Nhat Hanh
Nhat Hanh
Thích Nhất Hạnh; born as Nguyen Xuan Bao on October 11, 1926) is a Vietnamese Buddhist monk and peace activist. He lives in Plum Village in the Dordogne region in the south of France, travelling internationally to give retreats and talks. He coined the term "Engaged Buddhism" in his book Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of Fire. A long-term exile, he was given permission to make his first return trip to Vietnam in 2005...
NationalityVietnamese
ProfessionActivist
Date of Birth11 October 1926
CountryVietnam
In us, there is a river of feelings, in which every drop of water is a different feeling, and each feeling relies on all the others for its existence. To observe it, we just sit on the bank of the river and identify each feeling as it surfaces, flows by, and disappears.
At first glance, that might seem a little silly: why put so much stress on a simple thing? But that's precisely the point.
There's no way I can be tossed around like a bottle slapped here and there on the waves.
Look deeply; I arrive in every second to be a bud on a spring branch ... to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.
If we can not smile, we cannot help other people to smile.
I am you and you are me; it is obvious we inter-are.
In the mountains of wisdom no climbing is in vain.
You are like fireworks. You go out into your children, your friends, your society, and the whole world.
Breath is aligned with both body and mind and it alone can bring them together.
Leaves are usually looked upon as the children of the tree. Yes, they are children of the tree, born from the tree, but they are also mothers of the tree. The leaves combine raw sap, water, and minerals, with sunshine and gas, and convert it into a variegated sap that can nourish the tree. In this way, the leaves become the mother of the tree. We are all children of society, but we are also mothers. We have to nourish society. If we are uprooted from society, we can not trasform it into a more liveable place for us and our children.
When reality is perceived in its nature of ultimate perfection, the practitioner has reached a level of wisdom called non-discrimination mind - a wondrous communion in which there is no longer any distinction made between subject and object.
Happiness is not an individual matter. When you are able to bring relief, or bring back the smile to one person, not only that person profits, but you also profit.
Doubt in my tradition is something that is very helpful. Because of doubt, you can thirst more and you will get a higher kind of proof.
In order to rally people, governments need enemies... if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us.