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Through the Insight of Interbeing | Dharma Talk by Thich Nhat Hanh, 2012.10.11
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Dharma Talk by Thầy
2012.10.11.Lower Hamlet (Plum Village). Talk in English. Audio: English Help us caption & translate this video! http://amara.org/v/HJqy/
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[The bell sounds.]
[The bell sounds.]
[The bell sounds.]
Good morning, dear Sangha. Today is Thursday, the 11th of October,
in the year 2012, and we are in the Assembly of Stars Meditation Hall,
Lower Hamlet, Plum Village. This is our Autumn Retreat.
The Buddha reminded his disciples
that his teaching is about suffering and the transformation of suffering.
And he repeated that several times, because many students tend to ask him
philosophical questions, like
"Is the world finite or infinite?"
And he said that all this philosophical speculation will
take all our time and we won't have time left in order to
practice transformation and healing. So, he encouraged his disciples not to
engage in philosophical speculations.
There were many questions that he refused to answer.
It's not because he did not know how to answer, but he did not want to encourage his disciples in that direction.
Many European scholars in the field of Indianism have studied Buddhism
in the last 100 years.
And many of them are, were
very well versed in Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan, Chinese, and so on.
But most of them misunderstood the Buddha, because they had that intention to find out
what is the philosophy, the ideas of the Buddha, in order for
them to compare with the thinking, the philosophical thought of the West.
They used their intellect only to study Buddhism.
They never tried the practice.
And although they know that the Buddha discouraged metaphysical speculation,
but they didn't follow that advice. They didn't try mindful breathing,
mindful walking, practice of mindfulness, practising the five precepts, ten precepts.
They didn't do these things. And if they do not do these things,
how could they understand Buddhism? Because Buddhism is practical.
It's not theory.
In Kosambi, one day the Buddha came back
from a walking meditation, and he held in
his hands a handful of simsapa leaves
he picked up from the forest. He showed it to his monks, and he said, "Dear Friends,
do you see these simsapa leaves?" "Yes, we do, Teacher."
"Do you think that the leaves I have in my hand
are more numerous than the leaves of simsapa in the forest?"
The monks said that "Dear Teacher, well, you only have a handful of them. In the forest, there are
tons and tons of leaves." The Buddha said, "This is true.
I know many things, but I only teach you a few things,
because these few things are very crucial for your transformation and healing."
That is the story of the Simsapa Leaf.
There was a time when a disciple of his,
whose name is Malunkyaputta,
came and asked him philosophical questions. Teacher, you should tell me whether
the world is finite or infinite, who has created this world,
and if the world is going to be destroyed or not.
Is the soul the same thing as the body? Or the body is something different
and the soul something different? When a person dies, does he continue
or does he not continue? And things like that.
Teacher, if you don't answer these questions, I'm not satisfied. I will have to leave the Order,
because I am curious about these things. I want to find out.
Philosophically minded people.
The Buddha has told him, Malunkyaputta, when you first came here,
and practised as an aspirant for monk, did I promise you that if you become a monk,
I will teach you these kind of things?
No, Teacher, you did not promise. That's right. I don't promise anyone
to teach them philosophy and solve these metaphysical enigmas.
Because what I want is to offer you concrete methods and teachings that
help you transform suffering and heal.
Suppose someone is hit by an arrow.
With poisons.
And the doctor came and said, "Let me pull out that arrow,
and try to get the blood in that space
out, as quickly as possible." And the wounded person said,
No, no. Don't do that. You should tell me first, who has shot the arrow?
What is his name? To what caste does he belong?
Why did he hit me like that? What intention did he have?
Malunkyaputta, if he waits until these questions are solved, he will die.
He will have died already. So, your questions are like that.
They are not important. If you spend your time trying to answer these questions, you will die before
you can transform and heal. That is why. Listen to my teaching,
and put it into practise right away, in order to heal and to transform.
That is the story of Malunkyaputta.
And many scholars, many monks of other schools,
come to the Buddha and ask these questions also, and he always remained silent.
Because he did not encourage people to indulge themselves in this kind of
metaphysical speculation.
We come to the Buddha because we have ill-being in ourselves, ill-being.
We don't feel well in our body; we don't feel well in our heart.
We suffer. And we want to know how to transform
the suffering in us and to heal the suffering in us.
And that is exactly what the Buddha wants to do -- helping people to practise
in order to heal and to transform.
That is why a real, a true, disciple of the Buddha should know
how to handle a painful feeling,
how to handle a strong emotion.
They should learn that, first! The question whether the world is
finite or infinite is not so important.
The real practionner has to know how to
generate a feeling of joy, of peace, of happiness, for her nourishment and healing.
And the time is for that, not to discuss about metaphysical problems.
So somehow, we can say that Buddhism is hostile to philosophy.
But that does not mean that in Buddhism there is no philosophy.
It is very deep. Because when you practise mindfulness,
concentration, insight, you have a very deep view of the world.
And you may express your view
of the world. It's very deep.
But not in terms of speculation. That is only an expression
called right view, right view. Insight.
That insight can help with transformation and healing.
So, it's not true that in Buddhism there is no philosophy.
