Talks with Thay: UBC, Vancouver, BC, 8/13/11, Saturday Morning

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Review of Mindful Breathing Exercises
Breathing in, I know that I am still in the retreat.  Breathing out, I smile to my sangha.

The first four exercises on mindful breathing are designed to take care of our body. 

The first one is “In-Out” to recognize our in-breath and to recognize our out-breath and we focus our attention on our in-breath and out-breath only; to identify in and out breath.

The second one is to follow our in-breath all the way through, and to follow our out-breath all the way through. To follow.

These two first exercises can already help us to cultivate mindfulness and concentration.  And we can enjoy breathing in and out.  If we have enough mindfulness and concentration while breathing in and out, we may get insight also.  The insight that we are alive.  That there are many wonders of life that are available in the here and the now.  That we don’t have to run into the future in order to be happy. Many kinds of insight can come already with mindful breathing.

The third exercise is to become aware of our body.  “Breathing in, I’m aware of my body.”  That is to bring our mind back to our body and be fully present in the here and the now, body and mind are together.  We are truly present.

The fourth is to release the tension in the body.  And when we release the tension in our body, we reduce the pain also.

In the fifth we move into the realm of the feelings, and the fifth one is to recognize a feeling of joy.  Or we may produce a feeling of joy using the energy of mindfulness to recognize the many conditions of joy and happiness that are already available.

The sixth is to recognize and generate happiness.

The seventh one is to become aware of a painful feeling.

The eight one is to embrace tenderly a painful feeling, or emotion, in order to get a relief.  And we can do this collectively also.

And then we move to the ninth exercise of mindful breathing.  We know that there are more than 50 mental formations.  There are positive, negative and neutral mental formations.  The ninth is to recognize any mental formation that manifests itself whether it is joy or happiness, or sorrow or fear.  We have to recognize it, any mental formation.

Mind is a kind of river, and each drop of water in the river is a mental formation.  They succeed each other and they flow.  And to meditate means to be there and observe and recognize the birth, the staying, and the dying down of a mental formation.  We can do that without being carried away by these mental formations.

The tenth exercise is to touch the good seeds that are there in the depth of our consciousness like the seed of understanding, compassion, non-fear.  There are many good things down there.  So the practice is to invite them to come up, to manifest.  And we can support each other in watering the beautiful seeds in us and we have learned that when we spoke about Right Diligence - four steps.  This is called “invigorating the mind”.  To make them stronger, to help them grow at the base.  This is called the practice of “transformation at the base.” 

At the base there are seeds.  And when the seeds manifest up on the level of mental consciousness they are called mental formations.  If we are able to help a good seed like compassion, and keep them up there longer, at the base the seed will grow.  And that is transformation at the base.  Our love, compassion, our insight continue to grow down there.

Exercise #11
The eleventh exercise is to use techniques of concentration, “Concentrating the Mind.”  With some mindfulness and concentration embracing our pain and sorrow, but to really transform the block of pain we need the practice of samadhi, of powerful concentration.  Samadhi concentration has the power to burn away our afflictions.

Suppose there is a lens receiving the sun rays.  And then it is concentrated at one point, one-pointed mind.  The mind is concentrated to just one point.  The power of concentration becomes powerful and it can burn away the afflictions whether it is fear, or anger, or despair.  So concentration is a kind of power with the capacity to transform, to liberate, to burn away the afflictions like fear, anger, delusion, and so on. 

There are many practices of concentration, dozens of them.  There are three kinds of concentration called, the “Three Doors of Liberation” that are available in every school of Buddhism; the concentration called “Emptiness,”  the concentration called “Signlessness,”  and the concentration called “Aimlessness.”  We can find these teachings and practices in every Buddhist tradition.  They are called the “Three Doors of Liberation.”  But there are more.  The Buddha proposed many more practices of concentration; impermanence, non-self, interbeing, dependent origination.  All of these are methods of samadhi concentration.  And if we know how to use them we can unlock the door of understanding and liberate us from fear, anger and hate.

So the eleventh is concentrating the mind.

The twelfth is to liberate the mind.  So with the practice of being aware of the pain, and embracing the pain you can bring a relief and suffer less.  But in order to fully transform the pain and the sorrow we need to use the practice of samadhi concentration in order to full liberate us from the mental formations of fear, anger or despair. 

The next four are four concentrations proposed by the Buddha.  So the method proposed by the Buddha in the sutra of mindful breathing is very methodical.  It begins with body, and goes to the feelings, and goes to mental formations, and then uses techniques of meditation and concentration in order to liberate.  In the Plum Village Chanting Book you can find the sutra of mindful breathing with the 16 exercises.  One time we organized a 21 day retreat in America and the subject of our studies and practices there was the sutra on mindful breathing.  And the dharma talks of that retreat has been transcribed and made into a book called the “Path of Emancipation” - available in English.

So today we consider a little bit, the three concentrations proposed by the Buddha.  The three concentration practices that are available in every Buddhist tradition.  And first of all the concentration on emptiness.

Concentration on Emptiness
Emptiness does not mean non-existence.  This glass can be empty or can be full of tea.  But in order to be empty or to be full the glass has to be there.  So emptiness does not mean non-existence.  This glass is empty of water now, but it is not empty of air.  So what is helpful is when we ask the question, “Empty of what?” 

The bodhisattva Avalokiteshvera say that everything is empty and we ask him, “Mr. Bodhisattva,  you say everything is empty but I would like to ask, empty of what?”  To be empty is always to be empty of something.  This glass is empty of tea but not empty of air.

So when we contemplate a flower like this, we see that the flower is full of everything.  The whole cosmos has come together and helped the flower to manifest; the cloud, the sunshine, the earth, time, space, the gardener.  Everything has come together to help the flower to manifest.  And we can see the flower is full of the cosmos.  Why do we say that it is empty?  And bodhisattva will say that, “You are right.  The flower is full of the cosmos.  But it is empty of only one thing.  Empty of a separate existence.”  Because a flower cannot be by herself alone.

A flower has to inter-be with the whole cosmos.  A flower is made only of non-flower elements, and if you remove all of these non-flower elements there is no flower left.  So it is clear that the flower has to inter-be with the cloud, she has to inter-be with the sunshine, she has to inter-be with everything in the cosmos.  She cannot be by herself alone.  And we can see that “to be” means to “inter-be.”  “To be” can only mean to “inter-be,” but to be by ourself alone - that is something impossible.  So we can begin to see the nature of emptiness in everything. 

Sometimes that nature of emptiness is called “no-self”.  There is no self.  But “no self” does not mean that you are not there.  It’s like the glass.  The glass is empty but the glass is there.  So “no self” does not mean that you don’t exist.  When we look at an action, we believe that there should be an actor behind it that can exist separately from the action.  In quantum physics we learn that force and matter, they are just two aspects of the same thing.

When we say that the “wind blows” we may imagine that there is a “blower” that exists outside of the wind.  But in fact there is no “blower”.  There is only the wind.  And if the wind does not blow, it is not the wind at all. 

So when we produce a thought, we may believe that there is a thought and there is a thinker that exists separately from the thought.  But we know very well that you cannot find a “blower” outside of the wind.  You cannot find a “rainer” beside of the rain.  So action and actor cannot be two separate things. 

So when we produce a thought - the thought is us.  There is no thinker existing outside of the thought. 

When we say something - that speech is us - and there is no speaker outside.

And when we do something, our action - is ourselves - there is no actor outside.

When the French philosopher Jean Paul Saytre says that ‘man is the sum of his actions’ he came very close to that.  There is no man - outside of the action. 

So when we produce a thought, speech and act - these things are us, and they are our continuation.

What you have produced in terms of thought, speech and action are you and they continue you, not only in here but out there.  You continue always - that is energy.  And energy and mass, they are the same thing. 

So empty means to be empty of a separate existence - there is no separate self.  And that does not mean non-existence. 

This morning before we bowed to the Buddha, our teacher, we chanted a verse to help us remove the notion that the Buddha is outside of us, the Buddha is an entity that exists outside of us.  The verse goes like this, “The one who bows, and the one who is bowed to.”  The one who bows is you, and the one who is bowed to is the Buddha.  In the beginning we think that we are a separate entity and the Buddha is a separate entity and the one who bows and the one who is bowed to are two separate entities.  That is not the best kind of bowing because there is no Right View. 

If you think that you and the Buddha are two separate entities your bow does not reflect insight and wisdom. 

So before you bow to the Buddha you have to meditate and you say, “the one who bows and the one who is bowed to, the nature of both are empty.” 

A Buddha is made only of non-Buddha elements, and me, I am made only of non-me elements, just like the flower.  If you remove non-Buddha elements from the Buddha, there is no Buddha left.  If you remove non-me elements from me, there is no me left.  That is the meditation on emptiness, and we began with that flower.  And we agree with each other that if you remove all of the non-flower elements there is no flower left.  The same thing is true with you and with the Buddha.  So it means,

“Dear Buddha, You are not a separate entity.  You are in me and I am in you.  You are made of non-you elements, and I am a non-you elements.  And I am made of non-me elements, and you are one of the non-me elements.”

That is meditation.

And if you cannot see the Buddha in you and you in the Buddha the communication is not deep enough.  There is still dualistic thinking, and it goes against the wisdom of emptiness.  “The one who bows, and the one who is bowed to - there nature both are empty.  And that is why communication is perfect.”  And only when you have that insight, will the bow that you make can truly help the Buddha to manifest.  You don’t think of the Buddha or God as a separate entity.  You have transcended the dualistic way of seeing things, and that is Right View.  So to bow like that is not just to worship, to bow like that is an act of meditation and you touch the insight of non-duality, you touch the insight of inter-being, you touch the insight of emptiness. 

