Before the discussion, a recorded teaching from the founding elder monk was played, describing "two sides" that govern merit: the Buddha side and the Mara side. When the Buddha side governs and we make merit and do good, that side sends merit our way, like electricity being sent down a line for us to use. Someone asked Phra Ajarn Watcharin to expand on this.

Two forces competing for the human body

Phra Ajarn Watcharin explained that the human body, in its original nature, belongs to the wholesome side — built for accumulating goodness. But interference from other forces is constant, creating an ongoing tug-of-war. Whichever side gains enough strength to hold the body directs the energy it generates toward its own purpose. People with a greater share of wholesome dhamma in them generate good for themselves and their families; those with a greater share of the unwholesome bring trouble to themselves and those around them — and this ripples outward from the individual to the family, the village, all the way to the level of a country.

The human body, then, is like a junction — an energy generator for whichever side controls it. Fundamentally there are two forces in direct opposition; a third, minor influence has little real effect beyond wasting time. He also explained that the merit-power of each person, connected to the Triple Gem within, gets channeled toward abundance — in weather, harvests, and the economy of each country — so that people are freed from basic hardship and have the time and heart to keep building goodness.

He concluded that each person's task is simply to choose a side. Once chosen, that side governs and steers life toward its own end. Someone who doesn't understand this and simply drifts, unguarded in body and mind, ends up controlled without realizing it — that not-knowing is what's called ignorance (avijjā). The wholesome side, by contrast, offers knowledge — guiding us, through teachers and our own inner wisdom, past the obstacles in front of us.

Is there a "sea of demerit" to match the "sea of merit"?

Someone then asked: since there's a term for a "sea of merit," shouldn't there also be a "sea of demerit"? Phra Ajarn Watcharin answered honestly that he had never heard the term "sea of demerit" before, and so wasn't willing to claim whether such a thing exists or not.

Quitting a harmful livelihood, yet life still feels hard — why?

Someone shared an example: two people worked in the same line of business, one that came bundled with harming living beings. One of them decided to quit, seeing it as unwholesome — but afterward the business steadily declined until it had to close, and life became harder. The other continued in the same line of work and kept prospering. This raised the question: why does it seem like merit didn't help the person who chose to do the right thing?

Phra Ajarn Watcharin said this needs to be looked at point by point, not lumped together. Quitting a harmful livelihood protects the person's future from becoming worse than it would otherwise be — that particular karmic consequence simply won't arise again down the line. What's happening in the present, though, follows the natural rise and fall of a person's own life graph, and may simply have coincided with a downward stretch — not something caused directly by the decision to quit. As long as the person keeps living within wholesome dhamma, he encouraged holding firm with sincerity of resolve, asking the Triple Gem within and Nirvana for protection, and not giving in to grief or overthinking. Once the difficult period passes, the flow of merit built from that steadfastness will gradually lift life back up.

As for someone who knows their livelihood causes harm but can't yet quit because of obligations — supporting a family, for instance — he explained this comes from strong binding attachments. Letting go can only happen once the person themselves is ready to release it. If the time to be free of that burden hasn't yet come, one has to accept the karmic consequences that follow, while doing what's possible to lighten the load, and resolve that in a future life one won't choose this path again.

This life matters most

Phra Ajarn Watcharin closed by noting that the modern world is full of temptations that make it easy to lose one's way. He asked everyone to be patient and see this life through to the end, because being born to encounter the Triple Gem and teachers like this is not something that happens easily. If this opportunity is missed, the chance of meeting again in a future life becomes remote. He asked everyone to keep learning with sincerity, and to let go of what isn't wholesome dhamma with understanding, so as not to fall under the influence of anything else.