Am I Good Enough? | Ajahn Brahm | 28 April 2017

so that sometimes happens you're giving it all are you really putting energy into it and then people leave another thing oh my goodness my talks aren't good enough I'm hopeless maybe I should find another career at this time of my life and then they say no we just going to the toilet and bran it has got to go but isn't it interesting too that some innocent things happen in our life and we always interpret that as a fault there is something wrong with me that I am to blame and this is one of the subjects are going to start with anyway this evenings talk I am not good enough are you good enough for me then for most people I was always told when I was young you are not good enough so I tried very hard and I just did really well at Primary School and I got a scholarship to a big of Secondary School in London but not good enough you had to do really well in your old evel's try harder put up the grades and so I tried really hard that I passed was good enough no a levels go to university get a good degree good enough now get a PhD good enough now get a Nobel Prize I'll come on that's raising things a bit huhai but as we have you ever noticed that in our world no matter what you achieve no matter how high you go is still not good knife and recently I was gave a talk in Sydney Olympic Park and they were talking about the house weight and swimmer guan hackett you know who was until he win gold medals and olympic games really top of his field but now it looks like he was had some emotional problems recently within the newspaper got it right and why is it somebody gets so high and then they tend to lose it why was it that robin williams a great comedian he committed suicide because he thought he wasn't good enough and these are people who you think Elise these people really successful really sort of admired lots of followers why do they think they are not good enough look at me i'm a very well-known man now so but am I good enough no I think I should give a better talk find some better jokes but can I know there's only a limited number of jokes about and anyway somebody's told the jokes today that there's some people look at me and my tummy and they said well you know you should do more exercise but I do exercise I do exercise a lot serving our ISIL I push the envelope sometimes with some of the things I say and some of my language and my jokes and I stretch my mouth I always do ten push-ups every morning there is lots of exercise which you do but we always think no it's not good enough and a long time ago I started realizing does it matter how much you try to please others it doesn't matter just what they expect of you you can never satisfy the elites what other people ask of you and so there's a time I stopped trying to please other people at the time I stopped worrying about whether people think of me and that's why I recognized it's a wonderful saying which is so accurate though when you are young usually you know from 15 to maybe about 25 30 you know you have to be fashionable you have to dress cool you have to know the special language I heard somebody say the other day about their son whenever they asked him hey going at school the answer was none yeah and the Arsena how you going with your girlfriend nunya and the arson how you feeling today nunya I never heard that word before you know what it means it's shorter than your business so you have to be cool to use cool words so if we go over to and die and the priests must option have you been drinking man yeah I should like courage you but you have to be really cool but there comes a time in life where the girls you stop dressing up this is too much painting to put makeup on and dresses which are really uncomfortable doing your hair all the time we're doing that for pleasing other people and so I never do my hair before I do the talking so those who I you should and so there comes a time when you got what we call self-confidence you just go and do we don't kill other people think of you but some people actually they even dress to upset people we know like the punk movement remember the parks yeah they would dress particular to try and really upset and get you angry and upset and I remember this story about said something the subway in New York there was you know this old man sitting opposite one of these punks you know just spiky here about 20 different colors and just razor blades you know coming out coming from his ears his colors with there's no really multi colors to so they really need a pair of sunglasses to look at him and they're just piercings all over his face and then there's a guy opposite no just you can't help is why him plenty have to look at it and so the punk shouted out what are you looking at old man and I said I just notice you didn't you ever do anything no bits of outrageous when you were young oh you said I did when I was in the Navy I had sex with a power I thought you might be my son [Music] that's not true please don't go it's right before the society complaint only a joke okay and I don't really hate palace but anyway sometimes the easiest things just to upset people and but you know after whiteís no don't worry what other people think of you that's using your middle age and then you finally find out I hope you find this out earlier like I did when you're young you why do i people think of you middle-aged you don't care what other people think of you in your older years you finally figure out that people weren't thinking about you anyway so let me do this or whatever you like just forget about other people saying and it's also when people say you're not good in now he can try harder oh they need to improve that's something in life is really I objective improve all your life you have to improve you have to you know look at your your figure I look at my figure every day I can't miss it and you have to learn