Thich Nhat Hanh Dharma Talks

This 59-minute talk was given on May 13, 2004 in New Hamlet, Plum Village, France. The talk was given between retreats to the monastic community and a small number of lay residents and guests. Thank you to Chân Phúc H?i for writing the summary and providing a time-stamped transcript. Thay begins this talk with a description of the concept of Apranihita or aimlessness.  Our tendency is to be constantly running, constantly searching.  We need to stop and reestablish ourselves in the here and now. Walking meditation is a wonderful way to learn how to stop. Can we walk with freedom and happiness? The Buddha said it was possible to live happily in the here and now.  In the sutra given to the White Clad People (Upasaka Sutra) “live happily in the here and now” occurs five times. The first time our planet was seen from space we were made aware of what a beautiful and precious place the Earth is.  The Earth is the bastion of life. It is a real paradise.  The pure land is right here.  What are you searching for? Are you looking for love, for freedom, for understanding?  We need to get in touch with the wonders of life.  Our practice is to get in touch. Mindfulness is a very concrete way to go home to the here and now. Having a sangha is of great benefit.  In a sangha we remind each other that it is fortunate to be alive.  If we know how to stop running, how to take care of ourselves, how to water seeds of happiness every day, we can transform our suffering.  Doing this together is wonderful. Thay tells a story about visiting a prison.  Even in prison a person can be free.  And even outside of prison a person can be a prisoner of anger, despair, and hate.   Freedom is freedom from fear, from anger, from forgetfulness.  And our practice is the practice of freedom.  Our practice is the practice of awakening. The twenty-four brand new hours given to us every morning are a precious gift.  The day when we lay down to die we cannot bargain for another day.  Today is available, and if we are lucky, tomorrow will also be available.

