Ayyā Medhānandī Bhikkhunī, is the founder and guiding teacher of Sati Sārāņīya Hermitage, a Canadian forest monastery for women in the Theravāda tradition. The daughter of Eastern European refugees who emigrated to Montreal after World War II, she began a spiritual quest in childhood that led her to India, Burma, England, New Zealand, Malaysia, Taiwan, and finally, back to Canada.
In 1988, at the Yangon Mahasi retreat centre in Burma, Ayyā requested ordination as a bhikkhunī from her teacher, the Venerable Sayādaw U Pandita Mahāthera. This was not yet possible for Theravāda Buddhist women. Instead, Sayādaw granted her ordination as a 10 precept nun on condition that she take her vows for life. Thus began her monastic training in the Burmese tradition. When the borders were closed to foreigners by a military coup, in 1990 Sayādaw blessed her to join the Ajahn Chah Thai Forest Saņgha at Amaravati, UK.
After ten years in their siladhāra community, Ayyā felt called to more seclusion and solitude in New Zealand and SE Asia. In 2007, having waited nearly 20 years, she received bhikkhunī ordination at Ling Quan Chan Monastery in Keelung, Taiwan and returned to her native Canada in 2008, on invitation from the Ottawa Buddhist Society and Toronto Theravāda Buddhist Community, to establish Sati Sārāņīya Hermitage.
When a river flows into the sea it acquires one taste, the taste of salt. As our meditation deepens, regardless of age, health, race, gender, culture or social status, delving into the mind, we discover one taste, that is the taste of truth. The world is full of suffering, not what we want it to be. And on the street where you live is your monastery, your garden, the thorns and the flowers, the compost and the field of cultivation – from feeling hopeless despair to the dawning moment when you understand the origin of suffering and the way to the Deathless. Letting go in the very marrow of the moment, spread peace and compassion in all directions – on the street where you live.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
“Being human is a guest house” wrote Rumi. Every day we greet new arrivals – joys, sorrows, hostilities and more; and moments of awareness too. We bow to the present moment and greet them all, be they thorns or unruly monsters like malice, shame, fear, anger or greed. Can we see them all just as they are, painful or pleasant – impermanent, not ours, not who we are? Can we let them come and go, and be grateful? Treat whatever passes through the heart as empty. After all, these are karmic messengers from beyond bearing unique spiritual gifts. For in their presence, we strengthen our practice. Wisely attentive, reflective, and aware, we are on the magnificent path of waking up.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
Seeing the honest truth of the mind's delusion can teach us to develop a healthy mind and know true happiness. It is a doorway to freedom, opened through mental cultivation including loving-kindness and compassion for ourselves and all beings.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
The way out of pain is not in sense pleasure. But suffering can be a ticket to Nibbana – maybe not the one we asked for, but it's in our hands. So we try. Taste the moment just as it is. Choose love when there is every reason to hate. Trust when there is every reason to despair. Be patient when anger is burning within. Faced with terror or far from peace, let go. Being still in the very midst of fear, we can know non-fear. All is fleeting, not what we are, and nothing to hold onto. There, in the silent flow of the breath, the heart will soften in a tender wave of unconditional love.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
In a psychic feat for his sister, Sundari Nanda, the Buddha creates a vision of a beautiful lady who transforms into an old woman. Through this direct experience of impermanence, her mind is liberated. Likewise, those who rightly love wisdom and contemplate death without fear see the emptiness and impermanence of all conditioned things. Realizing the futility of all clinging and the inevitability of death, our wisdom and faith in the Dhamma ripen and reveal the doors to the Deathless. This is the path of awakening.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
We underestimate the power of renunciation to gain our true spiritual inheritance from the Buddha. These deeper levels of practice require not a formulaic approach but faith enough to let go the clinging that perpetuates an endless cycle of loss and suffering. On this sacred way of freedom, we walk the razor’s edge to ascend the Everest of the heart. This is no small task for a human being. But we push on with clarity, courage and insight. Holding the chalice of sanctity, we come face to face with the law of impermanence, the jewel of awakened wisdom, and the immeasurable peace of all that is pure and beautiful and true.
Stokes Valley Monastery Retreat, New Zealand
The poison arrow of ignorance spreads its toxins through passion, desire and ill will. By sitting still, applying mindfulness and surrendering to what is, the right view will illuminate our minds and will help us extract the arrow and heal the wound.
Learn how we can refine our mental skills of faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration and wisdom. Enhanced by right view and a deepened understanding of the Four Noble Truths, these spiritual powers vanquish hatred and fear, nurturing our readiness to forgive, and the blessed qualities of universal loving-kindness and compassion. A talk given during a 10-day retreat at Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand in 2002.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
What is the best chariot according to the Dhamma? A commentary on the Buddha’s conversation with Ananda about the noble vehicle that will carry you victoriously along the spiritual path - to Nibbana, full awakening. A talk given at a 10-day retreat in Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand in 2002.
Bodhinyanarama Monastery, Stokes Valley, New Zealand
A reflection on the tale of Patacara’s meeting with the Buddha after the deaths of her sons, husband, and parents and how she attains equanimity in the face of great suffering. A talk given at Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, UK, Death & Dying Retreat.