new things why why do you need to improve yourself I asked that question aren't you good enough already who said you're not good enough usually your mother your friends your partner in life the problem is we believe them and because we believe other people say about us a lot what our culture says about us if you are not going on holidays overseas if you're not fit and got a partner is really hot or really just cool it's amazing isn't they being hot is good or being cool is good can understand which were not supposed to be the opposite end of the spectrum succeed Buddha so we're not hot you know Buddhist women aren't hot guys aren't cool we're in the middle way somewhere with temperate why we try so hard to be these things why do we need to improve a lot of times I say that that's one of the causes for a lack of self-esteem for lack of self-worth now that you know we're always trying to into it we actually hate who we are literally hate who we are want to be somebody else and that doesn't make any sense to me if you hate other people your boss you know your mother-in-law as a pre mother's and I don't know why I always say mother-in-law there's so many jokes about mother-in-law when my favorite mother-in-law jokes was this guy who said oh you know my mother-in-law she comes over to our hat and she comes to our house for Christmas every year she's coming to our house for Christmas for the last 20 years but this year we made an exception we decided to let let her into the house she's coming with me quickly okay and that's cool I should improve my jokes but they're good enough for me in other words in other words you don't judge yourself because other people you don't judge herself which means you don't judge other people a long time ago there was a book coming around our monastery down in serpentine I don't know if it's still there it was in German be great if it was translated into English I don't know if it's been done but one of our German monks German born monks you know he sort of read it out to me in translation as a story of a young boy in Germany had an out of the body experience you notice floating out of your body near-death experience he's only about seven or eight years of age and the reason I remembered it was you know because of and what this little boy learned from that out of the body experience you know he he was walking through a forest in Germany fossil really important to people so now they live in the forest and though they could a culture was born out of the forest so that he was walking through a forest now having temporarily died and he came to like a barn like a shed and you know it was a typical the way that some people perceives that time when you left your body at the near-death or death but he came to this guy who asked what his name was and the guy looked in some book they always say it support these days if young people die they find he just the logs into a computer and shakes your name he looked into a book his name wasn't there so he said are you not supposed to be dead you better go back but he said that before you go back you can actually see how this all works and so the next person who came no to the beat no see if he really deserve to die or not was a farmer and when the farmer came up you know the guy watching him oh yeah he knew your time's up time you did but said the the guy who was with the book and he said you know have you ever killed anything any animals is that all not honor maybe one or two but no more than that and the guy looked for this little kid and said you see even though he's dead he still lies to his teeth he was a farmer killed many animals but as they were noticed talking to this farmer to see where what he thought we was going to go there was another man Walker I pass the shed white pass and went up to what the little kid thought was heaven and the kid said to the guy I'm you're going to stop him and ask him what he's been doing and that's when this judge so this little kid threw out that man's whole life he hasn't judged anybody therefore we're not going to judge him and that's what the kid came back with and that's why I remembered that story the rest of it is just feeling true or not in the sort of out-of-body experience sometimes you create a lot of things but the important stuff if you don't judge other people you don't tend to judge yourself so all is no this judging yourself thinking you are not good enough but also I notice that meant I was always judging other people as well you know you're not good enough pretty enough which enough kind enough working hard enough then found that the more critical you are other people the more critical you are yourself the two always go together and that made a very good reflection for me because I figured out and it's absolutely true though people are always putting you down criticizing you giving you a hard time like it could be your boss at work if they give you a hard time I guarantee 100% in their personal moments they also give themselves a hard time how you regard others as how you regard yourself how you treat others is how you treat yourself and that was how I understood His Holiness the Dalai Lama's quote that if you're having a difficult time with your boss at work remember you only have to stay with him for 40 hours a week he has to stay with himself 24 hours a day seven days a week for the rest of his life so have some pity on him you only have the only 40 hours of suffering he has 24/7 suffering or she whichever gender it is so that's such a amazing insight so it means that we can have some compassion and forgiveness to other people if they misbehave the mystery to us because imagine what they're going through them but if you know how to be kind to yourself then you can be kind to others if you're kind to others then you can be kind to yourself the two go together so sometimes if you haven't got no self-esteem