The place doesn’t look like a monastery because, in my opinion, a monastery should have a temple, but there is no temple there, just a meditation hall, dormitory, kitchen and several houses in the forest. This place looks more like a summer camp and I would call it not a monastery, but a meditation center.

If you want to become a monk in this monastery, you’ll be interested in this article: How do a foreigner become a buddhist monk in Thailand?

If you want to visit the monastery you can read this link about how to get there and about the monastery life: Staying at Wat Pah Nanachat, but the reality is a little bit different.

Advance letter

You don’t need any letter to come to this monastery. On the monastery website they ask to send a paper letter to the monastery before you come here and you can not find an e-mail or phone on their website. In practice you can come without any letter at all. We arrived at the monastery without any preliminary letter at 1 PM. We met a smiling monk and he told us that the guest monk would come at 3 PM and asked us to wait for him. At 3 PM the guest monk asked us to fill a simple one-page form and showed us around. He even didn’t ask about a letter. So you can come without a preliminary letter and they will allow you to stay. But…

An Englishman who came here third time for one month, told me that he wrote a letter three times and nobody answered him. He also told me that supposedly they answer with a refusal only if there’s no place here. Also he told me that if you come without a letter, they can refuse you, if there’s no place.

While we waiting for a guest monk we went to 7 Eleven which is 15-minute walk from the monastery. Near the 7-Eleven there are several Thai eateries in on which we eat two portions of Som Tum (traditional thai papaya salad) with noodles just for 60 baht, it’s about $2. And it was so delicious!

Women

Women are allowed here! Although it’s written on the monastery website that women can not visit the monastery, it’s turned out that this information is false. Women are welcome here! They live separately from the men, but we chanted and meditated together.

Electronic gadgets

Electronic gadgets are not allowed here. You can not use your smartphone or computer. But it’s not strict. I used my smartphone all the time to make photos and to write this article and I even didn’t have to hide it.

Dormitory

We slept here. This is my bed).

It was very cold to sleep at night, very cold, and the blankets that they gave us were not warm enough to help. But you can put on any clothes and sleep in them.

We were given white clothes. They were surprisingly clean.

We get up at 3 AM and at 3.30 we went for chanting. I loved it so much! There is something mysterious and majestic in buddhist chanting. We chanted until 4 a.m. and until 5 a.m. we meditated. I do not know why but to meditate here is so easy: it was very easy for me to focus on my breath and no thoughts disturbed my mind. And it was easy to sit one hour, to me, one hour passed so quickly as if it were 5 minutes.

After meditation I took a broom and swept the sidewalks. I couldn’t imagine before that to swipe sidewalks from the fallen palm leaves at 5 a.m. is such a pleasure. Oh no, it’s not a pleasure, it’s a bliss. I think now that janitors are the happiest people on Earth.

After the swiping I wrote this article. Usually I go to sleep between 1 and 3 a.m. and I never tried getting up at 3 a.m. So I never thought that to work at 5.30 AM is so easy. I felt myself so fresh, full of energy, serene, my mind was clear, I had no disturbing thoughts and it was such a pleasure to write an article at 5.30 a.m. Now I think that may be it’s a good idea to go to sleep at 9 PM and get up at 3 AM every day. At least I should try.

In the morning lots of Thai lay people came to the monastery and they chanted and meditated with us. They brought lots of food with them and we ate all this alms food after 8 AM. The process of having food organized as a buffet. There are lots of food on long tables and monks are the first who come to the tables and take the food, after the monks novices and students like us can take the food, and after us Thai lay people took the food.

Skeleton

There’s a skeleton in the meditation hall. I’ve found the story of this skeleton to be very strange and not suitable for the monastery. A monastery monk has told me this story. The skeleton is a skeleton of a woman who had cancer and who suffered a lot because of terrible pains and she shot herself with a gun. You can see a hole in the skull in the temple area. Why her skeleton is in the monastery now? The monks wanted to have some skeleton in the meditation hall to remind them of impermanence and to practice meditations with it. This woman was a wife of one of the important sponsors who helped to establish this monastery. Before death she bequeath her skeleton to the monastery, that’s why they put it there to remind everyone of impermanence and suffering. I am not sure that this is a completely true story, because it looks very strange to me, but I wrote my understanding of what the monk had told me. If you know other story about this skeleton, please, share it in the comments.

