You live the story you write

During my recent meditation retreat at Birken Forest Monastery I had two interesting encounters.

A retreatant from Edmonton who had spent a lot of time in Myanmar recommended the book Mindfulness with Breathing by Buddhadasa. It is apparently a very popular book and by a famous monk named Ajahn Buddhadasa that I didn’t know.

Later I met a different retreatant who told a story about going to Thailand in the 1990s where her brother was about to ordain as a Forest Monk. She was inspired to learn to meditate, so they sent her to monastery that taught beginners. This was Suan Mokkh in southern Thailand whose abbot was… Ajahn Buddhadasa.

Interesting! Two references to Ajahn Buddhadasa in one day. 🤔

This got me thinking a little. Suan Mokkh is a monastery in southern Thailand near the city of Surat Thani. In March of 1995 I was in the area on a school trip. We visited a monastery and I remember walking around the grounds, through the trees, and seeing the biggest spider I have ever seen in my life just hanging out in a massive 5 foot tall web, nobody bothering him. It was my first lesson in ahimsa or “non-harm”. I took a photo of the spider that I didn’t realize was super blurry because… well, film camera. Anyways, at that monastery was the first time I ever interacted with a Buddhist monk (as I have mentioned before). I was 16 years old.

I got to thinking… could it be?

Then I jumped out of bed at midnight and dug around in my memory box. I found that photo of the giant blurry spider and another picture of a young monk. But no shots of the entrance or any signs of the place. As is the unsatisfactory nature of life, I kept on digging around until I found my travel journal from that trip.

Turning to the page marked “March 18 1995” it said:

The next stop was at a place called Suan Mokkh. This little enclave of monks was the home of Ajahn Buddhadasa, a famous monk who is said to have reached enlightenment. The monastery was very interesting and we talked with two monks, about the Dhamma of course. One told us a story of the turtle, and the other told us of the deer with one head and four bodies. … He also showed us a picture of the pyre where they cremated Ajahn Buddhadasa. The amazing think is, you can see a fire that looks suspicious like the Ajahn, wai-ing, formed by the flames!