Hi, do any of you have an experience being a part of a buddhist monastery? Tell about it. I'm considering
Try out this forum: http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/ There are several monastics and people otherwise related to a monastery there, and lay Buddhist who visit monasteries.
Make sure you stretch and lengthen the hamstring muscles before you go...it will make sitting meditation a whole lot easier.
It heavily depends. What type of monetary are you thinking of joining. I have spent time with both the Abbot of the ** Temple from Japan, and have spent the last 6 years working informally (ie, I still have hair) under the head of the official Shoalin Temple of PA. They are VERY different from each other. There are purely non-violent Buddhist temples, and there are martial temples. There are silent temples, and there are question-and-answer temples. There are temples based around the Mahayana (Great Vehicle) and Theravada (Lesser Vehicle or "way of the elders"), there are temples based around local variations of Buddhism. All are different in their own ways; for example, Tibetan Buddhism is very closely tied to the old Tibetan religions; it is a very animalistic shamanism, and very different in its daily approach from traditional Indian Buddhism is based directly on Hinduist theology. Japanese Buddhism was effected greatly by Shinto, while Chinese Buddhism was modified by the extant religions of Taoism, and Confucism. Modern, western Buddhism similarly has is advantages (being tied closely with the text themselves, as they were amongst the first things to bring Buddhism to the west), and its disadvantages (the texts were often translated by very biased sources, and the original translations were often poor at best). edit: I miss-spelled the Japanese temple, so I'm going to check my papers at home before I attempt to fix it.
That is a valuable comment. There is a great deal of variation in what passes for "Buddhism" in practice. To the extent that I subscribe to Buddhism, the outlook was originally acquired, many years ago, by way of admiring lay Buddhists as they lived their ordinary lives, from day to day, rather than by intellectual study, nor by ritual or meditation or anything of the sort; ordinary doing rather than thinking or talking. The righteously bookish escapist clique that I have since encountered online is not the same, and definitley not for me. -- Ron.
One thing is that most monasteries don't appreciate westerners (aka white people) coming in on whim and joining their clubs until they get bored and move on to other experiments. The life of a monk is a dedicated one.
That is true even of "white" Buddhist communities in the west. Back in the 1970s I met more than one bald headed refugee, escaped from a monastery. They had dedicated themselves in all sincerity but the reality of the experience proved to be counterproductive to the cause, uncongenial to their conditioning, and from then on I counsel to be wary. There is a good deal of hyposcrisy to it. The same as with anything else, their high aspirations do not always correspond to the actual practice. While pretending not to, they suffer from personality clashes the same as the rest of us, especially with regard to furthering their iconocastic sense of superior exclusivity. --- Ron.
Thanks for the information, all! Maybe it will come in handy for someone else. This post was made at a crisis point in my life, there were two choices, I chose the other one. p.s. I considered it as a retreat place. I did not need any spiritual guideance.
Yes, for the most part - though again, the rules will differ depending on where you go. For instance, many segregate men and woman, and some will not allow women at all. As a rule of thumb, however, do not expect to go and relax. If you are staying there, you will work hard, both mentally and physically. You earn your place through diligence. Avatar: I wish you luck; such times are never easy.
I'm a martial artist, so the physical aspect never bothered me. As for the mental, I can't say, because I don't know about how that is in such monasteries. Thanks for the well wishes!