The date is November 25, 2001 at Plum Village, Upper Hamlet. This is the first talk of the 3-month winter retreat. The talk is offered in English. 00:00 Connecting with Green Mountain Dharma Center and Deer Park Monastery09:10 Chanting34:12 Going Home to Ourselves41:08 Drinking our Tea43:22 Mindfulness of our Body46:04 Body52:50 Feelings56:26 Perceptions1:01:38 Mental Formations1:05:14 Consciousness1:06:01 Reclaiming Our Sovereignty1:14:01 The Sangha1:17:58 The Energy of Mindfulness1:24:55 Healing from Within1:29:04 Looking Deeply1:37:53 Building a Sangha What is the 3-month retreat? How do we practice together? Our practice is to build brotherhood. How do we know if we are succeeding in our practice? To practice to be happy together. It is a kind of daily food. Through our sitting mediation, walking meditation, eating in mindfulness. These help build our sisterhood and brotherhood. This is done by building peace within ourselves so it can manifest around us.  The Energy of Mindfulness Buddhist meditation has a universal value. The energy of mindfulness help us to there, to be fully present in every moment of our daily life. To be there for us. Our body, our feelings, our perceptions – they are all there, but are we taking care of them? Our practice is to go home to ourselves and tend to our feelings, perceptions, and our body. Our tendency is to run away from ourselves.  Drinking our tea. Are we fully present to drink our tea? Or are you drinking like a machine? Mindfulness of drinking. Everyone can do that. If we are not careful, we may follow our habit. Mindfulness is the energy to be there for what is going on. Through breathing, walking, eating, etc.  Mindfulness is the kind of energy that helps you to be fully there. This is the first action for peace. Have you abandoned yourself? Mindfulness can help you come back to yourself. We start with our body. Your breath is part of your body. When you breathe in, bring your mind back. Mindful breathing. This is the best way to begin making peace. It is the door in which you can come back to yourself. We can restore ours sovereignty in the territory of ourselves.  The Five elements (Skandhas)  The first element is form – your physical body. Our physical body is like a river; it is always flowing. The first thing a practitioner should do is make peace with our body. Learn how to calm and renew your body. Learn the art of deep and total relaxation. Give our body a chance to rest and restore itself. It is an action of peace. In the Harvard medical school, they have studied the role of meditation in healing the body. Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile to my body. The second element of your person is feeling. The painful feelings, pleasant feelings, neutral feelings. All kinds of feelings. Like the body, there is a river of feelings. They are born, remain, and affect other aspects of our person. Are you taking care of your feelings? Your emotions? Our tendency is to run away. Breathing in, I am aware of my feeling. Breathing out, I calm my feeling. They are like a suffering baby and they have been left alone. We need to take care of this territory of feelings.  The third portion of our territory is perception. We perceive realities, we have an image of ourselves. That is a perception. We have an image of the other person, or other group of people. This is a perception. And very often they are wrong. And because of our wrong perceptions, we suffer very deeply. There are a lot of contradictions.  In the Buddhist tradition, the physical body is called a formation. Formation is a technical term that means anything that manifests based on conditions. For example, a flower. Our body is formation. Our feelings are also a kind of formation, but we call it a mental formation. The fourth element is mental formations. According to Buddhist psychology, we have defined 51 mental formations. And mindfulness is one of the mental formations; we should develop our mindfulness.  The fifth domain is called consciousness. Consciousness contains all the kind of seeds that can manifest into mental formations. It is like the soil keeping all the seeds and when the rain falls then mental formations manifest.  Reclaiming Our Sovereignty The territory of our person is very large. And if we don’t know how to bring peace into our territory, then we cannot help our brother or sister to do the same. To restore peace, it is the act of peace. And it is a collective effort. We are the king/queen that rules our territory, but we have not been very good at taking care of our territory. We have lost our sovereignty. We have to go home and rely upon our sangha to help us restore and reclaim our sovereignty. We have our in-breath and out-breath to support us in this endeavor. And when the quality of your breathing has improved, you can step into your body and channel the peace and harmony with your breathing. That is the practice.  Our society is organized in such a way that we’re encouraged to do the opposite of taking caring of ourselves. Television, magazines, etc. help us to run away from ourselves. When you don’t have anything to do, we often look for something to do. We are afraid of coming home to ourselves because we may encounter the war within ourselves. We have been running away. The buddhist practice helps us return to our kingdom without fear. With the energy of mindfulness of our sangha. We need the sangha. It is very difficult to do alone. The sangha can help us embrace our body, our feelings, our perceptions. The Buddha offers many concrete methods to restore peace and well-being.  The Energy of Mindfulness The energy of mindfulness has several functions. The first function is to be there for yourself. To help us produce our true presence. Through mindful breathing and mindful walking. This is the basic practice of Plum Village. The second function is to recognize what is there. What is there is your body, your feeling, etc.  And the third function of mindful is to embrace. Not fighting. Just embracing. The fruit of the practice depends on the strength of your mindfulness. If you practice well, then it will be enough to embrace your pain. This can bring about relief and calming. We can create an environment that is favorable for this practice.  Healing is not really coming from outside. It can come from the inside. It is inherent in our body and consciousness. Just like an animal is injured retreats to take care of the body. If we worry too much, then we make the situation worse. We need to rest. We can believe in the capacity of our body. This can also apply to our consciousness too. Every wound can be healed. Through tenderly embracing our pain in the body and in our feelings.  The next function of mindfulness is to look deeply. Look deeply into what? Our feelings, our perceptions. To identify the roots of our pain and our suffering. Our ill-being. Looking deeply into the nature of our anger, our pain, then we can see the kind of food we are using to feed them. This is related to consumption. And practicing mindful consumption is the way out. Nothing can survive without food. To know what to consume and what not to consume. Looking deeply requires concentration. Which then gives you insight to know what to do.  Practical Example: a feeling of despair.  Building a Sangha Thay shares of coming to the West and feeling all alone. I had to come to call for a cessation of war in Vietnam. And so he began to build a sangha to feel supported and not be alone. Building sangha is the most important task. Without a sangha, we cannot have refuge. Even if you are a teacher or a Buddha, you still need sangha. A group of people can change the course of history.  Peace and well-being always begins with yourself. Learn the methods from the sangha. Have faith in the practice. And you can feel peace and well-being. Coming together for three months is our opportunity to build brotherhood and sisterhood.  The next Buddha is Mr. Love. And will take the form of the sangha. The Five Skandhas working in harmony, that is a sangha. 

