In this first dharma talk of the winter retreat, Thay shared with us about how to organize our life and get healed in our daily life. The way society is organized today is such that we live with a lot of pressure. We are pushed by the habit energy of running, always looking for something to make us happy. Thay taught us how mindful breathing and mindful walking can help us stop running. If we breathe and walk mindfully in such a way that we find peace and happiness, we are nourished and we can be healed. If we walk with an idea to achieve something, we are still running.

But just the willingness to stop cannot help us to stop. Thay stressed the importance of insight. We need insight to be able to really stop. Thay also shared about the 5 universals and 5 particulars, in which mindfulness is one of the particulars. Our mind is like a river. There are 51 wholesome and unwholesome seeds in our store consciousness. When seeds are touched they become mental formations. We all have the seed of mindfulness. When practiced deeply, with mindfulness comes concentration. They grow together. If both of them are powerful enough, we will get insight. We will have insight that running cannot get us anywhere, it is not bringing happiness, even if we have a lot of possessions. Insight can help us to get out of our suffering and illusion, and help us to really stop. Then we can be in touch with the wonders of life again and enjoy life more easily.

Thay also shared about one mental formation called ease, or peace, one of 7 factors of enlightenment. It is important to cultivate ease to be healed. Mindful breathing and walking help to cultivate ease. Another mental formation of the opposite nature is restlessness. Thay shared the symptoms of restlessness, with which we keep doing things to cover up our loneliness and suffering, and do not know how to deal with it. Mindfulness without insight cannot heal us, our suffering will come back. We need Vipassana not just Samantha, to look deeply in order to get insight, to liberate us from restlessness. Meditation is not a temporary refuge and it should have the power to transform. With Vipassana, we have the power to transform. We can organize our life, live simply and deeply and we can have all the nourishments and healing we need.

Rebuilding our health - mental and physical. Our society seems to be not very healthy. Some come to our retreat to heal and mindfulness can help you heal. If we are mindful, we may see that we are running. Running into the future. We have a habit of running. So our mindful breathing can help us to stop the running. Breathing is an art.

Mindfulness has to go with insight. Insight can get you out of your suffering. This winter we will look at the 51-mental formations. The first five are called universal:

• Contact
• Attention
• Feeling
• Perception
• Volition

Then we have five particulars:

• Intention
• Determination
• Mindfulness
• Concentration
• Insight

Right now we are talking about mindfulness. Our consciousness has two parts - store and mind. Our mental formations can move from one part to the other. Each formation is known as a seed in the store consciousness. There are conditions that cause a seed to manifest in your mind. Mindfulness is the capacity to see what is going on in your feelings, your perceptions, and around you. We can also use the mindful walking to heal and stop the running. We can allow nature to heal us.

The earth is not just the environment, the earth is ourselves. A good mental formation is ease. We need to practice to cultivate this kind of energy. This is one of the seven factors of enlightenment. An opposite mental formation is called restlessness. Mental excitement. This prevents our mind from applying itself to good mental formations. Our society suffers from restlessness and that is why we run after the consumption, the internet, work, etc.

Mindfulness to release stress is good, but it is not enough. We need the insight in order to be able to truly release. Without the insight we will not stop running. Time is more than money, time is life. In this winter retreat, we will look with a critical eye at the manifestation-only.

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The details of this Dharma Talk took place on November 21, 2013, at the Full Moon Meditation Hall, Từ Nghiêm Temple, Plum Village. Thầy recounts the meeting with the young poet Quách Thoại in 1949 in Saigon under French control. Thầy shares about the reverence for the delicate beauty of flowers and the connection between natural beauty and art in literature. He emphasizes that everything manifests the teachings of no birth and no death, and every sound contains a profound message. He explains that everything manifests from a common foundation called “alaya” or “store consciousness.” He deeply analyzes the concepts of manifestation and non-manifestation in Buddhism, emphasizing that everything exists in an unclear form of manifestation. He also discusses the cultivation of mindfulness energy through breathing and listening to the bell, focusing on the cultivation of mindfulness, concentration, and insight to nourish the body and mind. He encourages building a collective practice community to enhance positive energy and reduce suffering for everyone. He emphasizes that all manifestations are interconnected between the individual and the collective, and everything exists in parallel and reflects each other.