But that is a philosophy that is a kind of insight, that has the power to help
with healing and transformation, and not for speculation.
One of the insights that belongs to that
category is that suffering and happiness,
they have a deep connection with each other.
That is a deep vision, the right view.
The insight that we need in order to be able truly to practise
transformation and healing. And that insight is called "interbeing".
Sometimes it's called "non-self" or "emptiness".
But "interbeing" may be the easiest way to understand that kind of insight.
Interbeing means you cannot be by yourself alone.
You have to co-be,
interbe, with everything else. It's like this sheet of paper.
This sheet of paper cannot be by herself alone.
When you look into it, you see elements that are not paper.
And without these elements, a sheet of paper cannot be there. Like a tree.
Looking at the sheet of paper, you don't see a tree. But there is a tree inside.
Without a tree, you cannot make paper paste.
You see the paper mill. You see the forest.
You see the rain that allows the trees to grow. You see the sunshine,
that helps the trees to grow. You see the logger. You see everything in the sheet of paper
So this paper, without these non-paper elements, can never be there.
So, the paper cannot be by itself alone. It has to interbe with the tree,
with the sunshine, with the cloud, with the rain, and so on. That's called interbeing.
So, the word "to be" that we use in everyday, can be very misleading.
When we say "I am there",
you think that you are there, but you cannot be there without us,
without the trees, without the air, without the sunshine.
It's better to say "we are there", because you carry all of us inside of you.
You carry Mother Earth; you carry the sunshine; you carry the rain, everything.
So this is not a me, this is a we. We are there.
We interare. If we remove the element of parents,
ancestors, food, education, air, water,
there is no us left. So we means the whole cosmos.
And suppose you look at the sheet of paper, you turn it over and you see that
it has two sides, the left and the right.
The recto and the verso.
And think about the being of the left side.
The left side cannot be by itself alone.
Without the right side.
The left cannot be by itself alone. The left has to interbe at the same time
with the right. You cannot take the left out of the right.
I cannot ask you to come and bring the left to Paris.
And I cannot ask her to come and bring the right to Rome.
Because they interare; the left and the right,
they cannot be by themselves. So "the left is", that's not correct.
The left cannot be by itself. The left must interbe with the right.
Wherever the left is, the right is also.
So if politically, you are on the left,
don't wish for the right to disappear, because if the right disappears, the left disappears at the same time.
That is the teaching of interbeing. That is a kind of philosophy.
But not for the sake of speculation, this is a seeing by deep observation,
by meditation. And in this case, we know that suffering and happiness,
they are the same. One cannot be without the other.
So if you have a wish that you only want to retain happiness.
You don't want any suffering. That is not possible.
And our idea of paradise, our idea of the Kingdom of God,
is very naive. We think, over there, up there,
there is no suffering, there is only happiness. It's like, well, there is a sheet of paper
that has only the right side; there is no left side. It's not possible.
It is with suffering, the element of suffering,
that we can make happiness. It is like the mud and the lotus,
and if you have insight, and then looking into the lotus flower, you see the mud inside.
Like when you look at the sheet of paper, you see the tree inside.
The tree is not apparent, but it is there. If you remove the tree from the paper,
the paper will collapse.
That's interbeing. That's philosophy also, but practical,
very deep, very useful.
So it's not true to say that there is no philosophy in Buddhism. Philosophy in Buddhism,
that is the insight, the deep vision that you get with meditation.
And that is called "Prajna". Prajna is insight that you obtain from the
practice of mindfulness and concentration. Mindfulness, concentration bring insight.
And insight has the power to liberate you from ignorance.
When you say, "In Paradise, in the Kingdom of God,
there is no suffering", that is ignorance.
That is naive, because happiness can never be by itself alone.
Like a lotus flower cannot be by herself alone. There should be the mud
in order for a lotus to be. So I have a better definition of
paradise, of the Kingdom of God. In Buddhism, we don't speak of God
and the Kingdom of God. That does not mean that we deny God,
and we deny the Kingdom of God.
In Buddhism, we speak of the
Pure Land of the Buddha.
The land of bliss.
We know that true happinesss
is made of understanding and love.
Imagine a person that does not have understanding.
He does not understand anything. How can he love?
When you don't understand yourself, when you don't understand the other person,
how can you love yourself and love him or her?
Every one of us needs to be understood.
There are those of us who complain that no one in this world understands him or her.
Very lonely. So if we have a chance to meet a person
who can understand you deeply, you are a lucky person.
And you feel grateful to him or to her, because that is a person who has the capacity to understand you.
I know a young man in California.
He lives with his mother. He graduated from a very famous university,
very intelligent, very handsome. He has a good job, a good salary.
He had so many girlfriends. Many of them very pretty.
And his mother observed and saw him
especially interested in one of these
girlfriends, but for her, that is not the most beautiful lady.
And he spent time more with her, and he seemed to be appreciating her
very much. And his mother was surprised, she thought
that that young lady, she is not the best, judging on the aspect of beauty and so on.
So one day, she could not resist. She said, "My son, I see that you have
so many pretty friends, but why are you interested only in that one.
That one to me is not the best."
And the young man at first
did not know how to answer.
