Tag Archives: Breathing

The Uncultivated Mind Brings Suffering

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October 25, 2012. 105-minute dharma talk given by Thich Nhat Hanh from Lower Hamlet at Plum Village. The sangha is enjoying the Autumn Retreat and this is a Day of Mindfulness.

Last week we learned about the Four Kinds of Nutriments and having to do with the Fifth Mindfulness Training.

Power. Some people think if they have power, they will be happy. It takes a great deal of understanding. The mind of love; of enlightenment. Bodhicitta. This comes from the practice of mindfulness and concentration. Understanding your own suffering helps you understand the suffering of others around you. I’m the family and in the nation. Love and understanding. Understanding is the foundation of love. The mind left uncultivated will bring lots of suffering. We need a spiritual dimension in our daily life. This is our practice. Bodhicitta is a tremendous source of energy.

Mental formations. There are mental formations that make us suffer, but they can be transformed.
Samadhi. Maintaining awareness.

Meditation on impermance. We have to keep this alive in us. Treasure the moments we have. Impermanance is a characteristic of life.

The Three Doors of Liberation. Concentrations. Emptiness. Signlessness. Aimlessness. This teaching includes an exploration of birth and death. Being and non-being. Impermanance. Non-craving. Nirvana.

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Sitting is an Art

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October 7, 2012. 105-minute dharma talk given by Thich Nhat Hanh at Plum Village. The sangha is enjoying the Autumn Retreat and this is a Day of Mindfulness.

Thay begins his talk today with reminiscences from Vietnam in the 60s. Forty-six years ago, Thay was invited by Cornell University to give a series of lectures on the conditions in Vietnam. The Vietnamese were fighting each other with foreign ideologies and foreign weapons. We were not allowed to use our voices for peace, but there was a peace movement in Vietnam. Thay wrote a book of poems and a book, Lotus in the Sea of Fire, that needed to be published and distributed underground. We also trained many social workers to help orphans and children. Those supporting peace were often threatened and murdered. We need a spiritual dimension in our life so we don’t lose ourselves to despair and to help sustain us.

What do you do when you’re practicing sitting meditation? Sitting isn’t “doing” but it’s more about “being” – harmony, joy, and healing are possible. Sitting is an art. There is no need to do anything. Mind and body must be together to live in the preset moment. One mindful in-breathe may be enough to come home. We don’t need to worry about the future. Teaching on mindfulness of body – it is a wonder, a mystery.

The Kingdom of God. Dharmachaya. The body of the cosmos. Suchness. Reality as it is. We cannot use our notions to describe God. This is available in the here and the now.

Exercises on mindful breathing. Enlightenment is not far away; it can be immediate with mindfulness. Breathing in you can have enlightenment. No thinking. No planning. No fear. Then your concentration becomes stronger. Brings insight to transform our suffering and bring happiness. This is not prayer, this is practice. Happiness does not depend on the outside, it depends on our way of looking at things.

Walking on Mother Earth. Samskara. Formation. We calm down the body formation.

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Our Spiritual Body Should Grow Everyday

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May 4, 2012. 92-minute dharma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh from Lower Hamlet in Plum Village during the 12th annual Francophone Retreat. The talk is given in French with English translation. This is the final dharma talk.

We begin with a teaching on the Four Noble Truths and the noble eightfold path. We spend quite a bit of time on Right Concentration. A review of the exercises of mindful breathing is included. As part of these teachings, we learn of birth and death. being and non-being. Three Doors of Liberation.

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Creating a Spiritual Practice

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April 29, 2012. 55-minute dharma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh during the 12th annual Francophone Retreat. Thay says we have become a big family. The talk is given in French with English translation. This is the first dharma talk.

Creating a spiritual practice. Drinking tea is a spiritual practice. Becoming one with your in breath can create freedom; freedom from our worries, anxiety, etc. The things that make life difficult. You can touch the present moment with mindful breathing.

We can use our breathing to cultivate our spiritual practice. Our mindfulness. What is happening in the present moment.

Recognizing our breathing.
Following our breathing

We continue learning the next six exercises of mindful breathing.

Dharma Talk Francophone Day 1 from Plum Village Online Monastery on Vimeo.

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Cultivating Happiness with the Bell

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April 6, 2012. 115-minute dharma talk given at The University of Nottingham by Thich Nhat Hanh. The sangha is on the UK and Ireland Tour and this is the first dharma talk for the Cultivating Happiness Family Retreat. The recording begins with a couple of practice songs before Thay enters the meditation hall followed by 10-minutes of chanting.

At 18-minutes into the recording, Thay gives a talk for the children present at the retreat. Cultivating happiness. We begin with a story of a teacher who implements coming back to oneself in the classroom by breathing and resting together. The practice helped the students and teacher in the classroom. The teacher used a bell in a classroom, so Thay teaches us about inviting the bell and how to be a bell master.

At 56-minutes into the recording, we begin the primary talk. The focus of our talk is on mindful breathing. This has to do with our suffering and our happiness. Exercise #5, from the Sutra on Full Awareness of Breathing, is cultivating joy, followed by #6 on cultivating happiness and #7 is to recognize a painful feeling and #8 is calming the painful feeling.

