About This Answer
Someone who once vowed to save all beings now wishes to seek liberation first, and asks what to do, and about Ajahn Mun's own bodhisatta vow. Ajahn Dtun answers that to relinquish the vow for Buddhahood and practise to go beyond suffering, one cultivates sīla, samādhi and paññā along with the spiritual perfections.
He gives an analogy of buying cars. Buddhahood is like saving three million baht for the most exclusive car; arahantship needs only one million. Someone who has already saved more than a million and gives up the larger goal has enough perfections to become an arahant in that life. Someone with only seven or eight hundred thousand must keep saving, developing the perfections until there is enough.
Ajahn Mun, he says, had made a vow for Buddhahood, gave it up, and through the strength of his pāramī attained full enlightenment in that life.