What Are You Waiting For?

The French have a song called: "Qu'est-ce qu'on Attend Pour Etre

Heureux?" (What are you waiting for to be happy?). When I practice

breathing in and 1 say, "I have arrived," that is an achievement. Now

I am fully present, one hundred percent alive. The present moment

has become my true home.

When I breathe out 1 say, "I am home!' If you do not feel you are

home, you will continue to run. And you will continue to be afraid.

But if you feel you are already home, then you do not need to run

anymore. This is the secret of the practice. When we live in the

present moment, it is possible to live in true happiness.

From: 'no death, no fear' Thich Nhat Hanh

“Drinking a cup of tea and the tea being drunk is a distinction that evaporates. Drinking a cup of tea becomes a direct and wondrous experience in which the distinction between subject and object no longer exists.”

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

“Waking up this morning I smile.

Twenty four brand new hours are before me.

I vow to live fully in each moment and

to look at all beings with eyes of compassion.”

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

When we come into contact with the other person, our thoughts and actions should express our mind of compassion, even if that person says and does things that are not easy to accept. We practice in this way until we see clearly that our love is not contingent upon the other person being lovable.

~ Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh

"Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts.

Smile, breath and go slowly."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

"Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child -- our own two eyes. All is a miracle.”

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

'The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching'

There is a story in Zen circles about a man and a horse. The horse is galloping quickly, and it appears that the man on the horse is going somewhere important. Another man, standing alongside the road, shouts, 'Where are you going?" and the first man replies, I don't know! Ask the horse!" This is also our story. We are riding a horse, we don't know where we are going, and we can't stop. The horse is our habit energy pulling us along, and we are powerless. We are always running, and it has become a habit. We struggle all the time, even during our sleep. We are at war within ourselves, and we can easily start a war with others.

We have to learn the art of stopping - stopping our thinking, our habit energies, our forgetfulness, the strong emotions that rule us. When an emotion rushes through us like a storm, we have no peace. We turn on the TV and then we turn it off. We pick up a book and then we put it down. How can we stop this state of agitation? How can we stop our fear, despair, anger, and craving? We can stop by practicing mindful breathing, mindful walking, mindful smiling, and deep looking in order to understand. When we are mindful, touching deeply the present moment, the fruits are always understanding, acceptance, love, and the desire to relieve suffering and bring joy.

But our habit energies are often stronger than our volition.  We say and do things we don't want to and afterwards we regret it. We make ourselves and others suffer, and we bring about a lot of damage. We may vow not to do it again, but we do it again. Why? Because our habit energies (vashana) push us.

We need the energy of mindfulness to recognize and be present with our habit energy in order to stop this course of destruction. With mindfulness, we have the capacity to recognize the habit energy every time it manifests. "Hello, my habit energy, I  know you are there!" If we just smile to it, it will lose much of its strength. Mindfulness is the energy that allows us to recognize our habit energy and prevent it from dominating us.

"The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence.  When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

"Through my love for you, I want to express my love for the whole cosmos, the whole of humanity, and all beings. By living with you, I want to learn to love everyone and all species. If I succeed in loving you, I will be able to love everyone and all species on Earth... This is the real message of love."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

"The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching"

"When the six senses and their objects make contact, this contact gives rise to a pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral feeling. When a bodhisattva sees a child suffering, she knows how it feels to suffer, and she also has an unpleasant feeling.  But

because of that suffering, concern and compassion arise within her and she is determined to act.  Bodhisattvas suffer like the rest of us, but in a bodhisattva, feelings do not give rise to craving or aversion. They give rise to concern, the desire and

willingness to stay in the midst of suffering and confusion, and act. "When a bodhisattva sees a beautiful flower, she recognizes that the flower is beautiful.  But she also sees the nature of impermanence in the flower. That is why there is no attachment. She has a pleasant feeling, but it does not create an internal formation. Emancipation does not mean that she suppresses all feelings. When she comes into contact with hot water, she knows it is hot. Feelings are normal. In fact,

these feelings help her dwell in happiness, not the kind of happiness that is subject to sorrow and anxiety, but

the kind of happiness that nourishes."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Thich Nhat Hanh

Begin with Yourself

This is from: 'Anger - Buddhist Wisdom for Cooling the Flames'

Without communication, no real understanding can be possible. But be sure that you can communicate with yourself first. If you cannot communicate with yourself, how do you expect to communicate with another person? Love is the same. If you don't love yourself, you cannot love someone else. If you cannot accept yourself, if you cannot treat yourself with kindness, you cannot do this for another person.

Very often you behave exactly like your father, but you don't realize it. And though you behave like him, you feel you are total opposites. You do not accept him, you hate him. When you do not accept your father, you do not accept yourself. Your father is in you; you are the continuation of your father. So if you can communicate with yourself, then you can

communicate with your father.

The self is made of non-self elements; therefore, understanding ourselves is our practice. Our father is a non-self element. We say our father is not us, but without our father, we cannot exist. So, he is fully present in our body and in our mind. He is us. Thus, if you understand yourself, your whole self, you understand that you are your father, he is not outside of you.

There are so many other non-self elements that you can touch and recognize within yourself- your ancestors, the earth, the sun, water, air, all the food you eat, and much more. It may seem like these things are separate from you, but without them, you could not live.

Suppose two warring parties want to negotiate, and both sides do not know enough about themselves. You have to really know yourself, your country, your party, your situation, in order to understand the others party, the other's nation, the other's people. Self and others are not two separate things, because the suffering, hope, and anger of both sides is very much the same.

When we get angry, we suffer. If you really understand that, you also will be able to understand that when the other person is angry, it means that she is suffering. When someone insults you or behaves violently towards you, you have to be intelligent enough to see that the person suffers from his own violence and anger. But we tend to forget. We think that we are the only one that suffers, and the other person is our oppressor. This is enough to make anger arise, and to strengthen our desire to punish. We want to punish the other person because we suffer. Then, we have anger in us; we have violence in us, just as they do. When we see that our suffering and anger are no different from their suffering and anger, we will behave more compassionately. So understanding the other is understanding yourself and understanding yourself is understanding the other person. Everything must begin with you.

To understand ourselves, we must learn and practice the way of non-duality. We should not fight our anger, because anger is our self a part of our self Anger is of an organic nature, like love. We have to take good care of anger. And because it is an organic entity, an organic phenomenon, it is possible to transform it into another organic entity. The garbage can be transformed back into compost, into lettuce, and into cucumber. So don't despise your anger. Don't fight your anger, and don't suppress your anger. Learn the tender way of taking care of your anger, and transform it into the energy of

understanding and compassion.

"Feelings, whether of compassion or irritation, should be welcomed, recognized, and treated on an absolutely equal basis; because both are ourselves. The tangerine I am eating is me. The mustard greens I am planting are me. I plant with all my heart and mind. I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath. Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

The Miracle of Mindfulness

"When you touch everything with deep awarenss, you touch everything."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

From: Touching Peace