But when she asked it for the second time, he found an answer. He said, "Mother,
because she understands me.
Because she understands me. I am a scientist, and I love to write poetry.
But when I read my poetry, all the other girls did not seem to be interested very much.
But she listened very deeply, and she knows how to appreciate my poetry.
And when I say something, she listens with all her attention.
I say one thing, she understands two things. [laughter]
So, all of us need to be understood.
And those who understand us, we are grateful for them.
Especially when someone understands your suffering.
Every one of us has suffering inside. And if someone understands, recognizes,
suffering in us and knows how to help us to suffer less, we are very, very grateful
to him or to her. We feel [we are] being loved by that person.
A person who has no understanding
cannot love, cannot love.
They may have passion, craving, but not love.
Love is made of understanding.
So if in the world you have one person who can understand you,
especially your suffering, your difficulties, your despair,
then you are a very lucky person already. There are those of us who go and look for
search for, such a person, and never meet (them).
But as we practise and observe, we see that if you understand your own suffering,
then you look at your suffering, and you know how to hold your suffering,
and listen to it, and look deeply into it,
you'll find out the roots, the nature of your suffering,
and that kind of understanding brings the relief right away.
And when you have understood your suffering, you suffer much less.
Because the understanding of suffering shows you the way
to transform that suffering. If you do not understand suffering,
you don't know how to transform it. It's like a doctor. Before the doctor sees
the nature of the illness in the patient, he cannot do anything to help him.
So understanding the disease, the cause of the disease, is crucial for the doctor to prescribe a
kind of practice or medicine that can heal. The same thing is true here.
If you have a chance to go back to yourself and listen to the suffering
inside, and try to understand the nature of that suffering,
suddenly you see the way out.
And just to see the way out, we suffer less right away.
You see the path that leads to the transformation and cessation
of the suffering. You suffer less right away,
even before you practise. Just see the path, see the way,
makes you suffer (less) because you are lucky if you see the path.
The spiritual path that leads you to the cessation of your suffering,
that leads you the transformation of suffering.
We suffer because we are in the dark. We suffer, but we don't know why we suffer
and the nature of suffering. So if we know how to understand,
to listen to our suffering, the path will be revealed to us.
And at that moment, we suffer less, right away, much less.
Even if you have not taken the first step on that path.
And when you have understood your own suffering, it's much easier
to see and understand the suffering of the other person.
It means that before you can understand someone else, you have to understand yourself.
That insight is not confined to Buddhism,
to the Buddha. Many sages, many wise people in the world
know that: "connais toi toi même", understand yourself,
Understand yourself --- first of all, understand your suffering. Because your suffering carries within it
the suffering of your father. Your suffering is also the suffering of your father.
Your father had that suffering, but he did not know how to transform it,
so he transmitted it to you. Your suffering carries within itself
the suffering of your mother, of your ancestors.
So understand your own suffering, you understand the suffering of your father, your mother, your ancestors.
That is the teaching of the Buddha. And your suffering also reflects the
suffering of your partner, of the world.
So understanding suffering is the first step. And that is why the first Dharma talk
given by the Buddha is about the Four Noble Truths.
The first one is suffering, and the second one is the nature,
the roots, of our suffering. It's very practical.
Right away in the first Dharma Talk. Dukka is suffering; dukka is ill-being.
In Chinese, the word suffering also means bitterness.
And the Second Noble Truth is
the making of suffering, how suffering has come to be.
The roots of suffering, the nature of suffering.
Suppose you have a depression.
A depression is the first Noble Truth.
If you have a depression, you should recognize that
there is a depression. You cannot say, "I do not have a depression."
when you do have a depression, when you have an illness,
you have ill-being, suffering, in you. The first thing you should do is
to recognize, to admit, that you have the suffering. You have to know that
"I have a depression." A depression has come to be in me.
Accepting the first Truth is the first step.
If you suffer, and you try to say that, "No, I have no suffering",
you have no chance in order to transform. So the first thing is to acknowledge the fact that you have suffering.
And who amoung us does not have suffering?
So we have to confirm the existence,
the presence of suffering in us. Suppose there is a depression. We have to say, "There is a depression.
A depression has come to settle in." That is the first step of the practice.
The second step of the practice is to have the courage
to look, to listen, to embrace it.
The courage is to recognize it as something existing.
The courage is to go back to it
and take care of it, and listen to it, and embrace it, in order to understand
the nature of that suffering.
Because everything has causes.
What has come to be
should have been brought by something. So looking deeply into the nature of
the depression, we see the roots,
the cause, the kind of nutriments that we have used in order to feed, to nourish,
our depression. The Buddha said this: "Nothing can survive without food."
It's very clear. Your happiness, your love, needs food
in order to survive. Your love may be beautiful.
But if you don't know how to feed it, it will die. It may last 6 months, or one year,
and then it turns to be something else.
So love needs food in order to survive.
And those who love each other should know how to feed their love, the kind of food
that can help that love last long,
longer and longer.
The thought that you produce, a word that you say, an action that you do,
may be the kind of nutriment in order to help your love grow and last.
Or may cause your love to get thinner.
to diminish.
So suffering is the same.