if you think you're hopeless one of the great things is learn how to be kind to others get a cat get a dog get a little puppy get a rabbit get a monk would it be wonderful to take a monk over the old story was where the first month went to England they were worried whether they could afford looking after months it's like Buddha Society over there the English Sangha trust it was called and one of the I think was a president no it wasn't the president he was one of the members of this little group and trying to find a place for monks when they first went to England they thought through can we afford monks can we how many monks can we afford you know we're going to get a few but few donations our monks expensive to look after and one of the members of the committee he was a coordination if he's listening they're really nice friend nice guy he was say professor of economics of Reading University if I remember correctly and he was also an adviser to the Bank of England now he was an economist so he decided to answer the question can we afford to look after monks how much does it cost he did the math he crunched the numbers and he made this wonderful discovery that it is actually much cheaper to look after a monk than to look after a dog much money you pay on your dog nothing after it no feeding it giving a nice little kennel and is taking it for walks and taking to the vet actually that once and nuns are much cheaper to look after and often says it's lots of lots of similarities and there's a dog see out of a bowl so do we don't live in his little Hut's just like we do they call cooties dogs are called kennels but you know some of the sizes the only difference in book and and dogs your pentose they never bark good monks never bark is you take a nun for walk and if you had to tell she'd be wagging it all the time if we did have if were allowed to lick you we would because we're kind we're nice and even better than a dog or a cat we can actually teach you some dumber all the dogs and cats can teach you is compassion but there are great teachers so because there he said at the end when he found out yes we can afford them a number two realizing how cheap it is to look after a dog or a cat every home should have one look after a monk or a nun every home should have one would it be wonderful you can go to the monk shop or the nun shop and just get a monk or a nun and put him in the back of your your house very easy to feed one meal a day take him for a walk in the morning anyhow it was an expensive so it was just that's one of the reasons is why that one of the reasons for why that monks an answer are very good to be around is because they they teach you kindness just like dogs and cats do to kindness so when this was old story of this trainee muck we call them an agaricus these are people who wear white and precepts one of which is not eating in the afternoon no solid food from noon until the following morning I've been keeping that precepts for almost forty three years and it's amazing only eating in that small period of the day still I put on weight it's really unfair yeah it's a thing that you know you don't eat afternoon tea or snacks or dinners you don't sort of raid the fridge in the middle of the night and it still put on weight anyway I think it's only because I don't worry enough because apparently worried people certainly intend to lose weight but I need to worry some more so he came to see me one morning one is an agaricus you know in quite a few years ago he hadn't slept all night and the reason was because he felt guilty what have you done and he said he was almost crying afraid last night when you'd all go back to your rooms I was feeling hungry so I went into the kitchen no one was around I made myself a sandwich and I ate it Oh terrible you gotta throw me out when I told him that we don't do throwing outs in monastry from stinking simple things like that and that he praised him well done you've acknowledged the weakness and then I said well is no this advice I can give you eat more at lunch and we also have this huge list of allowables loopholes things which you can just slip under the rules by the Buddha you know simply because they didn't have Buddha and any of you go to the Nan's monetary or the monks monastry or go and retreat you see all this cheese and chocolates and sweets and jellies and honey's and fruit is that carrot juice oh the only stuff which you can eat and the people what autumn any more of that and he said yes but it's not the same as having a sandwich so I told him he said well you notice you get used to it after a while he said and I said he can go now he said that's not good enough what's not good enough you mean you're not going to punish me or give me a penance he said I need a penance or punishment because I've made a big mistake it's called guilt what most people experience he did something wrong you want to be punished for it and so I said no we don't do punishments in Buddhist monasteries it but you have to he said I need it really weird psychology so he felt so bad about himself hands dead the night felt so guilty for having a punishment would get rid of his lack of worse so I told him okay I'll give you a punishment how to make one up on the spot what's a good punishment for somebody you know just forgiveness doesn't work so it just happened that morning yes by chance I've been reading a book quite a well-known book by the author Phillip Hughes called the fatal shore set in the early years of colonial Australia when the prisoners are convicts who were sent over here if they made a small mistake if they broke any wall or law they were flawed with the cat of nine tails I just been reading that little but I said well you asked for punishment I'm going to give you 50 strokes of the cat and you should have seen this pork you know when people get really afraid that they'd start to quiver they