Pure Inspiration

Ven. Bhikkhu Guttasīla – 63
against the Mahāsi tradition. Whereas, Ven. Ñāṇapoṇika was part of
the Vajirarama tradition, but was more a supporter of the Mahāsi
tradition. Even though Ven. Ñāṇavimala joined in Dhamma discussion
with Ven. Kheminda, I think he liked certain suttas (discourses) and
was more limited or rigid in terms of what he based his practice upon.
However, the knowledge I had of Ven. Ñāṇavimala’s actual practice,
what he imparted to some of his Sinhalese disciples, was based on
mindfulness and awareness of the six doorways. Of course, we can
imagine when you are spending so much time walking on cārikā, it
wouldn’t be possible to practise deep samatha (tranquillity) meditation.
The emphasis was on mindfulness in everything, so no matter what
activity he participated in, to keep in mind the kammaṭṭhāna
(meditation object), and also an emphasis on the six doorways.
I think he is the only monk who has walked around Sri Lanka a
number of times, so in some areas he walked, like the Muslim or
Tamil areas, it is quite likely he didn’t get very much food at all on
piṇḍapāta. But that would be insignificant for Ven. Ñāṇavimala, that
would be just extra ‘food’ for practice. One of the tips we heard was
that if piṇḍapāta in the village was not successful, he would sit down
some place where people could see what he was doing. That was
actually a condition for people to go to bring a bit more food to
supplement the piṇḍapāta.
I think he tended to stay in the village temples on walking tour and
would return to those temples that were suitable In his routine he
would walk in the morning, which would include walking for
piṇḍapāta, and then some time in the afternoon, if he’d found a
suitable place such as a pansala (village temple), he would stop for the