Practice is to “generate” joy, happiness, and peace through the three energies of mindfulness, concentration, and insight: in every step, every breath, whether sweeping the floor or brushing your teeth, if you maintain these three energies, joy, happiness, and peace will naturally be present. A practitioner knows how to make use of every action to generate mindfulness, concentration, and insight, and from there, peace and happiness overflow; if these three energies are not present, even if you practice for a long time, it is difficult to transform suffering.

The Four Noble Truths consist of four realities: (1) Suffering, (2) The Cause – the cause of suffering is the lack of mindfulness, concentration, and insight, (3) The Cessation – the absence of suffering, which is happiness, (4) The Path – the path of happiness. The path is not a means to happiness; the path itself is happiness: “There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way.” Each step, each word, each thought, and each action must carry the essence of peace and happiness, being both the path and the destination in this very moment.

Hearing the bell invites every cell in our body to participate, so that the wholesome energy of mindfulness deeply penetrates; within each cell, our ancestors, parents, and descendants are all present and enjoy peace. When we hear the bell, the listener and the sound of the bell become one, there is no longer any distinction between subject and object, the one who hears and what is heard become a seamless whole.

The five universal mental formations arise very quickly, including:

• Contact (xúc): the state of vibration when sense organ, sense object, and consciousness come together, serving as the basis and foundation for feeling.
• Attention (manaskāra): the mental action of directing the mind toward an object, of which there are two kinds:
  • Appropriate attention (Yoni­so manaskāra) leads the mind to beneficial objects.
  • Inappropriate attention (Ayoniso manaskāra) leads the mind into afflictions.
• Feeling (vedanā): the sensation of pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral.
• Perception (saññā): the abstraction of the sign of the object, helping with recognition but also capable of deception.
• Volition (cetana): the will that urges the mind to act, leading to actions of love-hate, grasping-rejection.

Mindfulness (anusmṛti) intervenes as soon as contact and attention arise, to maintain mindfulness, to transform feeling and perception in the direction of peace and happiness. Alayavijñāna — store consciousness — preserves all seeds, both constant and changing, serving as the foundation for the arising of the other six consciousnesses and for the maturation (vipāka) of each moment.

According to the theory of “no-birth, no-separation between Buddha and living beings,” Buddha and living beings are not separate: “without living beings, there can be no Buddha,” just as the lotus cannot bloom without the mud. All things arise from conditions (earth, water, fire, wind, plants, animals…), and the Buddha also contains living beings, suffering, and afflictions that have been transformed. Happiness, enlightenment, and insight are all impermanent and require continued practice by “using suffering, afflictions, and ignorance as the very materials to build enlightenment,” just as the World-Honored One continued to practice walking meditation, sitting meditation, and mindfulness of breathing. When we breathe gently and sit in stillness, “the Buddha breathes with our lungs, sits with our spine,” and there is no longer any boundary between self and others, transcending all dualities.

The Alaya Consciousness (store consciousness) preserves and maintains the seeds of karma, the five sense faculties (eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body), and the physical form. It manifests in two main ways:

1. Appropriation – receiving and maintaining the seeds;
2. Locality – “emplacement,” the place where body and mind exist.

The entire process of transformation in the Alaya Consciousness is “inconceivable” (asamviditaka), beyond the capacity of words and thought, wondrous like the way children absorb the French language from their environment.

To be born as a human being with a limited lifespan of about one hundred years is a precious opportunity to live deeply, to cherish each present moment instead of running after money, power, or fame. Practicing mindfulness through daily gathas, walking meditation, sitting meditation, or through ordinary activities such as drinking tea or sweeping the house helps to nurture the quality of life, bringing peace, joy, and happiness right in each step and each breath. The path of the Dharma is not to escape from life, but to generate the energy of love and understanding, in harmony with science and philosophy, helping us to transform suffering and difficulties into insight and deep love.

In the study of Manifestation-Only, all phenomena—self and dharmas—arise thanks to the store consciousness (ālaya-vijñāna) with its seeds (vāsanā) that are always arising and passing away, transforming and continuing. From there arise the seven evolving consciousnesses (manas, mind consciousness, and the five sense consciousnesses), which both perfume the store consciousness with wholesome and unwholesome, happiness and suffering, and serve as the intermediaries manifesting the world. Understanding the impermanent, interdependent, and interpenetrating nature of the seeds helps us to let go of attachment, to maintain insight, happiness, and lasting liberation.

