During the Summer Opening Retreat we have regular sessions of Questions & Answers. It is an opportunity for children, teenagers, parents, and practitioners of all ages to ask a question from the heart, related to the practice. We hope you benefit from Thay’s answer to these questions
Question One: How do I stop negative perceptions of myself?
Asked on behalf of the entire 2014 teenage programme in Plum Village
Self perceptions have no separate self
This question should be addressed to parents and school teachers and if parents and teachers have enough time, they will see that it is the environment that is responsible for this situation of many teenagers.
First in the family, maybe children do not have a chance to learn how to love themselves, and to take care of themselves. If parents know how to love themselves and take care of themselves, then their children will naturally learn from them, because parents are a kind of teacher. So parents are responsible. Parents suffer and do not know how to handle their suffering. Parents suffer and make each other suffer. That is the kind of environment in families where a child is not nourished, where a child can get a lot of wounds within themselves.
When they go to school, teachers cannot help them either because teachers may be like the parents. They have problems at home and they bring their problems into school. At home, they have difficulty with their children and in school, they have problems with their students. If school teachers do not know how to handle the suffering in them, if school teachers do not know how to love themselves and take care of themselves they cannot help the students to do the same.
If we have happy teachers, if we have teachers who know how to love themselves and take care of themselves, then the child will have a second chance. The second chance is a school that has a good environment, where teachers are capable of being compassionate, peaceful and loving. If teachers do not know how to handle their suffering then there’s no second chance for the child.
People in the Ministry of Education should be aware that the environment in school and the environment in families is not conducive to peace, to mutual respect, to love and understanding. They should try to change the education system. They should bring into school the kind of teaching that can help the young people learn how to love themselves, how to take care of themselves, how to heal and to bring that practice home in order to help parents also.
This is a huge problem but young people can help. They can express themselves. Supposed like this morning, when you asked the question, you help us as parents and teachers to be aware of the situation, because we may be too busy with our suffering, with our anger, with our problems, that we do not have the time to listen to you. So you help us to know what is going on by asking this question and we have a chance to think about changing our way in order for you to have a better chance to change.
In Plum Village, we can offer the kind of teaching and practice that can help us take care of our body, protect our body, treasure our body and heal. When we are able to do that, we can help our parents and our teachers also.
You are a masterpiece of the cosmos
In Plum Village we learn that you have a body and our body is a wonder. Our body is a masterpiece of the cosmos. Biologists, neuroscientists, all agree that the human body is a masterpiece. It is a wonder. We have to learn how to treasure, how to protect and to preserve that masterpiece of the cosmos. We also learn that this body has been transmitted to us by generations of ancestors, and our ancestors have not died. They are still alive in our body. If we mistreat our body, we mistreat all our ancestors.
Our parents are also in our body and we are the continuation of our parents. That is the kind of practice we have, to look more deeply at our body. We begin to respect it, we begin to try to preserve it and protect it. We also learn very concrete things like how to calm our body. There is stress, tension and pain in our body. In Plum Village, we learn how to breathe and to walk in such a way that you can release tension in our body. These are very concrete practices that maybe parents do not know and teachers do not know. We have a chance to to do that here. We can practice releasing tension, reducing pain in our body.
In Plum Village, we also learn how to calm a feeling, how to calm an emotion and to have peace. These things may not have been taught by our parents and our teachers, but now we have a chance to learn. There are lots of things teenagers can do to improve themselves first. We know that The Five Mindfulness Trainings are very helpful. If you live according to The Five Mindfulness Trainings, you can protect yourself. You don’t allow your body and your mind to be destroyed, to be ruined by the environment.
If you don’t respect your body, the other person will not respect your body. If you don’t respect yourself, then they don’t respect you. That’s why you have to respect yourself first. Your body is something beautiful and sacred. It is a masterpiece of the cosmos and it can be filled with peace and well-being and joy. If we know the practice, we can help our body to be protected, to heal, and to be a source of joy for us and for other people.
Question Two: How do I stop being obsessed with video games?
Asked by a young practitioner in 2013 in Deer Park
Consuming in order to forget our suffering
Young people may already have a lot of suffering in themselves and their parents do not know how to help their children to suffer less – to transform the suffering in them.
That is why both parents and children try to cover up the suffering inside by entertainment, music, books, films, electronic games and so on, so this is really not enjoyment – just trying to run away from the suffering inside and as the time passes the suffering inside continue to grow because the item that we had we consume in order to forget about our suffering can bring more toxins, poisons, anger, distress to us, so this is not living. That is running away from life.
But what the west called the kingdom of God, in Buddhism we call the dharma body. The Buddha has the buddha body, but also has his dharma body and when the body and the physical body of the Buddha is no longer there his dharma body continues. When you listen; when you contemplate a flower; when you listen to the wind in the willows, with mindfulness and concentration you hear the dharma talk given by the Dharma body of the Buddha. The Buddha is always alive giving Dharma talks and if you contemplate the moon, the cloud, the blue sky, the river, the rising tide and then everything is teaching the Dharma.
The Dharma body is equivalent to the Kingdom of God, and we know that the Kingdom of God is there; every flower, every tree belongs to the kingdom of God; speaks to you – they speak to you about the kingdom of God that are here and now, so if you you know how to go home to the here and the now, you have the kingdom of God with you, they will nourish you, you are happy and you don’t have to run away and take refuge in electronic games.
Practice to enjoy the wonders of life here and now
When you breathe in mindfully you bring your mind home to your body, and when mind and body are together you are truly alive. If you get lost in your computer, your body and your mind are separate. You are not truly alive, and you are wasting your life; you don’t profit from your life. Nature has given us a life and every minute, every second is a jewel. If you can stay in the here and the now you can enjoy the kingdom of God in the here and the now and that is the best kind of enjoyment.
There is an example; an image in the gospel – a peasant farmer discovers a piece of land with the treasure in it, so he went home and sold everything in order to buy that small piece of land because there has a treasure in it, and that treasure can make him happy all his life, and next lives also. If you have the treasure, the kingdom of God, you don’t need other things including money, fame, power, sensual pleasures and electronic games.
Parents should practice in order to be able to enjoy the kingdom of God, in the here and the now. In that way they can teach their children to do the same and they should not run away and take refuge in electronic games and get addicted to it anymore. If you continue your body will have a lot of problems and your mind will have a lot of problems also. And that has proven to be true – if you spend too much time with your computer, your electronic games, you are addicted to new technology, and then you don’t have any time left to enjoy the wonders of life, the kingdom of God that is available in the hear and the now.
This is not only an answer to a young person, but to all of us, especially parents and teachers. Thank you for asking the question.
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