A 13-minute segment on the second door of liberation – signlessness. The talk takes place on August 17, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness and this is part three of a four-part series. Signlessness The second door of liberation. Sign here is the appearance. When we look deeply we have to see the nature of signlessness. The seed of corn has an appearance, we see it as a seed of corn. But when it grows, it no longer appears as a seed of corn. But the seed of corn is still there; it’s only changed how it appears.  Say you fall in love with a cloud. Thay helps us smile by recognizing our beloved cloud. It has not died. A cloud never dies. This too has been confirmed by scientists.  Piece of paper. Can you establish the birthdate of this sheet of paper? Was it at the paper mill? But the paper hasn’t come from nothing. Even if we burn the sheet of paper, it will continue. Being and non-being are just ideas. They do not apply to reality. These are conventional designations.  More examples. A drop of water falls from the sky. What happens? Does it become nothing? Before you were born. Were you there? Did you exist before the moment of conception? It is all a continuation. The same applies to “so called” death.  In the moment of great despair, great anguish, signlessness is there to rescue you.

A 15-minute segment on the Wisdom of Nondiscrimination. The talk takes place on August 17, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness and this is part one of a four-part series. The Wisdom of Nondiscrimination Togetherness is not possible without a kind of wisdom. The wisdom of non-discrimination. The practice of looking deeply helps remove our discrimination. Teaching on the umbilical cord. The art of being an expecting mother. Everything you do as a expecting mother, you do for your child. And the father is there to support. Even after the umbilical cord is cut, you are still linked very deeply with your parents. Even if we think are different person as we grow older. This is discrimination. And looking deeply we see are still linked. Non-discrimination. Teaching on Thay’s right hand. There is no inferiority and superiority between the two hands. Writing a poem. Hammering a nail. This is the wisdom of non-discrimination. Low self-esteem (inferiority) and high self-esteem (superiority). And even equality. In Buddhism, these three complexes are also a symptom of discrimination. If we have the wisdom of non-discrimination then we will not suffer. We inter-are.

We continue our series of posts with questions and answers. In this tenth post, we hear questions on the theme of sexual abuse in families. Earlier we had a question about transforming suffering from sexual misconduct at a community level. Now we have a question from several people about transforming this at an individual level and the family level. One person shared about being abused as a child and now as an adult, what can I do to help heal this scared little child who feels like the past is the present. Another person shared about sexual abuse in their family and I’m afraid for a new baby’s safety in our family.  The session takes place on August 16, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness.

We continue our series of posts with questions and answers. In this eighth post, we hear one question. Many of us experience chronic depression. Earlier in the retreat you talked about what is feeding that depression. For me, there is also an underlying biochemical component. Do you think I should not need medication and heal from the practice only? The session takes place on August 16, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness.

We continue our series of posts with questions and answers. In this sixth post, we hear one question. The session takes place on August 16, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness. Question about healing within my church community. A church leader who has acted inappropriately with sexual misconduct. The person is now gone, but we still need a healing process. Is that important even when some don’t want to or with people who didn’t even know the person?

We continue our series of posts with questions and answers. In this fourth post, we hear one question. The session takes place on August 16, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness. Aware of the suffering surrounding death. Are we forced to see our friends and loved ones as impersonal parts that will manifest in other ways or are we able to take comfort in the idea or notion that their energy will live on and are we attaching to them as a notion to much?

We continue our series of posts with questions and answers. In this second post, we hear three questions from children. The session takes place on August 16, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness. What do you do when someone is annoying you? Do you see your family much? How often do you travel in a year?

