Transcriptions of Dharma Talks Part 3

So you practice sitting there and you touch these qualities of the Buddha in you. You touch the real Buddha, not the Buddha made of plaster or copper or even emerald. For the pract.i.tioner, Buddha is not a G.o.d. Buddha is not someone outside in the sky, on a mountain. Buddha is alive, that is a living Buddha that is in us. Tell me of a person who does not possess the nature of Buddha within him or her. No. In Mahayana Buddhism, the most important message of all the sutras is that everyone has the capacity of being a Buddha. The capacity of loving, understanding, and being enlightened. That is the most important message of all sutras.

So this is a very deep practice. You may spend only three or four minutes on this practice. You may like to put your fingers on your heart and you practice visiting the Buddha inside. The Buddha is in your heart, also everywhere in your body, not only in your heart. In your stomach, also. Sometimes you feel that fear is in your stomach, but you should know that the Buddha is in your stomach at the same time. It is up to you to choose.

After a few minutes of practice like that, you practice alone, or together with a few friends. You say, "Dear Buddha, it is very comfortable to know that you are there." The Buddha always says, "Of course I am always there for you. But please visit more often." Because every time you visit the Buddha, the Buddha in you profits. The Buddha in you will have more s.p.a.ce and air to breathe. Because during the day you may have suffered a lot and you throw into yourself anger, hatred, frustration, suffering. So you deprive the Buddha of fresh air to breathe inside. So your little Buddha may be suffocating a little bit inside. But every time you practice touching the Buddha, you bring in a lot of s.p.a.ce, of air. The Buddha within you has a chance to grow. It is very important. Sitting meditation, that is for what? Walking meditation, that is for what? That is to give to the Buddha inside a chance to grow.

Dear little Buddha, I need you very much," and the little Buddha in you will say, "Dear one, I also need you very much. Please come and visit more often." This practice is called recollection of the Buddha and is taught in every school of Buddhism. You touch the Buddha, you touch all the qualities of the Buddha, and you know that the Buddha is absolutely real-not as an idea, not as a notion, but as a reality. Our task, our life, our practice, is to nourish the Buddha and give ourselves and the people we love a chance.

Please write down the practice in short, complete sentences to make it available for other children who are not sitting today in this Dharma hall, so that they can practice with you also. The children should stand up and bow [Bell-Children leave Dharma hall].

On the sixteenth of this month I started our summer opening with a Dharma talk where I said that it's very important to allow our body and our minds to rest. Our body may still carry a lot of wounds inside, and our consciousness also, it may carry a lot of wounds inside. They need healing. The basic condition for all healing is to be able to rest, but we don't have the capacity to rest. We have the habit of running, of doing things. That is why to meditate is first of all to learn how to rest, to give your body and your mind a chance to rest and to heal themselves. It seems to be a very simple thing, but we need training to be able to do that.

I said that when an animal living in the forest is wounded, it always tries to look for a quiet place to lay down for many days and allow the wound to heal. During these days the animal does not think about eating or anything else. That is the practice of all animals in the forest every time they get wounded by another animal or by other kinds of things, including disease. That wisdom we have to learn. There are wounds within our body. We may have diseases, we may even have cancer or other difficulties that we think to be incurable. We may have blocks of suffering in our consciousness. We may have despair, fear, and confusion, but we know that our body has the capacity of healing itself if we allow it a chance to rest. This is not only true for our body but also for our soul.

Our consciousness knows and has the capacity of healing itself-only if we allow it the chance, that is, to allow it to rest, to authorize it to rest. When we cut our finger we are not so afraid, we know that our body can heal itself. So we just clean the wound, protect it from the dirt, and the battle is from inside and in just twenty-four hours we can heal it. Our body knows how to create antibodies to protect itself. We have to believe in our body. We have to allow our body a chance to rest. Many difficult diseases may be healed just by our capacity of resting. This we have to learn. In the practice of Buddhism there are many things like that to learn. The sutra on mindful breathing, for instance, is more than enough for you to heal yourself. If you know how to practice exercises brought to you by the Buddha, you know how to do it, to enjoy doing that, you give your body a chance to heal and also your consciousness.

You have had the experience of utmost suffering-something happened to you and you did not believe that you could survive that. How could you survive such bad news, pain? And yet, you have survived. You have gone through that period and you've proved to be able to survive that kind of suffering. It means your consciousness knows the way to survive. You say, "Time heals." But time alone cannot heal your suffering. It is not because you are acquainted with the suffering that you are healed. No. It is because of the fact that your consciousness knows the way to heal itself. You have to trust it because in your consciousness there is the Buddha, there is a seat of love, of understanding. If you allow them to manifest, then your consciousness will be able to heal itself.

Talking to a therapist, talking to a teacher, talking to Dharma brothers and sisters, allows these wholesome energies to be touched, to give them a chance to become more apparent. They will take care of the healing. Sometimes we speak about a "talking cure," but the talking cannot cure. The talking-the most it can do-is to allow yourself to have confidence in your own ability to heal yourself. So it's very important that during that time we spend with a Sangha, a Dharma teacher, we have to learn the techniques of allowing our body and our soul to rest. The heart of the Buddhist practice is to stop-to stop running, to stop preventing our body and our soul from resting.

Many people believe that they need to go for holidays. They struggle, they do everything in order to have these holidays. But during these holidays do they really rest? They are much more tired after the holidays. So everyone has to learn the art of resting, of restoring. Your Dharma teachers, your Dharma brothers and sisters, they know how to practice resting and healing. When you practice fasting for instance, you allow your stomach, intestines, liver, kidneys, to rest. You are not afraid of fasting, because you know that there is a reservoir, a reserve, of nutrition in your body. You can go on a fast of two or three weeks without eating and not lose your strength. Those of us who have tried the practice of cleaning our digestive system, we know that. We just drink water. We just rest.

We continue to enjoy our sitting meditation, walking meditation. We don't feel that we lose any energy at all. Our bowels, given time to rest for ten days or two weeks, can heal themselves. We have to believe in such things because we have practiced it and other people have practiced it-it proved to be the truth. Healing is possible only on the days of resting.

