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Brother Pháp Hữu’s name means “Dharma friend”. In this live talk, the first of our 3-month Autumn Rains Retreat, Brother Pháp Hữu speaks to us about how to be a true friend, and how to live in harmony with those around us in our family and community. He shares that as monks and nuns in the monastic community, we learn how to live as a drop of water flowing with the river of the community. He reminds us that every drop of water is important: the elders at the front show the way, but the young drops also offer their fresh energy from behind to help the river move forward. Brother Pháp Hữu shares several intimate and funny stories about his time as an attendant of Thầy (Thich Nhat Hanh) and as a young vice-abbott and abbott of Upper Hamlet. We learn about Thầy’s work to renew Buddhism, to make it simpler and more relevant to our times– and why Thầy says the work is not done. And from Brother Pháp Hữu’s story about being a vice-abbott at the age of only 20, we learn the importance of mindful breathing to develop our solidity, whether we are leading an important meeting or simply being there for ourselves or offering our presence for our loved ones.

What actions can we take to help bring about healing within ourselves and around us? How do we regain our sovereignty in moments of difficulty? (5:05 – ~10:00) Do we see a craving inside of ourselves for normalcy? How can we take this moment as an opportunity to realign our sense of ‘normal’? (12:50 – ~18:00) Sister Lang Nghiem shares her own experiences, challenges, and practice living in community in recent months, and offers us several models for acting with insight, compassion, and courage, especially in times of turbulence, uncertainty, and challenge. She shares about each of the five bodhisattvas represented in a sutra called “Invoking the Bodhisattva’s Names”. (Introduction at 25:30, Invocation begins at 33:00 ) The Bodhisattvas embody energies present in each of us, which we can cultivate and call up in the midst of the challenges of our daily life: Compassion– Avalokiteshvara Understanding– Manjushri Action– Samantabhadra Aspiration– Kshitigarba Reverence — Sadhaparibhuta You can support us by: – donating: https://plumvillage.org/support – helping to caption & translate: https://amara.org/en/profiles/videos/plumvillage/ or http://www.youtube.com/timedtext_cs_panel?tab=2&c=UCcv7KJIAsiddB2YRegvrF7g Help us caption & translate this video! https://amara.org/v/C13qA/

How do we engage with the present moment with both clear-eyed awareness and open-hearted kindness? What kind of mindfulness practice brings us understanding, and has the capacity to relieve suffering in ourselves and others? Brother Hue Truc playfully refers to his talk as a User Manual for mindfulness practice, with a long Troubleshooting section. At the same time, he says, all that practical guidance is offered with acknowledgment of the mystery and uncertainties we meet along the journey to understanding, and an invitation to relate to our experience with openness, curiosity, and responsive flexibility. Brother Hue Truc structures his talk along the lines of the Four Establishments of Mindfulness taught by the Buddha in the foundational “Sattipatthana Sutra”. With humility and kindness, he describes his own experiences and challenges as he has practiced mindfulness, and some of the questions and trainings that he uses to anchor and direct himself. “What is practice and what is not?” “Where does this state of mind lead?” “How does this feel?” He invites us to be aware both of the felt experience of the moment, and how we are relating to it. He shares that when he pays attention to what is right in front of him, and allows himself to feel it, his body and mind seem to learn from such experience, even if that learning is subconscious. Therefore much of our work as practitioners is to take care of our mental attitude, continually returning to kindness, openness, and responsiveness to what we find– and trusting in the capacity of our own mind and body to learn. “How do I come in contact with this experience in this moment, allow it to be, and learn something out of it?”

Brother Ngo Khong shares about habit energies, strong emotions and how to transform them.

“Even if you don’t call yourself an environmentalist but you take good care of your body, then you are taking good care of Mother Earth. Some people say that they lose trust in their body when they become sick, but I gain trust in my body when I become sick. It is a chance for me to come back and look deeply into my body. Now we are going through a pandemic, which certainly has something to do with how we are living on the Earth. Will we change the way we live on the Earth?” Sr. Chân Đức speaks about accepting unpleasant feelings as part of life, how everything is always in a wondrous state of change, and how we can practice in moments of uncertainty to see that we already have more than enough conditions to be happy.

These days, our attention is focused on the tightening restrictions to our daily lives, or on the people working the frontlines and putting their lives at risk. In doing so, we have forgotten another life-changing event that is about to happen for teenagers across the country, and around the world: high school graduation. In this talk, we explore how – even in the midst of great uncertainty and upheaval – you can still be the people you planned to be after graduating – you can still change the world for the better. There are new ways, undiscovered ways, to implement the diplomas you will soon receive. And you don’t have to walk across a stage to get your diploma, or dance it out at prom to feel the culmination of growing up together. There are ways that you can shine that you may not have anticipated, and society itself didn’t see coming – but now is the time to shine brightly and for the benefit of everyone around you. You as a generation have been through crisis not once but many times. In fact, you are already strong – stronger than you think you are. And this moment is an opportunity to build on that strength that is already a part of you, to add to it a soft and kind-hearted awareness that this is a new kind of togetherness that we now have the opportunity to embrace. History will remember you as heroes or sheroes for your strength and resilience, for cherishing what is most important and making a future possible.

This talk was given to a monastic audience on a day of mindfulness closed due to coronavirus. Guided meditation from Joanna Macy’s “World as Lover, World as Self”.