If your suffering is increasing every day, it's because you keep feeding them
by your way of living, daily living. If your depression refuses to go,
it's because you keep feeding your depression. Everything you see, everything you listen to,
everything you consume in your daily life, may be feeding your depression.
So look into your depression, and find out the roots and the nutriments,
the food that you have used to feed it. And when you have identified
the kind of food that you have used to feed your depression,
you have enlightenment. And you need only to cut off the source
of nutriment. You deprive your depression of food, and your depression will have to die
in a few weeks. Nothing can survive without food.
That is the statement made by the Buddha. And the second Noble Truth can be
described in terms of food,
in terms of nutriment. If your relationship has become difficult,
impossible, because you have not nourished
your relationship with the right kind of food.
You have used poisons in order to nourish that relationship, with the kind of thoughts you produce,
the kind of words you utter, the kind of action you perform.
So, meditation is to look into the nature of your suffering to find out the
source of nutriment that has brought it to you so that you can see the path that
leads to the cessation of the suffering.
[The bell is awoken.] [The bell is invited to sound.]
So this is the roots of ill-being.
The making, the accumulation,
the making of suffering.
But many of us do not want to practise the second Noble Truth.
We think that we don't like to do so. We don't want to come home to us,
and get in touch with the suffering and listen to it, and look into it to
find out how and why it has come to us.
Because we don't think of it as something pleasant.
So most of us do the opposite; we try to run away from our suffering.
We make it sound like we don't suffer.
And you try run away. You don't want to go home
and encounter the suffering inside,
because you are afraid that if you come home and touch the suffering,
it will overwhelm you. And that is why most of us in society try
to run away.
And to cover up, to dissimulate, to pretend that
it's not there. There is no suffering.
We pretend that everything is alright.
We try to deceive us, and we try to deceive other people
that we are OK. There is nothing wrong in us. But in fact, there may be a very deep
block of suffering inside. So the Buddha recommend that we should not practise that.
Because many of us try to cover up the suffering by the way of consumption.
If you turn on the television, it's not exactly because there is
an interesting program that you can watch, and you can enjoy, and you can learn.
Sometimes the TV program is not good at all, and yet you don't have the courage to
turn it off, because if you turn it off, you have to go back to yourself.
And many of us who are not hungry,
who do not have the need to eat, and yet we go and open the refrigerator,
and take out something to eat. We eat not because we are hungry.
We eat because we want to use eating
in order to forget that something is painful in here.
And we take our car and go out, we talk on the telephone,
we do everything in order not to have to go back to ourselves, in order to touch
the suffering inside. This is the opposite of the practice.
Because you are afraid of being in touch with your suffering.
And the method of the Buddha is that you should train yourself in the practice
of mindfulness of breathing, of sitting, of walking.
of driving. Because when you practise mindful breathing,
mindful walking, you generate an energy.
The energy that can help you be strong.
And when you go back to yourself with that energy, you are stronger, because that
energy help you to recognize your suffering, help you to embrace your suffering,
and to listen to it. Without mindfulness, you are only a
passive..You are only a passive entity.
You'll be overwhelmed. You'll be a victim of the suffering.
But with mindfulness, with the energy of mindfulness, you can be active.
Because with mindfulness, you have the strength to recognize
suffering. "Hello there, my despair.
I know you are there. I will take care of you.
I am back for you. I am here for you." That is the voice of mindfulness.
"Hello, there. I know you are there." "Hello, my little anger, my little despair,
I know you are there. I am coming back to you and taking care of you."
That is the work of mindfulness. And if you don't practise mindful walking,
mindful sitting, mindful breathing,
you don't have that energy. That is why Buddhist meditation begins
with mindfulness. And mindfulness is the kind of energy that everyone can generate by the practice.
When you walk, from your living quarter
to the meditation hall, walk in such a way that
every step helps generate the energy of mindfulness, mindfulness of walking.
When you wash your dishes, don't think of anything else, just focus your attention
on dish washing, enjoy dish washing
and breathing generating the energy of mindfulness.
And in Plum Village, we do like that. We do everything in mindfulness.
We eat in mindfulness. We cook in mindfulness.
We clean in mindfulness. Because that energy of mindfulness is
the energy that can heal. that can transform. So with mindfulness, you can go home
to yourself without fear. With mindfulness, you can say
"Hello, my despair. Hello, my anger. I know you are there.
I will take good care of you." And with that same energy of mindfulness,
you can embrace tenderly your pain,
your sorrow, and listen to it. It's like a mother holding her ailing baby
and listen to the baby, why the baby suffer like that?
So your suffering is your baby.
When the mother does not know what is wrong with the baby yet, but the fact that she's holding the baby
with tenderness, can help the baby suffer less right away.
So with mindfulness, you are holding your suffering. You have not seen
really the roots of that suffering, but the fact that you are there for
your suffering, holding it tenderly, not trying to run away from it,
can already bring some relief and you suffer less.
Sitting or walking and embracing tenderly your suffering, can already bring relief.
And if you are sitting in a group of people,
who are capable of generating mindfulness, you can make good use
of that collective energy of mindfulness in order to recognize and embrace
the pain in you. It's like a drop of water in a river.
