Ven. Acariya Mun - Spiritual Biography + photos

he did rebuke them for this, they became too scared to think of
solving the problem themselves, as would befit monks who were
training under Ãcariya Mun. It made no sense at all to go to an
excellent teacher only to continue following the same old ten-
dencies. They went there, lived there, and remained unchanged:
they listened with the same prefixed attitudes, and indulged in the
same old patterns of thought. Everything was done in an habitual
manner, laden with kilesas, so that there was no room for Ãcariya
Mun’s way to penetrate. When they left him, they went as they had
come; they remained unchanged. You can be sure that there was
little change in their personal virtue to warrant mentioning, and
that the vices that engulfed them continued to accumulate, una-
bated. Since they never tired of this, they simply remained as so
many unfortunate people without effective means to oppose this
tendency and reverse their course. No matter how long they lived
with Ãcariya Mun, they were no different than a ladle in a pot
of delicious stew: never knowing the taste of the stew, the ladle
merely moves repeatedly out of one pot and into another.
Similarly, the kilesas that amass immeasurable evil, pick us
up and throw us into this pot of pain, that pot of suffering. No
doubt, I myself am one of those who gets picked up and thrown
into one pot and then into another. I like to be diligent and apply
myself, but something keeps whispering at me to be lazy. I like to
follow Ãcariya Mun’s example; and I like to listen and think in
the way of Dhamma as he has taught. But again, that something
whispers at me to go and live and think in my old habitual way. It
doesn’t want me to change in any way whatsoever. In the end, we
trust the kilesas until we fall fast asleep and submit to doing every-
thing in the old habitual way. Thus, we remain just our old habit-