Now how about our consciousness, our mind? What kind of practice should you do, or what kind of nonpractice should you do in order for your soul and your consciousness to be able to rest? We should not lose our time in getting ideas, even very wonderful ideas, about enlightenment, nirvana, Buddhahood, or things like that. We should get to the real thing, to the bones of the practice. How to start? With samatha samatha. Samatha is just stopping. You stand in front of a young tree. You look at the young tree. You stand in front of the tree in such a way that you can stop. You breathe in and out in such a way that you can stop completely running in your mind and in your body.

Last year when we visited China, we saw on crossroads the sign, "stop." And the Chinese word, "stop," is exactly the word that the Chinese people use to translate the word "samatha." One day I stood in front of a sign like this and I practiced breathing and smiling to it. And I completely stopped. It was like standing in front of the Buddha who made the sign to tell you to stop. You are breathing, you are standing there, but you have stopped completely. It is a wonderful thing to be stopped. With stopping like that, calm becomes something possible. Peace becomes something possible and of course healing. As long as you continue to run-running to look for something or running to escape something-it is still running. You have not stopped, you have no peace. So learning how to stop is extremely important. Because stopping, being calm, being peaceful, is the precondition for deep looking, which is vipasyana vipasyana. Vipasyana is insight practice, contemplation, looking deeply. Meditation is made of stopping, calming and looking deeply. Stopping helps you to rest, to calm, to have peace, to provide the basic condition for healing. Then looking is something you can do easily once you have stopped. Looking into the nature of your illness, looking into the nature of your pain, you begin to have the insight, you begin to understand. That understanding relieves you from the pain completely. That is called salvation by knowledge. We don't speak about salvation by grace in Buddhism. We speak about salvation by knowledge, by understanding, prajna prajna. Prajnaparamita Prajnaparamita means the kind of understanding that carries you to the other sh.o.r.e, the other sh.o.r.e of nosuffering. means the kind of understanding that carries you to the other sh.o.r.e, the other sh.o.r.e of nosuffering.

[Bell]

One of the deepest insights that you may try to obtain is the insight on noself. But noself is not a theory, a doctrine, a philosophy. Noself is only the insight that has to be touched directly with your practice. As pract.i.tioners we should not talk about noself in such a way that it will have nothing to do with our daily life. I have recommended that all friends who come here to Plum Village during this summer learn and practice the practice of Earth-touching. Touching the Earth is one of the many practices we do in Plum Village in order to touch the nature of our nonself. It is very healing. It heals body and mind. We should practice it every day.

You hold your hands like this [palms together in front of chest] and stand in front of something like a tree, or the blue sky, or a dandelion, or the statue of the Buddha, anything-because everything has the Buddha inside, has the ultimate dimension inside-to bow to anything is fine, to the moon, to the morning star. You produce your true presence, and be there with one hundred percent of yourself. Then you bow down and you touch the earth. Touch the earth with your feet, with your arms, with your forehead. Touch deeply, don't do it halfway. Because this is an act of surrender. Surrender what and surrender to what? This is the act of surrendering the self, the idea of self. Because you think that you are a separate ent.i.ty, that is the basic cause for your suffering. When you touch the earth deeply-the earth may be your mother, your father, your ground of being, yourself-you surrender the idea that you are a separate thing. You smile and you open your palms. The act of opening your palm like this and facing inward, it means that I'm nothing. There is nothing. My intelligence-we're very proud of our intelligence. Our talents. Our diplomas. Our position in society. We may be proud of many things we have or we are, but when we are in that position we smile and we know, we know that all these things have been handed down by our ancestors.

If you have a beautiful voice, don't think that you have created that beautiful voice for yourself. It has been transmitted by your ancestors, your parents. If you have the talent of a painter, don't think that you have invented that talent. It has been transmitted to you as a seed. So everything you have thought that you are has come from the cosmos, from your ancestors. So during the first touching of the earth you link yourself with the cosmos. The water in you, the heat in you, the air in you, the soil in you, belong to the water outside, the soil outside. Without the forest how could you be? Without your father and mother how could you be there this moment? Therefore you say, in wisdom, that you are nothing. Everything that you think, you thought that you are, you have received from the cosmos, from parents-including your body. Suddenly nonself arises as an insight. You belong to the stream of life. If you bear hatred toward your father, you think that your life has been ruined by your father, that you don't want to have anything to do with your father. It is out of ignorance that you have thought so. Because if you touch the reality of noself, you see very clearly that you are your father. You are just a continuation of your father, and your father is a continuation of your grandfather.

We are one in a stream of life. To think that you are a separate ent.i.ty, that you are a self that can be independent from your father, is a very funny thing. Because your father is inside you, you can never get rid of him. There is no alternative except to reconcile with your father. To reconcile with him means to reconcile with yourself. You have a chance to do so now with the practice. The other person, it might not be your father, he may be your brother or your spouse or anyone. You think that he or she has made you suffer so much, has made your life miserable. There is a tendency in you never to see him again, to hear from him again or from her again. That kind of willingness, that kind of feeling is born from your ignorance of the reality of noself. Because we are all together. Not only are we together, we are inside each other, we interare. So during the first act of Touching the Earth you surrender your idea of self, and suddenly you release a lot of suffering, a lot of anger. You give yourself a chance for compa.s.sion and understanding to be born in your heart.

When you make a prostration like that you are not invoking a G.o.d to come and save you. To save yourself. But it is really a practice of wisdom. You touch the earth in order to release, to let go of your notion of self and to get insight that you belong to the same stream of life, reality. Suddenly you see that it is possible for you to make peace with that person. Making peace with him means making peace with you. Strange, because my peace depends very much on his peace or her peace. If I devote time, energy, to help him, to help her to suffer less, suddenly I have more peace and more happiness. I do not have the intention to do it for me. But I get all the results.

When you see a small insect in danger, you spend half a minute to rescue the insect. You think that you are doing that for its sake, out of your compa.s.sion. But while you do that you cultivate the compa.s.sion inside you and happiness becomes yours. What does it mean to be compa.s.sionate? To me, to be compa.s.sionate means to be able to relate to other living beings. When you are able to relate to other living beings your loneliness, your feeling of being cut off, will disappear. So, compa.s.sion is for whom-for these living beings or for you? The answer is, for both. Any word, any thought, any act, born from that insight of noself, brings healing and reconciliation within you and around you. There are friends who have practiced the Five Prostrations and the Three Prostrations who have reported that the practice is very effective, that those who practice just one hour get a big relief, and continue to cry and cry during the first hour of practice. You already know when you practice like that you do not invoke, call upon a G.o.d to help you, but you touch reality. You touch understanding. You touch prajna, that is able to free you. So stopping, resting, is for healing. Looking deeply, touching the insight of noself is also for healing, for liberation. That is the essence of Buddhist meditation.

