Buddhist Monks On: Letting Go of Shame, The Opposite of Depression, and Dealing With Criticism | Ajahn Kovilo and Ajahn Nisabho

What It Covers

American Buddhist monks Ajahn Kovilo and Ajahn Nisabho from Clear Mountain Monastery in Seattle share three practical frameworks drawn from monastic life: a biweekly confession practice for accountability, the Buddha's five-point BAGEL framework for giving and receiving feedback skillfully, and a three-part sila-samadhi-panna approach for maintaining mental clarity amid modern life's chaos.

Key Questions Answered

• •Biweekly Confession Practice: Every two weeks, meet a trusted accountability partner and openly name actions that fell short of your values. Use a simple three-part formula: state the transgression, confirm you recognize it, commit to future restraint. Research on car insurance reporting shows that affirming your identity as an honest person before acting increases truthful behavior measurably. Follow confessions with gratitudes to balance the practice.
• •BAGEL Framework for Giving Feedback: Before speaking, run through five checks — Beneficial (does this help them?), Accurate (is it true?), Gentle (is the tone kind?), Expedient (is the timing right?), and Loving kindness (is your intention clean?). If even a sliver of contempt or annoyance remains, wait — fifteen minutes of delay after emotional activation is often enough to resolve what felt like an irresolvable conflict.
• •Receiving Feedback — Two-Point Check: When criticism arrives, regardless of how poorly it is delivered, hold two questions: Is this true? And, am I being provoked into reactivity? Use the Nonviolent Communication structure — Observation, Feeling, Need, Request — to respond rather than react. Physically slowing the breath, placing a hand over the heart, and directing loving kindness inward reduces the physiological activation that drives defensive responses.
• •Saranya Generosity Practice: Give something before consuming each day — food, time, or resources. This practice, rooted in a direct Buddha teaching, counteracts the overwhelm of global suffering by converting passive anxiety into concrete action. Practical forms include carrying protein bars to give away before eating, serving a family member first, or committing to a weekly volunteer shift. Action absorbs anxiety more effectively than consuming more news.
• •Morning Loving Kindness Reset: In the first fifteen minutes after waking, before the mind crystallizes around arguments, plans, or anxieties, direct attention to the heart and generate a loving kindness mantra — "may they be well, may they be happy." This orients the day's emotional trajectory along warmth rather than reactivity. Even ten minutes of metta practice at day's start pays compounding dividends across subsequent interactions and decisions.
• •News and Phone Boundaries as Sila Practice: Treating media consumption as an ethical discipline — no news before morning meditation, no phone after 6PM, one news-free day per week — functions as a form of virtue practice. The Buddhist framework reframes this not as avoidance but as protecting the mind's capacity for brightness. Being miserable about the world's suffering does not honor that suffering; bringing a clear, warm mind to action does.