And when the father looks into the son and if he knows that he is inside his son, then he has seen his son.  But if he thinks that his son is a totally different person, not connected to him.  He is a different person, and his son is another person - he has not seen his son yet.  But if he can see him in his son, and his son in him he touches the nature of emptiness, he touches the nature of inter-being, and no anger is possible. 

With the insight of inter-being, no discrimination, no anger, no hate is possible.  That is why the insight of emptiness, the insight of inter-being can evaporate anger and fear.

Meditating deeply, looking deeply into the nature of what is there you can touch the nature of inter-being in it whether it is a flower, or a Buddha, or a person, or a tree - you can touch the nature of emptiness and inter-being.  And you can see that the one contains the all. 

David Bohm used the expression, “the explicit order and the implicit order.”  Reality can be seen in two ways.  In the explicit order things are outside of each other.  The flower is outside of the cloud.  The flower is outside of the sunshine.  But when we look deeply, we see that the sunshine and the cloud are in the flower.  So in the implicit order things are inside of each other.  And that is very close to emptiness.  It is very exciting that scientists are now coming closer and closer to the insight of emptiness and inter-being.

Concentration on Signlessness
The second door of liberation is the door of “Signlessness.”  A sign is a mark, an appearance.  And we recognize things through the sign.  But the Buddha said that if you count or rely so much on the sign, you will be caught in wrong perceptions and delusion. 

We recognize a cloud floating in the sky because there is a sign; the appearance of a cloud.  And when the cloud has become rain, or snow we don’t recognize it anymore and we say that our cloud has died, and we may cry.  But if we know that our cloud can be found, can be identified under another sign then we will not cry.  In fact, it is impossible for a cloud to die because in our mind to die means from something you become nothing, from someone you become no one.  That is our idea of death. 

But with this practice of looking deeply you see that nothing can die.  There is a French scientist whose name is Lavoise (sp?), he said that, “nothing is born, nothing dies.”  A cloud can become snow, or rain, or hail - but a cloud cannot become nothing.  A cloud cannot pass from being into non-being.  If we practice signless-ness we will be free from grief, despair and fear.  Your beloved cloud is no longer in the sky so you cry, you are caught in grief.  But your cloud in her new form, the rain, is calling you, “You, darling, darling, I am here.  Don’t you see me?”  So instead of getting caught in despair you have to look deeply to see that your beloved one to pass from being to non-being.  It’s impossible for a cloud to die.  It’s impossible for you beloved to die.  She is no longer in the usual form that you used to see, but that does mean that she no longer exists.  So we should not count on the appearance, on the sign.  Otherwise we will be caught in despair and anger.

In this dharma hall, there are a lot of clouds but we don’t see them.  When we breathe, we generate clouds.  The water vapor is there but we don’t see it.  It is a kind of gas - we don’t see it.  But when the air which is full of water vapor comes in touch with something cold, it will begin to be visible, we see the fog, and we see the cloud.

There is a high mountain, and the wind is blowing towards it.  You don’t see any cloud but the air has a lot of water vapor.  You don’t see it.  When it comes to the foot of the mountain it cannot continue any more so it begins to rise.  And when it rises it meets the cold and it becomes visible as a cloud.  So you think that there is a cloud here (at the top of the mountain) but not here (on the bottom of the mountain).  That is a wrong perception.  There is a cloud here (at the bottom of the mountain), and there is a cloud here in this very dharma hall.  You don’t see because you only count on the sign, on the mark, on the appearance.  So the Buddha says that we should not rely so much on the sign.

So the practice of emptiness and signlessness helps us to touch the nature of inter-being, of no birth and no death.  And that can dissipate, remove our fear our anger, and so on.

Concentration on Aimlessness
The third practice of concentration is called aimlessness.
 
Aimlessness means that you don’t put in front of you an object, and run after it.  You no longer long for anything.  You no longer chase after anything.

Because you come home to the here and the now, you touch deeply what is there and you know that what you have been looking for it is right there already in the here and the now.  What you have been looking for like Buddha, Jesus, God, the Kingdom of God; they are already there - in the here and the now.  Your happiness, your peace also.  You don’t have to go and look for it elsewhere and in the future.  This is already it.  You don’t have to go and look for anything else.


On the first day of our retreat we practiced looking deeply into a flower and I remember that I said that this flower if you come in touch with it deeply with mindfulness and concentration you know that this belongs to the Kingdom of God.  It is the Kingdom of God.  It contains the Kingdom of God.  And if you can get in touch with it, you get in touch with the Kingdom.

You don’t have to look for the Kingdom elsewhere and in the future.  Not only do you touch the Kingdom of God, but when you touch the Kingdom, you touch God.  And your body also belongs to the Kingdom. 

Your body is also a wonder like the flower.  We should not have any complex. 

Not only the lotus is a wonder of life, but the mud that helps create the lotus is also a wonder of life.  Not only happiness is holy, but suffering is equally holy because if we know how to handle suffering we can create happiness.  Because happiness is made only of non-happiness elements.

That is the insight of inter-being. 

Therefore, when you touch the truth of aimlessness you don’t run anymore.  You are at peace in the here and the now and true happiness becomes possible.


Contemplation of an Wave in the Ocean
Let us contemplate a wave on the surface of the ocean.  It looks like there is a beginning and an end.  It looks like there is a coming up and a going down.  It looks like there is this wave and other waves.  And the wave may be caught in this notion; beginning/ending, high/low, being/non-being.  And the wave can suffer deeply because of these notions. 

We know that our cloud can never die, because to die means from something you suddenly become nothing.  But we have learned that nothing can become nothing, and nothing has come from nothing.  Because to be born means from nothing we suddenly become something, from no one we suddenly become someone.  That is our idea of birth.  But look at our cloud again, before it appears as a cloud.  It has been something already. 

Our cloud has not come from nothing.  Our cloud has not passed from the realm of non-being to the realm of being.  Before being a cloud she has already been the water in the ocean, the heat generated by the sun.  So the manifestation of the cloud is only new, but we cannot call it the birth of the cloud because to be born from nothing you suddenly become something.  But this is only a continuation - of something.

It is like this sheet of paper before she expresses herself as a sheet of paper she has been a tree, the rain, the sunshine so this is only a continuation.  The sheet of paper has her former life as a tree.  So this is a new manifestation, not just a beginning - not a birth.  And we live with our notions of birth and death, being and non-being - that is why we suffer. 

It is possible for the wave to practice meditation, to bend down and touch herself and realize that she is water.  In fact, a wave is made of water.  And we cannot speak about water in terms of beginning and ending, and going up and going down.  The notions applied to wave cannot be applied to water.  The moment when the wave realizes she is water, she loses all her fear.  She has the joy of going down, she has the joy of going down.  She is not afraid of dying because she cannot die.  After this point, she continues to be water.  Does the wave have to go and search for water?  Is water something outside of the wave?  No.  She is water in the here and the now.

The same thing is true with the Kingdom of God, the Pure Land of the Buddha, enlightenment, nirvana - we don’t have to look for them elsewhere and in the future.  They are our true nature.  We don’t have to go and look for them.  And that is the meaning of aimlessness.  You don’t have to run and look for it.  It is right here and right now.  You are already what you want to become.  You are a wonder and you belong to the Kingdom - enjoy.  You are a wonder and you are in touch with wonders.

The Notion of Being and Non-Being
Suppose we draw a line from left to right representing time and suppose we select one point here and call it “B”, point “B” - birth.  Everyone of us has a birth certificate and we believe that we only begin to exist at point B, before that we did not exist.  We have passed from non-being into being.  The segment before B is called ‘non-being’.  Starting from B we enter into the realm of ‘being’. 

That is the way we think, and it is not right thinking because it is not based on right view. 

So we believe that we pass from the realm of non-being into the realm of being through point B, and we continue to stay in the realm of being until later, at the point D - death.  Maybe one hundred years, maybe less.  But from the point D on, we pass from the realm of being into the realm of non-being.  And that is our notion of life and death, of being and non-being.


But when we observe a sheet of paper, when we observe a cloud, we know that this is wrong.  This concept of birth and death, being and non-being are wrong.  Because if we speak of the cloud we know that before point B the cloud did not belong to non-being.  The cloud was the water in the ocean, the heat, and many other things.  This point B is only a point of continuation, and not a beginning.

The notion of beginning cannot be applied to reality.

There is no beginning.  There is no birth.

And some of the scientists have found that nothing is born, nothing dies.

Lavoise is a scientist, he did not call himself a practitioner of meditation but he also practiced looking deeply and he found out that there is no birth, there is no death. 

So the sheet of paper also when it appears in the form of a sheet of paper it is not a beginning.  Before that, it was a tree.  So the sheet of paper has not passed from non-being, and will not pass from being to non-being. 

So our notion of birth and death, being and non-being cannot be applied to reality.  And nirvana is the removal of all notions, including birth and death, being and non-being; to be empty of all of these notions.

Contemplation of the Flame (No Coming, No Going)
Let us try to meditate on a flame, on a little flame.  We know that a flame is made only of non-flame elements, like the flower.  And non-flame elements are already there, inside of the box and outside of the box.  Oxygen is a non-flame element, and we know that without oxygen a flame cannot manifest.  So we can talk to our flame.  Let us not think that our flame belongs to the realm of non-being, and when she manifests she passes into the realm of being. 

