Ven. Acariya Mun - Spiritual Biography + photos

very frustrated. He tried to force it to remain inside the confines
of his body, but often to no avail. His citta was far too fleeting for
mindfulness and wisdom to keep pace.
Still too inexperienced to work out an effective solution,
he felt uneasy about the direction of his meditation. Yet, being
a strictly internal matter, he couldn’t mention his predicament
to anyone else. So, with an intense degree of mindfulness and
wisdom to guide his efforts, he experimented with many differ-
ent techniques, suffering considerable mental strain before find-
ing a viable means of controlling his adventuresome citta. Once
he clearly understood the correct method of taming his dynamic
mind, he found that it was versatile, energetic, and extremely
quick in all circumstance. Eventually working in unison, mindful-
ness and wisdom blended so well with the citta that they merged
to become one with it. Thus strengthened, the citta functioned
like a magic crystal ball; and he was fully capable of keeping pace
with all the myriad phenomena arising within it.
Ãcariya Mun possessed a bold, fearless character. He was also
extremely intelligent. Because his rigorous training methods dif-
fered significantly from ones practiced by other monks, his style of
practice was unique – and incredibly difficult to imitate. From my
own observations, I can unequivocally state: He was a truly noble
character with a quick, adventurous mind who trained himself with
uncompromising resolve. His harsh training methods were often quite
unique. He had an ingenious way of mixing coercive pressure and gentle
persuasion to tame a dynamic mind that, at the least lapse of concentra-
tion, ventured out to find things that could easily cause him problems.
Struggling desperately on his own to find ways to control his
unruly mind, practicing without a dependable guide and endur-