In this 95-minute talk we learn how to sit, how to practice with the love mantras, and how to practice insight in order to transform our suffering. The talk takes place on August 14, 2007 during the Stonehill College retreat during the U.S. Tour. The retreat theme is Mindfulness, Fearlessness, and Togetherness and this is the second dharma talk of the retreat. We begin with the monastics chanting The Four Recollections. Sitting on our Portable Lotus Flower 9:25 Thay leads us in a short guided meditation. To be alive is the greatest of all miracles. Please sit like a Buddha. Thay teaches us about the lotus (or half-lotus) position. Feeling solid and stable. This way of sitting influences the mind. We are sitting like a mountain. The solidity of the body has something to do with the solidity of the mind. It is like sitting on a lotus flower. What does this mean?  16:15 A story of the time Thay visited a prison in Maryland. Sitting with a few hundred inmates, we learned how to sit like a Buddha on a lotus flower. How to keep our back upright and to release tension. We also learned how to practice a mindful meal. This visit later became a book called Be Free Where You Are. 19:25 We describe the Buddha as an artist. Sitting on the lotus flower. As a friend of the buddha, it is nice to know how to sit like him. The Buddha is not a God. He was a human being. He did become a free, happy, enlightened person. The word Buddha is a title, not a name. Anyone can become a Buddha. Do you have a capacity to sit like a Buddha? What are the challenges we experience as students of the Buddha.  21:57 When Mr. Nelson Mandela came to visit France, he was asked what he’d like to do the most. He responded by saying, to sit down. To rest. Thay said we need some training in order to sit well. To do nothing. To be a Buddha is to allow freshness, solidity and peace to manifest in us. Sometimes we are very close to this. Almost a Buddha.  Love Mantras 25:13 When you love someone, the best thing you can offer them is your Buddhahood. To have a little Buddha as a present for our loved ones. In this moment, Thay is teaching this to the children present at the talk. The best kind of present is your beautiful presence. Our mindful sitting and walking can improve our presence. It just takes some practice.  29:02 In Buddhism, we sometimes practice a mantra. It is something that can help transform a situation. “Darling, I am here for you” You can practice with this. To love is to offer your fresh presence. And when you are truly there, you may notice something else is there – your beloved one, and the world. This mantra is the first step. Then you can say, “Darling, I know you are there and it makes me happy.” To acknowledge the presence of your loved one. To be loved is to be recognized. We are reminded that you don’t need to go to the meditation hall in order to practice. No matter how old you are, you can still practice these two mantras. Without love, happiness is not possible. What would it be like to have a million dollars? Would this make me happy? Allow me to do more? Would it bring happiness? What Thay has is mindfulness, and this can bring us a lot of happiness. When we have enough insight, we are not caught up in difficult situations anymore. This comes from our mindfulness and concentration. We come to this retreat to learn how to do things with mindfulness. To create love, understanding, and insight. This is the gift of the Buddha.  Contemplating the Body 38:59 In the previous talk, we were trying to learn just one thing – releasing the tension. The Buddha has much to teach us on healing. Every step we take can help us release the tension. Every breath that we take can help us release the tension. When we allow our body to relax, our body begins to have the capacity for healing itself. There are many ways to do this, such as deep relaxation practice. In the sutra on the contemplation of the body, the Buddha uses an example of farmer who went into the cellar and opened a bag of seeds. Thay teaches us this practice of scanning our body with a ray of mindfulness. How do use this practice? This practice will bring relieve. And if we know how to go a little bit further, into our ill-being, we may discover the roots of our ill-being. Looking deeply with concentration. What is the source of our ill-being. 47:18 In Buddhism, we teach the Four Noble Truths. And the first is ill-being, and we have to call it by its true name. Sickness, anger, fear, depressions, etc. To recognize it and to name it. From that we can see the second noble truth; the roots of that ill-being. We look at this truth in terms of nutriments. Nothing can survive without food. If we have fear or depression, it is because we have been feeding them. Just practicing this, you are already on the path of healing. If depression is there, perhaps we have lived in such a way to make that possible, we ask what did we consume? What kind of contact did we have? We look at the second noble truth in terms of nutriments. How do we practice with this in order to transform the depression? The fourth noble truth cannot be seen unless we first see the second noble truth. Do not run away from suffering so we can begin to see the path of healing in the fourth noble truth. The Buddha is a Human Being 54:30 The second noble truth is the path leading to ill-being. The path of consumption. The Buddha spoke of four kinds of nutriments: edible food, sensory impressions. What is the importance practicing mindful consumption? How can we do this in our daily lives? Why do we consume when we don’t need to consume?  1:01:04 Continuing from the previous talk, we look again at store and mind consciousness. When the seed of anxiety, fear, or confusion come up to our mind consciousness level then we feel uneasy. It makes us suffer. That is why we want to occupy the mind with another object (such as a film or a book). But this is a way to repress the feeling of uneasiness. To coverup the feeling of emptiness. We want to forget our suffering. The practice recommended by the Buddha, you should not try to suppress it with consumption, but invite the energy of mindfulness to manifest by mindful walking or mindful breathing. This can help take care of that energy that makes you suffer. We strengthen the seed of mindfulness through our daily practice so we can more easily apply it when we are suffering from fear, sorrow, despair. It is recognizing and embracing our suffering. The energy of mindfulness is something that can continue to grow inside of us. The Buddha is inside of you and you are capable of holding your pain, sorrow, and fear. We don’t need to practice consumption without mindfulness. We need to stop consuming toxins. We practice mindfulness to recognize and hold the pain and sorrow. That is the Buddha at work inside of you. The Buddha is a human being.  1:12:23 Those who of us who don’t practice, we practice repressing our fear and anger. We cause bad circulation of our psyche because we suppress the negative feelings. With this bad circulation, symptoms of mental illness appear. The practice is to allow the pain to emerge. And if we are equipped with mindfulness, then we are no longer afraid. If we are still young in the practice, we can ask for help from the sangha to help restore the circulation of our psyche. With some months of practice, we can do this on our own. To use our mindfulness and concentration to look into the nature of our ill-being. The path leading to the cessation of ill-being is also the path leading to well-being. This is third noble truth. The existence of well-being.  1:17:10 The beginning of well-being. This path is a noble path. Mindfulness always carry the energy of concentration. And if you live mindfully, then you can see through to the true nature of our suffering. This is insight meditation. It has the power to liberate. With this you can liberate yourself and you can help liberate other people.  1:20:09 Remembering the tsunami that hit Southeast Asia. All of us suffer. We ask why did this happen and why did so many people die? We want to know why. Thay also suffered, but by practicing looking deeply to see that we too have died with them also. And we discover they died for us and that we should live for them. How are we living today so their death will have a meaning? This is interbeing. This is insight. We are all of the nature to die. We are all of the nature to get sick. We need courage to have the strength of our mindfulness. How do we die with peacefulness? Nothing is born and nothing dies. There is no birth and no death. This insight can remove fear and true happiness is possible.  With our practice, we bring the element of non-fear. Thay teaches in light of climate change and the use of technology. 