So we say, “My dear little flame, I know you are somewhere there why don’t you manifest for us?  I know you are there - inside the box and outside of the box.  You are in your non-you elements.  Why don’t you manifest for us?”  And then the flame if you listen you can here the answer, “Dear Thay, dear sangha I am ready to manifest for you but I need one more condition - one movement from your fingers.”  And then we provide the flame with the last of the non-flame elements.  And the flame manifests.

“Thank you dear little flame for having manifested for us.  Please stay a little bit longer.”  We may like to ask, “My dear little flame, where have you come from and where have you gone to?”  And we can hear something like this, “Dear Thay, Dear Sangha; I have not come from anywhere.  I have not come from the south, the north, the east or the west.  When conditions come together sufficiently I manifest.  My nature is the nature of ‘no coming’.  My nature is non-local.”  And we know that the flame has told us the truth.  



And if we ask, “My dear little flame, where have you gone?”  And she will say, “I have not gone anywhere.  I have not gone to the south, to the north, to the above, to the below.  My nature is non-local.  When conditions are no longer sufficient, I just stop manifestation and wait for a chance to manifest again.  My nature is ‘no coming’/‘no going’. 

Think of your beloved one.  Think of the person that has left you.  We have cried and have said, “Darling, where have you come from, and where have you gone to?”  But our beloved one has also the nature of no coming/no going.  She has not come from non-being in to being.  She has not passed from being to non-being.  All these are just notions, ideas.  And meditation helps us to touch the real nature of reality and remove all the notions of being and non-being, birth and death, coming and going. 


Contemplation of the Flame (Sameness and Otherness)
Now we have two flames.  And we shall ask this flame that looks like another flame, “My dear little flame, are you the same as the other flame or are you at totally different one?”  That is meditation.  And if we have enough concentration we can hear the answer, “Dear Thay, Dear Sangha; although I am not exactly the same as the other flame, I am not a totally different flame either.” 

When we look at the flame like this it looks like it is the same flame going on, but we don’t know that there is a multitude of flames succeeding each other.  It’s like when we project the film, we see the image of one person making person but we don’t know that there are many pictures succeeding each other to give you the impression that that is the same person, the same actor.

So we have the notion of birth and death; being and non-being; coming and going; and sameness and otherness. 

When we open the family album and we see ourselves as a five year old, or as a baby we see how different we are now from that baby.  We have grown into an adult.  And we may ask, “are we the same person with that baby, or are we a totally different person.”  The answer is like the answer we received from the flame.  We are not exactly the same person as we were as a baby because we have changed so much; form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, consciousness have been changing a lot.  But we are not an entirely different person either.  So reality transcends all these notions; being/non-being, birth/death, coming/going, sameness/otherness. 

There are theologians who describe God as the foundation of being.  They are still caught in the notion of being, because the notion of being exists only together with the notion of non-being.  And if God is the foundation of being, who will be the foundation of non-being?  God should transcend both concepts of being and non-being.  You cannot describe God in terms of being and non-being.  And deep meditation helps us transcend the notion of being and non-being.  “To be or not to be” - that is NOT the question (laughter).

Even scientists are still caught in the notion of being, with the idea of a beginning.  But they are on their way to discovering the nature of reality that transcends the notion of existence and non-existence.  They begin to say things like the “quantum”, or “quanta” do not really exist.  They fluctuate in and out of existence.  They don’t really exist - they have only a tendency to exist.  Very close!  And meditation can help them remove notions of beginning/ending, being/non-being more quickly.

We will have a 21 meditation retreat for scientists and buddhist practitioners at Plum Village next year and both traditions can help each others.  Please join us - 21 days.  We will examine these teachings in more depth during this retreat.

So Nirvana is not a place where we try to go to.  It is not something in the future we are trying to reach.

Nirvana is the true nature of reality itself.

We can get in touch with our true nature by practicing “looking deeply”, and we are able to remove all of these notions.  The notions of birth/death; being/non-being; sameness/otherness; and coming/going are the foundation of all of our afflictions - fear, anger and despair.  And if we are able to touch our true nature of no-birth, no-death, no coming, no going, no being, no non-being all of these afflictions like fear, anger and despair will no longer be possible.  And that is what the Buddha called “right view”. 

If you have right view all your thinking will be right thinking, all your speech will be right speech and you can only create peace and happiness.  And that is why on our first day of the retreat we already said that the Buddha described right view as the notion that is free from being and non-being.  And let us organize our lives in such a way that we have time to go deeply into this, it will satisfy us deeply. 

We need a spiritual dimension in our life.  And if we can touch our true nature of no birth, no death, no being and non-being, and then no fear will be there, no despair will be there.  And peace and solidity will help us to serve other people much better.

The Story of the Venerable Shariputra and Anathapindika
In the time of the Buddha there was a lay practitioner called Anathapindika.  He was a business man.  He offered the Buddha a park.  He bought the park from a prince and offered it to the Buddha as a practice center.  And he took a great deal of pleasure to serve the Buddha and the sangha. 

And one day the Buddha learned that Anathapindika was dying and he sent his disciple Shariputra to come and visit and help Anathapindika to die peacefully.  And on that day, Shariputra learned that Anathapindika was going to die within 24 hours, so he asked his brother in the dharma, the venerable Ananda, a cousin of the Buddha to come with him.  So when they came Anathapindika tried to sit up but he was too weak in order to sit up.  Shariputra said to him, “Dear friend, please stay on your bed.  We will bring a few chairs and sit close to you and we can spend some time with you.” 

And when the two Venerables sat down, Shariputra asked, “Dear friend, how do you feel in your body?  Is the pain in your body decreasing or still increasing?”  And Anathapindika replied that the pain did not seem to be decreasing, in fact is was increasing all the time.  Shariputra said that, “In that case let us practice together the Recollection of the Three Jewels.”  And he began to offer a guided meditation on the Buddha, the dharma and the sangha.  Shariputra was one of  the most intelligent monks, and he knew that Anathapindika had taken a lot of pleasure serving the Buddha, the dharma and the sangha.  That is why he felt that if he could focus the attention of the lay person on the three jewels it would lessen the pain in the body.  In fact the guided meditation was very helpful, and focusing his attention in this way reduced the pain in the body, and he was able to smile.

And Shariputra said, “Let us continue our guided meditation:

Breathing in - I’m aware of the element of water in me.
Breathing out - I smile to the element of water in me. 
Breathing in - I’m aware of the element of water outside of me.
Breathing in - I’m aware of the element of heat in me; water, earth, heat and air.
Breathing in - I know that the element of water is not me.
Breathing out - I know that the element of air is not me.  I am much more than water and air. 
Breathing in - I know that this body is not me.  I am much more than this body. 

I am my actions.   I am the thoughts that I have produced.
I am the speech that I have produced

And I have produced many beautiful thoughts, and deeds and speech. 
And I have served the dharma.

Breathing in - I know that this body has come from nowhere, and this body will go nowhere. 

When conditions are sufficient, this body manifests.

And when conditions are no longer sufficient, this body stops manifesting and will manifest again in other forms.

So this guided meditation tried to help Anathapindika to touch the nature of no coming/no going; no birth/no death.  There is only manifestation, and re-manifestation.  There is no birth and no death, no coming and no going.

And after about 15 minutes of the guided meditation, Anathapindika began to cry and Ananda said, “Dear friend, why do you cry?  Do you regret something?  Or did you succeed in the meditation?”  With a smile, Anathapindika said, “No Venerable Ananda, I practiced very successfully and I do not regret anything.” 

So Ananda said, “Why are you crying then?”  Anathapindika answered, “I cry because I am so moved.  I have served the Buddha in the last 30 years but I have never received a teaching and a practice that is as wonderful as this.  I am completely free now.  I am not afraid of dying because I know that nothing dies, and nothing is born.”  Ananda then said, “Dear Friend. You don’t know this, but this teaching we monastics - we receive every day.” 

And Anathapindika answered, “Dear Venerable Ananda.  Please go home and tell the Buddha that many of us lay people are so busy, but there are those of us who still have time to receive this wonderful teaching, so please tell him to dispense this practice and teaching also to the lay people.”  And Ananda said, “Well, I will do that.  I will go back and tell the Buddha what you have recommended.”  And after the two Venerables left, Anathapindika passed away very peacefully. 

You can also read this story in the Plum Village Chanting Book.

I think this is the cream of the buddhist teaching and practice.

We have to re-arrange our lives so that we have time in order to enjoy this kind of learning and practicing.

And when we have gotten that kind of insight and non-fear and we can very well sit by the bed of an agonizing person and help him or her to die peacefully like Shariputra has helped Anathapindika.

Closing Remarks...
Dear Friends, It has been a great joy for us to meet with you in the last six days and we have watered many good seeds in us.  Please remember when you go back to your city, try to set up a group of practitioners in order to organize the recitation of the 5 Mindfulness Trainings, organize a tea ceremony, organize a session of sitting meditation, organize a session of walking meditation to nourish our practice.

We are the continuation of the Buddha.

Each of us should be a torch in order to transmit the light of the Buddha to the next generation.

We will have a chance to be together again in the future.

