A young monk came to
live in the monastery where Ajahn Chah was practicing. The people who
lived in the town outside the monastery were holding a series of
festivals in which they sang and danced all night long. When the monks
would rise at three thirty in the morning to begin their meditation, the
parties from the night before would still be going strong. At last, one
morning the young monk cried out to Ajahn Chah, 'Venerable One, the
noise is interrupting my practice - I can't meditate with all this
noise!; 'The noise isn't bothering you, ' Ajahn responded. 'You are
bothering the noise.' As Lushtak put it to me, 'Silence is not a
function of what we think of as silence. It's when my reaction is quiet.
What's silent is my protest against the way things are.'