Are you interested in realizing your Buddha nature in you, in suffering, in enlightenment? But, that Buddha nature, that suffering, that enlightenment, do they have anything to do with your suffering, your illness? I would not be interested in Buddha nature, enlightenment, awakening, if these have nothing to do with my suffering, my liberation. I only do the practices that can help me to rest, to heal and to liberate myself.

Our practice should be concrete, effective. We should not allow a practice to go on for a long time without bringing us any relief, any transformation. That would not be an intelligent way of practicing. When a farmer, after having used a certain kind of seeds or fertilizer, or methods of agriculture, does not get the results he wants, he would be intelligent enough to change. Meditators have to be like that. If having tried a certain method for some time they do not feel any change, any transformation, they should inquire again. They should learn again from their teachers, their brothers in the Dharma, their sisters in the Dharma, in order to get the right methods. According to the Buddha, the Dharma is effective right away-if you get the right Dharma, like mindful breathing. The moment when you begin breathing in mindfully you already get the result of such a practice. You get the concentration. You get the stopping. What is the use of breathing in if you cannot stop and rest? If you don't feel more concentrated, why do you have to bother yourself? To suffer because of the practice of breathing in and out, is nonsense. So if you are breathing in and out, and feel concentrated and restful and calm and producing your true presence, you know that the practice is correct and you already enjoy the fruit of the practice.

Walking meditation: Why do we have to walk slowly like that? Why do you have to compose yourself in slowing down like that? It does not look natural. In the beginning, people around the practice center always say, "They don't seem to live in the real world. They like to live in a dream, they walk so slowly." That is a first impression because in the world people always run. They don't know the art of stopping. They don't know the art of living deeply each moment of their life. So when they see a nun or a monk or a lay person walking, looking, smiling like that, they don't feel it's normal. They feel it's abnormal. There's one villager in the New Hamlet, she said she was very, very surprised and shocked when she saw a nun walking slowly who stopped and looked at the garbage. What is the use of looking at the garbage like that for a long time? What is normal and what is abnormal? There are people who have demonstrated that after just a few hours or a few days of staying in Plum Village they begin to like the practice. Because for the first time they know how to stop. To be able to stop is a wonderful thing, because they may have been running for the last 3,000 years.

[Bell]

Please, when you breathe in, do not make an effort of breathing in. You just allow yourself to breathe in. Even if you don't breathe in it will breathe in by itself. So don't say, "My breath, come, so that I tell you how to do." Don't try to force anything, don't try to intervene, just allow the breathing in to take place. What you have to do is be aware of the fact that the breathing in is taking place. And you have more chance to enjoy your in-breath. Don't struggle with your breath, that is what I recommend. Realize that your in breath is a wonder. When someone is dead, no matter what we do, the person will not breathe in again. So we are breathing in, that is a wonderful thing. Breathing in I know I'm alive, it's a miracle. We have to enjoy our in-breath. There are many ways to enjoy your in-breath. We want you to tell us how you enjoy your in-breath, whether in a sitting position or in a walking position. But if you don't enjoy breathing in, breathing out, you don't do it right.

This is the first recommendation on breathing that the Buddha made. When breathing in, I know this is the in-breath. When breathing out, I know this is the out-breath. When the in-breath is long, I know it is long. When it is short, I know it is short. Just recognition, mere recognition, simple recognition of the presence of the in-breath and out-breath. When you do that, suddenly you become entirely present. What a miracle, because to meditate means to be there. To be there with yourself, to be there with your inbreath. So you now understand the two sentences, "Breathing in, I know I am breathing in. Breathing out, I know I am breathing out." And a few minutes later, "Breathing in I know my in-breath has become deep. Breathing out, I know my out-breath has become slow." That is not an effort to make the in-breath deeper or the out-breath slower. That is only a recognition of the fact. These instructions will be used for our walking meditation right after the Dharma talk. After having followed your in-breath and out-breath for a few minutes you will notice that your in-breath and out-breath now have a much better quality, because the image of mindfulness, when touching anything, increases the quality of that thing. The Buddha when he touches something, reveals and increases the quality of being of that thing. Mindfulness is the Buddha, therefore it plays that role.

When you look at the full moon, and if you are mindful, "Breathing in I see the full moon, breathing out I smile at the full moon," suddenly the full moon reveals itself to you maybe one hundred times more clearly. It's more beautiful, it's clearer, it's more enjoyable. Why? Because the moon has been touched by mindfulness. So when you touch your in-breath and out-breath with your mindfulness, your in-breath becomes more harmonious, more gentle, deeper, slower, and so does your out-breath. Now you enjoy in-breathing and out-breathing. Naturally your breathing becomes more enjoyable, the quality of your breathing increases. So "In/Out" is for the beginning. [Thay writes on blackboard.] Then "Deep/Slow" is the next step: "Breathing in, I know that my in breath has become deep and I enjoy it. Breathing out, I see that my out-breath has become slow and I enjoy it."

During that time you have stopped, you have allowed your body and your mind to rest. Even if you are walking, you are resting. If you are sitting, you are resting. You are not struggling anymore, on your cushion, or walking. Then later on you will try this. These words are only to help you to recognize what is happening. "Calm/Ease: Breathing in I feel the calm in me." This is not autosuggestion, because if you have enjoyed In/Out and Deep/Slow, calm is something that is established. Resting. If you touched your calm, your calm rose. It's like when you touched the moon. "Breathing out, I feel ease in me." I don't suffer anymore. I will not make it hard anymore. Don't be too hard on yourself. Allow yourself to be at ease with yourself. Don't struggle. All of these can be done even if lots of suffering is still in your body and in your soul. Doing this, we are taking care of them. We are not trying to escape the pain in us. We are giving our body and our consciousness a rest.