Talks with Thay: UBC, Vancouver, BC, 8/12/11, Friday Morning

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Q:  Where did you learn to become mindful, and to breathe?
When I was about nine years old I happened to see a drawing of a Buddha on the cover of a Buddhist magazine, and the Buddha was sitting on the grass very peacefully - very relaxed.  And I was very impressed because people around me were nervous.  So that was the first time I had the desire to be like a Buddha. 

In order to be a Buddha you have to practice - do do something.

So a few years later I happened to see a monk.  We were students, we were going up to a mountain for a picnic.  We were organized in groups of 5 - boys and girls.  I had learned that up on the mountain there was a monk practicing on the mountain to become a Buddha. So I was very excited to go and find out how he practiced in order to become a Buddha because I, myself, I wanted to become a Buddha - peaceful, happy, relaxed and so on. 

But I did not have much luck, because when we came up to the top of the mountain we found out that the monk was not there.  Maybe someone had told him that 500 boys and girls were coming up the mountain (laughter).  So he may have gone and hid himself in the woods to practice sitting alone, so I was very disappointed. 

I did not know how to do walking meditation or to breathe in and out because no one had taught me.  So we were given instructions to bring bottles of boiled water, and a rice bowl and sesame seeds in order to have the picnic on the mountain.  Because we did not know how to climb relaxingly and happily like we do walking meditation here, that is why all of us tried to climb as quickly as possible to get to the top, and half way we were so thirsty and we drank up all of the water that we had brought.  But added to that we found out at that the hermit, the monk, was not there so I was very disappointed.

So our teachers gave the order for us to sit down and set up our picnic.  While the other four boys were setting up the food, I ventured into the wood hoping that I might meet the monk.  When I went into the wood, I suddenly heard a very beautiful sound, the sound of water dripping.  I allowed myself to be guided by the sound and finally I found a very beautiful, clear, natural well.  You know, Thay was very thirsty, I was very thirsty and when I saw the fresh water I was so happy.  I kneeled down and cupped the water in my hand, and drank.  It was so delicious. 

The water was so refreshing, and because Thay had read many fairy tales he believed that the monk had transformed himself into a well so I would have a private audience with him, and he was displaying himself as a well - fresh water.  So when you are young and read so many fairy tales you believe things like that, that a monk has the magic power of transforming himself into a well so that you can drink the water and you can meet him in the form of the well.

What happened is that after I had drunk the water I felt completely satisfied, no more desire, even the desire to meet the monk - very strange.  And the water was so delicious, I had never tasted any kind of water like that.  It was much better than Coca Cola.  So after having drank the water I sat down, and then I lie down and I contemplated the branches of the trees.  Because I was very tired I fell into a very deep sleep.  I don’t know how long I slept, but when I woke up I did not know where I was.  The sleep must have been very deep.  It took me a minute to remember that I was on the top of the mountain and the other four boys were waiting for me down below.  So I had to leave the well with regret to join them. 

And in my mind, a line of poetry came up, “I have tasted the most delicious water in the world.”  Strange - when I met up with the other four boys I did not tell them what happened to me.   Because it was a very sacred spiritual experience and if I talked about it, I would lose some of the happiness.  So I kept silent.  I was very silent that day.  And I believed that I was very lucky because the monk had transformed himself into the well so that I could have a private audience with him.  And I think at that time I believed that I was the luckiest person on earth. 

Later on, I hoped that everyone would have the chance to meet that hermit the monk - maybe not in the form in the well, but maybe a tree, or a rock, or a beautiful sunset because you are very lucky if you have a chance to meet your hermit, your monk.  And many of us may have had a chance to meet him, but did not recognize him.  So I always tell the young people that if it happens that they meet their monk, their hermit, they should write to me and announce the good news.  “Dear Thay, yesterday I have met my hermit, my monk.”  And since that day I wanted to become a monk. 

And at the age of 16, I obtained the permission of my father and my mother to go to a temple and be ordained as a novice monk.  It is exactly there that I learned how to breathe, how to sit, how to walk in order to bring peace, and happiness, and compassion into myself.  So remember, maybe you will meet your monk, your hermit, tomorrow or after tomorrow.  And if you do, please write Thay a note and tell Thay that you have met the Hermit of your life.

Q: Do you think you have accomplished the highest level of Buddhism, and if you haven’t do you think you will?  And would you play soccer with the kids today?

Frankly, I do not have the wish to accomplish the highest level of Buddhism - because after that level you don’t have anything to do any more.  At this level I am already very happy.  So I am relaxingly practicing.  Practicing and helping people to practice in order to suffer less, and to be able to smile and to reconcile - that brings me a lot of happiness.  I am not very eager to attain the highest level of Buddhism.

I will ask one of my young monastic students to play soccer with you today, because they are my continuation - they are my self.  My students, my disciples are also my self.  And you are my student, and you are also my continuation; you are my self - so enjoy playing soccer.

I think that is enough questions for children.  Very good questions.

Q: Do you believe that you have reached the state of enlightenment, and if not, do you believe that you will reach it at some point?

Enlightenment is not something that is difficult.  You can get it today.  Enlightenment is always enlightenment about something.  In one day, you can get many enlightenments several times.  If you practice mindfulness and concentration you may get insight and enlightenment several times a day.  You don’t need to practice ten years in order to begin to have enlightenment.

Enlightenment is our daily business.

When you breathe in, and if you become aware that you are alive - that is already enlightenment, that is already awakening. 

Because so many people who are alive, who are there but they don’t know that they are there - alive.  So one in-breath can help you to be enlightened to the fact that you are still alive on this earth, on this beautiful planet.  So when you walk, if you are aware that you are making steps on this beautiful planet.  That it is a miracle to be alive and to be walking on earth - that is already enlightenment. 

Great enlightenment is made of many small enlightenments like that.

Enlightenment can happen today, if you practice mindfulness and concentration.  You do not have to wait for enlightenment to happen.

There is individual enlightenment.  There is also collective enlightenment.  There are those of us who are enlightened on the fact that our planet is in danger.  And thanks to this enlightenment we  try to live in such a way in order to make a future possible for the planet.  But there are those who are still not enlightened.  They don’t know what is going on.  They don’t know that our planet is in danger.  And that is why we have to practice in such a way in order to help wake them up so they can also experience enlightenment.  And when they have enlightenment they will change their style of living, and they will be able to protect the planet.  That is why we have to produce individual enlightenment.  We have to help create collective enlightenment in order for us to suffer less.  And in order to bring joy and hope to us and to other species.

Enlightenment is our daily practice.

And every moment of your daily life can be a moment of enlightenment if you are inhabited by the energy of mindfulness and concentration. 

And if you do like that you are a good continuation of the Buddha.

Q: What is the goal of Buddhism?

The goal of Buddhism is to be happy right here and right now.

And it is possible. 

With the practice of mindfulness you can bring your mind back to your body.  Mindful breathing, mindful walking and when your mind is there with your body you realize that there are so many wonders of life that are available in the here and the now, and you can enjoy them.  And you can be happy right here and right now.  You do not have to long for something in the future.

Buddhism means “the path of awakening”.  And a Buddha is someone who is already awake.

Awakening is always awakening to something. 

You are awake to the fact that life is a wonder, and you don’t need to run anymore to look for something elsewhere, and in the future.  It’s just beautiful, just wonderful here and now.

And enlightenment, or awakening can be obtained in just a few seconds.  When you breathe in, and come home to the here and the now that is full of wonders.  The Kingdom of God is there, the Pure Land of the Buddha is there, life is there and you can be happy and compassionate right here and right now.  So the goal of Buddhism does not mean that you have to wait for the future, that you long for something that hasn’t happened.  Buddhism is the kind of practice that can help you to be right here, right now - in order to live your life right away and with peace and brotherhood and sisterhood.  And that goal can be realized very quickly with the practice of mindfulness of breathing, walking, sitting and so on....

Q: Do you have any advice on how to overcome my self-doubt, my worries about my shortcomings?

When something negative happens, we should not try to fight it.  We should accept the situation as it is. 

And then we can see, that the situation can be different, because there are good things in us that can come to the foreground.

It’s like a television there are many channels.  If what is manifested on the screen you don’t like, you can change the channel.  There is a channel of the Buddha, of love, of trust, of happiness, of joy, of brotherhood in you.  And you don’t have to fight the channel of sickness, of anger - you have to smile to it, and you just have to turn on the other channel.  It’s very easy (laughter). 

Don’t fight.  Don’t try to fight, just accept that it is.  Smile to it, and change the CD, change the channel.

And that can be done easily.

Because you have to believe that there are good things in you transmitted by your parents, ancestors and we have to learn how to make good use of the positive things that are in us.  The Pure Land of the Buddha, the Kingdom of God, brotherhood, sisterhood, joy, peace, forgiveness - they are all in us.  To practice means to give them a chance to manifest. 

Sickness and anger can vanish in one or two seconds if you know how to turn on the good things inside.  And if you find yourself living with people who can do that around then, well you can do it easily.

Q: How can I stay connected the practice and remain true to my volition to help others, outside of the retreats?

When you practice with a sangha you are reminded by the members of your sangha to come home to that.  Like the practice of mindful walking, if around us people are walking mindfully and are enjoying every step, you are motivated to walk like that.  And to walk like that is to come home to the best of ourselves.

We should learn to organize our practice in such a way that without making a lot of effort we can still remember to practice.  We need more skill than physical strength.  Suppose we practice breathing in, you don’t need to make much physical effort in order to breathe in.  You don’t have to struggle with your in-breath. 