I Send My Heart Along with the Sound of this Bell from Plum Village Online Monastery on Vimeo.

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True Peace and Happiness

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March 29, 2012. 73-minute talk from the Royal Festival Hall in London, England. The sangha is on a tour of the United Kingdom and this is the first public event. The recording here is the main talk of the evening activities.

We focus our attention on our breath. One in-breath is enough to bring enlightenment. The teaching is from the Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing – we look at the first eight exercises.

Near the end, a few questions are taken from the audience. (1) When you live in the here and now, do you actually forget the past? (2) How do you resolve someone pushing in front of you on the Tube? (3) How can I practice with pain I have caused someone in the past? (4) How do you practice with forgiveness?

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Communication and the Mind

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March 25, 2012. 110-minute talk from Upper Hamlet in Plum Village, France. The talk is given in English. We begin with 10-minutes of chanting in Vietnamese and French.

Communication. We trust to much in our instruments of communication – mobile phone, email Skype, etc. Behind the instruments is our mind, and the question to ask is whether you can communicate with yourself. Many of us are angry or don’t respect ourselves. It is a mess inside. In that situation, how can we communicate with another person?

In Plum Village, we try to teach you how to come back to yourself. We learn to breath in mindfulness. We learn to eat in mindfulness. We learn to walk in mindfulness. We connect with our body and our mind. We need to let go our thinking – the practice of non-thinking.

Related to our suffering and being connected to our body is our consumption. We read a book, listen to music, drive the car, etc. We look to consumption to help us forget the pain their ourselves. Again, learning mindful breathing and walking we can gain the energy of mindfulness and be able to look at the pain and the sorrow. If you have mindfulness, you are no longer afraid.

Mindfulness is generated from your practice. And when we are together, we can generate collective mindfulness.

At 56-minutes, the talk switch to Vietnamese with English translation. [Editors Note: a group of Vietnamese exchange students were up for the day and Thay responded to some questions.] Questions about personal relationships, relationship with Vietnam and the Vietnamese government, ethics and relationship to the government

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Making Peace with Ourselves

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February 12, 2012. 79-minute dharma talk from Upper Hamlet in Plum Village, France. The sangha is in the 2011-2012 Winter Retreat. The talk is given in Vietnamese with English translation. A French translation is also available.

Learning to connect with oneself. In Plum Village, our practice is simple. First, we learn how to breathe. We can start to connect with ourselves through the in-breath. The in breath is us. If you practice, the quality will improve. More gentle. More light. We use a gatha: In. Out. Deep. Slow. Calm. Ease. Smile. Release. Present moment. Wonderful moment.

Working with feelings through our breath is also possible. This is taught in the Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing. Practicing means taking care of our body and our mind. We have the five Skandhas. There is still suffering alongside the well being, but we can be harmony with ourselves. Make peace with ourselves. We don’t need to commit suicide.

At 21-minutes we resume the sutra study of “Alambanapariksha and Vrtti” with gatha #7. Last time we talked of the image of perception. The subject and the object take refuge in each other; like the right and the left. We call this Interbeing (in science this is called Entanglement). They must manifest at the same time and serve as conditions to each other. Thay then teaches the six characteristics of bija (seeds).

Making Peace with Ourselves from Plum Village Online Monastery on Vimeo.

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Applied Mindfulness of Breathing

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January 4, 2012. 102-minute dharma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh from Lower Hamlet, Plum Village. The sangha is in the 2011-2012 Winter Retreat, but within that retreat is the 6-day Applied Ethics and Teachers Retreat. This talk is given in English. During the past six days we have practiced together as educators.

We begin with a teaching on the first eight steps of the Sutra on Mindful Breathing. Belly breathing. Rising and falling of the abdomen. We are much more than one emotion and with this practice we can realize this.

Thay continues (at 1:03) to share about the practices of loving speech and deep listening. Many of us suffer from our family relationships. If we can master these practices, we can transmit to our students and help them.
He also shares (at 1:25) the practice of how to die happily and peacefully.

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Practicing in the Winter Retreat

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November 17, 2011. 53-minute dharma talk with Thich Nhat Hanh from Lower Hamlet in Plum Village, France. The sangha is preparing for the upcoming 90-day Winter Retreat. Thay shares some guiding practices for the community to follow during the upcoming Winter Retreat: touching the Earth, sitting meditation, realizing the practice in all activities, etc.

Deepen practice. Build sangha. Cultivate peace. Make our breathing more peaceful. Improve the quality. We can bring four things into the practice: Peace. Clarity. Compassion. Courage. These four virtues bring happiness to the practitioner. Other elements of happiness: Brotherhood and sisterhood. A Path. What is your story of transformation and healing?

This winter we will study texts in preparation for 21-day retreat in June 2012. The theme of that retreat will be the Science of the Buddha. The first text will be the Paramartha Gathas of Asaga, 44-verses. Thay has translated this into Vietnamese and will serve as the foundation for a new English translation during the Winter Retreat (it has previously been translated into English by  Professor Alex Wayman). It is also available in Chinese and Sanskrit. The second text, if we have time, we will be Studies on the Objects of Conciousness. This too has been translated by Thay.

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