Thank you for your kind and generous questions.
There's really no other pathway moving forward in terms of ordaining outside of connecting with monastics.
Becoming a monk has nothing to do with lay people their ideas their perceptions their views their preferences It's not a matter of lay life It's a matter of monastic life.
So if you want to consider about ordaining you need to connect directly with monks and you need to do so in a way that is to listen deeply and support.
To the degree that you are willing to be generous or detach or let go or give up or give away your body and mind or your life as a lay person that is to the degree that you can be supported to enter into monastic life and that's really the only way you can have an experience of monastic life is by going into it.
The major barrier for modern people especially Americans or Western people is that we have a culture that values greed as a virtue.
The beginning or the entry point into monastic life is giving up everything.
And it's most especially giving up your mental attachments or expectations about what monastic life is going to be or that somehow you're going to enter into monastic life as a way of meeting your desires.
That's not what monastic life is about.
It's about detachment and giving up everything.
Especially an explicitly at the start when you're entering on to the path when you're you're bringing yourself forward as a monastic prospect for the sangha.
You've got to connect more deeply with monks and you've got to be ready to listen to them and follow and show them that you're serious then you can be guided on next steps.
Which are going to be completely practical nothing to do with your ego or your desires or wishes about monastic life it's going to be okay you can go here and you can start.
But that's not starting what you want or what you desire It's starting the path of taking full refuge in the Sangha.
....
There is absolutely no standardized monastic life or training This is a myth.
Every temple every environment every monk is going to be a unique experience and especially as Westerner there's no standardized experience that you're going to have as a monastic.
We have a lot of romantic ideals about monastic life or temple life from the outside of perspective as Americans or westerners and those ideals have nothing to do with the reality of monastic life or life in the Sangha over in Myanmar or Thailand etc.
It's practical if you have that commitment to become a monk then you should reach out to a monk you should express your commitment and be ready to listen to what they tell you to do.
At that point you should expect that the challenges you encounter are no other than the natural challenges that exist in your mind.
My difficulties relate to remembering my inspiration and day by day reestablishing my commitment to walk on the path of sila samadhi panyo
Well wishes and good luck
anagaarika wrote: ↑Thu Nov 09, 2023 5:44 pm
Hello Bhante,
Welcome to Dhammawheel!
I would like to use this opportunity to ask you some questions on ordination:
1) What advice or general guidance would you provide for someone who feels more or less done with most of the lay life motivations (family, career, hobbies, ...) but has zero experience with monastic life, and thus no idea of how well they could do in such environment? Let´s say the person feels sort of trapped in a bardo - not belonging to either world... Also, let´s say the person feels they would like to devote their life to Dhamma, but is not sure about how they would manage to live in a community under such "extreme" circumstances, having been of a very solitary nature most of their life.
2) What were the biggest challenges you personally encountered after ordaining? One monk here on Dhammawheel wrote in a post that the monastic environment "will make you want to scream, cry and vomit at the same time" - meaning there is a difficult adaptation stage one has to pass through... Is that your experience as well? Does this claustrophobic reaction happen for everybody?
Thank you very much for your time!