Negatives

I loved this place, its fantastic, but as usual every place has it positives and negatives. What are the negatives of this place?

• There’s little to no guidance. You’ll be here alone. You are not supposed to speak. If you don’t know what’s buddhism and how to meditate, you’ll get no help. Of cause you can ask for help and the guest monk and guests will answer your questions and help you, but you should be ready to do everything yourself.
• Thai pop music. On the evenings there was loud Thai pop music outside. It didn’t bother me, but some guests found it annoying.
• Lots of mosquitoes.
• Very cold at nights and you have to sleep outside. But I loved it!
• Dhamma talks in Thai language only. Although Dhamma talks are supposed to be in English here, they were only in Thai language while I was there.

Toilets and shower

Toilets and shower are Thai style and are in the same room, but clean and nice. 

Taxi

It takes 20 minutes to get to the monastery from the Ubon airport and 180 baht. I don’t know why, but despite the taxi meter shows only 100 baht, taxi drivers on our way to the monastery and back to the airport asked 180 baht. When you are at the airport there are lots of taxis there. And you can order a taxi from the monastery by the phone 045 265 999, but you should ask somebody who speaks Thai to call this number. A taxi arrived in 5 minutes to the monastery after we called this number.

Wat Pah Nanachat Photo Gallery

Stages of the transition from a lay person to a Thai Buddhist monk (bhikkhu)

• First stage (about one month): an eight-precept layperson. Having the intention to prepare for ordination, you would first stay in the monastery as an eight-precept layperson for more than one month.
• Second stage (about six months): a white-robed postulant (anagarika, ‘homeless-one’, ‘pah-kow’). After the first stage you can ask the abbot if you can become a white-robed postulant (anagarika, a ‘homeless-one’, in Thai known as a ‘pah-kow’). The abbot will discuss it with the sangha, and with their approval, you can formally commit yourself to being a pah-kow by taking the eight precepts in a sangha meeting, and from then on train in the monastic routines at Wat Pah Nanachat continually.
  • Requirements. For becoming a pah-kow, there are no specific requirements, other than showing the community that generally you are in good physical and mental health. You need to have health coverage or a travel insurance and sufficient funds for emergencies, possible visa extensions, and further travel.
• Third stage (about a year): a brown-robed novice (samanera). After about six months as a ‘pah-kow’, you can proceed to request the Going Forth (pabbajja) as a novice (samanera). The main difference between a pah-kow and a novice is that a pah-kow is still in a test phase of taking on monastic life for long-term, and thus still keeps his financial independence, while the novice adopts an additional precept that prevents him completely from ownership and the handling and use of money. This makes the samanera a full alms mendicant relying on the support of the lay community for his living. Novices wear the same brown robes as the monks and train in almost the same ways as the monks, but their explicit code of rules is much smaller and less detailed. At Wat Pah Nanachat novices already start studying the monks rules, and also acquire various basic skills of monastic life such as chanting and making robes and other requisites. Otherwise novices practice meditation and apply themselves to the duties of communal life just as the monks.
  • Requirements. For novice and bhikkhu ordination one needs one’s parent’s permission.
• Fourth stage (five years): a new monk (bhikkhu). If everything goes smoothly during the previous stage, one is well prepared, and the Sangha considers one ready for bhikkhu life, after at least one year as a novice, one can proceed to request Higher Ordination and become a part of the bhikkhu Sangha. This is a typical course of training that our monastery has used for many years now and seems to work well. It is a gradual way of becoming familiar and adapting to the new lifestyle, Thai culture, practices and rules of conduct as a monk, and it also enables our community to get to know its new members in an unhurried way. In addition, being a novice and already living in the midst of the Sangha is a very conducive opportunity to reiterate or clarify ones own plans and possibly communicate them to parents and close family members before making the step to a full commitment to the bhikkhu life. The monastic code requires new monks to be under dependence of a teacher for a period of five years.
  • Requirements. Generally we have agreed upon an age limit of about fifty years for ordination. Other requirements for ordination are that one needs to be free from debts, free from government service, and free of major diseases such as epilepsy, HIV, cancer, etc.

