title: A Monastery Within: Tales from the Buddhist Path
author:  Gil Fronsdal 
description: Gil Fronsdal is the primary teacher for the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California. He has been teaching since 1990 and has practiced Zen and Vipassana in the U.S. and Asia since 1975. He was a Theravada monk in Burma and trained with Jack Kornfield to be a Vipassana teacher. He was also ordained as a Soto Zen priest at the San Francisco Zen Center and received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman. Gil has a PhD in Relgious Studies from Stanford University. Gils teachings can be found at www.audiodharma.org and www.insightmeditationcenter.org/books-articles/. His translation of the "Dhammapada", an important collection of Buddhist verses, is published by Shambhala Publications. He is the author of "The Issue at Hand: Essays on Buddhist Mindfulness Practice." He is a husband and a father of two sons.
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  ![Title](../images/00002.jpeg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Copyright © 2020 by Karen Baugh Menuhin
  
  
  Published by Little Dog Publishing
  
  
  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any
  manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of
  quotations in a book review.
  
  
  This is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents either are the product
  of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to
  actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
  
  
  Front cover: An old Monastery courtyard garden, with flowers, statue and
  fountain. / Old Monastery Garden Courtyard By Larry Jacobsen
  
  
  First paperback and ebook edition August 2020
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  To Philip & Trudi Palin
  
  
  With love.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # Chapter 1
  
  
  April 1922
  
  
  ‘I must inform you, sir, there is a ghost in the garden.’
  
  
  ‘No, there isn’t.’ I didn’t look up from the magazine I was reading.
  
  
  ‘I have the word of Cook that