You need to learn a skillful way of breathing in.  You breathe in such a way that your in-breath brings you joy, and peace, and enlightenment.  And this is possible. 

In our daily life we breathe all of the time, but many of us do not pay attention to our in-breath and our out-breath. 

So in our practice, we allow ourselves to breathe normally, but we pay attention to our in-breath and our out-breath.  And with mindfulness, you touch the insight that being alive and breathing in is a wonder, so you enjoy your in-breath. 

Your in-breath is very gentle, very natural.  It can bring peace and relaxation to your body, and to your mind.

So we need more skillfulness than physical strength. 

And sitting we need also skillfulness.  If you suffer, if you make too much effort and you can get pain into your body very quickly.  But if you enjoy sitting, relaxingly, you can sit for a long time and every minute can bring you joy and peace.  And if you are surrounded by good practitioners who enjoy walking, breathing, sitting and then you are reminded by all these friends to go home always to your practice.

Practicing with a sangha has the advantage that when we find ourselves practicing with a sangha we can profit from the collective energy of mindfulness created by the whole group.  And with that collective energy of the whole group you can very easily recognize your suffering, your sickness, your anger, your fear and embrace them and transform them.  It is very important to have a sangha around you to help you maintain the practice and to help you strengthen your mindfulness and concentration.  Therefore, every practitioner when they go home to their city should look around to recognize members of their future sangha, and invite them to come for a sitting, a walking, because a sangha always helps us to maintain our practice for a long time, and we don’t have to wait for the next retreat. 

We can continue in our daily lives, enjoying the practice.  If we have the talent to organize, and organize our daily lives in such a way, that can help maintain our practice.

Gatha for Waking Up
When I first learned Gathas, when I became a novice monk, my teacher gave me 50 verses to memorize to practice with and the first one is:

Waking up this morning I smile.
I know that 24 brand new hours are offered to me.
I vow to live them deeply.
And learn to look at people around me with eyes of compassion.

They are four line gathas, and when you breathe in you read the first line.  When you breathe out, you read the second line silently.  And you have mindfulness and concentration, and you enjoy and cherish the gift that life gives you 24 hours every morning. 

So in order to do that I stuck a leaf, an autumn leaf, on the mosquito net, because in VietNam we sleep in a mosquito net.  And as soon as you open your eyes and see the leaf it means you should breathe in and recite the gatha.  So I allow myself to relax.  I breathe in and I read the first line, I breathe out and read the second line.  You begin your life like that in a beautiful way, in a mindful way.  And when you sit up, using your feet to find your slippers there is another gatha for you to recite and to breathe.

That is the way they organize the practice in a temple so that you can maintain the practice in every moment of your daily life.

I remember the first time my teacher told me how to light a stick of incense.  Usually, when we light a stick of incense it is to offer it to the Buddha, but my teacher said that, “My Child, When you hold a stick of incense you have to hold it by both hands, like this.  You put your left hand on your right hand.”  This means that you use your whole body and your whole mind in picking up a stick of incense and you light it mindfully.  And that is already the practice.  You have to do everything in your daily life with the whole of your body, and the whole of your mind.

And we are trained like that in order to maintain your practice throughout the day. 

There are many ways; the gathas that you memorize, a co-practitioner next to you, a sangha around you, and the sound of the bell.  Everything can help you to go back to the here and the now, and practice mindfulness.  So if you have a talent for organizing, make use that talent in order to help yourself and your community to practice with skillfulness.  And the practice should be pleasant.  The practice can bring relaxation, joy and happiness right away and we don’t have to wait for a long time to get these.

Q: What advice can you give to those who practice with physical pain and agony over seeing many negative things in the world?

We have learned that we can reduce physical pain with the practice of releasing the tension in the body.  The pain may still be there, but it can be reduced by releasing the tension.  The pain increases as a function of the tension.  So the practice of relaxation in the lying position. 

The practice of relaxation during the time we walk.  Because every step you make can help release the tension.  Walk like a free person.  Put things down, don’t carry.  And you feel lighter.  There is a burden that we always carry with us.  And the technique is, the skillfulness is how to lay down the burden in order to be light.  And if you sit, and walk, and lie down like that it is very easy to reduce the pain.

The Second Arrow of Exaggeration
And the Buddha said that we should not try to amplify our pain, or exaggerate our situation.  He used the image of someone who is hit by an arrow.  And a few minutes later, a second arrow comes and strikes exactly in the same spot.  So after the second arrow comes, not only is the pain doubled but it can be tripled or ten times more.  It can be very painful and intense.

So when we have some pain whether it is physical or mental, we have to recognize it as it is and we should not exaggerate. 

Breathing in, I know this is only a minor physical pain.

I can very well make friends and peace with it.  I can still smile to it.

And if you recognize it as it is and do not exaggerate, then you can make peace with it - you don’t suffer much.  But if you get angry, revolting against it, you worry too much, if you imagine that you are going to die very quickly then the pain will be multiplied by one hundred times. 

And that is the second arrow.  We should not allow it to come.  And that is recommended by the Buddha.  It is very important.  Don’t amplify the pain.

Re: Activism
And we know that if we are not peaceful.  If we do not have enough compassion in us we cannot do much to help the world.  As an activist we want to do something, to help the world to suffer less.

We ourselves are the center.  We have to make peace, to reduce the suffering in us first, because we represent the world.

Peace, love, and happiness should always begin - here (pointing to the heart). 

And the Buddha, he recommended many practices in order to help reduce the pain in the body, reduce the pain in the feelings and emotions, to reconcile with ourselves.  Because there is suffering inside; fear and anger.

When you take care of yourself, you are practically taking care of the world.

Imagine a pine tree standing in the front yard.  We ask the pine tree what it can do, what is the maximum the pine tree can do in order to help the world.  And the answer is very clear, “You should be a beautiful, healthy pine tree.”

You help the world by being your best.

So that is applied for humans also. 

The basic thing we can do to help the world is to be healthy, to be solid, to be loving, to be gentle to ourselves.  And when people look at us they will gain confidence, and they will say “She can do that, then I can do that too.”

So anything that you can do for you, you do it for the world.  Don’t think that you and the world are two separate things.  When you breathe in mindfully and gently, and feel the wonder of life you are doing that for us - for the world.  Remember.

And practicing with that kind of insight you will succeed in helping the world.  And you don’t have to wait until tomorrow, you can do it right today.
 

Talks with Thay: UBC, Vancouver, BC, 8/11/11, Thursday Morning

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My Dear Little Grain of Corn
Every two years I go to Italy and offer a retreat.   I bring with me many monks and nuns to help me.  And retreats organize in Italy, and take place not very far from Rome.   So many people like the practice of mindfulness, and there are a lot of children in the retreat.  So every time I go to Italy I am surrounded by many children. We practice joyfully together.  I enjoy walking with them and sitting with them.

One day I gave them some homework to do.  I had a bag of corn seeds and I distributed to each child one grain of corn.  And you’re supposed to bring that grain of corn home and plant it in a small pot, and you remember to water every day. 

And when the grain of corn has become a plant of corn, a young plant of corn of two or three leaves, you come and ask the plant of corn one question.  And you ask, “My dear little plant of corn, do you remember the time you were a tiny seed?”  And you wait for the plant to answer.  You listen very carefully, and you can hear the answer of the young plant of corn.  It may say something like, “Me?  A tiny seed?  I don’t believe it.”  In fact, the young plant of corn has only been there for ten days or two weeks but it has already has forgotten that it used to be a tiny seed of corn. 

So you have to remind her, you have to help the plant of corn to remember.  And you tell her something like this, “My dear little plant of corn.  It’s me who has planted the grain of corn in this spot, and I have watered it every day, and you have come from that seed.”  Maybe in the beginning, the plant may not believe you.  But you have to be patient.  You have to help the plant to remember, and the plant will remember.  It will accept, that at one point in history it was a little seed. 

And you who are a practitioner of meditation, when you look at the plant of corn you can see the grain of corn inside.  You know longer see the form of the grain of corn but the grain of corn has not died.  You can no longer see the grain of corn but you know very well that the grain of corn has not died.  If it had died, there would be no plant of corn available.  So you know very well, so you can help the plant of corn to understand.

“Dear little plant of corn, when I look at you I still see the grain of corn that has become you now.”  It’s always alive.  It may be a little bit hard for the plant of corn to realize that - but that is the truth.  That the plant of corn is only a continuation of the grain of corn.  And the grain of corn is always there inside of the grain of corn although you don’t see it in its former appearance.  That is meditation.  When you meditate you can see things that other people cannot see.  

When you look into a plant of corn, you can see the grain of corn inside.  And we know very well that a plant of corn is a continuation of the grain of corn.  You cannot take the grain of corn out of the plant of corn.  If you do, there is no plant anymore.  So everyone of us whether we are a little girl or a little boy.  And do you know something?  In the beginning, you were also a very tiny seed in the womb of your mother and much smaller than the seed of corn. 

Everyone of us begins with being a very tiny seed and we don’t remember.  We need a friend in the dharma, we need a teacher to remind us that in the beginning we were a very tiny seed planted by our father in our mother.  In fact, half of the seed is from our father and half of the seed is from our mother.  And then that seed continue to sprout, to multiply itself and to become a tiny living being in the womb of our mother.  And we stay there in the womb of our mother for about nine months.  And it was very comfortable in there.