• Six characteristics of seeds in the store consciousness
  1. Arising and ceasing in every instant—impermanent
  2. Continuous succession—like a flowing river
  3. Determinate nature—only manifesting corresponding results
  4. Collective conditions—requiring sufficient conditions to manifest
  5. Leading from result—maintaining the relationship between cause and effect
  6. Individual manifestation and collective manifestation (sva and saha vijñapti)—manifesting both as individuals and as a community

New year, new me – the two calligraphic phrases welcoming Tet 2013 at Still Water Meditation Hall remind us that “When the person is happy, the scenery will also be happy”: joy arises from the mind and illuminates the circumstances, not the other way around. The concise English version “New year, new me” encourages us to transform ourselves, while the French “Année nouvelle, je me renouvelle” and “La joie en soi, la joie tout autour” express the inner joy that radiates outward. The practice of printing these phrases on red paper helps to renew body and mind, and to spread peace and happiness within the family and society.

“Going forth” means stepping out of the small family to join the great spiritual family of the Buddha Shakyamuni, letting go of old identities to live simply, celibately, and wholly in service to life. Ordination – as with the 27 young people who have just been “planted” – brings body and mind into the great work of the Sangha, letting go of the separate self in order to share in the collective suffering and joy, like fingers on one hand.

Buddhadharma must always be renewed to be “appropriate to the times”:

1. sowing the seeds of mindfulness, altruism, and joy in the store consciousness;
2. transcending the duality of mind and object to practice non-duality;
3. renewing forms of practice – from the Wake Up program for young people to the Five-Year Ordination;
4. simplifying ceremonies while keeping their deep meaning (Sanghakarman, the Five Mindfulness Trainings).
   Only when the teachings are in harmony with human needs and circumstances can they remain fresh and continue the revolutionary work of the Tathagata.

• When we hear the sound of the bell, “breathing in gently, breathing out gently,” we are no longer “separate individuals but merge into a single sangha body.” This is the phenomenon of synchronization: just like “millions of neurons … always communicating and working together,” water below 0°C crystallizing into ice, laser beams being created when “atoms are stimulated … emitting photons … in phase,” and the Bose–Einstein condensate—“each particle is no longer separate but merges into one.” That collective power is “a thousand times stronger” and has the capacity to heal, nourish, and deeply transform.

• In the study of Consciousness-only (Vijnanavada), the store consciousness (alaya-vijnana) is “indeterminate” (neither wholesome nor unwholesome) but contains all seeds. According to the Yoga-Sasatra, there are “twenty-two faculties”: the six sense faculties, three faculties of masculinity, femininity, and vitality, five feeling faculties, five faculties of Faith, Diligence, Mindfulness, Concentration, and Insight, and three undefiled faculties (what should be known, what has been known, and complete knowing). These three undefiled seeds “rely on” the store consciousness but are not embraced by “retribution,” and are the pure source leading to liberation.

In the nonviolence retreats that began in 2006 at UNESCO, Paris, with the support of Frédéric Mayor, there was a proposal to establish a training center so that teachers could learn methods to transform the energy of violence in the classroom—according to statistics in 2006, there were up to 88,000 cases of school violence in France. Plum Village drafted and published two materials, Anger and Creating True Peace, as textbooks for the Wake Up School movement, which have been sent to many countries (Bhutan, India, Thailand, France, the United States, the United Kingdom). Direct cooperation with UNESCO, the United Nations (proposing ten years of nonviolence practice for young people), and the Ministry of Education of Vietnam is expected to bring this practice into schools, helping teachers and students together create an environment of peace and loving-kindness.

In the teachings of Manifestation-Only (Vijnaptimatra), the eighth consciousness—Alaya (store consciousness)—is fundamentally indeterminate (neither wholesome nor unwholesome, neither defiled nor pure), serving as the common ground for all dharmas, containing the seeds of the six realms of samsāra and nirvana. These six realms are:

1. the heavenly realm (deva)
2. human
3. Asura
4. hell
5. hungry ghost (preta)
6. animal

From Alaya arises both birth-and-death and liberation; they inter-are—whenever the six realms are strong, nirvana is weak, and vice versa; the outflows and the non-outflows also rely on each other. When we practice transformation, Alaya becomes the mirror-like wisdom (immaculate consciousness), containing only wholesome seeds, in harmony with the five particular mental formations (desire, determination, mindfulness, concentration, insight), manifesting the clarity and freedom of true understanding.