Smile/Release: Breathing in I smile." In Plum Village we speak about "mouth yoga," you just try to smile and then you realize the relaxation of the many hundreds of muscles on your face. According to the law of cause and effect when you have joy you smile. Or when you smile you release all the tension on your face. The first case is cause and effect. The second case is also cause and effect. So why do you have to wait for joy to take the initiative? Why don't you allow your mouth to take the initiative? Do you practice some kind of discrimination against your body? You know that the moment when you sit down and rest you feel much better in your soul. So the body can always take the initiative if you allow it to be. And to practice meditation, you don't practice it only with your mind, but also with your body. The Buddha said it is possible to touch nirvana with your body.

Breathing in, I smile," because there is calm, ease, and the joy of being rested. And "breathing out, I release." I release because there is in me a tendency to continue to run, to struggle. Even in my dream I continue to struggle-that is a habit energy of more than three, four thousand years. I recognize it. It has been transmitted to me by many generations of ancestors. So now I'm practicing for them. If I can stop and release, then all my ancestors in me get liberated. You are doing it for everyone, because you are not a self. And you are doing it out of love.

The last is, "Present moment/Wonderful moment." To be walking on earth and realizing that you are alive, dwelling in the present moment. You see, to be alive and to be walking on earth is already a miracle. Because you have been running to look for your happiness, you may not know that happiness is available in the here, and the now. Conditions for your happiness may be more than enough in the here and the now. That is the result of the practice of stopping-stopping to realize that you are wonderful like this. You can be happy right now.

Present moment," because that is the only moment for us to live. If you miss the present moment, you miss your appointment with life. The Buddha said life is available only in the present moment. "Wonderful moment," that is life that you touch. Suddenly happiness becomes possible. Being alive, walking with the Sangha, touching the blue sky, the earth, breathing in and out freely, allowing us to rest body and consciousness is already a wonderful thing. Do we need a deeper practice? A more difficult practice? More complicated kind of practice? I don't think so. Because for those of us who have practiced forty, fifty years already, we continue to practice like this or something similar to this, and we always get more peace and joy and happiness. Our insight always continues to grow. You don't have to look for an "intensive" course of meditation, or a "high" level of meditation, or "intensive" or "high" practice. Lin-Chi, the founder of the Rinzai school of meditation, said, "The miracle is not to walk on fire or on thin air, the miracle is to walk on earth." If mindfulness is there, you are performing the miracle of being alive in each moment.

So please, my friends, now it is time for us to enjoy walking together. When you hear the bell, enjoy your in-breath and out-breath. We will take time to enjoy also going to the bathroom. After that we gather around the linden tree. We start walking together. Walking meditation, I consider it to be an act of life-celebrating. To walk together as a Sangha, enjoying every step we make, feeling alive, is really the celebration of life. Don't consider it to be hard or hard practice.

The Five-Fold Steps of Training

Dharma Talk given by Thich Nhat Hanh on August 4th, 1996 in Plum Village, France.

Thich Nhat Hanh.

August 4, 1996 Good morning, my friends. Today is the fourth of August, 1996, we are in the Lower Hamlet, and we are going to speak English.

In the past three weeks we have been talking with each other about how to run the twenty-first century, how to climb together the hill of the twenty-first century, with joy and peace and happiness. We already talked about a room in our home so that we can practice restoring our self, restoring peace, joy and communication. We also talked about a little park in our neighborhood so that people in the neighborhood may enjoy walking meditation, sitting together in peace, and so on.

We also have talked about how to maintain peace in school. I think we have to ask schoolteachers how we could have more peace and joy and harmony in school. Not only do we have to ask them, but we have to sit down together, teachers and students, in order to decide how we can make the school a beautiful place in which to live. I know of a number of schools where teachers and students practice being quiet during the first three or five minutes and just enjoy breathing in and out; and every time there is disharmony, there is anger, in school, everyone in the school practices sitting down and breathes in and out peacefully.

I don't think that this is a Buddhist practice alone; it is a practice that everyone likes. I am sure that the Catholics like the practice, the Protestants, the Jews, the Muslims also, because everyone values peace and harmony, and everyone knows that to breathe in and out deeply is very good. Doctors, scientists, nurses: they know very well that breathing quietly, slowly and deeply is very good. When a nurse gives you a shot, she may ask you to breathe in and out peacefully, and while you are preoccupied with breathing in and out, she just gives the shot and you don't feel anything at all; you feel fine.

I know of a school teacher whose name is Henry. He teaches mathematics in a high school in Toronto. He is old-I think he has arrived at the age where he can retire; but the princ.i.p.al of the high school and all the other teachers asked him to stay on because people like his teaching so much. The first time he came to Plum Village for the practice of mindfulness, he confessed that the thing he liked best was to go fishing. When other people could not catch a fish, he did not know why, but he continued to catch fish after fish. That is why he liked it so much. But after staying in Plum Village, he decided that killing fish like that is not a nice thing. These beautiful little animals are swimming very happily in the stream, and suddenly you've caught them, and they die. So he decided to abandon fishing as a hobby, and he thought that, when he went home, he would find other kinds of joys. He found a lot of joys.

But he had some difficulties adjusting the way of life he learned at Plum Village to his environment. The day cla.s.s resumed, he came in the cla.s.sroom using walking meditation. He never did that before. He opened the door slowly, he entered slowly, he smiled to the students, and he walked slowly to his desk. And then when he stood up and wiped the blackboard, he did it mindfully, slowly, and all the students were very surprised. They thought that he was sick.

So they asked, "Papa, are you sick?" Because they love him; he's a very excellent mathematics teacher. He was very well known in Vietnam as a mathematics teacher. He wrote many good books on mathematics. He used to get angry with his students. Every time a child couldn't give an answer to his question or showed his stupidity, he would get angry. He might just pick up a piece of chalk and throw it directly to the head of the student. That's the way he had done in the past. And when he corrected math exercises, he might get angry; he might write down, "You are stupid." But still, the students liked him. There is something in him that makes the students like him, that is why they call him "Papa."

