Remembering Thich Nhat Hanh
/
Image by Gráinne Schäfer
The Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh died on January 22, 2022, at his home in Vietnam. He was 95 years old. His books include The Miracle of Mindfulness and Being Peace and The Long Road Turns to Joy: A Guide to Walking Meditation. He led the Buddhist delegation to the Paris Peace Talks in 1969, and Martin Luther King, Jr. nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Here are quotes from Thich Nhat Hanh taken from an interview by Krista Tippett for the On Being Project during a retreat held in Wisconsin, USA, in 2003.
On Mindfulness:
True mindfulness means your mind is fully present in the here and the now… And mindfulness and concentration help you to see things and to touch things more deeply, so that you might understand the true nature of what is there.
You can get in touch with the wonders of life that can nourish you and heal you. And you are stronger, you are more solid in order to handle the suffering inside of you and around you. When you are mindful, you can recognise, embrace, and handle the pain, the sorrow in you and around you, to bring you relief. And if you continue with concentration and insight, you’ll be able to transform the suffering inside and help transform the suffering around you.
When you breathe in, your mind comes back to your body. And then you become fully aware that you are alive, that you are a miracle, and everything you touch could be a miracle. The orange in your hand, the blue sky, the face of a child — everything becomes a wonder. And in fact, they are wonders of life that are available in the here and the now. And you need to breathe mindfully, in and out, in order to be fully present and to get in touch with all these things.
On Suffering:
(With mindfulness) … you understand the nature of the suffering, you know that role of that suffering plays in life, and you are not trying to run away from suffering anymore, and you know how to make use of suffering in order to build peace and happiness.
It’s like growing lotus flowers. You cannot grow lotus flowers on marble; you have to grow them on the mud. Without mud, you cannot have a lotus flower. Without suffering, you have no ways in order to learn how to be understanding and compassionate. That’s why my definition of the Kingdom of God is not a place where suffering is not; where there is no suffering.
I could not like to go to a place where there is no suffering. I could not like to send my children to a place where there is no suffering, because in such a place they have no ways to learn how to be understanding and compassionate. And the Kingdom of God is a place where there is understanding and compassion; and therefore, suffering should exist.
And suffering and happiness, they are both organic, like a flower and garbage. If the flower is on her way to become a piece of garbage, the garbage can be on her way to becoming a flower. That is why you are not afraid of garbage.
I think we have suffered a lot during the 20th century. We have created a lot of garbage. There was a lot of violence and hatred and separation. And … we don’t know how to handle the garbage that we have created, and then we would have a chance to create a new century for peace. That is why now it’s very important for us to learn how to transform the garbage we have created into flowers.
Peace always begins with yourself as an individual, and as an individual, you may help building a community of peace. That’s what we try to do.
On Anger:
Tippett: I’m wondering if, by way of bringing this back to you and the practice and how you know the practice, if you would read this poem, “For Warmth,” and talk about how you think about anger and how one lives with anger. Being mindful doesn’t take away all these emotions, right, these human emotions.
Thich Nhat Hanh: We have to remain human in order to be able to understand and to be compassionate. You have the right to be angry, but you don’t have the right not to practice in order to transform your anger. You have the right to make mistakes, but you don’t have the right to continue making mistakes. You have to learn from your mistakes.
“For Warmth,”
I wrote this poem after I hear the news that the city of Ben Tre was bombed, and an American army officer declared that he had to destroy the town in order to save the town. It was very shocking to us. In fact, there were a number of guerrillas who came to the town and would use anti-aircraft gun to shoot. And because of that, they bombarded the town and killed so many civilians.
“I hold my face between my hands.
No, I am not crying.
I hold my face between my hands
to keep my loneliness warm —
two hands protecting,
two hands nourishing,
two hands to prevent
my soul from leaving me
in anger.”
When you notice that anger is coming up in you, you have to practice mindful breathing in order to generate the energy of mindfulness, in order to recognize your anger and embrace it tenderly so that you can bring relief into you and not to act and to say things that can destroy, that can be destructive. And doing so, you can look deeply into the nature of your anger and know where it has come from.
On Compassion:
Tippett: I look at you and I also see that you view the world through the eyes of compassion, which is another term you use, and that I see the weight of that on you, that it is also a burden to look at the world straight and to see suffering and to see the sources of suffering wherever you look.
Thich Nhat Hanh: When you have compassion in your heart, you suffer much less. And you are in a situation to be and to do something to help others to suffer less. This is the truth. So, to practice in such a way that brings compassion into your heart is very important. A person without compassion cannot be a happy person. And compassion is something that is possible only when you have understanding. Understanding brings compassion. Understanding is compassion itself. When you understand the difficulties, the suffering, the despair of the other person, you don’t hate him, you don’t hate her anymore.
When you practice looking at people with the eyes of compassion, that kind of practice will become a good habit, and you are capable of looking at the people in such a way that you can see the suffering, the difficulties. And if you can see, and then compassion will naturally flow from your heart. It’s for your sake, and that is for their sake, also. In The Lotus Sutra, there is a wonderful, five-word sentence: “Looking at living beings with the eyes of compassion.” And that brings you happiness. That brings relief into the world. And this practice can be done by every one of us.
The interview with Thich Nhat Hanh can be found at the On Being Podcast.
Books by Thich Nhat Hanh:
The Miracle of Mindfulness
Being Peace
The Long Road Turns to Joy: A Guide to Walking Meditation
Practice Piece: Hugging Meditation
Thich Nhat Hanh was the founder of the International Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism.
One of Thich Nhat Hanh’s powerful practices of connection – the hugging meditation - brings together the conscious breathing of Eastern practices and the heartful embrace of Western practices. We can mindfully hug anyone who is willing, or a tree, and indeed ourselves. The hugging meditation described on the Plum Village website* describes the simple steps we can follow:
In recognising each other’s present, we can bow in acknowledgement
We take three deep conscious breaths, mindfully bringing ourselves into the present moment
We extend our arms and embrace the other - wholly in mind, body, and heart - for three inbreaths… three outbreaths
We tune into the experience of hugging, conscious of our breathing and the connection between two living beings in this moment
Breathing in… I know my loved one is in my arms, alive… Breathing out… my loved one is so precious to me
Breathing in… my loved one is here with me in this moment …Breathing out…I am grateful for their presence
Breathing in… we are here, alive on this earth together… Breathing out … I am joyful and happy
In releasing from our embrace, we can bow to each other, allowing them to become more real and alive to us
Whether we come together in joyful greeting, extending compassion, or seeking forgiveness, the hugging meditation allows us to be truly and deeply present to the living being we hold in our arms.
This article originally appeared in the CMA newsletter. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.