She allows the whole river to embrace her,
to carry her, to guide her.
So sitting in a Sangha, in a group of brothers and sisters in the practice,
you say, "Dear brothers and sisters, here is my pain. Here is my despair.
Help me embrace this because I am only
a beginner in the practice." So you open your heart, and allow
the collective energy of the Sangha to recognize and embrace your pain.
And if you do that, in a few minutes, you suffer less. You get relief.
And that is what we call taking refuge in the Sangha, trust the Sangha, like a drop of water trusting the river.
It's easier to practise with a community. The community is a jewel,
one of the three jewels. Buddha is a jewel; Dharma is a jewel;
Sangha is a jewel. And Sangha is very concrete.
The Sangha is made of practionners. Members of the Sangha are capable of generating
mindfulness, concentration and insight. So Sangha is carrying also the Dharma.
A true Sangha has the true Dharma in it.
And where there is the Dharma, the Buddha is there also.
So the Sangha carries within herself the Dharma and the Buddha.
Don't look for the Buddha in the temple or in the sky.
The Buddha is in the Sangha action. Because the Sangha knows how to generate
mindfulness, concentration and insight. A Buddha is someone inhabited by
these kind of energies. And we are all capable of generating
these three kinds of energies. We are a Buddha to be.
[The bell is awoken.] [The bell is invited to sound.]
Mindfulness also carries within itself
the energy of concentration.
Together mindfulness and concentration can bring insight,
that has the power to bring relief.
The practice of concentration can be very powerful. It can allow us to gain
the kind of insight that can liberate us.
We don't need to change the environment
in order to be happy If we get an insight, we have
another way of looking. and we don't suffer anymore.
So please don't think that unless you change the environment, you change the partner,
you cannot be happy. Don't think like that! You suffer because of your way of looking
at things. You suffer because you do not have enough insight.
And insight is obtained by the practice of mindfulness and concentration.
And insight is something very concrete. It's like the left side of a
sheet of paper and the right side. The left cannot be without the right.
If you think that happiness is an individual matter, you are wrong.
The father cannot be truly happy if the son suffers deeply.
The son cannot look for individual happiness when his father suffers deeply.
So happiness is not an individual thing. If you can make your father suffer less,
you suffer less. So that is the insight of interbeing.
The insight of interbeing is that you are in your father.
And your father is in you. And there are young people who say,
who are so angry at their father, and who say,
"I don't want to have anything to do with that person!", namely their father.
It's nonsense. Because looking into the son, you see the father.
His father is there in every cell of his body. And how can he say, "I don't want to
have anything to do with him anymore"?
You cannot take your father out of you. It's like you cannot take the tree out
of the sheet of paper.
So when the father see him in the son, and the son sees him in the father,
they got the insight of interbeing. They know that making each other suffer
is something stupid. Helping him to suffer less,
you suffer less. Anything you do for yourself to suffer less,
you do for him. So that is the insight you get by
mindfulness and concentration. So many of us believe that unless
we divorce, unless we change the environment, we cannot be happy.
Unless we go to another place...
we cannot be happy.
But in this teaching, you only need to change your way of seeing things,
by getting the insight. And when you get the insight,
you don't suffer anymore. This is salvation not by grace,
but by insight.
In the beginning of this talk, Thay has said that,
he said that, when you have understood your own
suffering and suffer less, you are capable of seeing the suffering
in the other person much more easily.
Before that, you believe that you are the only one who suffers. That person only makes you suffer.
He does not suffer. But now since you have mindfulness
and concentration that help you to understand your own suffering,
you know that suffering is made mainly by ourselves. And you see the other person,
you see the suffering in him, the difficulties in him, the despair in him.
You see that that person has so much suffering in him and he does not know
how to handle the suffering, to transform the suffering, so he continues to be victim
of that suffering. And since he does not know how to handle suffering,
he continues to suffer and he continues to make
people around him suffer. His suffering is spilling over around him.
He is the first victim of his suffering, and you are only a second victim.
And maybe he did not want you to suffer. He has no intention to make you suffer.
because he does not know how to handle suffering, and that is why you have to suffer with him.
So that is the kind of insight you get
when you look at the other person. And when you have seen that that person
has a lot of suffering, of difficulties, unable to handle the suffering and
difficulties, then you know that that person needs help, and does not need punishment.
And you may think that you can help him or her. You want to say something
or to do something to help him suffer less. It means that you have understood,
and the understanding has given rise to compassion.
So the same person, and you don't suffer anymore.
You don't deal with that person with anger and despair anymore. But you see hope, you see love.
You think that if you divorce, and then the problem will no longer be there.
That's not true. You have been with him or with her
quite a few years already, and now he is in you, even if the paper has been signed.
You cannot get him out of you. He will be with you for all your life.
She will be with you for all your life.
So the only way is to practise in order to transform you and transform him in you.
And if you are transformed, if you get light, liberated, you can help
the other person transform and get light.
And you don't have to change anything. You don't have to change partners,
you don't have to change environment. You have to change your way of looking at things.
And you do that only when you have insight. Insight is gotten by the practice of
mindfulness, concentration. [A bird cawing loudly.]