go all white that's what he did you know he had so little understanding of Buddhism he really thought that me as the Apple was going to flog him and he was really scared I could read his mind that it's not what was asking for something else please I said no 50 strokes of the cat is your punishment and I explained what that means because at that time in the monastery down a serpentine we had two cats I said find one of them anyone older one you have to learn some kindness and one of the best heaters of kindness is to stroke a cat you know who's on your your lap I know stroke the dog because that will teach you some kindness and say that is your punishment 50 strokes of the cat and he got it as they took the cat's stroked it and he learned how to forgive himself now that is actually how we learn how to love ourselves by learning to love another being to look another being be kind to them and maybe generate enough kindness we can show the same emotion to ourselves which means we don't have a lack of self-esteem we learn that from my relationships with things like animals but even more important that why don't people have you know goodwill towards themselves and if they don't have the kindness what you can learn kindness towards yourself by being kind towards animals or being kind towards your kid or know being kind towards your favorite monk I don't know but you can also learn how to be kind to others by being because people are rude cruel malicious to other people it's usually that did the same to themselves there's something wrong in their psyche and so this particular story how do you forget where I got this from but I used the story recently and also a few minutes ago before I came in here which is why I'm giving this talk and it was the story of the seven-month meditating in a cave this is in opening the door of your heart and had great fun telling this story when I was in the USA a couple of years ago and listening to me was a bishop an Episcopalian Bishop that was similar to an Anglican bishop and I told this because I was bidding a little bit cheeky see if I can catch him out he fell into the trap but he thanked me for it afterwards and he said can I please use this in my sermon say no please do and there was a story of seven monks meditating in a cave they are meditating on loving-kindness which I hope you all know may all beings be happy and well my all beings without distinction without discrimination on species or race gender sexual orientation my loving-kindness goes to everyone and the seven marks meditating in this cave listen carefully because it's a question coming at the end and if you heard it before you have to promise to please shut up the host boiled like fun so the seven marks were the head monk the boss the other the second monk was his best friend they'd grown up together they loved each other just like the third Michaels his brother they loved each other the fourth monk however even though they are Dane was an recording his enemy they just had personality trust I just didn't get on even though there were really good people they just know whenever once said one thing it just always grated on the other you know good people they still can't get on let's see that in a quite often when people come to marriage counseling really good people why don't you get on that something else could still kind of stand you see the woman the wife is just a beautiful girl no no a long time see the guy an amazing fella as we get into bad habits that's all so this was a typical bad novelist monk too much didn't get on together and the fifth monk number five was a very old monk he's so old so advising is he could die any day you notice waiting for this his last breath and the next mark was now also he was a sick mock very ill so ill they never thought he would recover that no one would know who was going to die first the old Michael the Sigma though both of the end of their life and the last mark number seven is what we call the useless monk they're in useless monk whenever they tried to meditate he would always be the first one to fall asleep which wasn't that bad but he'd snore really loudly whenever they did any chanting he would always turn out of key if he could remember the words anyway and even when he was wearing his robe as well always tended to fall off I wonder what that useful what I use of my keys and he was the useless monk and that I often say when I mention this part of the story and this is actually true every modesty has one you can find out who it is he's a good luck he's pleasure me right headed for the weekend if I didn't say that he wouldn't leave me look after me and I asked that I has upon you it's none of it's as well the same it was hoped that the useless weren't there anyway how did useless mark was number seven and what happened next one sees gang of robbers these thieves they found this cave deep in the jungle and they thought this is a great place for our hideout after we've robbed and maybe killed we can take all of our loot all of our stolen goods into this cave you know they didn't have money laundering in those days I was going to say sort of overseas banks Panama but I bet get in trouble for that so they didn't have overseas banks in those days so they just had to hide their ill-gotten Goods this is a brilliant place to hide out goods and also have found it first so let's kill all the monks so none of the monks can say the location of his cave to the police that was what they wanted to do but the senior monk their senior monk was such a great talker so convincing if he hadn't taken the runs he could have been the treasurer of a country like ours I better go further that one so the senior monk managed to talk and convince the head of the thieves to letting all the monks go except one because the only reason he wanted to kill everybody is so they'll kill all the masses so they didn't tell