The 2007 United States Tour began in August at Stonehill College in Easton, Massachusetts. In this 57-minute recording, we begin with Sr. Chan Khong offering a lovely orientation to the basic practice. Sister Chan Khong is one of Thich Nhat Hanh’s most senior student having met Thay in 1959 and then became one of the first members (the “Six Cedars”) of the Order of Interbeing. Following the sharing by Sr. Chan Khong, we continue with Brother Phap Tri. The date is August 12, 2007. Introduction During this retreat we want to learn the way the young man Siddhartha discovered the ultimate dimension of himself. If we can put this into practice, we can take the ultimate dimension within ourselves. How can everyone can touch that deep dimension of ourself? To help us to love.  Our body is here, but our mind is somewhere else. Our mind is not in the present moment. That is why we don’t see the ultimate dimension. The training he discovered is our breathing. This can bring our mind back to our body. That breathing is the link. During this week, we learn this training. Be aware of your in-breath and your out-breath.  The first part of Buddhist practice is samatha. Stopping. Doing this we can see deeply. We then use vipassana. If you look deeply, then it is very interesting. We can see the wonderful nature of the present moment. During our retreat, when we hear the bell then we stop and come back to the present moment.  Breathing  The practice is to be happy. Even if we have 30% of bad things, we also have 70% of good things. With our practice, we go back to the present moment all the time. In the present moment, we go deep into the positive things. Even our cell phone can be our bell of mindfulness. Sr. Chan Khong relates a story of a retreat at the Ojai Foundation that occurred during a fire. Many people were so upset by the helicopters and Thay reminded everyone that this too can be a bell of mindfulness. We come back to the present moment by following our breathing – this is not so easy, but we work toward stopping our thinking. Even when we are irritated. Any unfriendly noise can be transformed by following our breathing.  Sitting  Sitting meditation. How can we sit on the cushion, or the bench, or the chair? Chrysanthemum position – whatever position is most comfortable for you. The key is to sit in a stable position. What can we do with pain we experience during sitting meditation? If you are in pain, then you may be trying too hard. It is okay to change position. And we pay attention to our breathing as it goes in and out of our body. In the book, Blooming of the Lotus, there are simple exercises for following our breathing that build and expand upon the Buddha’s teachings on the Sixteen Exercises of Mindful Breathing.  Sister Chan Khong offers us one of these short exercises through a song. In. Out. Deep. Slow. Calm. Ease. Smile. Release. Present moment. Wonderful moment. We can use this song while practicing walking meditation.  By dwelling deeply in the present moment, we can all become enlightened during this retreat.