And since you have suffered,
you have the mud. And if you know how to make good use
of the mud, you can grow beautiful lotus flowers. So suffering plays a certain role
in making happiness.
If there is no suffering, how can understanding arise,
and how can compassion arise? And understanding and compasssion
are the foundation of happiness.
And you know that in order to create understanding and compassion,
you need a substance, that is suffering.
So to practise, a good practionner is someone who knows how to make
good use use of suffering in order to create understanding and compassion.
And you don't have to produce more suffering. There is enough,
more than enough suffering already. So the problem is how make good use of it.
[A bird is cawing in the background.]
She (the bird) agrees with me. [laughter]
So my definition of the Kingdom of God is not a place where there is no suffering.
The Kingdom of God is a place where people know how to make good use of suffering
in order to create understanding and compassion and love.
I am sure, I am
more than convinced. I see very clearly that there is suffering in the Kingdom of God.
If there is no suffering, you have no way to create
understanding and compassion. Suffering is very useful,
and we can speak about the "goodness of suffering",
"les bienfaits de la souffrance".
If you don't have the mud, you can never make lotus flowers.
If you have no suffering you can never create happiness and joy.
And that is the insight of interbeing.
So in the beginning of the talk, Thầy has said that a good practionner is someone who knows how to generate
joy and happiness. And someone who knows how to handle
and transform suffering. And these two things together, go together.
And this practice helps the other practice. If you know how to handle suffering,
it's easier for you to produce joy and happiness. If you know how to produce joy and happiness,
it's easier for you to handle suffering.
The right and left, they lean on each other, they support each other,
they are not enemies. Suffering is not an enemy. It may be your ally.
So the fifth exercise of mindfulness of breathing is to generate joy.
And the sixth is to generate happiness.
And if we are a practionner,
we should learn how to do that. A good practionner can generate
a feeling of joy, a feeling of happiness, whenever she wants.
For them and for the other person.
But the how is very clear.
The practice of mindfulness helps us to bring our mind home to our body.
Remember the last Dharma talk?
And when mind and body are together, you are fully present in the here and the now.
In our daily lives, your mind and your body are very often apart.
Remember the computer. You spend two hours with your computer.
You let your body... you forget that you have a body.
So when mind and body are together, you enjoy breathing in, breathing out.
You are established in the here and the now. You see your body as a wonder.
You see the sunshine, the rain, the trees,
the hills, as wonders. You know that you are healthy enough.
Your eyes are still clear, in good condition. Your heart is still pumping the blood well.
You have feet strong enough to walk, to run.
You have the good air, to breathe. There are so many conditions of happiness
that are available in the here and the now. So, getting in touch with these elements
of happiness.... elements that are
refreshing and healing and nourishing,
you generate a feeling of joy.
Many of us have plenty of conditions of happiness,
available in the here and the now. But we are carried away by a feeling of anger, of fear, and we ignore everything.
We step on these conditions of happiness. We are wasting ...
So mindfulness helps us to recognize these conditions of happiness.
And when we are in touch, a feeling of joy, a feeling of happiness, arises very easily.
Last time Thầy talked about
opening the water tap with mindfulness. With mindfulness, you see that the water
has come from up in the mountain, down on the earth, come to your kitchen.
And (to) allow this fresh water to flow
on your fingers can be a happy, can be a happy moment. It's a wonder.
There are people in the world who have to go 5 kilometers to fetch some water,
and not of a good quality. We are very lucky.
Even if we have just lost our job, but we are still much luckier than
so many people. So, recognizing that we are lucky, that we still have plenty of conditions
of happiness, that can give rise to a joyful feeling, a feeling of gratitude,
a feeling of happiness. You remind yourself with mindfulness,
and you remind the other person, that both of you are lucky.
Before eating your breakfast,
look at the other person and say, "Darling, don't you think we are lucky?
We have a roof to live under, we have something for breakfast, we are still together."
Remind ourselves and remind others, "There is no war going on around here!"
And if you have suffered in the past, bring the suffering back into the
present moment in order to compare. And against the background of suffering,
happiness will stand out very clearly.
You know that during the war in Vietnam, you hear the sound of the guns,
day and night, and your wish is that
you can sleep better without the sound of the guns.
But here, there is no sound of guns at night.
You have peace.
Our workers in the School of Youth for Social Service in Vietnam,
young monks and nuns and laypeople, we have rebuilt many villages that
have been destroyed by the bombing.
The war in Vietnam lasted 30 years.
The first part of it was waged by the
French Army, from 1945,
And then, long after that, the French did not have enough money to continue the war, so Americans were financing
the war in Vietnam, out of fear of communism,
and thinking that if Vietnam fall into communism, and then all the countries of Southeast Asia
will follow, in the theory of dominoes.
So fear is under, is the foundation
of the action. So millions of people were killed.
Many French soldiers died in Vietnam. Many American soldiers died in Vietnam.
And we lost about 6 million people in the war.
And our social workers worked in that difficult situation.
There was a village that was bombarded by the Americans.
That village is situated near the demilitarized zone in the village,
in Trà Lộc. That zone separated
the North and the South. And our workers received the order
to rebuild that village. And then, it was
bombarded again, for the second time.
