Thich Nhat Hanh - The Sun My Heart

The monk who taught the world mindfulness.

TIME

Thich Nhat Hanh shows us the connection between personal inner peace and peace on earth.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Thich Nhat Hanh is a holy man, for he is humble and devout. He is a scholar of immense intellectual capacity. His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Sun My Heart first came into my hands over three decades ago, and it is still my most cherished book by Thich Nhat Hanh. Ever again it brings the freshness of morning, a luminous, clear-eyed sanity at the core of the Dharma. Here is born the courage to embrace our suffering world, which has grounded and guided me through the years.

Joanna Macy, author of A Wild Love for the World: Joanna Macy and the Work of Our Time

Thich Nhat Hanhs work, on and off the page, has proven to be the antidote to our modern pain and sorrows. Here is a monumental, life-giving mind, preserved as textual force. And that's what I feel reading and practicing his teachings: that I am being acted on by a compassion equal to and pervasive as gravity itself. His books help me be more human, more me than I was before.

Ocean Vuong, author of On Earth Were Briefly Gorgeous

Thich Nhat Hanh is a great teacher. I have studied him, his work, his passage through life, with gratitude and joy. Through his writings, his public offerings, his insights, Ive gained vision and clarity; Ive often felt it would be impossible to find a more lucid, determined, and courageous soul.

Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple

Thich Nhat Hanh is among the most revered leaders in the world. His teachings and mindfulness practices have deeply influenced my journey through life. He is a torch of wisdom lighting the path ahead, generating the compassion, love, and understanding we need to create peace for ourselves and the world.

Marc Benioff, chair and CEO, Salesforce

Thich Nhat Hanh does not merely teach peace; Thich Nhat Hanh is peace.

Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love

Thich Nhat Hanh's words are like water. Simple, pure, transparent, and absolutely indispensable for life.

Alejandro Gonzlez Irritu, director of Birdman and The Revenant

How is it that a Vietnamese Buddhist monk who teaches mindfulness could inspire Martin Luther King and become one of the great nonviolent activists of the twenty-first century? Like no other teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh shows us the revolutionary possibilities of building social movements based on compassion, for both ourselves and others.

Professor john a. powell, director of the Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley

I first met Thich Nhat Hanh in 1968 in Paris. That was the time of rising counterculture, protest against the Vietnam War and student uprising. At that time his presence in Paris was like a soothing rain in dry heat. Ever since, for more than fifty years, he has been the conscience of humanity. He has been a compassionate catalyst of spiritual awakening, social harmony, and ecological awareness. He has nurtured the human spirit with dedication, determination, and delight. He is humble and gentle yet powerfully persuasive and strong-willed. It has been a joy of my life to know him and follow his teachings.

Satish Kumar, editor emeritus of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine and founder of Schumacher College

Parallax Press

PO Box 7355

Berkeley, California 94707

www.parallax.org

Parallax Press is the publishing division of the Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism, Inc.

Copyright 1988, 2006, 2020 by the Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism, Inc.

All rights reserved

Printed in Canada on 100% postconsumer recycled paper

Translated from the Vietnamese by Anh-Huong Nguyen, Elin Sand, and Annabel Laity

Thanks to Tyrone Cashman, Roger Jones, Brit Pyland, Sara Norwood, and Tom Ginsberg

Cover and text design by Katie Eberle

Composition by Happenstance Type-O-Rama

Cover art by Atelier Atelier

ISBN: 978-1-946764-70-6

LCCN: 2020029160

I first came across Thich Nhat Hanhs teachings in 2013, when I was leading the international climate change negotiations and was suddenly dropped into the deepest personal crisis I have ever had. I found myself standing on the sharp abyss of emotional agony, and yet was conscious of the fact that I could not abdicate my responsibility of holding the global reins of what eventually became the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change. My heart had shrivelled to nothingness, but my head had to vehemently push forward to converge the efforts of 195 governments and thousands of stakeholders representing the global economy into one ambitious legal agreement.

Universal causes and conditions aligned to get me to the European Institute of Applied Buddhism in Germany, which I had never even heard of before. That is where I started my study of Thays teachings. Slowly but surely, I began to understand the deep art of transforming pain into learning, and eventually into gratitude and grace. No mud, no lotus. Not an easy journey, but the one that liberates us. I later started to frequent the beautiful Plum Village, Thays main monastery in southwest France. Several Brothers and Sisters lovingly took me under their wing, sharing Dharma light in moments of despair and darkness. Today I continue to walk in Thays footsteps, witnessing, in his words, how The tears that I shed yesterday have become rain, upon my own inner soil and how they are watering my seeds of love, compassion, and peace.

It has always been important to water the seeds of love and peace, but perhaps now with ever more intensified purpose. We find ourselves at a historically unprecedented convergence of global crises. The chronic climate change crisis, the biodiversity crisis, and the inequality crisis have all been lingering at our doorstep for decades. And now they have all converged upon each other, exacerbating their potential destructive impact on all living beings. However, the convergence of the crises is at the same time an opportunity for us to see beyond the evident obstacles in order to converge our deeper understanding of the way forward.

Thays timeless handwritten book The Sun My Heart is being republished in 2020, a year unquestionably unique in human history. It was intended to be the year in which critical steps on climate change and biodiversity would be taken. Instead, the COVID-19 pandemic has swept across the world, forcing the Great Pause. The world has stopped its pounding busyness and millions have been confined to their homes for months. Home, work, and school have lost their rhythm, and travel has lost its meaning. All manner of forms and structures have been lifted, suspended in a timeless unknown of uncertain evolution.

We are in a fertile suspension that already contains the seeds of everything that will become. While it seems that the outside world has paused, it is actually only the constant compulsion to rush forward that is suspended, opening bountiful space and time for deeper wakefulness. It is precisely in this fecundity of potential that Thays writings bid us to peaceful and heart-filled presence. As many of our sense windows are closed, it is a fortuitous moment for us to pause our mental compulsions and look attentively inside, exploring the bounty of our mindful awareness.