Thich Nhat Hanh - Be Free Where You Are

Table of Contents

Being Peace

Breathe! You Are Alive: Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing

Call Me by My True Names

Calming the Fearful Mind: A Zen Response to Terrorism

The Energy of Prayer: How to Deepen Your Spiritual Practice

Freedom Wherever We Go: A Buddhist Monastic Code for the Twenty-first Century

Finding Our True Home: Living the Pure Land Here and Now

The Heart of Understanding

Interbeing: Fourteen Guidelines for Engaged Buddhism

Keeping the Peace: Mindfulness and Public Service

Joyfully Together: The Art of Building a Harmonious Community

The Long Road Turns to Joy: A Guide to Walking Meditation

Old Path White Clouds: Walking in the Footsteps of the Buddha

Opening the Heart of the Cosmos: Insights on the Lotus Sutra

The Path of Emancipation

Peace Begins Here: Palestinians and Israelis Listening to Each Other

Plum Village Chanting and Recitation Book

Present Moment Wonderful Moment

The Sun My Heart: From Mindfulness to Insight Concentration

Teachings on Love

Touching Peace: Practicing the Art of Mindful Living

Touching the Earth: Intimate Conversations with the Buddha

Transformation and Healing: Sutra on the Four Establishments of Mindfulness

Understanding Our Mind

I accompanied Thy Thich Nhat Hanh to the Maryland Correctional Institution at Hagerstown on October 16th, 1999, along with Pritam Singh, Brother William, and many other friends. In order for us to join the more than one hundred inmates that were waiting for us in the chapel, we had to pass through sixteen checkpoints. At one gate, a security guard confiscated a small tape recorder that I was carrying with me to record Thys talk. I stubbornly objected to his taking it from me, explaining to him that our teacher was getting old and I did not want to lose any of his Dharma talks. After a half an hour, he returned the recorder to me and we continued on. As it turns out, the correctional institutions recorder was not working, and it is thanks to my small tape recorder that this book, a transcription of the talk he gave to the inmates that day, is being made available to you.

During his talk, one of the things Thy explained to the inmates was how to eat mindfully and joyfully in the present moment, with awareness of everyone and everything around us. When lunchtime came and we all sat down together, I was surprised to see that our inmate friends, even after hearing Thys talk, still ate their food so quickly. Their habit energy was very strong. We had barely finished setting out the food for Thy when most of them had already finished their lunch! At first, I feared that they would not understand Thys teaching about mindful eating. However, as we started to eat, our inmate friends began to watch us as we mindfully enjoyed our food. They could see the joy and mindfulness with which Thy picked up each morsel of food, as well as the friendly looks that we gave them from time to time. I hoped that after having had a chance to witness Thy embody his teaching while he ate, they too might enjoy eating more mindfully in the future.

Later that day, an inmate who had spent thirty years in jail asked me what he could do to bring joy and peace into the world. Looking into his eyes, I could see that he was very sincere.

I turned to him and smiled. One of the best things that you could offer to the people around you, I said, is your way of being. You do not need to have money in your pocket or wait until you are out of jail to do something for the world. If you can practice dwelling peacefully in the present moment during the day, being mindful of whatever it is that you are doing, peace will radiate from you, and this will inspire the people around you.

Perhaps there is an inmate or a guard who acts aggressively towards you. If you can look with compassion at himwith kindness and loveand offer him a gentle smile, he will be receiving something very precious from you. When you understand the pain of those who cause you suffering and choose to let it go, forgiveness will come naturally, because compassion will be present. When it is necessary, you can be firm and strong, but never lose your kindness or your beauty.

I knew that doing this would not be easy for him without a Sangha, so I suggested: Why dont you form a small Sangha here? You can start by gathering two or three friends to discuss the practice that Thy has taught you today. Is it possible to do that during the religious service time?

My friends eyes grew brighter as he listened. It will not be as easy as it sounds, he replied, but I think it can be done.

Throughout the day the inmates showed a lot of interest in Thys talk and asked many questions. I am quite sure the teachings and answers given to prisoners can be applied to any one of usinside or outside the prison walls.

Sister Chn Khng
March 3, 2002

Dear Friends, I wrote the following poem during the war in Vietnam after the town of Ben Tre was bombed by the United States Air Force. Ben Tre is the hometown of my colleague, Sister Chn Khng. The U.S. forces destroyed the entire town because there were five or six guerrillas there. Later on, one officer declared that he had to bomb and destroy Ben Tre to save it from Communism. This poem is about anger.

I hold my face in my two hands.
No, I am not crying.
I hold my face in my two hands
to keep my loneliness warm
two hands protecting,
two hands nourishing,
two hands preventing
my soul from leaving me
in anger.

I was very angry. It was not just my anger, but the anger of a whole nation. Anger is a kind of energy that makes us and the people around us suffer. As a monk, when I get angry, I practice caring for my anger. I dont allow it to cause suffering or to destroy me. If you take care of your anger and are able to find relief, you will be able to live happily with much joy.

To take care of my anger I bring my attention to my breathing and look deeply inside myself. Right away I notice an energy there called anger. Then I recognize that I need another kind of energy to take care of this anger, and I invite that energy to come up to do that job. This second energy is called mindfulness. Every one of us has the seed of mindfulness within us. If we know how to touch that seed, we can begin to generate the energy of mindfulness, and with that energy, we can take good care of the energy of anger.

Mindfulness is a kind of energy that helps us to be aware of what is going on. Everyone is capable of being mindful. Those of us who practice daily have a greater capacity for being mindful than those who do not. Those who do not practice still have the seed of mindfulness, but its energy is very weak. By practicing just three days, the energy of mindfulness will already increase.

There can be mindfulness in anything you do. While you are drinking a cup of water, if you know that you are drinking water in that moment and you are not thinking of anything else, you are drinking mindfully. If you focus your whole being, body and mind, on the water, there is mindfulness and concentration, and the act of drinking may be described as mindful drinking. You drink not only with your mouth, but with your body and your consciousness, too. Everyone is capable of drinking his or her water mindfully. This is the way I was trained as a novice.