Thai Visa&Financial issues during the transition from a lay person to a Buddhist monk (bhikkhu)

You should be careful not to cut off your financial life-line before coming to the monastary, because even though the monks freely share their almsfood and the monastery infrastructure with everyone, all guests and pah-kows still need to take responsibility for their private needs and business, such as medical care, visas, return airfare, and personal items such as toiletries, before becoming ordained. Especially the cost of visas over a long period can be significant. The visa situation normally requires making several trips to Laos or Malaysia. A trip costs about $150 (US).

Unfortunately, until you take the novice precepts, the monastery is not able to assist you in visa matters, other than coordinating the logistics and the timing (especially for your last visa-renewal before your Going Forth). Once you are a novice, though, the monastery will take care of your visa applications without you having to arrange for any payment. Before you come to Thailand you need to acquire a two-month tourist visa at any Thai embassy (or a longer tourist – or non-immigrant visa, if possible). Please, make sure your passport is still valid for a few years and has sufficient pages left for the numerous stamps you will need.

You may be interested in reading my article about my visit to this monastery: My visit to Wat Pah Nanachat or monastery romantic.

Vipassana is practiced to develop steadiness of mind, nonreactivity, neutral awareness, mindfulness by observing physical sensations and the body’s reactions to them. The main benefit of this meditation is reduced emotional reactivity, you will become less frustrated, irritated, hurt, insulted, upset, angry, scared, less often, and it passes more quickly.

Vipassana Short Instruction

• Sit in a comfortable position;
• Bring your attention to the sensations of air going in and out of your nostrils. Don’t try to change your breath pattern, just observe it, whatever it may be. Observe, if you can sense it, the change in temperature at the rims of your nostrils. If not, simply note whatever sensation is there, be it pressure, moisture, dryness, itching, pain… Anything you can feel. Perhaps you can feel the air rushing down towards your upper lip. Practice this stage 15 minutes;
• Slowly scan your body from the top of your head to the bottom of your toes with your awareness. Observe the sensations on the surface of your body. Practice this stage for 45 minutes;

PEOPLE WHO give in to their pain are almost always destined to come in second or third in life. It’s like runners in a race: one guy’s knee starts hurting and he slows down to protect it; another guy’s knee starts hurting, and all he can see ahead of him is the finish line. It’s the people who stop to consider their hurt and heartache who usually fall short of their goals. Some even drop out altogether just because they experience a little disappointment or sorrow. You’ve got to play through your pain if you want to make it where you’re going.

People on the sidelines rarely feel any pain. For the last few years, my wife and I have had season tickets for the men’s pro basketball team in Houston. We look down and watch the guys play, and if we get tired, we can sit back on a comfortable sofa and follow the game on a screen. There’s even a place to put a wheelchair. But it’s a whole different story for the basketball players. Looking down from my seat, I can see them limping off the court, putting ice on their knees, lying on their backs, even going back to the dressing room to get medical treatment like stitches — whatever it takes for them to stay in the game.

The point is there is pain while you’re playing; there is pain while you’re in the game. Pain means you’re in it. If you aren’t feeling any twinges or pangs, it means you’re out of it. You can’t quit just because something hurts; you can’t stop to feel sorry for yourself.

Not many people I’ve asked have ever heard of Buster Mathis. But if I ask those same folks if they’ve heard the name Joe Frazier, everybody’s hand pops up. Buster Mathis was a boxer who was trying to get to the Olympics in 1964. He won all of the qualifying events. He even whipped Frazier. But then Buster hurt his hand and Frazier went to the Olympics instead. Buster Mathis could have won it all, but he gave in to his pain.