*The store consciousness (alaya) operates together with the seven universal mental formations: contact, attention, feeling, perception, volition, concentration (one-pointedness), and vitality. A key mental formation is volition (cetanā) – the will, the aspiration to accomplish something – not just a fleeting thought but a “true intention,” a persistent motivation that nourishes our vitality. When true intention is lacking, a person loses their vitality; on the other hand, even a negative aspiration such as the desire for revenge can generate a powerful energy. Recognizing our own true intention – for example, the Bodhi mind in Prince Siddhartha before his renunciation – is the first step to living a meaningful life, transforming suffering, and nurturing the joy of sharing with the sangha, family, and loved ones.

*The store consciousness also has the function of storing seeds, learning (imprinting), maturating (ripening), and self-healing, similar to a hard drive or a pot of beans being simmered: it preserves, arranges, and “cooks” experiences, helping body and mind to heal themselves. Thanks to store consciousness, the main manifestation (body, six sense organs) and the supporting conditions (environment) arise; it drives retribution – the continuous arising and passing away in every instant and over a lifetime. Impermanence exists on two levels: in each instant (every moment of arising and passing away) and over a lifetime (the stages of human life), creating the unceasing flow of birth and death. Understanding and living deeply in each present moment, allowing the old to “die” so the new can be “born,” is the practice of Applied Buddhism, transforming the ideal into each breath and step of daily life.

We can get in touch with the wonders of life. Every time when we focus our attention on our breath and our steps, we produce a feeling of joy and peace. Our body is a wonder of life. There are so many wonders of life around us and inside of us. Sometimes we cannot be in touch with these wonders, because we are always running and looking for something else. We do walking meditation because we like it. We enjoy every step. This is the same for sitting meditation. We do sitting meditation because we enjoy it. Sitting meditation can produce peace and joy. Mindfulness reminds us that to be alive. To be able to walk on earth is a wonderful thing. Many of us have spent our life searching for material comfort and affection. Many of us have a lot of material comfort but we are not happy. Many of us have someone who love us and understand us but yet we are not happy. Mindfulness helps us to appreciate what we have.

Time is precious. When we wake up, we know we have 24 brand new hours to live and this is a gift of life. We live deeply in each moment so that we don’t waste our life. May be we have wasted many days in anger, fear, jealousy. We haven’t made the best use of the time given to us to live. We may ask ourselves, “What have we done with our life?” “Is it possible to live in such a way that we have more peace, more joy, more happiness?” With the practice of mindfulness, we may enjoy more of the time we have, have more peace and happiness, and be able to have other people suffer less. In our modern time, everyone works very hard. We do not have time to take care of our body, our feelings, our emotions. We do not have enough peace and happiness in us. If you are not capable of taking care of yourself, how can you take care your beloved, your family?

In this talk, we use the practice of walking meditation to explore themes of enlightenment, secularization of mindfulness, technology, schools, and the corporation. Today during our Touching the Earth practice, we promised to the Buddha that we would enjoy the practice of walking meditation in our daily life. Every breath and step can generate a feeling of joy and a feeling of peace. Our body is a wonder. We don’t need to be in a hurry, looking for something. In Plum Village we practice walking mediation. Why do we practice walking meditation? The same question is asked of sitting meditation. How does Thay practice mindful movements? Why does Thay practice mindful movements? It is not only for better health. It tells Thay that he is alive and strong enough to do the movements. Thay shares about those astronauts who return to the earth and walk again - how long do they maintain this awareness? Mindfulness of being alive and walking on the earth is a wonderful thing. To enjoy walking meditation is not difficult.

Everyone can have mindfulness of breathing. Enlightenment can arise in a few seconds with awareness of our breath and that we are alive and we have a body. Buddhism is not exactly a religion but it is a way of living. You don’t need to be a Buddhist to practice mindfulness. We can even generate this while we brush our teeth.