And so when we look at the plant of corn, we can see the seed of corn.  So when we look into ourself we can see the seed that the father has planted, that your mother has planted, that later became us.  The same thing is true with the plant of corn.  You can no longer see the seed of the grain of corn in the plant of corn - but it is always there.  We are the continuation of our father and our mother like the plant of corn is the continuation of the seed of corn.

We believe that our father and our mother are outside of us - that is not true.  And most of us believe our father is outside of us, our mother is outside of us.  But in fact they are inside, also.  Your father is in every cell of your body.  Your mother is in every cell of your body.   You cannot take your father out of you.  You cannot take your mother out of you.  Because you are a continuation of your father; you are a continuation of your mother. 

In fact, father is both inside and outside.  And the father inside is younger.  We carry our father inside into the future.  So when the father outside dies, he does not really die.  He lives on in us, and we bring our father into the future.  Our father is not going to die.  It’s like a seed of corn. 

When a plant of corn is manifested, you don’t see the seed of corn anymore but you cannot say the seed of corn has died - no.  The seed of corn continues on in the plant of corn.  So each of us carries our mother and our father in us, and we bring them into the future.  And if we live a happy life, a beautiful life, our father and mother in us will be more beautiful also.  And thanks to the practice we can make our father and mother in ourselves more beautiful than in the past.

So I invite all of you to meditate on this.  And get rid of the idea that father and mother are only outside - that is a wrong perception.  Your father is inside.  Your mother is inside.  You have both of them in you.  And you carry them always with you, and you will bring them into the future.  During sitting meditation, I like to talk to my father inside.  One day in sitting meditation, I told my father inside, “Daddy, we have succeeded.”  And if people if they hear that they will be surprised.  Succeed in what?  That morning when I practiced sitting meditation I felt so free and so light, I did not have any desire, any craving anymore.  I was feeling so free from desire and craving, so I was very light.  So that is why I wanted to share this with my father.

And I also talk to my mother, because I know that my mother has not really died.  She continues on in me.  When I practiced walking meditation in India with a group of a few thousand people, on the largest boulevard of New Delhi I invited my mother to walk with me.  I said, “Mommy, let’s walk together.  These are my feet, but they are also yours.  My feet are the continuation of your feet.  So let us mother and son enjoy walking in New Delhi.”  So my mother was walking with me, mother and son walking very peacefully and happily together with thousands of other people.  I also invited my father to walk with me, and later on I invited my brother and my grandmother.  I invited the Buddha to walk with me, and my teacher to walk with me. And the walk was so wonderful.  We walked together.  I know that I carry in me not only my father and my mother, but all of my ancestors.  And also I carry the Buddha, because the Buddha and my teacher they are my ancestors also. 

We have blood ancestors, and we have spiritual ancestors.  These ancestors may be Buddha, or Jesus, or Mohammed.  And you have them inside of you.  Don’t think that they are outside.  Our blood ancestors and our spiritual ancestors are all inside of you.  And when you walk with insight and with mindfulness all of them walk with us.  And as we make a happy step, all of them enjoy walking and making happy steps.  If you walk in the Kingdom of God, all of them walk in the Kingdom of God.  If you walk in Hell, this means when you are very angry, in despair, and hateful you are walking in Hell and your ancestors have to join you - that’s not nice.  Let us choose to walk in the Kingdom of God or in the Pure Land of the Buddha so that our ancestors have the chance to enjoy also.

I have met with teenagers, young people.  Some of them are angry at their father or mother.  They cannot talk to their father.  Communication is impossible.  There is no communication possible between son and father, mother and daughter.  There is hate, there is anger that blocks communication. 

And there was a young man who said, “That person?  He is not my father.  I don’t want to have anything to do with him.”  So he was angry at his father at the point to where he did not want to have anything to do with his father.  But if you look deeply into him, you can see that he is made only of his father.  His father is fully present in every cell of his body.  He cannot take his father out of him, that is the truth.  And yet he made a very funny statement, “I do not want to have anything to do with that person.”  Nonsense (laughter).  So when you get angry at your father you get angry with yourself because you are a continuation of your father.

Suppose the plant of corn got angry at the grain of corn - regrettable (laughter).  So if there is a feeling of fear, separation and anger we have to breathe in and out and reconcile with our father inside, reconcile with our mother inside, in order to have peace. 

You cannot have happiness and peace if you are in conflict with your father, or your mother.  Because your father and your mother are inside of you. 

And everything you do in order to bring freedom and joy and happiness and forgiveness to you, you offer your father and mother the same thing; and you are a very kind son, a very kind daughter because that’s the best way to repay the debt to your parents.

In Plum Village, France, where we live and practice there are hundreds of monks and nuns and lay people.  In summer we organize four weeks of practice called “Summer Opening”, and you know something, children come from all over the world representing more than fifty countries.  They don’t speak the same language but they play together, they walk together, they sit together - very joyfully.  And every summer they ask their parents instead of going to the beach or to the mountains for the holidays, they want their parents to come to Plum Village.  In Plum Village they have a lot of friends, and people in Plum Village, children and adults, in Plum Village are very gentle because they know how to practice mindful breathing, mindful walking, calming our anger so both adults and children are happy in Plum Village.  I hope that one day you may come to visit us in Plum Village. 

Wake-Up Organization of Young People
But today here, in Vancouver, in this dharma hall this is Plum Village already because everybody is calm, everyone is nice, and you can very well set up a Plum Village here in Vancouver for people to come and practice.  And the young monks and nuns of Plum Village have set up an organization called, “Wake Up,” comprised of young Buddhists and non-Buddhists who want to organize and create a society that is more peaceful, that is more compassionate.  Today you may like to ask them about the Wake Up movement where the young people join each other and practice sitting, walking, chanting, singing, dancing in such a way that makes brotherhood and sisterhood prevail.  And they learn how to transform their anger, their suffering, their discrimination.

Buddha is Not a God...
You know that the Buddha is not a God.  The Buddha is a human being like us.  When he was young he suffered also.  He wanted to practice in order to transform his suffering.  Finally, he succeeded and became an awakened person full of compassion and understanding.  And we all are his friends.  We can learn a lot from him - how to be peaceful, how to be joyful, how to transform anger and hate.  So let us consider the Buddha not as a God, but as a friend, a brother, a teacher.  And I always talk to the Buddha, always hold the hand of the Buddha to do walking meditation. 

When I hold the hand of a child to walk, I know that this is also a Buddha to be, because the child that is holding my hand has also the seed of compassion, understanding and love in him or her.  So I practically take the hands of two tiny Buddhas in order to enjoy walking meditation.  I learned that in this retreat, children have learned a lot.  They have learned how to to pebble meditation, they have learned how to be a bell master.  We adults, we have to try to catch up with you.

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The Noble Eightfold Path (cont’d)
Dear friends today we continue with the Noble Eightfold Path.  This one represents Right View, Insight, Enlightenment, Wisdom.  This one Right Thinking, Right Speech.  In the 5 Mindfulness Trainings we learn that Right Speech goes together with Deep Listening; Loving Speech and Deep Listening.

Right Speech
Right Speech is speech that is free from discrimination, and hate, separation. 

When the father sees himself in the son, and when the son sees himself in the father they know that they are not really two persons - they are the continuation of each other.  The son is a continuation of the father in the direction of the future, and the father represents the continuation of the son in the direction of the past.  Thanks to the father the son has access to all ancestors.  And thanks to the son the father has access to the future.  They are linked.  And if both of them see the interconnection, the non-duality of the two - there is no discrimination, there is no separation.  Understanding, mutual understanding then becomes very easy.  And that is why Right View is the foundation of Right Thinking and Right Speech.

Right Speech is what you say that goes in the direction of nondiscrimination, non-separation that has understanding and compassion.  This practice of Right Speech and Deep Listening is a wonderful instrument to restore communication. 

In Plum Village we used to sponsor groups of Palestinians and Israelis to come and practice with us.  It is very difficult to get visas for Palestinians.  We had to work very hard with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in order to get visas for them to come and practice with us.

In the beginning it’s always so difficult for both groups to look at each other, to accept each other.  Because one group considers the other group as the origin of their own suffering.  And we have asked a number of monastic members and lay members of the community to take care of these two special groups because we have many other groups. 

And the first thing we do when they arrive is to help them with the practice of calming down, because there is a lot of emotion of anger and fear.  So the practice of total relaxation using exercises proposed by the Buddha in the Sutra of Mindful Breathing to connect with the body, to release the tension in the body, to recognize and embrace a feeling of pain, anger and despair is very important, very crucial.  We practice with them, we lend them our energy so that they can succeed in calming down the tension in their body and the pain in their mind.  And the practice of relaxation and sitting and walking is very important to do so.  After a week or so, we begin to initiate them to the practice of Deep Listening and Loving Speech - putting the 4th Mindfulness Training into practice.

So many of us sit with them.  Those of us who have the capacity to be peaceful, to be mindful, to be concentrated.  The number of us should be big enough in order to create a good energy atmosphere.  So we practice with the bell, breathing, sitting, walking.  And then we ask the Palestinian group to express themselves, and the Israeli group and others to just listen.  We give instructions on how to listen.

The Practice of Deep Listening
The purpose of Deep Listening is to allow the other person, the other group of people to have a chance to speak out.  Maybe no one has ever listened to them, and you may be the first person to listen to them.  You may be the first group of people who has the capacity to sit quietly and to listen to them.  We are convinced that if we know how to listen, then one hour of deep listening, of compassionate listening can bring them a lot of relief - they can empty their heart.  And maybe this is the first time that anyone has listened to them. 

