Contentment

One of the principles that the Buddha stressed over and over again was contentment, but it’s important to understand what he meant by that. He meant contentment with material things, material conditions.

As with the heat right now: You may find yourself wanting to be someplace cooler. But can you practice in the heat? Well, yes, you can.

The same with the food. It may not be ideal food, but it’s good enough for the practice.

Clothing, shelter: With what you have with regard to these things—if it’s good enough for the practice—you can still practice? Okay, it’s enough.

We spend our time trying to get things better: Improve this, improve that. We neglect where the Buddha said the real issue is, of course, is inside.

When he set out the customs for the noble ones, he talked about contentment with food, clothing, and shelter. But then he went on to say that you try to delight in developing and delight in abandoning. In other words, you’re not content with the state of your mind as long as you haven’t finished the work, and there’s still work to be done. You don’t want to be an underachiever.

Here’s your opportunity to practice—the whole point of this being that, if you place all of your attention on things outside, inside gets neglected. So we learn to put up with whatever difficulties there are outside, so that we can focus inside because this is where the greed and aversion and delusion are. This is where the causes of suffering are. And the path to the end of suffering is here, too.

So when you find yourself commenting on things outside, remind yourself: Can you practice? Well, yes, you can. It’s like that time Ajaan Fuang suddenly out of nowhere said, “Okay, tonight we’re going to sit up all night.” I had been working hard that day. I told him I didn’t think I’d be able to do it.

He said, “Is it going to kill you?”

“No.”

“Then you can do it.”

You have to have that attitude because, as the Buddha said, there’s a fire burning in your head, and you have to put all your mindfulness and alertness and resolution into putting out that fire.

Don’t let food, clothing, shelter, the weather outside—other conditions outside—distract you from the important task, the urgent task, at hand.