Many of us have searched for material comforts and many of us do have many material comforts but we may still not be happy. Time is something we should treasure. When we wake up in the morning, we can breathe and be aware that we have 24-hours to live. Thay teaches the waking up gatha. With the end of the year, it may help us to think about the way we live our life. How did we spend 2013? What have we done with our life? Can we live with more joy?

This year we had the opportunity to visit Google and spend a whole day practicing with the employees. We noticed the people there practiced whole-heartedly - they did walking, sitting, and eating mediation. A company like that wants to succeed and be #1 but there is also so much suffering. They do not have the time to take care of their body, feelings, emotions, families, etc. They see a need for a spiritual practice so they can suffer less. Time is no longer money. Time is peace. Time is life. Thay shares further about the visit to Google and how we can suffer less through our practice. Going home to ourselves. We are running away from ourselves and we do not take the time to take care of ourselves. If we cannot take care of ourselves, how can we take care of the person we love? Is technology helping us run away from ourselves? Thay sees a struggle within corporate culture - they have stress, guilt, etc. They want to learn ways to deal with these issues.

Is it possible to be #1 and be happy? This is the dilemma. There are people who are victims of their success, but there is nobody is a victim of their happiness. Which is #1 priority? The bottom line in the corporation is still thinking of being #1 in their area. And some practice mindfulness to become #1 and not to become happy. Are they using mindfulness to do the things to be more successful in business?

Note: this description was automatically sourced from existing YouTube descriptions and other sources. Please ‘Suggest Edit’ if it’s incorrect.

Finding Our True Home in Ourselves and in the Sangha

Thầy invites us to reflect deeply on what it means to be truly at home. Drawing from the lives of the Buddha and Jesus, he reminds us that both spiritual teachers began without a worldly home but discovered their true home through practice and awakening.

Thầy teaches that our body is our first home, and that by coming back to our breathing and our body, we return to life itself. Through mindful breathing, “Breathing in, I see myself as a flower,” we learn to dwell peacefully in the present moment, caring for our body as a living wonder.

From this foundation of embodiment and mindfulness, Thầy guides us toward the deeper aspiration of building Sangha, creating communities rooted in brotherhood, sisterhood, joy, and understanding. Just as the Buddha and Jesus could not realize their work alone, we too need a Sangha to sustain our practice and nurture our dreams.

This talk was offered on Christmas Eve during the Christmas and New Year Retreat in the year 2013. Thầy offered this talk at the Upper Hamlet, Plum Village, France.

Buddha, Sangha, Dharma Are Your True Home

Thầy invites us to return to the simple miracle of mindful breathing and the supportive presence of community. When we breathe, walk, and sit together, we touch the wonders of life available in each moment. From this ground of mindfulness, he reflects on time, impermanence, and how our practice shapes the quality of our days. A year becomes truly new only when we renew ourselves—learning to generate joy, care for suffering, and transform anger into understanding.

Nothing truly disappears—not a year, not our childhood, not our ancestors. Like clouds becoming rain, everything continues in new forms. Through this insight of interbeing, Thầy encourages us to touch the Earth, recognize our shared destiny, and look deeply into the suffering of those who hurt us. This is the heart of mindful living: returning home to our body, feelings, and mind, and taking gentle care of what we find there.

Our true home is an inner refuge built through mindfulness and compassion. When each of us cultivates this home, we help create a collective home, a Sangha where peace and understanding are generated together. Such a community becomes a refuge not only for its members but for all who come near it. In this way, the living Dharma is found in the way we breathe, speak, listen, and walk alongside one another.

This talk was offered during the Christmas and New Year Retreat in the year 2013. Thầy offered this talk at the Upper Hamlet, Plum Village, France.

(Join us for the annual New Year’s Eve Dharma talk of Thay, scheduled at 3pm France (9 am New York/Eastern) in the Lower Hamlet of Plum Village.)((Can this sentence be taken out as it is repeated in the next sentence.)) This talk by Thich Nhat Hanh is from the Lower Hamlet of Plum Village on Tuesday, December 31, 2013, on the occasion of New Year’s Eve. It is the fourteenth talk of the 2013-2014 Winter Retreat. This talk is in English.