where the location of the cave was and so that the head makes it look we might as we keep our promises we won't tell the location of the caves let us go and the head bandits said no I've got to be sure I'm going to make an example I'm going to kill one of the monks in front of the rest of you in fact in front of the other six as a warning because if you tell the location of this cave will find you will come for you and the same will happen to you that's the best deal the head monk could that one of them had to be killed in front of the others so the rest could go free so now the question is who was chosen and before you answer I've got to go through the list again head monk brother best friend enemy old my sick monk both at the end of their lives anyway this was a day or two you know 60 70 years matter and lastly the use of monk and the useless might have never done anything for anybody never done any good karma in his whole life maybe this was his chance so if you were the head monk who would you choose answer if you know the answer please be quite does boil it very did he choose thank you for that wrong answer because that's what the bishop said and when I'll tell the story that's what most people say he sacrificed himself and that is the wrong answer but there's a reason why I tell this story which is coming up soon any other suggestions who else anyone for the for the use of smoke yeah the back I thought that no of course not the answer is and those people heard destroyed very good story once you find out what the answer is and why the meaning of telling the story the answer was that the head monks love for his brother was no more no less than the love for the best friend if he lost two people just the same he just countries between them and his love towards the enemy was no more no less than the other two even the old Michael Sigma and the use of smarty love everybody equally he just couldn't judge between them no matter who they weren't who they did what they did his love was unconditional all beings no matter what gender what race what religion what they did or what they didn't do his love was given to everybody equally and most importantly his love towards himself was no more no less and his love to all the other six months and that's where I told the bishop I said didn't your teacher Jesus tell you to love your neighbor as yourself I said yeah doesn't that mean to love yourself as your neighbor no more no less that's what the word has means to love you your neighbor as yourself means to love yourself as your neighbor equally yes he said he he gave me the the Buddhists respect he said that's why was the Latisse that you know in his in his sermons because when you learn how to love yourself no more no less and everybody else no matter who they are then you understand what we mean by unconditional love I love this doesn't judge all beings no matter who they are and that unconditional love has to include yourself that's why I tell the story because most people especially in the Western coal they don't love themselves other people yet you can sacrifice yourself for the poor for the sick so many nurses they sacrifice themselves for their patients they never take a risk for themselves they treat other people with such kindness and such giving they never give that to themselves this is why people have burnout so when you realize that we treat ourselves no more no less than other people that we count as well the idea of sacrifice personal sacrifice other people come first just disappears you count you are important you should love yourself as well not judge yourself it's so wonderful when you don't judge yourself when you just accept yourself as you are when you don't try and improve this is a gentler take it or leave it but I never fake it in an often thought that being a public speaker sometimes that a might is wanting in front of you guys and another thing when I'm by myself ask the mugs I'm a nice peaceful and happy Teddington Oh hooks is that what I'm like you know when we just by ourselves he better say that otherwise I get 50 strokes with the cat because I really feel for people to try and be something they're not because they don't like themselves because they try to improve they have got kindness and love compassion towards themselves there must be a terrible world to live in and it is trying to to fake it so when you love yourself if we give yourself but I was I remember when I was a kid though is they don't love yourself just become proud and big-headed and that is totally wrong when you're kind to yourself when you respect yourself when you have cut and compassion love towards yourself you don't get big-headed you get big stomach [Laughter] they get big hearted so then we'll say you get big head to get big harder that changes of all going you're encouraged to be kind to so you encouraged to love yourself to respect yourself and a practical way of doing that already mentioned it earlier first time I was starting meditation it's not just about sitting down on the ground meditating because sometimes people get too serious my first teacher gave one of the most powerful meditation techniques I've ever practiced gladdy practice it for two years he said not to be kind to yourself in order to learn how to love yourself he said when you get up in the morning first thing go and have a look in the mirror at the bathroom would smile at yourself that's what he told me to do and I argued I resisted at that time I was a student you go out late at night you know what it's like when you first get up in the morning you feel terrible you can't smart yourself in that time in the morning especially those days you notice go into the pub with your friends and getting a bit drunk and you felt even worse in the morning I wasn't born a month stupid what I did when I was a young man believes I know it was stupid by personal experience not