About This Teaching
How did Ajahn Dtun practise after ordaining? He explains that before ordination he had meditated fewer than ten times, watching the breath. As a monk he at first used the breath in walking meditation too, but on hearing a monk teach that 'buddho' suits walking better, he switched to buddho while walking and kept the breath for sitting.
He slept about four hours a night and resolved not to rest during the day unless ill, since he had ordained to train mindfulness, not to seek comfort. He ate moderately, just enough to have strength to practise. Reasoning that laypeople work eight hours a day, he felt that a monk living on their support should practise more, and spent at least eight or nine hours in formal sitting and walking, while trying to keep mindfulness in all activities from waking until sleep.
The key, he stresses, is continuity. Effort made for five days or a week and then dropped for a month will not bear fruit; practice must be done every day, treating each day and night as if it were all of one's life.