The talk begins with a lovely guided meditation by Thich Nhat Hanh followed by a teaching on compassion to help us listen to the monastics chanting. The second half of the talk focuses on love and healing our suffering. A few months ago, we visited Stanford University where the topic of compassion was discussed. Many of us do not know how to take the mud to make the lotus. Compassion can be used to embrace and understand suffering. Without suffering, no compassion is possible. We shouldn’t run away from our own suffering. How do we do that? We can use mindful walking, mindful breathing, then we can generate the energy of mindfulness and we won’t feel overwhelmed. We can take care of the suffering inside.

In Mahāyāna Buddhism, we have a great being capable of overcoming great suffering and helping other people. This is the Bodhisattva of Compassionate Listening, Avalokitesvara. The monastics will chant her name today to help us all generate the energy of compassion. We can stop the thinking and just listen to the chant. Thay gives us instructions on how to best listen to the chant - we practice as a drop of water in a river and allow it to embrace us.

We have been discussing home and the new year. The first element is our body. Learning how to breathe, to walk, and to build our home. The second element is our feelings and emotions. We have to learn to take care of this as well in order to have a true home. The third element is our perceptions. We should always be asking, are you sure of your perceptions?

Do we know how to love ourselves and how to take care of ourselves? If we can love and take care of ourselves, then we’ll know how to take care of someone else. Self-love is the foundation. We have been discussing the new year. The year is made of time, speech, and action. The year 2013 will continue from our action. The fruit of our action will stay. Nothing is lost. This is retribution. This coming year we have the sentence “New Year. New Me.” To liberate us. We should renew ourselves. To create a feeling of joy, happiness, and compassion. This is the practice of mindfulness.

Have you been able to enjoy the Kingdom of God, the Pure Land? The new year is your chance to enjoy it and practice. In Plum Village, we have the time to walk together. We can challenge ourselves to walk in mindfulness. Every step. Happiness is possible. Mindfulness is being aware…aware of our steps. The practice of mindfulness is the practice of happiness.

Suffering is part of life. The Buddha spoke about the second arrow. It is a teaching to help us suffer much less. If we allow fear and anger to grow, then we are allowing the second arrow. But don’t be afraid of suffering, especially if we know how to practice. Being aware of the painful feeling and calming the painful feeling. The first step is to suffer less. The second is to make good use of our suffering. Our true home is in every step and in every breath.

Note: this description was automatically sourced from existing YouTube descriptions and other sources. Please ‘Suggest Edit’ if it’s incorrect.

We sow karma every day through right thinking, right speech, and bodily actions, nourishing love and understanding in order to harvest wholesome fruits for the present and the future. Family life—each shared meal, moments of sitting silently together, or practicing mindful walking at Plum Village—are means to cultivate ease and brotherhood. Ease is not merely the absence of busyness, but the cutting off of the ropes that bind the soul—vimukti, or liberation—which arise from

1. busyness
2. worry
3. anger
4. craving
5. jealousy
6. fear
7. inferiority complex
8. delusion

Only when we sever these chains can we have inner freedom, perceive the simple beauty of each moment, and nurture happiness in every step, every breath, and every mouthful of food.

In the Buddha’s teaching, store consciousness (alaya) is the beginningless ground that nourishes all actions and phenomena—both the main manifestation (our form) and the environment—while mind consciousness (mano vijñāna) and the five sense consciousnesses are only the surface manifestations. When we practice mindfulness—sitting, walking, eating, chanting—mind consciousness creates “neural pathways” that penetrate deeply into store consciousness, transforming the practice into a living action and leading to liberation.

The Dharma body (Sanskrit: Dharmakaya) is the indestructible body of the teachings and the practice, which the Buddha has transmitted to each disciple from ancient times, alongside the physical body that is subject to decay. The Dharma body shines most radiantly in the morning—when the mind is clear and the body is healthy—because at this time, each peaceful breath and each mindful step in walking meditation help to nourish the practice body. If our Dharma body is weak, we will not have enough solidity to generate joy, happiness, or to handle suffering. After about forty days of conditioning at Plum Village, the sound of the bell and the images of walking meditation become natural reflexes, reinforcing the Dharma body even when the sangha is not present.