by theory so in the bathroom try to smile at myself I said I can't do it and that's where the teacher told me if you can't manage a natural smile get the two fingers on the side of your mouth and push up and that was an exercise in learning how to love myself even first thing in the morning when it was most difficult when you felt terrible and what had happened is I saw this stupid young student making a faith in himself in the mirror and that made me smile back and I smiled even more and the guy in the mirror smiled even more and every morning for two years I ended up laughing at myself laughing at yourself loving yourself the two words are so close together in English and there's a good reason for that if you live a life of love there's a lot of laughter between the two of you if you don't live a life of love is there any laughter this is criticisms so a lot of times but learning how to love yourself is so close to learning how to expect to love yourself that's why that method really worked I learned how to love myself no matter what happened by learning how to laugh at myself when I learn how to love myself accept myself that is so easy to accept other people and of course the last little anecdote which is was even more powerful that to learn about unconditional love for others it was old story but I love repeating it because how we were doing a ceremony the other day before you know it's in the tiny year they were noted party relations and so when we did the little ceremony here that was some eight for the sixteenth yeah April 16th was only hunger was that sorry about two weeks ago my dates are what I want quick that we're supposed to are telling other people to do this and I did it myself with remembering your your parents who passed away it's an opportunity to remember them we call it sharing merits with them the least I remembered my mother especially my father and just how much he taught me even though he's been dead 50 years now 30 50 years next month I'll never forget him never will especially some of the beautiful things he said to me one of which was that great story which fits in here taking me aside in his old second-hand just about managing to go car it would have be banned from the roads if it was on the roads in West Australia these days he was very poor man taking me aside I still remember the place in Acton just off Church Field Road I remember it just to this day and I'm looking at it now even the colour of the car was green and he'd stopped the car turned around to me and he said son whatever happens to in your life I was about 13 at the time whatever happens to you in your life however you turn out please I want you to remember this you know I did remember this so clearly he said whatever you do in your life whether you go have you turn out the door of my house will always be open to you it will always be open to you either we shut the door in your face you're always well only 13 didn't really understand how deep that meeting was only later on when you became a month one of the nice things about being a monk or nun especially is that the young back or not you have so much time you can reflect figure things out understand what these things mean and that's worth knowing Thailand I remembered that and I understood what it meant was the door of his heart was open to me not his house his heart well that was just such a beautiful beautiful teaching it was unconditional love telling me son whatever you do turned out to be a criminal you turn out to be something which most people will be embarrassed about but not me the door of my heart is always open to you you're my son that's enough whatever you do and that so inspired me because it was expression of unconditional love and I've done my best to live by that Creed really beautiful creat whoever I see I give them unconditional love no matter what they say to me how they deal with me what they do with all my heart always open to you even if you mistreat me and make me give a talk for a long time and after the talks that we going to the toilet to call your questions I'll still come back next week I know I'm exploited and I'm taken advantage of but that's the purpose of my life to be taken advantage of so I don't resist it exit but it's beautiful when you have this wonderful door of your heart open no matter who you are no matter what you did and when I practice that to other people you know I also practice it to myself whoever you are whatever you've done open the door of your heart up to yourself and that was this next incredible moment I say that everybody does this sooner or later using a private moment of your life when you feel comfortable in a spiritual place doesn't have to be accurate or monastery or a temple sometimes it's in the forest or by the beach when you by yourself sitting down you remember these words and just you know see there's a surf rolls in you close your eyes and say me this person I've known all my life if you remember it is how old you are and where you've come from one and all the difficulties the problems and until you be so in your life so far me the door of my heart is open to me no matter what I've done how behaved what's happened to me my life some wonderful moments and tragic really hard moments they opened the door of my heart to me come in that's where you in one moment you forgive yourself you realize you're not such a bad person and you love yourself unconditionally just like my father did just like a dog does your favorite dog it's just always so happy when you come home a little cat so happy when you feed it I know cat well there's only two and you're happy to have them there and that's when you open your heart to yourself it's amazing experience you know you're beginning to not judge yourself that's why it's unconditional you're at peace with yourself and it's always so incredibly positive there's no bad side effects to