Here’s a man who beat Smokin’Joe Frazier and no one’s ever heard of him. That’s why the one thing you’ve got to do is move past your pain. If you break your right hand, you have to start doing things with your left. If you break your left hand, start doing more things with your right. Believe me, there is no comfort in saying, “I almost made it.”

Life is the same way. There is always a broken dream or a broken promise; there is always a broken heart. But if someone breaks your heart, you have to move past that empty feeling. If someone steals your money, you have to get over your anger and sense of vulnerability. Why? Because you have to get where you’re going. People can take away everything else, but no one can take away your desire to get where you’re going.

People break bones all the time. There have always been people who have had no choice but to work — people with families, people with responsibilities. If they broke their finger, they had to find a stick and wrap some tape around their finger. They had to deal with it and move on. Why? Because they had to get to where they were going. If you asked them why they didn’t go to a doctor, they’d say, “I wouldn’t have gotten my crop in. I’ve got all my stuff in the barn now.”

If you want to live this good life, you have to understand that a little suffering and disappointment are bound to come with it. It’s part of the package. If you’re tired of all life’s troubles, you don’t get to say to yourself, “I think I’ll hang around in the morgue for a day or two.”The real residents of the morgue feel no pain. You could turn the temperature down to freezing in there and they wouldn’t complain. You could hold a lit match to their finger and they wouldn’t feel it burn.

In life, there’s always going to be something to wake you up and let you know you’re alive. You don’t fall down and stay down; you don’t give up just because you run into a little pain. You keep on fighting. After people leave this life, the electricity bill comes to their house. It might be six hundred dollars. But the people who died don’t give it a second thought. Have you ever heard them complain? “Oh my God, these bills are killing me.”It’s different when you’re alive. You can always tell when someone is living in a house because they start screaming about those bills. You can hear the mother or father telling the kids, “Close those windows, shut those doors, turn down the heat.” The dead do not complain about bills. That’s a job for the living.

After I had been boxing for a long time, I looked up one day and it was as though my hand had dried up. I tried to grip a little weight and I couldn’t get my fingers around it. I could barely make a fist. So I went to a doctor and he stuck some needles in there. He said, “Can you feel this?”I said, “No.” “How about this?” I said, “No.” He said, “You’ve just about lost everything out of this arm.” When I was boxing, I kept blocking shots with my hand and it apparently destroyed a nerve.

The first thought that came to mind was how I was going to conceal that from the doctors who would examine me for my boxing matches. I wasn’t thinking, “What’s wrong with my hand?” I didn’t care; I had another hand. My fingers were closed together, and I thought, “How can I conceal this from people who will say, ‘Poor old George’?” I became an expert at concealing my hand. If someone was considering me for a commercial, they weren’t going to see this right hand. I hid it. That’s because my goal was to do something with my life. If anyone was ever asked if they’d heard of George Foreman, I wanted them to know my name. I didn’t want to end up like old Buster.

Buster Mathis must not have realized that a broken heart hurts more than a broken hand. If you’ve ever watched the Winter Olympics, you’ve seen those young girls ice-skating. They always seem to be smiling. They suffer just as many aches and pains in practice as any hockey player with black shoe polish under his eyes. But they are afraid to tell their parents or coaches. They’re afraid someone might say, “Next year, dear.”

If you want to read the whole story, please, buy George Foreman book:

 

If you asked me to describe Rishikesh using only three words, I’d say, “Bazaar. Cold. Diarrhea.”

I know, there are a lot of girls who loves Rishikesh very much, but, sorry, girls), I don’t like it and that’s why.

Bazaar. Yoga Bazaar.