The Dharma body is nourished not only during sitting meditation (thirty to forty-five minutes in the morning) but throughout all daily activities when we practice the four elements:

• letting go
• concentration
• mindfulness
• insight
  These help to generate the three core states—joy, happiness, and ease—and at the same time are concrete methods to face, embrace, and to transform suffering, avoiding the “second arrow” caused by our additional reactions. When the Dharma body is strong, we can nourish ourselves and radiate joy and peace to our family, our sangha, and society.

Sitting in stillness, heart at peace, lips smiling—seven simple words, yet deeply imbued with essence, reminding us that when we sit in meditation in the morning, we must harmonize the three karmas:

• body at ease (sitting truly still)
• mind at peace (calm and settled)
• speech gentle (a gentle smile)

When the three karmas are purified, then “the holy face appears”—we can see the serene Buddha in each breath.

“The fifth watch has come, the Dharma door opens; the first watch has come, we ascend the meditation hall, when the three karmas are purified, the holy face appears”—meaning, when dawn arrives, the Dharma door opens, and we need to purify body, speech, and mind so that the Dharmakāya shines forth with the morning light. To realize the Three Vehicles (Śrāvaka, Pratyekabuddha, Bodhisattva) is to penetrate the teachings of the three vehicles, harmonizing the two truths (conventional truth and ultimate truth), embracing both the relative and the absolute in our practice.

Walking, eating, and breathing with mindfulness is the path that brings us freedom in every moment:

• each step is filled with peace, joy, and happiness, transcending “walking as if chased by ghosts”
• each in-breath is a moment of concentration, letting go of sorrow, awakening inner freedom
• eating in the present moment is to be in full contact with life and the Sangha

Through this, we directly experience all things as the wondrous Dharmakāya, and at the same time, recognize the store consciousness (ālaya-vijñāna)—which contains seeds, sense faculties, and the world—as the ever-present foundation leading us to direct realization of ultimate reality, transcending all dualities of being–nonbeing, good–evil.

Details of this Dharma Talk include Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings on the misunderstanding of the concept of “Emptiness” and the distinction between “Emptiness” and “Non-being.” He warns of the dangers of mistranslation and emphasizes that right view is a crucial element in Buddhism. He explains that everything contains causes and effects, similar to matter and energy. He also speaks about the interdependence between form and emptiness, matter and spirit, and emphasizes that everything is in constant transformation. He provides a deep analysis of the interrelation between happiness and suffering, encouraging the acceptance of suffering to achieve happiness. He teaches that everything exists in dependence on each other, not independently, and that perception is always divided into the perceiving part and the perceived part. He also emphasizes that everything depends on the surrounding environment and that the contrast between subject and object is the foundation of perception.

Some people can stay only seven days, a month, three months, or three years; even a week can be a lot if we know how to use our time to practice mindfulness. This practice helps to generate peace, joy, and happiness in every step, every breath; mindfulness dwelling in the present moment, recognizing body-feeling-mind. Practicing mindfulness for one week can increase our strength two or three times, and happiness can rise from two out of ten to nine out of ten, even ten out of ten, thanks to insight—the deep seeing that arises from the energy of awareness.

In all activities—breathing, walking, eating, standing, sitting, brushing your teeth, or urinating—mindfulness helps us to let go of the past and the future to dwell peacefully in this very moment, thereby generating joy, happiness, and peace. The practice can rely on the collective energy at Plum Village, but it can also be maintained in the city. Thanks to mindfulness, remembering past experiences of suffering and happiness, we cherish our breath and understand how to transform suffering into the lotus of insight.

Plum Village reminds us that even after becoming a Buddha, happiness and insight are still impermanent; it is necessary to practice regularly—from sitting meditation, walking meditation, silent meals, to going on retreat—in order to strengthen and persevere, not to be swept away by the hurried pace of life. The story with Father Daniel Berrigan shows that practicing slowly and wholeheartedly is like a raft that takes us across the river, but it is not the final shore; only when our steps and our breath are firmly rooted in mindfulness can we maintain peace amidst the chaos of life.

In the talk, Thay also tells the story of the Buddha inviting Mara into the meditation cave, symbolizing the non-dual nature between good and evil, Mara and Buddha, compassion and delusion. In Vietnam, the legend of spreading the monk’s robe represents the vast territory of the Buddha’s practice, recalled through the New Year’s bamboo pole on the 23rd day of the twelfth lunar month and the custom of making square and round sticky rice cakes—so that each family may maintain mindfulness, generate happiness, and reduce suffering during the ten days of Tet.