forgiving yourself loving yourself accepting yourself as you are not needing to improve not needing to do anything better you are good enough and people say well there'll be no progress in this world if everybody thinks like that oh how wonderful why do we want progress you'll never get anywhere who wants to go anywhere in the first place isn't this place good enough but yes you know be testing yourself I've been testing myself for too long but you never be rich Oh crikey thank goodness I was never rich all the rich people I've known always really screwed up honestly I've known many rich people this quickly I've got to finish off soon the lady she's probably gone now I see how she has anyway because being that rich knows he can probably sue me she had a huge house in Shelly I never seen such a huge house because she asked me to come over to bless it and but as soon as I went in there just traveling all the way from serpentine I said I need to go to toilet you know and he said well it's easier if I drew you draw your Mac and that's what he did I mean this was a huge mansion so she had to draw a map to find the way to the toilet and you know has our 13 or 14 bedrooms or something huge house and just making conversation I asked her how many people said only me on that was just such a shock to me this huge house and only you live there why she said because I'm so afraid of my relations and friends asking me for some of my wealth they always come here they ask me can I bother this I'm starting a new business a bit sure and knowing that can I borrow some money such a rich person I never saw her they just saw her wealth and so she had to live by herself she was a prisoner of being mega-wealthy if you ever see guns have you ever gone to these big houses this is the one really rich person I went to go and see in Kuala Lumpur and you know he had guards on his house bars on his windows security everywhere just like a person staying in the prison I don't know is that to keep people out or keep people in so sometimes become a prisoner of wealth so you don't need to be wealthy you are all good enough and are you really enough handsome enough rich enough I you've inlined enough if you don't know this the story of open the door of your heart you'll never be aligned you'll never be at peace they'd always be trying to get something else you'd never think you're good enough you have to improve you have to do something more which means you can never take a break you can never take a rest so this is how to restore your self-esteem to restore your feeling of self-worth to love yourself no more no less than other people so you never need to sacrifice yourself you do really treat yourself as you treat all others no more no less I treat you as I treat myself sometimes in my room I tried bad jokes before I try them out on you and sometimes sometimes I lie flat laugh at my own jokes so much so that once we lay at the time I was laughing on my own joke and I loved so much I was choking and poured out my body thought I need to go see a doctor thought he's going to go so see if you can utter over the door of your heart to realize that he know you're not half as bad as your mother told you were don't trust otherwise people trust someone like myself trust the Buddha trust that even Jesus okay to love yourself as your neighbor no more no less then you'll find a lot of peace of your life thank you for this thing very good that wasn't the best artist but it's good enough in the circle okay some question from home to see if there are any to that yeah there are those of you want to go it's good enough so you don't offend me some of you've got to go toilet you're going to go check something or other but anyway those the ones will then go around for the dessert which is the questions that's coming through here it comes okay very good from Cannes from USA or for malicious malicious the beautiful island there one for malicious is divorce karmic what about me marriage after divorce is that karmic karmic I don't know exactly what you mean by karmic but there is it like the Karma you with a person was such a long time and then it just part is that predestined not like karma from a past life it's usually comes from this life you know if you get divorce it must be like the Karma of your husband having an affair that's calm with a calm of this life or often it's the Karma that you never put enough wisdom and love into that relationship this was there similarly artists modern I give this every other week the glass is cracked can you see the crack in the glass I give this as a funeral recently can you see the crack in the glass in the fun because the crack is microscopic that's why you can't see it but it's there this actually came from a gem show this story the crack is there because if I drop this or someone else kicks it it will break it's the crack of impermanence and each other I know this won't last because this won't last because it's impermanent that's why I carefully I can't kick it or mistreat it will break but if this was plastic it was unbreakable permanent I wouldn't need to care for it to kick it drop it squash it and we'll just rebound again being unbreakable is because it's breakable that's why we care because relationships won't last the class from the very beginning that's why we care for them that's it always looking after them just like with a car to this cut or this class because we know it's fragile your body is fragile is cracked one day will break will die that's all we care for it so the idea of marriage divorce being karmic because we never realized with that much is collect we should have taken better care of it we marriage after divorce is that Carmy yes sometimes you meet somebody else then who was it I was actually one of the stories which I consummate a talk told me a long time ago he went to visit his home in Seattle and he was brought