Papa, are you sick?" He smiled and said, "No, I am not sick. I am practicing mindfulness." "What is mindfulness?" He began to explain, "I am wiping out the things on the blackboard, and I do it slowly, I dwell in the present moment, and I enjoy doing that. I don't hurry in order to finish it. I just enjoy every step I make. You see, this morning, I came in, I saw you, I'm very happy. So I just stop and look at you and smile, and that makes me very happy." He spent a few minutes talking about what he had learned in Plum Village. Then he talked with them about the wonders of mindful breathing. He said, "I got a lot of calm when I was in Plum Village, and I want you to try it. Let us sit down; we don't have any bell here, but I will ask a boy to do like this [clap, clap] and then all of us just sit quietly and enjoy breathing in, calming, and breathing out, smiling."

There they went, the boy in the front did like this [clap, clap] and then he and all the rest of the students practiced breathing in and breathing out. He said, "That is excellent. Why don't we do it for two minutes?" And they did it for two minutes. I think the students listen to him and like to try because they have sympathy with him. He proposed that every fifteen minutes there would be a pause of two minutes. Another boy would take a turn to [clap, clap] and then everyone would stop. He would stop lecturing, and everyone would practice breathing and smiling. They don't have a bell, so they just stopped by the sound. After a few months of practice like that, both teachers and students realized that they had made a lot of progress in their studies. The cla.s.s has grown much more peaceful. And they love it, they continue that practice of breathing, smiling, in the beginning of the cla.s.s and in the middle of the cla.s.s. So, they could have three times to breathe in and out and enjoy being together.

Professor Henry reported to me in a letter that other cla.s.ses learned about that, and they adopted the same kind of breathing in, out, and get three breaks during the hour of mathematics. At one point the whole school knew about the practice, and all of them enjoyed it. And that is why, when our Professor Henry asked for retirement, they said, "No, you have to stay on, you have helped us so much." Now Professor Henry no longer does things like throwing a piece of chalk directly at the head of his students. He told me that one time when he was correcting an exercise, he saw that the student did not understand anything at all. In the past he would write down, "You are stupid," but this time he did not write down that kind of word. He wrote like this: "My dear, you don't understand; that's my fault." A very deep transformation. And the student who received that correction got moved to tears. "It's my fault because I did not try my best to help you understand, that is why you don't understand me." Henry has come back to Plum Village several times for the practice; he's coming for this September retreat. He received the Five Wonderful Precepts many years ago, and finally he was asked to become a Dharma teacher. Those of you who will be back here for September, you will meet him.

So I would like to tell the young people who are here today, you can practice peace at school. The other day I asked you to ask your teacher when there is a conflict between you and someone else and you get irritated or angry, and you don't know what to do to preserve peace and to reconcile. A teacher should know. If she does not know yet, it is her duty to go and learn from someone else. It's very important; you just ask the question, and you make the wheel begin to turn. Yesterday, a mother told me that her daughter did not speak English, so her daughter had asked her to ask me what she can do every time she gets angry: I recommended that they ask their mother first. So if you ask your mother or your father that question, and the answer is not completely satisfying, then they will try harder and next time they will show you not only the theory, but also the practice.

In our hospitals, we've got to have a practice center. I have seen in many big cities, like in Amsterdam, hospitals in which there is a meditation hall, a chapel for the people to sit, to pray, to meditate. This is very important, because the people who are sick need a place to practice, and when their families come, they also need a place to practice. And when a relative undergoes surgery, members of their families, in order to deal with their worries, should be able to practice, and they need a center like that. There should be brothers and sisters who are trained in the art of meditation in order to serve in these hospitals. I think I am going to write a letter to the monks and nuns in Vietnam, and also to the government, about how to set up a meditation hall in every hospital of the country.

And I think that a meditation hall is needed in each school for students and for teachers. I know teachers sometimes suffer very much because of their students and they need to practice, and students also need to practice; therefore, to have a meditation hall or a chapel in school, that is very important. We have the right to ask for that. You know that all spiritual traditions, they would tell you that you need the same kind of thing. It is neither a Buddhist, nor a Christian, nor a Jewish practice, it is just practice; because all of us need peace, restoration, and so on. So in the twenty-first century I'm confident that people, including yourself, will try your best in order to set up meditation halls in schools and in hospitals.

[Bell]

I would ask also for a meditation hall in each city's central park. The park is something like an island of peace. When the people in the city are suffocated, they don't feel well within their body, in their mind, they would think of the park. If they are in the middle of the week, they cannot get out of town, then the park is the answer. That is why you have to take care of the central park. We have to make all the trees and streams of water clear and beautiful; we need silence in the park. And we need a meditation hall without any symbols, whether Buddhist or Catholic or Jewish. We don't need symbols, because it is for everyone. In Bois de Boulogne, Bois de Vincennes, even in the Tivoli park, we need a meditation hall. Of course, in a park we would need ice cream and hot chocolate, but we must have a meditation hall. By the way, I don't like children to eat too many ice creams in Plum Village. I think a child is ent.i.tled to have one only each day, that is the maximum.

And I want a meditation hall in the parliament house, in the city hall, because I have seen people debating in the house of parliament. This is war, this is not peace. They hit each other with poisonous arrows of speech. They are angry, they don't have peace at all, and we don't want people without peace to represent us in parliament. Do you? No. If they don't have peace, they don't have harmony within themselves and with the other members of the parliament, then they make decisions that go against our interests. So if you are a writer, if you are an artist, if you are a member of the parliament, if you are a member of the city council, or if you are only a householder, you have to do everything in your power to express your view that you want the person who represents you in the Congress and in the city hall to practice peace. Before you vote for him or for her, look; look carefully to see whether in his or her family, there is harmony or not. This is very important; we have to ask. We have the right to ask whether they have harmony with their partner, their children, because they are public people and they have to make everything transparent.

We should be able to know whether they can use loving speech, whether they can master their anger, whether they can practice somehow looking deeply. Because looking deeply is a matter for everyone, especially for those who have to confront very difficult problems concerning the economy, social conflicts, social injustice, and especially war with another country. If you have no right view within you, if you have no insight within you, you have no harmony, understanding, or compa.s.sion, you may declare war with another country and you draw the whole country into war. This is very important.

Therefore, there must be a meditation hall in Congress. It would be beautiful if Congressmen or Senators, before starting a session, would sit together breathing in and out, in peace and make the determination to hold the session in peace and harmony and not just fight each other. This is very important. This is peace education, and who can realize that? You claim to be a democracy, so you have to do it. Citizens have to do it. So when we sit for Dharma discussion, we have to find ways in order to put into practice what we learn from the Five Wonderful Steps of Training.