Key concepts in the teaching on Manifestation-Only (Vijnaptimatra) include:

• Indeterminate (avyākṛta)—neither wholesome nor unwholesome, neither with outflows nor without outflows
• Store consciousness (alaya-vijnana) contains seeds that are “neither existent nor non-existent” and are subject to momentary impermanence
• Interbeing and interdependence—subject and object, good and evil, birth and death… all “are each other” and rely on each other to manifest
• Momentary impermanence and lifetime impermanence—continuous transformation in every instant and throughout the cycle of a human life, not just at the moment of death

When we encounter difficulties in communication, we often blame the other person and forget to look back at ourselves. Both sides carry their own conflicts and inner struggles; only when we know how to love ourselves and love them, to recognize the loneliness, sorrow, and anger in ourselves and in them, will our hearts feel lighter. Mindful breathing is the main path that leads us back to our body and mind:

• First is regulating the breath—harmonizing the breath so that it becomes gentle, not hurried or rough.
• Next is regulating the body—sitting upright but relaxed, not tense.
  By maintaining mindfulness and concentration on the breath (in and out, deep and slow) for a few minutes, the breath will become gentle and soft, bringing peace to body and mind.

Store consciousness (the eighth consciousness), manas or the faculty of appropriation (the seventh consciousness), and the consciousnesses that perceive objects (the first to the sixth consciousnesses) are the three kinds of consciousness in Manifestation-only Buddhist psychology; among them:

1. Store consciousness is “direct and true perception,” containing seeds—formless seeds that give rise to myriad forms and appearances.
2. The first characteristic of seeds is momentary impermanence, always changing; the second characteristic is cause and effect are not separate;
3. The fifth characteristic is waiting for conditions—a seed only manifests when the conditions are sufficient;
4. The sixth characteristic is neither existent nor non-existent—it cannot be determined as existing or not existing according to fixed concepts.

We are truly fortunate to be able to sit together in this moment, as a spiritual family. Tet is an occasion to connect with our ancestors, reminding us that a tree has roots, a river has a source, and human beings also have ancestors. In today’s sitting meditation, we have “connected with our ancestors, recognizing that they are present in every cell of our body.” The daily offering of incense—which takes only one or two minutes—is not superstition, but a scientific act that helps “clean the ancestral altar and turn our hearts toward our ancestors,” strengthening our roots so that “our mind can remain steady.”

The tradition of burning votive paper reflects “the love we have for those who have passed away,” while the Rose Ceremony, begun in 1962, serves in part as a replacement:

1. Two red roses if both parents are alive
2. One red and one white rose if one parent has passed away
3. Two white roses if both have passed away

The notion of two separate realms—the world of the living and the world of the dead—is, in fact, just one. Science has erased the boundary between matter and energy, between magnetism and electricity, sound and air, heat and matter. The law of neither birth nor death of matter and energy is in harmony with “the true nature of all phenomena is no birth, no death, no increase, no decrease” in the Heart Sutra, bearing witness to the non-dualistic view and the unity of all dharmas.

The life faculty consists of rupa jivita (physical life faculty) and nama jivitindriya (mental life faculty): form (matter) and name (feeling, perception, mental formation, consciousness) are present as soon as the body is formed, inseparable from the life source of both mother and child. The boundary between sentient and insentient is not clear—a corn kernel, a speck of dust, a subatomic particle, or a cloud, a star, all contain vitality and consciousness, manifestations of a common life faculty of the universe.

Practicing mindfulness to live deeply, to generate peace and joy through three main activities:

1. Breathing: when the bell sounds, breathe in for 4 seconds, breathe out for 6 seconds, for a total of 9 breaths; recognize each breath, let go of worries, generate mindfulness–concentration–insight.
2. Walking meditation: each “legendary” step is connected with the breath, walking slowly (“slow walking”) to nourish joy, whether alone or with the sangha.
3. Eating: mindfulness of rice and mindfulness of the sangha, chewing at least 30 times, maintaining mindfulness, savoring the gift of earth and sky and the sangha in every bite of rice.

Dharma talk on February 9, 2014, Lower Hamlet, Plum Village, France. Applying the first 8 breaths in the Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing to generate peace and happiness.