Ajahn Sumedho

Buddha, by Ajahn Sumedho

Rather than trying to seek for Buddha or truth (dhamma) in terms of some idea or some doctrinal dogma that we might form around the concepts of Buddha and dhamma, the Buddha pointed to suffering and its cause. By recognising its cause as attachment to desire, we let go. When we let go of the cause, then we realise the cessation of suffering. The Buddha was actually teaching the way of nonsuffering. The Eightfold Path is really the experience of nonsuffering, in the present, in the here-and-now…

You Are Not A Permanent Person, by Ajahn Sumedho

So much of our suffering is around attachment to perceptions, views, opinions and emotional habits. In the enlightened mind one is breaking out of conditioning. Because there is an infinite variety of conditioned phenomena, the Buddha talked in terms of just five groups (five khandhas) in which to get a perspective on it, and this is to be understood in a very direct way, not in a theoretical way. Each one of us experiences through the body, feelings, perceptions, mental formations and consciousness, and…

Universal Original Purity, by Ajahn Sumedho

The purity of the moment is in this pure state of awareness. Therefore, you can always refer to it, remember it, just by the simple act of attention, this wide, embracing attention, intuitive awareness in the present. That’s the gate to the deathless, transcendent reality, the unconditioned. It’s not an achievement; you don’t achieve it; you just remember it