Luang Por Liem: The Ways of the Peaceful - Wat Pah Nanachat

anagarika, someone who practices in order to realize the danger of
samsara.
We practice to observe our bodily conduct according to the
good manners and etiquette of a samana. To practice like this
gives rise to beauty. Maintaining one’s bodily conduct is similar
to looking after one’s requisites, like the dwelling, for example.
One needs to maintain it well, so it can be of use and provide
comfort. In our training, we also need to check whether what we
do is appropriate for our community or not. What do our friends
in the monastic life think? Would they approve of our behaviour?
If not, we need to practice further. These are external things, of
course, but still, we should see them as important factors that
define our lives as anagarikas, those who realize the dangers and
drawbacks of samsara. You need to be alert and aware of
yourselves and keep good etiquette – or, in other words, keep sila.
Sila can also be called “an awareness of the dangers and
drawbacks in one’s actions” and the intention, or feeling, that one
no longer wants to act in ways that are not good. Armed with such
intentions – a sense of concern regarding actions that cause
enmity and danger – we need to develop and improve our capacity
to resist. Bodily resistance depends on factors like food, the
weather and our environment. Being a monk, food is something
that we aren’t able to control or choose by ourselves, as we
depend on laypeople’s free will to sacrifice by practicing dana
(generosity). We need to realize that what we get is independent
from what we would like to have. Actually, the things that we
want are very much conditioned by the things we are used to.
Being monks, we need to understand that our practice has to
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