When I decided to come to Rishikesh, my goal was spiritual growth and meditations study. I expected to get divine experience in Rishikesh. Before coming there I had visited lots of meditations with different teachers in Thailand and a retreat in Dipabhavan Meditation Centre. So, I’d had some experience. When I came to Rishikesh I understood immediately that there is no spirituality here, I got a feeling that I was in a big and noisy marketplace where the main commodity was yoga courses. Yes, yoga in Rishikesh is a commodity, and not something spiritual. Everybody is trying to sell you Yoga Alliance certificate. It’s a business, not yoga. My impression was confirmed by Swami Yogaswarupananda, the main yogi in Sivananda Ashram, who told me that there were no real yoga in Rishikesh these days. The same opinion had all the tourists and other yogis with whom I discussed this topic. Nevertheless, if your goal is just to get a Yoga Alliance certificate in India, it’s the best place to do it. The standard price for one month course is $1500, and you will get a certificate even if you don’t have previous experience. Everybody who has $1,500 can buy Yoga Alliance TTC in Rishikesh, and just in one month you can become a yoga teacher). No experience is required! Welcome)!

Cold. Very cold.

I was in Rishikesh in November. It’s very very cold there! It’s warm only from 11.00 AM to 4 PM, all the other time I was frozen to death. The rooms in most hotels there are not heated and inside the room the temperature the same as outside (5-7 degrees). I slept under two blankets, in woolen socks and in my clothes, but it didn’t help. If you want to take a shower, you should hurry up as you have hot water only the first several minutes. Usually you start taking shower with hot water and finish frozen to death with cold water. I lived in Hill Top Swiss Hotel, and it’s not the bad choice, it’s good, but it’s Rishikesh. Most hotels here are not heated. Welcome)!

Diarrhea. I Love You, My Dear Diarrhea)!

If you want to learn yoga in Rishikesh, diarrhea is a part of the package). Almost a whole month I had diarrhea every day. I know that it sounds not very romantic and spiritual, but it’s life). I am not a yogi who can eat food that was prepared with dirty hands in insanitary conditions and be ok. I studied at Shree Mahesh Heritage Meditation School and at one wonderful day all the students didn’t come to lessons as they had diarrhea, and even Indian cook who prepared the food was sick). When I lived in Goa for 5 months, me, my family and all my friends had poisoning, abdominal pains and diarrhea very often, I’d say too often. Unfortunately, Indians are uncleanly people, and you have to take precautions to be ok. To avoid problems with digestion, do not eat fresh food, eat only boiled or fried food. But, of cause, if you want to clean yourself, eat everything and drink raw water, but please, do not forget to take anthelmintics pills and immodium with you to Rishikesh. You’ll need them badly to finish your yoga course).

POSITIVES

That were the main negatives. Now I’ll share the positives. Some magic things happened to me here. And these things made me happy:
– I got three very good friends (two yogis with whom we decided to make a business together and a very kind and lovely Australian lady whom I love very much);
– I led two first meditation classes in my life (1. anapanasati + loving kindness, 2. satanama + sat narayn), people loved them very much, gave me a lot of support and I felt that this is my vocation;
– Before coming to Rishikesh, I suffered a lot because of my very unhealthy relationships, but I learnt not to give in to pain and as a result I learnt to feel myself very very happy in spite of anything;
– Everything is very cheap in India;
– I love Indians very much: they are so kind, warm, open and sincere.

7. Sahasrara (Sanskrit, “thousand petal lotus”) or crown chakra is located at the crown of the head. This is the chakra of enlightenment and spiritual connection to our higher selves, others, and ultimately, to the divine.

6. Ajna (Sanskrit, “command”) or third-eye chakra. Ajna is located in between the eyebrows. Ajna is our center of intuition.

5. Vishuddha (Sanskrit, “especially pure”), or Vishuddhi, or throat chakra is located in the area of the throat. Vishuddha relates to communication and growth through expression. Physically, Vishuddha governs communication.

4. Anahata (Sanskrit, “unstruck”) or heart chakra is located at the heart center. The heart chakra relates to complex emotions, compassion, tenderness, unconditional love, equilibrium, rejection and well-being. Physically, Anahata governs circulation.

