Unexpected Freedom

The Effort to RememberProfoundly SimpleThis teaching was the first gift I received from Ajahn Tate, aprecious gift, and one that very much set me up for thepractice that I have followed ever since. I was an enthusiasticbeginner who’d had a bit of pleasurable experience inmeditation. I was determined to get somewhere in mypractice and I made a huge amount of effort. After havinggot up early in the morning and gone out on alms-round Iwould eat the one meal and, after a rest, spend the rest of theday sitting and walking. There were few books in Englishthere, but the few I could find I reflected on seriously. Thelittle talking I could do was with people whose language Icould not speak. The other Western monk was meditatingon death, an object of meditation frequently recommendedby the Buddha and favoured in the forest tradition, and he didnot seem to want to pay much attention to me. As ithappened, as the months went by, I looked more and morelike death myself, and I think he began to find me aninteresting object of contemplation. I hadn’t been getting onvery well with the diet of sticky rice, pickled fish and chillies,and I lost a lot of weight. But I’d committed myself to stay forthe three months of the vassa, and that commitment addedto the intensity.I certainly experienced some benefits from the effort Imade during this retreat period of intensified practice.About halfway through the three months, I had anexperience of clarity that I can remember vividly – it was anight or two before my twenty-fourth birthday. It wasquite spontaneous; I wasn’t doing any special practice. Iwas sitting there in puja one evening, surrounded by theother monks. Puja took place in a very basic, unattractive,open-sided wooden building with the usual grass mats7