In psychotherapy we call it empathic listening.  In the Buddhist tradition we use the expression, Deep Listening, Compassionate Listening - it means that you listen with only one purpose; to allow him or to allow her to speak out and to suffer less.  Therefore during the time the other person speaks even if there are a lot of misunderstandings, wrong perceptions, bitterness, accusation you are still capable of sitting quietly and listening and do not try to interrupt or correct.  If you interrupt or correct the session becomes a kind of dispute and not a session of  Deep Listening anymore. 

You have to practice Mindfulness of Compassion.  Mindfulness of Compassion is to keep in mind that desire, that purpose; “I am listening to him with only one purpose - to allow him a chance to suffer less.”  So you are protected by Compassion so whatever the person says cannot touch the seed of irritation and anger in you because Compassion is a wonderful kind of energy that can protect you.  So even if what the other person says is full of accusation, complaining, blame, bitterness, wrong information the seed of irritation and anger in you is not watered because you are protected by the energy of Compassion.  Compassion is there because you are practicing Mindfulness of Compassion remembering that that you listen like this, I listen like this with other one purpose - to just allow that person a chance to suffer less by speaking out.  And that is not too difficult.

If you do not practice Mindfulness of Compassion the seed of anger and irritation will be exposed and when they are touched by what the other person has said the energy of irritation and anger will come up and we are lost.  We will lose our capacity of listening.  That is why when you sit down and listen you have to follow your in-breath and out-breath and remember just one thing: “I listen like this with only one purpose - that is to allow him, allow her to speak out and to suffer less.”  And that is the practice of Quan Yin, Avalokiteshvera.  And there is a Quan Yin inside of us - you can do it.  You can play the role of a Bhodisattva of Compassionate Listening.  You can listen to your husband.  You can listen to your wife, your father, or your son as a Bhodisattva.  The Bhodisattva of Deep Listening is not in the clouds.  He is, she is in your heart.  Invite him to manifest in order to help you to listen.

So any kind of bitterness, sourness, accusation will not make you angry because you are protected by compassion.  And everyone of us has the seed of compassion inside.  That is the Buddha inside of us.

The Buddha inside of us is not just an idea - it is a reality.

We have the capacity of being compassionate or being understanding.  We have the seed of forgiveness, and joy and peace and liberation in us.  That is the Buddha inside.

We have to trust the Buddha inside and allow the Buddha inside to have a chance to operate.  And then just practice mindful breathing and the Buddha will manifest and help us.

And when you notice that what the other person says is full of wrong perceptions, you still smile and you say, “Poor person.  He is the victim of so many wrong perceptions.  Where did he get that information from?” But you don’t interrupt.  Your job now is just to listen with all of your heart.  And you say to yourself, that in the next few days I will have plenty of time and I will offer him or her information so that he or she can correct his perception - but not now, now is the time to listen.  And if we can listen like that for one hour it will be very healing.

You are the Bodhisattva of Compassionate Listening at work and if you have confidence in the practice, one hour can bring a lot of relief.  You listen with all your heart, even if his speech is full of accusation, blame, bitterness and so on.  You are a beautiful Bodhisattva sitting there and practicing.

Israeli and Palestinian Retreat (cont’d)
The group of Israelis have been given that instruction so that when they listen to the group of Palestinians they know how to protect themselves in order for them to be able to continue with their practice of Deep Listening. 

As far as the Palestinian group is concerned we also have given them some instructions about how to speak.  We say that, “You can tell everything in your heart but try not to condemn, not to accuse because that will make the other person receive the information much easier.  Try to use Loving Speech.  You can tell all kinds of suffering that you have undergone; you, other adults, children, your people have undergone.  You have to tell us everything but try your best to use the kind of language of non-accusation, of non-blaming and don’t show your bitterness.  Just tell us everything about your suffering and that will make it easier for the other group to receive your message.”

So the session will not begin until both groups have been briefed on the way to speak and to listen.  You can see already the result of the practice right in the first session.  The Israeli group reported after the first hour that they were very surprised to find out that the kind of suffering of the other group looks very much like the kind of their own suffering.  What the children and adults of the other camp suffers from looks very much like the kind of suffering that the children and adults on their side suffers from.  And for the first time they saw the other group of people not as enemies, but as human beings who suffer like us.  Before that, they think that the other camp never suffers - they only make us suffer.  We are only the group that suffers.  The other camp - they don’t suffer; they just want to make us suffer. 

So that kind of wrong perception is removed right away during the first session of practice.  And when you see them as human beings who suffer like you have, suddenly there is compassion in your way of looking.  And when you look at them with compassion like that you don’t suffer anymore.  And when they see you looking at them like that they don’t suffer anymore.  The miracle happens like this right in the first session of the practice.

One session is never enough.  So we give that group another session and another session if we need more practice, and each side practices the practice of Deep Listening and Loving Speech and discovers that when you see the suffering Compassion arises in you and it is Compassion that neutralizes anger and hate.  The healing takes place when you sit and listen. 

Compassion is the antidote of anger and hate.

When you listen and if you recognize you touch the suffering in the other group, Compassion naturally arises.  The first Noble Truth is very important that is why we call it nobel.  And each group that is listening knows that there will be a chance for them to express themselves also. 

Several sessions like that take place.  And they do walking meditation together.  They share a meal together, which is something that they could not do when they first arrived.  It is very moving to see Israelis and Palestinians holding hands and doing walking meditation - it is very beautiful.  On the last day of the retreat they always came together as one group, not two, and report to the whole sangha about the progress of their progress.  And they always promise that when they go back home they will organize a sangha, they will organize practice so that other Israelis and Palestinians will practice and suffer less.  They have several sanghas there.  We have a monastic who is Israeli and she helped produce a book on Reconciliation and we from time to time go to Israel in order to offer retreats of mindfulness. 

I think when politicians organize peace negotiations they can apply some of our techniques.  Because peace talks organized by politicians are very different.  When they come together they only see the other group as enemies. They never have a chance to see them as human beings.  And they still believe that the other side does not suffer; that the other side only makes the other suffer.  So you are afraid, you are suspicious because you cannot connect with them as human beings and that is why these peace negotiations cannot result in anything that is substantial.  I think if they ask us to come and help we will be ready to go, and we will propose that when negotiators come the first thing to do is not to sit down and discuss.  The first thing to do is to have sessions of total relaxation - to calm down, to learn how to embrace anger, fear and suspicion.  And to learn how to be in touch with the suffering not only inside of our camp but on the other camp. 

It takes about a week to ten days for pre-conference preparation, and monks and nuns and lay practitioners can come and help with peace negotiations.  And then both groups will be initiated into the practice of Deep Listening, Compassionate Listening and Loving Speech.   I think the result of these peace talks would be much better, and maybe the time of negotiation will be much shorter because in the process we can remove so much discrimination and fear and anger because we come to understand each other as human beings.  We can see the suffering and the fear of the other side.

Politicians are trained in many respects, but I think they should be trained on this discipline also.  So if you are a professor of political science, think about it.  Try to bring this kind of practice into the school of politics, and help bring a spiritual dimension to political life - it’s very important.

Every one of us has the seed of understanding, compassion, forgiveness in us.  In a retreat we have a chance to breathe, to walk, to listen to a dharma talk.  A dharma talk is like rain; the dharma rain.  If we listen to a dharma talk with only our intellect we tend to compare this idea with other ideas, but the dharma talk is not just ideas.  The dharma talk comes from the living experience of a teacher, not from ideas from he has learned from books. 

The best way to listen to a dharma talk is not with your intellect - remove the intellect and allow the dharma rain to penetrate deep into your store consciousness.  Your intellect is like a piece of nylon that prevents the dharma rain to penetrate into the soil.  Usually when you hear something that agrees with your views; you hear something and you have some views that you bring them up and compare and if what is said agrees with what you think you say, “This is the truth,” and you accept.  And when what is there and you bring something up and you say, “This is not what I think.”  So in both cases you learn nothing, and that is the work of the intellect. 

I think we need to send the intellect on a vacation, and allow the dharma rain to penetrate into the soil of our store consciousness because there are so many good seeds down there; the seed of understanding, nondiscrimination, compassion and a dharma talk always waters the best of the seeds in us.  That is why during a dharma talk we feel wonderful already like the dharma rain has penetrated into our body.  In the time of the Buddha, many people get enlightened just during the dharma talk because they allowed the dharma talk to come deeply down and touch the best thing in them and one of the seeds is the seed of awakening, enlightenment. 

During the first, second, third and the fourth days walking, sitting, breathing and listening to a dharma talk we witness to the transformation inside of us; the seed of anger, fear and so on are not watered.  The other kind of seeds that are positive are watered every day.  And that is why on the fifth day the situation is different.  Usually on the fifth day we ask practitioners to put into the practice the teaching of Deep Listening and Loving Speech.  We say, “Ladies and gentlemen, now is the time for us to use the instruments we have received from the Buddha in order to restore communication with a person you are having difficulties with.  “You have until midnight tonight to reconcile with him or her.”  If she is in the retreat that is very easy because she has been exposed to good watering of the good seeds, so if you use Loving Speech you continue to water the good seeds in him or her and then reconciliation can be very easy. “And if the other person is not in the retreat you are authorized to use your portable telephone.” (laughter)

I remember in a retreat of Mackaw (sp?), the next morning many ladies came to me during the time of breakfast and they reported that last night before midnight they had used their telephone and had talked to their husbands and had reconciled with them.