At the city hall, we need it. Suppose the river that goes through our city is polluted, fish die in that river, who will be responsible? The whole city is responsible; but it is the city council that has to take the matter in hand, so they have to practice looking deeply together at how to save the river. In your home, in your neighborhood, you also organize for looking deeply at your part; and at the city center, city council, they have to practice looking deeply at their part. And we may support them with our insight: "Dear city council, we are in that quarter of the city, we have sat down, we have practiced looking deeply, and this is what we have found out." We can support our city council by the fruit of our practice of looking deeply. The city council, the city hall, has to make decisions based on this insight. If they don't, next time they will not be in the city council. All this is practice, and we practice as a Sangha and not as individuals.

How about places like l'Elysee or the White House, where the president and the government meet to make decisions? How about the military headquarters? I think it is like in our home: there should be a place of peace for the president, for his ministers, to sit in, to breathe together, to calm themselves, before they look into the urgent matters of the nation. And you have the right to request that. You have to speak out your aspiration, after having practiced looking deeply. We don't ask them to follow any particular religion; we just ask them to have a little bit more peace and calm and understanding and harmony within themselves, and we are ready to support them. We will write letters without anger, we will practice talking to them with loving kindness; but we have to do nonviolent action. Loving action has to be taken by us every day.

Decision-making is too important to leave to them alone; you have to take in hand your own fate, and therefore I want the children to hear this, because the twenty-first century is theirs. We adults are very sorry not to have been able to do it during the twentieth century, so we hope that in the twenty-first century you will be able to do that. We are already a little bit enlightened on the matter; we have suffered so much, and we have made you suffer. So we will be supporting you wholeheartedly, and many of us will be climbing with you the hill of the twenty-first century. Please, the people who are less young, also have Dharma discussions on this and make known your insight, your decisions. Now, the young people, when they hear the small bell, they would stand up and bow to the Sangha before they go out to continue their studies and practice.

Dear friends, the Buddhadharma is described as something that you can come and see by yourself. You don't have to believe something through another person, even the clergy, the priest, the mediator. The ultimate dimension of reality is something you can touch, you can see by yourself. And you can do it now, and here; it's not a problem of time. It's not a promise. In the method of Buddhism as I see it, it's very concrete; there's no place to speculate, to suppose, to create an hypothesis. When the Buddha set out to teach and to help people, the first thing he asked people is to look directly into their suffering. Suffering is not an abstract thing; suffering is there, very real. Suffering is one of the basic truths called holy truths, the n.o.ble Truths. Suffering is a holy truth. Why?

In Vietnamese we call it thanh de thanh de, the holy truth. The word that the Buddha used is dukkha dukkha; dukkha means ill-being, pain, suffering, translated by Chinese kou kou. This word, kou kou, originally in Chinese means bitter, the opposite of sweet. It makes you suffer. And you have to look at it. Why is suffering a holy truth? Because, without suffering, you have no way out. The first thing you have to do is to look, and look deeply, into the nature of your suffering. If you cannot do that, if you try to run away from it, there's no way that you can transform your suffering. That is why suffering is the basic truth and a holy truth. It means we have to learn from our suffering. We have to understand our suffering. If we don't know anything about our suffering, if we cannot learn anything about our suffering, suffering is no longer a holy truth. Holy or not holy: it depends on our way of handling suffering. And the Buddha said suffering is absolutely necessary for you to find a way out.

A Zen teacher in Vietnam during the 13th century urged his students to practice diligently in order to get out of the world of birth and death. And a student asked him, "Teacher, please show us how to get out of the world of birth and death." And he said, "You have to look for the world of no birth and no death." Then the student asked, "But where can we find the world of no birth and no death?" And the teacher said, "You look for it right in the world of birth and death." It means, out of suffering you will find the way of transcending the suffering. It sounds like something contradictory, but it is the basic Buddhist teaching. So looking into the nature of suffering, you can see many, many things that you need to know.

How that suffering has come to be, that is the second truth. That is about the nature of your suffering. If you already see the nature of your suffering, how it has come to be, you are already on your way to liberation. That is a sentence uttered by the Buddha. Dear friends, if you look into the nature of your suffering, and if you see already what kind of nutriment that has brought about that suffering, you are already on the path of liberation; because everything needs food to grow, to be there, including your suffering. So if you look into your suffering, and if you can see how that has come to be, what kind of food you have fed it so that it is now there as a hard fact, then you are already on the way of liberation, because you have already seen a path of liberation. So the nature of your suffering is the cause of your suffering, the nutriment, the food that you have used in order to feed your suffering.

For instance, if you suffer from a depression now, your depression is dukkha, suffering. So you look into your depression; you need your depression in order to understand your depression. You should not try to run away from it. Go back; confront your depression; embrace it and look deeply into it, and you'll find out after a few days of practice that in the past few months or few years, you have lived in such a way that made depression possible now. Because your depression cannot come just like that, without any cause. You have got the nutrition, the nutriments, the food that has brought about the depression. What you have eaten, what you have drunk, what you have listened to, what you have viewed, what you have touched, are the kind of nutriments that have made up your depression now. So if you know the nature of your depression, you also know how to stop feeding your depression. And you use other kinds of nutriments for yourself, and a few months later, your depression will be gone.

Suppose the person you love just betrayed you and goes with another person. In the beginning you had hope that he and you would live a long life together, sharing everything, and he or she has made the solemn promise to live together until your hair becomes white, until all your teeth come out. But now, he just abandoned you and followed a young woman. You feel the victim of injustice. You cannot just accept that. You cannot accept the betrayal. You want him, you want her to be faithful.

Your suffering is there, and we advise you to embrace your suffering and look deeply into it and look into how that kind of betrayal has come to be. Who is responsible? What kind of nutriment has made it possible? That is the Buddhist way. You are advised to do it by yourself, if possible with the help of other brothers and sisters in the Dharma. They can do it with you. They can join their mindfulness and the practice of deep looking with you, and help you to discover the nature, the cause of your suffering. If I sit with you, if I practice with you, I may find out that you have been somehow responsible for his act of betrayal.

