading, then revisiting as your meditation progresses, and able to inspire to greater effort and diligence.

Many themes here will become familiar over time but they always add more strength to the foundation you will build and develop upon in your meditation.

Hopefully, these articles will guide and motivate more to commit to this important, critical aspect of the practice. A broader collection of online links to meditation will sprout here soon.

Theravada

Theravada – The Way of Liberation provides a quick study on our particular branch or path. From there, the entire book, The Issue at Hand by Gil Fronsdal covers even more ground in easy to read and informative chapters and touches on the important aspects of Buddhism for those on this path.

Dhamma Lecture

From the short dialogs spoken each day as food is offered to the monks, to the more substantial presentations at special occasions at the temple, it is always considered beneficial to listen to and receive the Dhamma.

Observation of Buddhist and Thai Special Occasions

There are seven auspicious days in the Buddhist calendar that are observed at Wat Sacramento. Additionally, a number of Thai cultural events are observer at the temple throughout the year. Please check our Calendar page for upcoming events of all types at Wat Sacramento.

Chanting

Depending on the occasion, there are many types of chants you might hear both at the temple, and in the homes of devout Buddhist. Some, such as Requesting the Five or Eight Precepts, involve both the monastic community and the lay community. The lay person asks three times to take Refuge in the Triple Gem and receive the Precepts, after which the monk will lead them through each part, step by step.

While just hearing and participating in chanting can be beneficial, it is always better to know and be committed in your heart to what these chants are teaching. Chanting does not exist to entertain. It exists to pass on the Buddha's teachings - the meaning should be taken to heart and acted upon. As few of us are fluent in Pali, the language of Buddhist chants and suttas, it is helpful to know the meaning of these chants in English. A very good source, with Pali matched to a pronunciation guide and the English meaning, is the Chanting Guide published by the Dhammayut Order in the United States of America. Printed copies of this Chanting Guide are available at the temple. The Guide is also available on the internet at Access to Insight, [Go to A Chanting Guide on the Access to Insight website]. By listening to actual chanting, and participating along with others, we soon develop a better understanding of this worthy path.

Venerable Maha Bua

"Just as if there were a pool of water in a mountain glen — clear, limpid, and unsullied — where a man with good eyes standing on the bank could see shells, gravel, and pebbles, and also shoals of fish swimming about and resting, and it would occur to him, 'This pool of water is clear, limpid, and unsullied. Here are these shells, gravel, and pebbles, and also these shoals of fish swimming about and resting;' so too, the monk discerns as it actually is, that 'This is stress... This is the origin of stress... This is the stopping of stress... This is the way leading to the stopping of stress... These are mental effluents... This is the origin of mental effluents... This is the stopping of mental effluents... This is the way leading to the stopping of mental effluents.' His heart, thus knowing, thus seeing, is released from the effluent of sensuality, released from the effluent of becoming, released from the effluent of unawareness. With release, there is the knowledge, 'Released.' He discerns that, 'Birth is no more, the holy life is fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for this world.'

"This, great king, is a reward of the contemplative life, visible here and now, more excellent than the previous ones and more sublime. And as for another visible reward of the contemplative life, higher and more sublime than this, there is none."

— Samaññaphala Sutta, Digha Nikaya

Devine Equanimity

For one who clings, motion exists; but for one who clings not, there is no motion. Where no motion is, there is stillness. Where stillness is, there is no craving. Where no craving is, there is neither coming nor going. Where no coming nor going is, there is neither arising nor passing away. Where neither arising nor passing away is, there is neither this world nor a world beyond, nor a state between. This, verily, is the end of suffering.

Udana 8:3

The Failings of the World

Gain/loss,
  status/disgrace,
  censure/praise,
  pleasure/pain:
these conditions among human beings are
  inconstant,
  impermanent,
  subject to change.

Knowing this, the wise person, mindful,
ponders these changing conditions.
  Desirable things
    don't charm the mind,
  undesirable ones
    bring no resistance.

His welcoming & rebelling
  are scattered,
  gone to their end,
  do not exist.

Knowing the dustless, sorrowless state, he
  discerns rightly,
  has gone, beyond becoming,
  to the Further Shore.

 Lokavipatti Sutta: The Failings of the World" ( Anguttara Nikaya 8.6), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight, 4 July 2010

About Being Careful ~ From a Dhammatalk by Ajahn Chah

... Give up evil and develop merit - give up the negative and develop what is positive. Developing merit, remain above merit. Remain above merit and demerit, above good and evil. Keep on practicing with a mind that is giving up, letting go and getting free. It's the same no matter what you are doing: if you do it with a mind of letting go, then it is a cause for realizing Nibbāna. Free of desire, free of defilement, free of craving, then it all merges with the path, meaning Noble Truth, meaning saccadhamma. It is the four Noble Truths, having the wisdom that knows tanhā, which is the source of dukkha. Kāmatanhā, bhavatanhā, vibhavatanhā (sensual desire, desire for becoming, desire not to be): these are the origination, the source. If you go there, if you are wishing for anything or wanting to be anything, you are nourishing dukkha, bringing dukkha into existence, because this is what gives birth to dukkha. These are the causes. If we create the causes of dukkha, then dukkha will come about. The cause is vibhavatanhā: this restless, anxious craving. One becomes a slave to desire and creates all sorts of kamma and wrongdoing because of it, and thus suffering is born. Simply speaking, dukkha is the child of desire. Desire is the parent of dukkha. When there are parents, dukkha can be born. When there are no parents, dukkha cannot come about - there will be no offspring. ...

The entire article is available at: About Being Careful – A Dhammatalk by Ajahn Chah

As a bee without harming the flower, its colour or scent, flies away, collecting only the honey, even so should the sage wander in the village.

Dhammapada 4:6

Articles

• Bliss
• Reflections for One Gone Forth
• Heart of a Noble One
• Care for Your Own Heart
• The Poorer, the Happier