Everything Is Given

There is a particular quality of silence at a monastery. It is not the absence of sound, but the presence of something deeper. It is a stillness that has been held and tended over years, cultivated by the prayers and practice of those who dwell there.

I arrived at Sitagu Buddha Vihara this morning.

Founded in Austin, Texas by the Venerable Ashin Nyanissara, known as Sitagu Sayadaw of Burma, the monastery sits on sixteen acres of land in the Hill Country of southwest Austin and holds within it a world entirely its own. I am here for a week. I do not yet know what I am here to learn. I only know I was called.

Everything Is Already Provided

One of the first things I noticed was this — everything here is given. The land, the housing, the food, the medicine, the blankets, the electricity, the water. The community itself. In keeping with ancient Buddhist tradition, there is no charge for staying as a guest. It is supported entirely by the generosity of the broader community, through contributions of food, financial support, and labor. Many of the donors live in Asia, particularly Myanmar. Their names are noted on each gift, a quiet inscription of devotion.

I sat on a cushion inside the pagoda hall, beneath five large Buddha rupas, surrounded by dozens more along the walls, and I felt it. The generosity of strangers had built this place of peace. A sacred space comes into being through the accumulated offerings of many hearts.

The first teaching arrived immediately. Abundance is not something we accumulate. It is something we participate in.

The Five Monks and Detachment

Some monks at Sitagu came from Myanmar, where the monastery’s roots and parent organization were established, and they have made this land their home. They serve primarily as teachers of the Dhamma and meditation, with the ultimate goal of Nibbana, or Nirvana, by following the teachings of the Buddha.

I thought about the faith it must take to leave behind culture, family, the familiar textures of home. And then I remembered that this is exactly what the practice calls for. Monks train their entire lives in non-attachment, not as cold severance, but as a gradual and loving release of everything that binds. Their crossing of an ocean was perhaps an outer expression of an inner journey they had already begun.

What am I holding onto that keeps me from crossing into deeper freedom?

On the Question of Meat

At the communal lunch, I was surprised to find meat on the table. I had assumed a Buddhist monastery would be vegetarian. Martin, the man beside me, told me that meat is always served here. I sat with my surprise, curious about it. What had I been expecting, and why?

This turns out to be rooted in ancient Vinaya, the code of monastic discipline. In the Theravada tradition, practiced here and across Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and Laos, the Buddha gave permission for monks to eat whatever food is offered, provided it meets what is called purity in three respects. The monk must not have seen, heard, or suspected that the animal was killed specifically for him. What the monks eat is entirely dependent on what is given. The act of accepting food without preference is itself a practice of non-attachment.

This is different from the Mahayana tradition, practiced in China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam, where vegetarianism became the standard. My surprise, I realized, had come from that Mahayana-influenced assumption. Neither is more or less Buddhist. They reflect different lineages, different cultural inheritances, both pointing toward the same liberation.

The lesson I received was not about diet. It was about receiving what is offered with an open, ungrasping hand.

The Pagoda Hall: Going Within

I spent two hours in the pagoda hall in the afternoon, and something in me began to settle. As I sat alone in the stillness, I felt the accumulated prayers of the space begin to hold me. My mind, so accustomed to its own noise, grew quiet. And in the quiet, I heard something I had not expected. The suffering of the world.

For half an hour, I prayed. I held in my heart the many who are hurting, who are lost, who long for peace. This is what happens when the mind settles. Compassion has more room to move through us.

Meditation does not make us more removed from life. It makes us more fully available to it.

The Monastery of Nature

Outside the pagoda hall, a monastery of a different kind was waiting.

The campus is alive. Trees, birds, squirrels, butterflies. Centipedes and mosquitoes, too. I was bitten many times, and my skin inflamed in wide, allergic welts. In one moment, instinct overcame my intention. I slapped the mosquito biting my hand. It fell onto the table, flat on its back, still.

I paused. I said a quiet prayer, asking forgiveness, wishing it onward toward something with less suffering. And then, as I gently blew it away, it stirred. It righted itself. And flew away. So alive.

I have never seen that before.

I hold the question open. Are some beings waiting at the edge of one form of consciousness, ready to cross into something more expanded? Is prayer, even a simple and imperfect one, enough to help a being move?

Later, a two-inch centipede landed on my right foot, otherworldly in its green, gold, and black markings. I stopped moving, hoping it would find its own way. When I looked down some minutes later, it was gone. It had moved on without my intervention, in its own time, by its own direction.

Even the slow and steady arrive. This is the promise of daily practice. We do not need to be fast. We only need to keep moving.

The Offering Plate

I watched one of the monks carry a small plate of food to the edge of the grounds, set it down, and walk away.

This practice is found across Buddhist and Zen monasteries. Offerings of food are left before meals for beings in the lower realms, what Buddhist cosmology calls hungry ghosts. Pretas, as they are known in Pali, are beings caught in states of suffering and craving, unable to receive nourishment through ordinary means. The offering is a meritorious act, a reminder not to be greedy or selfish, and a means to extend compassion beyond the visible world.

I have known spiritual practitioners who scatter rice and spices on the earth for the same purpose, feeding those invisible to us, those caught in suffering they cannot name. The monk’s offering felt like the same gesture. A hand extended across the veil, with nothing asked in return.

Every being is included in the circle of compassion. Even those we cannot see.

What the Monastery Teaches

I arrived this morning and already I have been given more than I expected. This is the nature of sacred space. It does not wait for you to be ready. It begins immediately.

This place exists because of the generosity of donors in Myanmar and Austin and places between, the generosity of monks who crossed oceans, the generosity of a tradition that has carried the light of the Dharma for 2,500 years. It opens its doors with respect for all religions. Many people of other faiths find Buddhist practice deeply supportive of their own spiritual path.

I am one of them.

I came here seeking stillness and myself. The stillness came. But so did much more. There are reminders here that every being matters, that generosity builds worlds, that compassion has no edges, and that even a mosquito, when prayed for, may find its wings again.

May all beings be free. May all beings find peace.