In the Buddhist teaching, we learn that we have all kinds of seeds within our consciousness. This is our consciousness; it is made up of two levels, at least. The deeper level is called store consciousness. In Buddhist psychology, we speak of consciousness in terms of seeds, les s.e.m.e.nces les s.e.m.e.nces. The Sanskrit word is bija bija. We learn that in the store consciousness, we have all kinds of seeds within here. Seeds of compa.s.sion, mindfulness, tolerance, endurance, peace, joy, loving kindness. We have all the good seeds in us. And the Buddha is also there as a seed, the seed of Buddhahood, the seed of enlightenment, the seed of concentration, the seed of loving kindness, the seed of mindfulness. It is a fact, and not just a dogma, that you have the Buddha nature in you. You can touch it, you can make a demonstration, you can verify it. Because, according to this practice, mindfulness is the Buddha and loving kindness is the Buddha; understanding is the Buddha; and all of us have the potential of being mindful, of being understanding, of being compa.s.sionate.

Children have proved that at times they can be compa.s.sionate, mindful, understanding; and adults also. That is the Buddha nature in us. When I ask you to drink your gla.s.s of water mindfully, you can do it, you can drink your water mindfully. That means mindfulness is possible for you; you have a seed of mindfulness within your store consciousness. That is why you can practice, and you can be successful in drinking your water mindfully, or in walking mindfully. That is a demonstration that Buddha is in you, because mindfulness is very often described as the energy of a Buddha. A Buddha, a real Buddha, is made with that kind of energy. You have it. You don't need to believe, because you already have direct knowledge about it. It's not exactly a religious belief; this is just an experience.

But in your store consciousness there are other, negative, seeds, like the seed of ignorance, the seed of forgetfulness which is the opposite of mindfulness. Strange, you have the seed of mindfulness and you have the opposite kind of seed. Mara is the equivalent of Satan. If you want to invite the Buddha, you can. If you want to invite Satan to come up, he will be glad to come up. And Buddha and Mara both are of an organic nature. That is the teaching of the Buddha. Buddha and Mara, mindfulness and forgetfulness, both of them are organic substance because they can deteriorate. It's like a flower and garbage. A flower can become the piece of garbage. The piece of garbage, if you know how to do it, will be transformed back into the flower. Mindfulness and forgetfulness play the role of flower and garbage in us, also Buddha and Mara, because we are a living reality; we are not a piece of inert matter in a museum of life. We are a living thing, therefore everything in us is alive, including Buddha and Mara. How wonderful: Buddha is alive in us, not a notion, a concept.

And you have that seed of jealousy in you. You have also the seed of betrayal in you. All of us are able to betray the people we love, not only he, but you. All of us have the seed of loyalty, all of us have the seed of betrayal. If you have not betrayed him, it is because the seed of betrayal in you has not been watered by yourself and by the people who live around you. But if you allow your seed of betrayal to be watered today, tomorrow, by yourself and by the people around you, one day you will betray him, you will betray her. That's something sure.

Now, practice looking deeply to see, what have you done in the past? Have you allowed the seed of betrayal in him to be watered? Who has watered that seed? Did you water that seed yourself? Have you made an effort to remain fresh and loving? If you have not made any effort to remain fresh and pleasant, then you yourself have contributed to the watering of the seed of betrayal. People usually love what is lovable. If you have stopped being lovable, then you help the other way. Have you been very mindful in taking care of him? Have you allowed a situation to happen in which his seed of betrayal has been able to be watered every day? Outside of your mindfulness you have allowed everything to take place, and now you blame him, blame that person for your suffering.

Maybe the suffering, the cause of the suffering comes from yourself, mostly. You just think that you are a victim of injustice, all the suffering that you have now has come from the other person. You blame him or her entirely, and that is injustice on your part because you don't see the truth. You don't know how to handle your suffering, you don't know how to look into that holy truth, suffering, in order to see the real nature of that suffering. The first truth is holy, that is suffering. The second truth is holy also, that is the nature of your suffering. You need mindfulness, you need looking deeply, you need concentration in order to find out that holy truth.

The third truth is that your suffering can be healed, can be transformed. Because it is not a hope, it is a fact that if something has come, it can go away. If you used some kind of nutriment to bring up something, now if you don't want that something to stay, you just cut the nutriment. That is the simple truth, the truth of the absence of suffering. Suffering can be transformed, that is the third holy truth. It's rather comforting. There are people who say Buddhism is a little bit too pessimistic, they always begin with talking about suffering. But that is not pessimism; that is realism, realistic. Because when you peer into the truth of suffering, you see not only the second n.o.ble holy truth, but also the third n.o.ble truth, which is the possibility of removing the suffering. That's rather good news. You are confident that with some practice, you can end the suffering, you can bring back the state of well-being to you, and to the people around you. Because the first truth is the presence of ill-being, the third truth is the absence of ill-being, which means at the same time the presence of well-being. That's nirvana nirvana; nirvana is the extinction of suffering and of all the nutriments that have brought suffering to you. Is it too late or not? It's never too late.

[Bell]

Suffering is still going on if you don't practice, or if the other person doesn't practice. So now, if you want to take the initiative, you don't demand anything, you don't require any preconditions, you just begin to stop feeding your suffering. You do it with your faith in the third n.o.ble truth, holy truth. "I have to stop feeding my pain, my suffering." And that kind of conviction, that kind of att.i.tude can already bring you a lot of comfort. Then we learn that we have to practice expanding our heart. We should be able to realize many conditions of our happiness and peace. We should have several roots. The other day when I talked to the young people, I told them that if we are mindful, we can be aware of many things, many elements in us and around us that can make us happy. Don't commit yourself to just one idea of happiness.