And local workers, monks, nuns and others,
asked whether they should rebuild the village of Trà Lộc.
We said, "Yes, we have to rebuild!"
In the province of Quảng Trị,
near the 17th parallel, Trà Lộc.
Then it was bombarded for the third time.
And we met at the headquarters of the School of Youth for Social Service,
and after debate, we said, "Rebuild it again!" Third time.
And it was bombarded again, for the fourth time.
The problem is not the materials in order to rebuild. The problem is
whether we have to give up or to continue.
What is the use of building in order to be destroyed?
That is the question asked by many people.
But psychologically, if you give up then despair will overwhelm.
And despair is the worst thing that can happen to a human being.
So if we gave the order to build it for the fourth time,
you know, we rebuild it 5 times.
We rebuild it because we don't want people to be victims of despair.
Not because we .. we...we.. we
we have enough materials and money in order to do that. That is a psychological problem.
And when people are overwhelmed with despair,
that is the form of suffering that is
the most difficult, the kind of suffering that is most difficult to bear.
I remember, many young people came to me, and asked, "Thầy, do you think that
that the war is going to end soon?"
That was about 20 years after the war had started.
People died every day, every night.
And in our School of Youth for Social Service, we went to rescue people,
to help the wounded people, to bring relief,
to organize refugee camps,
war refugee camps.
And many of us, including monastics, died during the operation.
"Dear Thầy" -- it was a group of students
from many faculties of the University of Saigon who came and asked Thầy --
"do you think that the war will end soon? Is there is any hope? "
More than 20 years already. It is very difficult question to answer.
Thầy did not see any hope.
There is no light at the end of the tunnel.
But how can Thầy say there is no hope? That will destroy them.
That will crush them, the young people.
So after having breathed in and out a few times, then Thầy said, "My dear friends, the Buddha said
everything is impermanent. The war also should be impermanent.
The war has to end some day. So let us continue."
So as far as the global warming in concerned,
many of us are about to fall into despair. We have not seen any sign of the..
But if we allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by despair, we lose our lucidity, we lose our hope,
and we get the situation worse, very quickly. That is why we have to practice
in order to get the kind of insight that can help us prevent despair to descend,
to allow us to continue with clarity
and non-fear.
So, generating joy and happiness is
what the Buddha says that we should do, using mindfulness in order to create
a feeling of joy and happiness. Because all of us need
to be nourished.
And joy and happiness can be possible in a difficult situation also.
And that is why during the war, our workers continue the practice.
The practice of mindfulness allows us to get in touch with the good things,
so that we can get the nourishment and the healing to continue.
We have to invent joy and happiness in order to survive.
Suppose you have a beautiful garden, where you have 30 beautiful trees.
And if 5 of the trees in your garden
just fall down. Very beautiful trees.
And you are sad, and you may be possessed by that kind of sadness that you are
no longer able to enjoy your garden. But in the garden there are another twenty
trees that are still beautiful, vigorous.
So it's not because a number of trees have died that you stop enjoying the trees.
So suffering and happiness happen at the same time, in every one of us.
It's not because you have some suffering that we do not have the capacity to enjoy
the other part that is not suffering. And that is why even in the most
desperate situation, you have to preserve yourself
by generating moments of joy and happiness together.
Suppose you are having, you have something,
you are having lunch.
On the table, there is an orange, there is
a squash, with the rice, with the vegetables.
And even if, if we just get some,
some bad news, we should try to eat our lunch in
such a way that we can get the nourishment
and healing during eating.
It is possible to pick up a fruit,
a vegetable, and see that this is a gift of Mother Earth.
We still have love. So if you are able to enjoy your lunch,
your eating with mindfulness, if you can appreciate the fact that
you are still together, you are still a family,
you have still a chance to share a lunch together,
that is the positive things. Even in a difficult situation,
we still have to be able to generate a feeling of gratitude, of joy,
of happiness, to nourish us.
And then if you are nourished like that, you are stronger in order to handle
the situation of suffering. So in order to transform and heal,
you need nourishment. It's like a person who is about to
undergo surgery. And if a doctor judges that this person is
too weak, in order to go to the operation,
and then he will give the order to postpone the surgery and to help
that person get a little bit stronger,
in order to be able to resist, to stand, the surgery.
So it's the same. We have a block of pain.
We may think that unless I take out this block of pain,
I cannot enjoy life.
And that is not the best way of thinking. Even if there are trees that have died,
there are still many trees that are alive. And you should be able to sit under the
beautiful trees and say that "We still have beautiful trees."
And if you know how to enjoy the beautiful trees, you have more strength in order to rebuild, re-plant the other trees.
So the practice of generating joy and happiness helps you in the process
of handling suffering. So a good practionner should know how to
generate a feeling of joy and happiness by touching the good things, the positive
things, the things that are nourishing and healing us, that are still available.
And that is the work of mindfulness. Mindfulness allows us to recognize these things as available.
And mindfulness helps you to remind the other person, "Dear one, we are still
very lucky. Let us be thankful, so that we are strong enough in order to handle
the difficulties that we have had."
And the seventh exercise of mindful breathing is to...
is to recognize
pain. Ill-being.