This is a 117-minute session of questions and answers with Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh in Hanoi during the “Engaged Buddhism in the 21st Century” retreat. The date is May 10, 2008 and the questions and answers are offered in English. Questions How would applied Buddhism look to the healthcare professional? (3:25) How do we deal with guilt? (8:07) My father cares about no-one and has no interest in life. He also has lots of anger. How can I help him? (17:50) A question on mindfulness of joy. Can you explain a little more about joy as it relates too attachment to the joy? (23:30) Experiencing suffering in not being able to conceive a child. (32:30) A question about medication and depression. In reference to what Thay taught in a previous talk. Sometimes there is also a physiological aspect to depression. Concern that Thay’s teaching may be misunderstood. Can you clarify? (41:24) Why does life exist? Why are we here? (56:33) As a young person, how can I use the practice and be able to share with other young people? Is there some more creative language that might speak more to young people? (1:00:00) How do we forgive someone whom we have never known intimately and have no way of communicating? For the suffering they have caused. (1:08:15) Having recently traveled in Laos and meeting many people impacted by the war and areas where unexploded ordinance remains. This caused anger and sadness to arise in me. Is this karma? Is this a time when we can be righteously angry? (1:16:03) There are young people who grow-up in a loving and supportive environment, but when they travel for university or work, they will face really negative pressure. This is a challenge. We should vaccinate our mind. Should we give children challenges so they are better prepared? (1:25:50) What is your intention with offering the Five Mindfulness Trainings? (1:35:30) Question about the 5th Mindfulness Training. This training watered by feeling of fear based on my upbringing as a Catholic. (1:45:30)

This is a 97-minute dharma talk from Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh in Hanoi during the “Engaged Buddhism in the 21st Century” retreat. This is the fourth talk on May 8, 2008 and the talk is offered in English. We begin with Thay offering a short guided meditation that encourages us to bring our attention to our father and mother inside of us.  There is a school of Buddhism called “Mind Only” and that school studies our mind in depth. Another name is “Manifestation Only” school. No birth and no death. We are not a creation, we are only a manifestation. What does Thay mean by “manifestation” and how is it present in our lives? Before things manifest themselves they can be conceived in the form of Seeds. Bija. When the seeds manifest themselves, they become dharma. Samskara. This teaching of manifestation only could be easily applied in our daily life. And this is part of the practice of engaged Buddhism. In work. In family. In the May 7 talk, we explored the 51 forms of mental formations. Seeds.  This is illustrated with the story of a young couple where the woman is pregnant with a child. Thay recalls her niece who was pregnant and how she used the Lotus Sutra to nourish her unborn child by reciting the sutra regularly.  In Buddhism, we learn that understanding is the foundation of love. How do we practice this within our families? We can adopt loving speech. Concrete examples of how to do this is offered. We learn of the “Peace Treaty” used in Plum Village. And of flower-watering, or selective watering. It can be practiced in on our own.  What is buddhanature? Do we all have buddhanature? Illustrated by a couple who lives in Paris. They are well to do and have been married a long time. But they are not happy. They do not know the art of selective watering. How language and loving speech can impact their relationship. The language of love.  We receive a lesson on writing a letter of love. Thay shares the story of giving the monastics a “homework” assignment to write a letter to their parents.  Conditions of happiness. We have more than enough conditions of happiness. The practice of mindfulness is very crucial. The Five Mantras. Darling, I know you are there and it makes me happy. A young man who suffered greatly because of his father — they were very rich but his father was not available to his son. His father was completely absorbed with his business. The young man asked for his father to present for him. Darling, I am here for you. That is what he was asking of his father. To love means to be there. Your presence.  True love. Overcoming pride. In Plum Village we have a formula, a practice, for overcoming anger. Asking for help. The fourth mantra.  The Buddha in your wallet.  Story of Mr. Trung from many centuries ago in Vietnam who had returned home after being gone in the army a long time. A tragedy of misunderstanding and miscommunication. Wrong perceptions. They did not know how to practice the fourth mantra.  After 9/11 Thay tried to get America to practice the fourth mantra. Only a few days after 9/11, Thay gave a talk on holding our anger in Berkeley, California. To help people to calm down. Collective anger and collective fear. This is very dangerous. We calm down first and then practice the fourth mantra.  Loving speech and deep listening is effective for anyone in relationship, including nations. This is engaged Buddhism.