There was a layman who was asked to give a Dharma talk to monks and nuns because he was so well versed in Buddhism. That happened in the 1930's in Hue. It was to him a very great joy to be able to help the monks and the nuns with his knowledge and understanding of the sutra. I think he was teaching the Surangama Sutra Surangama Sutra. Before coming to the chair to teach, he touched the earth three times before his students. One day, as he was walking up the hill to go to the temple to give his instructions on the Surangama, Surangama, he saw two young boys on the sidewalk enjoying a chess game. He also enjoyed playing, so he wanted to take a few minutes to sit with the little boys, and he enjoyed it so much that he almost forgot that he had to go to the temple and give the Dharma talk. Another friend of his, coming by, saw him like that. He said, "Dear friend, do you know what time it is now? Let us go!" And then he climbed the hill with the other person. he saw two young boys on the sidewalk enjoying a chess game. He also enjoyed playing, so he wanted to take a few minutes to sit with the little boys, and he enjoyed it so much that he almost forgot that he had to go to the temple and give the Dharma talk. Another friend of his, coming by, saw him like that. He said, "Dear friend, do you know what time it is now? Let us go!" And then he climbed the hill with the other person.

His name is Tam Minh Tam Minh, Clarity of the Heart. He had the capacity of being happy with whatever was there around him and in him. To give a Dharma talk to the monks and nuns was a joy, but to sit down with children was also a joy. And not only that; everything around him could make him happy. So we should not commit ourselves to just one thing. We should not ruin our life just because of one thing. A French poet said, "Un seul etre me manque, et tout est depeuple," "Only one person is not there, and I see the whole world as empty." Why? Why behave like that? Because there are many living beings around; why look upon them as nonexistent? How could that being be there if all of us were not there?

So look deeply into the nature of your suffering and practice loving kindness, practice understanding, so that you will not continue to blame. You see your responsibility, you see your way of salvation, of liberation, you are able to touch many wonders of life that are available to you in the here and the now, and suddenly you become the most attractive person, very refreshing, very healing. And everyone will go back to you, because we need you. If you are fresh, happy, peaceful like that, every one of us will need you, will look in your direction, they would follow you, especially those of us who are suffering a lot.

The first holy truth is dukkha, suffering; the second truth is the nature of our suffering, samut kaya samut kaya and the cause of our suffering, the n. . . [GAP -- end of side two of latest tape] and the cause of our suffering, the n. . . [GAP -- end of side two of latest tape]

The third truth is the possibility of removing the suffering, Narodha Narodha. The absence, the taking away of suffering, which means at the same time the presence of well-being. The fourth truth is Marga, Marga, the way, the way of practice, the dharma. How not to continue to feed your suffering; how to offer yourself the opposite kind of nutriments; that is, the dharma the way, the way of practice, the dharma. How not to continue to feed your suffering; how to offer yourself the opposite kind of nutriments; that is, the dharma The Five Steps of Training are really the way. The way as presented by our teacher, the Buddha, is the Eightfold n.o.ble Path. Right understanding, right speech, right thinking, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration. If you practice the Five Steps of Training, you practice the Eightfold n.o.ble Path in a very concrete way. If you put all your being into the practice, if you abide by the practice of mindfulness of consuming, of speaking, of listening, then that is the suppression of the suffering because you don't allow the nutriment for suffering to continue any more. The Five Steps of Training are really the way. The way as presented by our teacher, the Buddha, is the Eightfold n.o.ble Path. Right understanding, right speech, right thinking, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration. If you practice the Five Steps of Training, you practice the Eightfold n.o.ble Path in a very concrete way. If you put all your being into the practice, if you abide by the practice of mindfulness of consuming, of speaking, of listening, then that is the suppression of the suffering because you don't allow the nutriment for suffering to continue any more.

The other day, we were speaking about the First, the Second, and the Third Steps of Training: to protect life, to practice giving, social justice, and to preserve the integrity of couples and families and protect children from s.e.xual abuse. All these things are right action, right view, right efforts. The moment when you undertake to practice these precepts, trainings, you already begin to get relief. I will offer you an example. There was a Vietnam war veteran who came and partic.i.p.ated in a retreat offered by us to about thirty or forty former soldiers, army officers, who had fought in Vietnam, together with twenty or thirty other people, including psychotherapists and family members and so on. I remember we had to practice listening deeply every day and with a lot of patience in order to allow a situation where the veterans can speak out. It's very difficult, because many of them were caught in their own suffering, it's very hard for them to touch their suffering, and to talk about it. Sometimes I had to sit there for half an hour not saying anything, just breathing and smiling, and show our compa.s.sion, our readiness to listen. Yet no one could speak a word. And we begin again.

There was a war veteran who tried to join us in walking meditation, but he was so fearful. During the war he had learned that you can get into an ambush very easily, and there were many Vietnamese there. A Buddhist monk can be a guerrilla in disguise. So he was scared to death. He tried to join others for walking meditation, but he kept a very big distance; he walked behind us about thirty meters. He thought that if anything happened, he would have time to run for cover. Instead of staying in the dormitory with us, he camped in the forest and he set traps around his tent. That was our first retreat organized for war veterans in America.

One of the retreatants finally told us his story, that had never been told before. During a battle in Vietnam, most of his friends were killed in an operation, and he saw his companions die. So he got very angry. He wanted to retaliate. He brought out a number of sandwiches, he put explosives inside the sandwiches, he left them on the place where children would play, and he hid himself and watched. He saw children coming. They were very happy to see this kind of sandwich, and ate them. And just ten or fifteen minutes later, they began to scream, and their mothers came out, trying to get them to the hospital, but the American soldier knew that nothing could be done in order to help the children. He had wanted to do so out of his anger and the will to retaliate. Since the time he went back to America, he could not live with that kind of image in his store consciousness. He told us that every time he found himself together with a few children in a room, he had to run out of that room as quickly as possible. He just couldn't bear it, for more than twelve years. His mother encouraged him to deal with the present time, to forget the war, the war was over; but for him, the war was never over. Until he came to the retreat.

I told him, "Yes, I know that you have killed children. You have ambushed them as your way to retaliate. I know you have caused suffering. But I want you to know also that there are many children who are dying around the world, everywhere. Many die just because they need just one medicine pill. Many children die because they need a gla.s.s of milk, soy milk. Many step on grenades and bombs that are left over there. If you know how to use your time, now, you can save many of them, even every day. You have the capacity of acting, of living in mindfulness, in compa.s.sion, and I know you will be able to save the lives of many children, now. Why don't you make a determination to receive the First Precept of not killing, of protecting life? You receive that precept in the presence of the whole Sangha.

And you take action right away. You go out and you save children who are dying in the present moment, children even in America. In America there