A Monk’s Wealth

The Buddha says that a monk’s wealth is his goodwill. When you look at a monk, what do you see that’s really his own? If he’s been here for seven years, they say that all the cells in his body have been replaced from the cells that he had when he was a lay person. So all the cells are cells based on food that has been given to him. His clothes, food, shelter, medicine: These are all gifts from other people.

So what is his? The goodness he creates out of his mind, out of his heart. And it starts with goodwill. Goodwill doesn’t cost any money to create. It’s a wealth you can generate. And it’s the kind of wealth that, unlike the wealth of the world, the more you generate, the more value it has. With the money of the world, when they keep creating new money, old money grows less and less in its value. But the wealth of goodwill keeps increasing.

So when the mind is empty and has nothing else to do, generate thoughts of goodwill. It’s like creating more of your own money, because goodwill is what motivates your practice. You want a happiness that doesn’t harm anybody—doesn’t harm you, doesn’t harm anyone else.

A lot of people go through the world looking for happiness without caring what harm it causes, not only to other people but also, sometimes, to themselves. That kind of careless attitude doesn’t show any goodwill at all. Goodwill doesn’t mean that you have to like other people. It’s simply that you don’t mean them any ill, that you don’t plan any harm to them. If they’ve harmed you, it’s as if they’ve been emptying out their wealth. They have nothing left. Well, you don’t want to empty out yours and have nothing left either.

So if they come at you with ill will, you return goodwill. Whatever the world does to you, return goodwill. As the Buddha said, even if bandits have pinned you down so that you can’t move and they’re using a two-handled saw to carve you up into little bits, you should still have goodwill for them—and then goodwill for all beings. That way, you maintain your goodwill, as the Buddha said, as a mother would look after her only child, would protect her only child with her life. After all, the body is something that you have to throw away at some point. Your identity in this world you can throw away—you’ll have to throw it away, but the goodwill that you generate stays with you wherever you go.

Someone asked Ajaan Mun if you could separate a person’s virtue from his mind. And Ajaan Mun said, “No. If you could, someone would probably steal their virtue.” The goodness in your mind goes with you wherever you go. Of course, the bad qualities you develop in the mind go with you wherever you go, too.

So ask yourself: What do you want to have in your baggage? What do you want to carry around?

The image they give in the texts is that when you have bad karma following you around, it’s like a cart that oxen have to pull. It’s really heavy. It just erases whatever footprints the oxen leave. But the good things you do are like a shadow that follows you. It has no weight at all, and it’s cool and refreshing.

So load yourself up with goodwill and you’re not going to be weighed down. And as I said, the value of your goodwill only increases as you generate more and more. So generate as much as you can.