In a retreat in northern Germany, that morning four gentlemen came to and said, “Thay, we reconciled with our father last night just using our telephone.”  One gentlemen said to me, “Thay,    I could not believe that I can talk to my father that way.  I was so angry at him I never thought that I could talk to him in the gentle way that you recommended.  But when I followed your instructions, breathing in and out, and get in touch with the suffering inside of my father.  Suddenly I hear his voice, and I was able to talk to him very nicely.  It has been many years since I had talked to him this way.” 

He did not know that was possible because during the first four days of the retreat the seeds of compassion and understanding in him had been watered by the dharma talks.  They had become more bold now, and that is why that night they allowed him to use that kind of loving speech.   When you see the suffering inside of the other person, compassion arises and suddenly your way of talking changes.  You don’t have to try - you don’t try - it naturally changes.  What is important here is that you can see and understand the suffering inside of him or her.  When you get in touch with the suffering, naturally compassion arises in you and suddenly you find it very natural to speak to him with compassion.  And they reconciled with their father who did not practice, who did not come to the retreat, but who opened their heart and they talked and they reconciled. 

Miracles of reconciliation always happen in our retreat.  And that brings us a lot of joy.  That nourishes us very much, those of us who organize retreats, because in just four or five days we can help people suffer less and reconcile.  It is very wonderful.  That is why we should not underestimate the power of the Fourth Mindfulness Training.  The Fourth Mindfulness Training can restore communication, realize reconciliation.  Not only between two people but between two groups and even two nations.  If you are a politician, professor of politics, in the realm of international activism you may like to think about it and bring this instrument into the practice to help with restoring communication and bringing about reconciliation.

This is Right Thinking, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, and Right Diligence, Mindfulness, Concentration, and Insight.

Right Livelihood is to select the kind of job that helps us to realize our ideal of compassion.  If your job allows you to help protect the environment and help the people to suffer less you are very lucky.  Not everyone can have a job like that.  I think that even if another job does not bring as much money.  You may have to drive a less expensive car, to live in a smaller house but you will be happier.  Because we know that we are helping with the environment we live in such a way that the planet and future generations will have a future that can bring a lot of happiness.

True Diligence
The teaching of True Diligence is very concrete.  It has four aspects, and we should have a little bit of understanding concerning our mind in order to practice it. 

The other day we drew a circle and we said that mind in Buddhism has at least two layers and the lower part has “store consciousness” and the upper part is called “mind consciousness”.  And we know that there are so many seeds lying in the bottom of store consciousness; good seeds and negative seeds.  There is a seed of despair, of anger, of discrimination - the worst seeds are there. 

Hell exists within in us.  So the practice of diligence is not to give hell a chance to manifest.

But Heaven is in us also.  The Kingdom, the Pure Land is in us also. 

So let us practice True Diligence in order to give the Kingdom, the Pure Land, and the Paradise a chance to manifest.

In Buddhist psychology, there are fifty-one variety of seeds.  In physics they speak of particles, and in Buddhist psychology we speak of seeds.  We don’t see them but we know that they are there.  Because the are used to manifest for us to see.  Like in quantum physics you don’t see the quarks but you know that they are there.  The Chinese character means, “seed”, and the Sanskrit word is “bija”.  There are 51 categories of seeds; there are good ones, negative ones, and there are those that can be either good or not good according to the circumstances.  There is the seed of anger down there.  Even when you are happy, when you are loving, when you are joyful - the seed of anger is always down there.  And if someone comes and touches the seed of anger, if someone says something or does something that touches the seed of anger it will manifest up here as a form of energy - the energy of anger.  And when it manifests in mind consciousness it is no longer called a seed, but it is called a “mental formation”.  A seed down below manifesting up here is called a mental formation, and in Buddhist psychology we speak of 51 categories of mental formation. 

Formation is a technical term in Buddhism.  It means composite things.  This flower is a formation.  It is made of non-flower elements like sunshine and clouds, and rain and minerals and so on.  But this formation is a physical formation.  My anger is a mental formation.  There are 51 mental formations.  And as a good practitioner we need to be able to identify each of them when they manifest. 

#9 - Recognizing Mental Formations
Recognizing mental formations; that is the object of the practice of the 9th exercise of mindful breathing.  The other day we have learned of the first 8 exercises of mindful breathing, and the 9th is to recognize mental formation as it manifests.  When anger is up here, you breath in and say, “breathing in I know anger has manifested.”  It is a simple recognition of anger as a mental formation.

When anger comes up to the mind consciousness the practitioner invites the mental formation called Mindfulness to come up and with Mindfulness we can recognize anger.  “Breathing in, I know anger has manifested.  Breathing out, I will take care of you my dear anger.”  Mindfulness is an energy.  Anger is an energy.  Mindfulness recognizes Anger, embraces Anger and brings relief.

First Aspect:  Don’t Give Negative Seeds A Chance to Manifest
We are speaking about Right Diligence, and the first aspect of the practice is the negative seed like anger, craving, fear.  If you are a true practitioner you don’t give them a chance to manifest.  The 5th Mindfulness Training is very important.  It depends on your way of consuming that you water the seeds of goodness in you, or the negative seeds in you. 

Suppose you watch television without mindfulness and you are not aware that the program has a lot of anger, despair and fear in it.  And you allow your children and yourself to watch that film so you consume toxins, poisons, because while you are watching that film the seed of anger, craving, fear are watered and they manifest.  If they grow strong it’s not good for you or your child.

That is why the first aspect of the practice is not to give negative seeds a chance to manifest, because once they manifest down below, the seeds become stronger at the base.  So in a relationship we have to apply this.  We look at the other person, your partner, and say, “Darling, I have some negative seeds in me and if you water these seeds like jealousy, anger, fear and if I suffer you cannot be happy.  So please refrain from watering the negative seeds in me.  And as for me, I make the vow not to water them by myself.  And I make also the vow not to water them in you.  So this is a “Peace Treaty”, a Love Treaty that you sign with your beloved one; not to allow the bad seeds in us to have a chance.  That’s the first aspect of the practice.

Second Aspect:  Don’t Give Negative Seeds a Chance to Stay Very Long
But if it happens that a seed like anger and despair has manifested, what to do?  The Buddha recommends, do something to help that mental formation go back as quickly as possible to its original position.  The problem is not to fight it, to suppress it, but to recognize it.   With mindfulness you can recognize it.  And you have many beautiful seeds down there so you can invite one of them to come up - especially one who is opposite of this.

It’s like when you play a CD, and you don’t like the music.  Why do you allow the music to continue?  You change the CD.  So changing the CD is what is proposed by the Buddha.  You have plenty of beautiful CD’s down there why don’t you play them and allow this one to go on and on and destroy you and your beloved one.  So the second aspect of the practice is that if it happens that a negative seed has manifested as a mental formation do something to help it go home to its original place by inviting a good one to cup. 

In the Sutra, the Buddha used the image of a carpenter who used pegs in order to connect to blocks of wood.  If the pegs are rotten, you have to change the peg.  You have to use a new peg, and drive the new peg into the same spot, and you drive the old peg out.  So changing the peg is an expression used by the Buddha in the Sutra.  So this is the second practice in diligence - don’t let that mental formation anger, fear, craving stay too long - change your CD, change the peg.

Third Aspect:  Allow Opportunities for Good Seeds to Manifest
The third aspect of the practice is to allow plenty of chances for the good ones to come up.  You have plenty of good seeds.  One of the ways is to come to a retreat.  Because in a retreat our good seeds have many chances to manifest, the seed of forgiveness, understanding, compassion, peace and so on. 

And as a co-practitioner you can help your partner if you see that your partner is a victim of a bad seed you can help her to change her CD, “Darling what are you thinking?  Why do you allow that anger, that fear to overwhelm you like that because you have plenty of beautiful things down there,” and you touch the best thing in him or her so that it can come up.  We are co-practitioners, we help each other in the practice.  And as a good practitioner we know how to give a chance to good things in us to manifest, and we can always do or say something to help bring the best things in our partner to come up.  You make him happy, you make her happy and you can profit from her happiness.  And this does not take a long time.  It may be done very quickly.

I remember one day I gave a talk on this matter we call it the practice of selective watering.  You only water the good seeds.  And I noticed that in the audience there was a lady who cried from the beginning of the talk to the end of the talk.  After the talk I came to her husband and I just said one thing, “Dear Friend, your flower needs some watering.”  In the morning they set out and it was not very joyful because she suffered - she cried a lot.  I did tell him more, that was enough.  So on the way back home, it would take only one hour he practiced selective watering.   He told her how wonderful she is, how talented she is and when they arrived the children were very surprised because their father and mother were very joyful.  So it does not take much time if you know the art of selective watering you can change the situation in just five, ten minutes.

Fourth Aspect - Keep the Good Seeds Manifested as Long as Possible
The fourth aspect of true diligence is that if the good seed has manifested in mind, try to keep it as long as you can up there.  It’s like if you have a good friend visiting you, you try to keep him or her with you as long as possible.  The same thing is true here.  If the seed of joy, happiness, forgiveness, compassion has manifested practice mindful breathing, walking, keep it up there because while it is manifested at the top at the base the base continues to grow.  And that is the practice of, “the transformation at the base.”  You don’t know but down there the good seeds are growing and the next time when you need it, it can come up very easily.  So this is the true meaning of the practice of Right Diligence.