Have the courage! to acknowledge the fact that
there is suffering in me. To come home with mindfulness
in order to recognize and to embrace, not to suppress.
The mother doesn't suppress her baby. The mother acknowledges the baby,
sees the suffering of the baby, picks up the baby and holds the baby
in tenderness. That is what a good practionner will do. Go home to your baby, your suffering baby.
Be there for your baby. Embrace it tenderly, and get a relief.
You cannot do this unless you have the energy of mindfulness.
That is why when walking from your tent to the meditation hall, don't talk!
Don't think. Walk in such a way that every step generates mindfulness,
every step brings the joy,
brings the happiness, of being alive, touching the wonders of life. That helps the healing.
You nourish yourself by that. So in our walking meditation,
we stop the thinking. The thinking takes us away from the here and the now.
We just feel. We just touch, feel the contact between
our feet and Mother Earth. Allow Mother Earth to heal you.
Allow the wonders of life
to penetrate your body, and trust.
Trust Mother Earth as source of healing.
You breathe in the air; the air can be healing.
You get, you allow the beautiful
green colour to penetrate into your mind or body. That is healing.
Every step can be healing, Every breath can be healing.
And Mother Earth is not only around you. She is inside of you.
Allow her to heal you.
Because Mother Earth is a a most beautiful Bodhisattva,
beautiful Mother, of all of us. Mother of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and Saints.
She has brought us to life, and she will receive us back.
And bring us to life again and again.
We have to trust. Mother Earth is not the environment.
Mother Earth is us, is a being,
a great being, Mahasattva.
And the eighth exercise of mindful breathing is calming,
calming the pain.
Whether that pain is a painful feeling,
a difficult, unpleasant feeling or a
strong emotion like fear, anger, despair.
We have to go home and take care of that. And with the energy of mindfulness.
So in our daily life, everything we do,
every minute we live, can be used in order to generate the energy of mindfulness.
Even when you brush your teeth, brush them in mindfulness and enjoy the time of
tooth brushing; it can bring you happiness.
[The bell is invited.]
There are many ways of generating joy and happiness
with mindfulness, including the practice of
selective watering. You have a seed joy,
memory of happiness, and a seed of love,
and a seed of understanding in you.
And the other person also has many good seeds in him or in her.
She has talents; she has tolerance;
she is capable of forgiving. And you also have these good things.
So recognize these things, and allow them to manifest.
Say something, listen to something in order to allow the good things in us
to manifest. When you listen to a Dharma Talk,
the Dharma Talk is a kind of rain penetrating into the soil
of your consciousness. In the soil in your consciousness,
there is a seed of love. There's a seed of understanding;
there's a seed of mindfulness; there's a seed of peace; there's a seed of compassion.
And if we allow the rain of the Dharma Talk to penetrate deep into the
soil of your consciousness,
and then these seeds will sprout, and that gives you joy and happiness.
You can read a book. You can listen to a good conversation,
that has the power to recognize and
water the good seeds so that they can come up. And joy and happiness become a reality.
And you can water the soil of mind of the other person.
He/She has many good things. Don't water the seed of anger, fear,
jealousy in him or in her. Water the seed of understanding,
compassion, joy, and you see that that person
can be joyful and happy, right away. It does not take much time; very quick.
That is the practice of selective watering. You water only the good seeds in you
and in the other person. You acknowledge the talents, the virtues
of that person. You say that you are grateful for them. You create happiness and joy right away.
There are many ways of producing joy and happiness.
And there are also many ways of ... to handle the pain.
Maybe the first is to just recognize the pain and not exaggerate.
Because sometimes you have something that disturbs you, in your body or
in your mind, and you suffer. In that moment, you allow suffering
to overwhelm you. You forget all about the good things.
And that is not a good thing to do. Recognizing that there are a number of
trees that are dying, but you remember there are many things that are still alive and beautiful.
That is the truth. And then, do not exaggerate.
If you have something that seems to be wrong in your body, don't panic,
don't think that you are going to die very soon.
And this the Buddha taught us.
If you have a pain in your body, if you have some pain in your mind,
just recognize it as it is, and do not exaggerate.
And he gave the example of someone who is struck by an arrow.
You are struck by an arrow, and you suffer. But if a second arrow comes and strikes
you exactly at the same spot, the pain will not only be double but
maybe 10 times more painful.
So if you allow your anger, your despair, your fear, to come
just because of that minor pain in your body and in your mind,
then you suffer 10 times, 100 times more.
So, that is the practice of simple recognition, mere recognition.
If there is a minor pain, you know that there is a minor pain. If needed, you need a doctor,
you need a friend, to look with you
so that you can recognize the pain as it is and do not exaggerate.
If you exaggerate by... you amplify the pain by...
by imagination, you think you are going to die very soon.
You think that is a cancer.
If you get angry at it,
if you worry too much, and then you amplify the suffering. So the first thing the Buddha recognized
is to... the Buddha said is to recognize the pain as it is and do not exaggerate.
It means, do not allow the second arrow to come.
And sometimes the second arrow comes from another person.
He or she worries too much, and that makes you worry also.
[The bell is awoken.]
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