3. Manipura (Sanskrit, “jewel city”) or solar plexus/navel chakra is at the area from the navel to the breastbone. It relates to willpower, fear, anxiety. Physically, Manipura governs digestion.

2.  Svadhishthana (Sanskrit, “one’s own base”) or sacral chakra is located above the pubic bone, three fingers below the navel. It relates to the testes or the ovaries that produce the various sex hormones involved in the reproductive cycle. Sacral chakra governs relationships, violence, addictions, basic emotional needs and pleasure. Physically, Svadhishthana governs reproduction, mentally it governs creativity, emotionally it governs joy, and spiritually it governs enthusiasm.

1. Muladhara (Sanskrit, “root support”) or root chakra is located at the base of the spine in the perineum region. Muladhara is related to instinct, security, survival and also to basic human potentiality. Physically, Muladhara governs sexuality, mentally it governs stability, emotionally it governs sensuality, and spiritually it governs a sense of security.

Inhale and exhale quickly ten times like the bellows of the blacksmith. Constantly dilate and contract. When you practise this Pranayama a hissing sound is produced. The practitioner should start with rapid expulsions of breath following one another in rapid succession. When the required number of expulsions, say ten for a round, is finished, the final expulsion is followed by a deepest possible inhalation. The breath is suspended as long as it could be done with comfort. Then deepest possible exhalation is done very slowly. The end of this deep exhalation completes one round of Bhastrika.

Benefits: Bhastrika Pranayama refreshes body and mind. It has a regenerating and rejuvenating influence upon the whole body and improves memory. The increased blood supply to the head improves eyesight and hearing. The lungs are strengthened and it is beneficial for bronchitis, as the respiratory system is quickly and deeply purified. Digestive function is stimulated, improving metabolism.

Contraindications: Do not practice Bhastrika if you’re pregnant, have uncontrolled hypertension, epilepsy, seizures, or panic disorder. You should also avoid practicing bellows breath on a full stomach. Wait at least two hours after eating.

Kapalbhati will calm your mind, clear thoughts and reduce stress. Normally you should do no more than 300 inhalations and exhalations, but If you do it 500 times, you’ll have no stress at all, and if you do it 1500 times you will fall into a trans state known as a glimpse of Nirvana. If you are a beginner, do not start from 1500 breaths, it’s dangerous! Start from 60 breaths and slowly increase this quantity over the time.

The word kapalbhati is made up of two words: kapal meaning ‘skull’ (here skull includes all the organs in and under the skull too) and bhati meaning ‘shining, illuminating’, so kapalbhati means shining skull. Kapalbhati cleans the cranial sinuses, that’s why it has such name.

You should practice Kapalbhati at least in 2 hours after a meal when you have an empty stomach.

Don’t practice Kapalbhati if you have some heart ailment, high blood pressure, stroke or epilepsy.

This practice is are intended for spiritual growth and self-realization. Its goal is moksha, nirvana, bhakti, or simple personal communion with a divine power in a similar way to prayer.

After long use of a mantra that is intended to foster self-realization or intimacy with a divine power, an individual may reach a state of ajapajapam. In ajapajapam, the mantra “repeats itself” in the mind.

It’s said in India that this meditation is very very powerful, and if you count while mentally repeating your goal, for example, “house, house, house, house, …”, you can get whatever you want. Just do this meditation for 10 minutes every morning at least one year. And remember, that your goal should be very specific and you should see the clear picture of it in your mind. In example with the house, you should imaging the house clearly, you should know its color, how many rooms, how many floors, a garden, its location, all the small details.

Watch This Video About How To Use a Mala (Prayer Beads)

This meditation technique taught by Swami Vipin Gyan from Rishikesh, India will release your emotional blockage and you will feel yourself more peaceful and joyful. This meditation is very very powerful, no depression in about 45 minutes!

Before meditation clean your nose thoroughly and take a handkerchief, you may need it during the meditation as you will breath forcefully through nose a lot. Find a quiet place where nobody can disturb you. Sit straight and comfortably, close your eyes.

Video Instruction by Swami Vipin Gyan