up and he caught up with an old school friend of his and the old school fan are great you're here I'm just about to get married please come to my marriage ceremony he said no you're getting old now while you getting married on this is not my first note this is my night he said or something like that that why are you getting married again 9 times so well look it's like this I like meeting a new guy now dating is really exciting and then falling about at that moment when it goes down or one day any proposes I'd love that one this is so beautiful so romantic and planning the wedding you know and you're getting all the guests in and the night nice dress I love that stuff and the wedding itself we look at each other which is really Juhi eyes smiling he looks so handsome and I have to dress up also beautiful and we we exchange our vows that is so beautiful I love that it's what happens afterwards I don't like so we end that one style all over again the course fees he goes with those little excitement about getting married and then do that this is my ninth time you know she had a point I wish I wouldn't encourage it but you can understand which is coming from so every marriage after what if it happens it happens if it doesn't it doesn't happen because the main story was if you're single you have single person suffering when you get married you have now in-person sufferings is just change you like one type of suffering for another type of suffering so I don't think that something is going to get away and people so what about if we don't get married anymore we don't get divorced we become a monk or a nun and then you have monk or nun suffering you can't get away I know John BAM can you give me some advice on making a difficult decision yeah toss a coin but if you read my book you toss a cop house I get divorce I know can't get there was until you make heads I'd marry her tails I don't and the point is once it comes up heads how do you feel heads I marry her do you think two out of three in other words you're not happy with the decision then of course what that's telling you is how you feel inside if it comes up heads heads I'm Mary Haney yes that means you really want to do it in the first place so tossing a coin it's just finding out what you really want to do so you make a decision heads I go there tell so go right after you've tossed the coin how do you feel what's the emotion inside it's just getting that intuition up to your brain lastly how does the lay person how do I consider I am good enough and find a middle way when it comes to entertainment relationship and a job though if you feel you're good enough you have what's called calm for your confidence in their job you come across as confident and even in entertainment just like me I'm confident I can tell good jokes because I was a member it was Bob Hope he said you know that when he started off as a comedian people used to throw tomatoes and eggs at him he said if they hadn't shown all that stuff at him in the early days he would have had nothing to eat so those are the positive side what about you ugly so if you think you could either most of life is about confidence and if you get that confidence I'm good enough I'm not the best that's being just so conceited and also negligent but you know I'm good enough thank you to get away with anything but what I've got away with in my life hunt was really surprised by being so confident that sort of shower went it went on on radio on 6pr I think it was and as a show on adult themes ten to twelve people actually ringing out with the sexual dysfunctions problems in marriage imagine asking a celibate monk about that but I thought I was confident so I didn't know I was talking about but I was confident what of my last bucket if he was like that well alibi that would dismissively I had two years ago giving the keynote address at a 2015 world computer Congress in South Korea what I know about computers you know what so your IT guy honestly do I know really much about computers I say he said stuff all and that I agree with you but doesn't stop me I go up there in front of all these executives of Google and and Samsung and LG come on they talk there's confidence that's what it is so anyway that's why if you think you're good enough you become good enough but it doesn't stop there this is the mating thing if you think you're good enough that's where you start to grow and get better and better and better and better you improve beyond your wildest imaginations if you think there's something wrong with you you're lacking in something that you know that you were born with you know lacking a few of the three words that you are now a bit short that means that you know your few suitors short of the Tripitaka what something like if you think about that you become right there with your confident so maybe you can see if anything so when you think you're good enough actually you get better when you think you need to improve you get worse so don't do i improve yourself you're good enough and then you get better so any questions from here before we finish off already but over time I'm enjoying myself how's our talk this evening was it good enough it's very good thank you [Applause] [Music] very good have a nice evening oh that's what we do down don't we couple of weeks who's our bid here keep forgetting so now pay me space to put a damn sang some tombow by Goa for dang bugger one happy Wadi so ah Cottle was a double the monomer sung-soo kaki pana by gamma doors are Kasongo sun gan naman you

Channel: Buddhist Society of Western Australia

Views: 110,024

Rating: 4.8345866 out of 5

Keywords: Buddhism, Buddha Dhamma, Dhamma, Dharma talk, Ajahn Brahm, Self esteem, Confidence, Expectations, Beliefs

Id: b2mWuCk70Ck

Length: 66min 44sec (4004 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 28 2017

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