Living Deeply in Each Moment | Dharma Talk by Thich Nhat Hanh, 2013.12.22

Chanting of the Heart Sutra in English and the Three Refuges in French. Dharma Talk starts at 16:00. Please excuse us for the sound quality. This was a dharma talk live-streamed in year 2013.

We can get in touch with the wonders of life. Every time when we focus our attention on our breath and our steps, we produce a feeling of joy and peace. Our body is a wonder of life. There are so many wonders of life around us and inside of us. Sometimes we cannot be in touch with these wonders, because we are always running and looking for something else.

We do walking meditation because we like it. We enjoy every step. This is the same for sitting meditation. We do sitting meditation because we enjoy it. Sitting meditation can produce peace and joy.

Mindfulness reminds us that to be alive. To be able to walk on earth is a wonderful thing.

Many of us have spent our life searching for material comfort and affection. Many of us have a lot of material comfort but we are not happy. Many of us have someone who love us and understand us but yet we are not happy. Mindfulness helps us to appreciate what we have.

Time is precious. When we wake up, we know we have 24 brand new hours to live and this is a gift of life. We live deeply in each moment so that we don’t waste our life. May be we have wasted many days in anger, fear, jealousy. We haven’t made the best use of the time given to us to live. We may ask ourselves, “What have we done with our life?” “Is it possible to live in such a way that we have more peace, more joy, more happiness?”

With the practice of mindfulness, we may enjoy more of the time we have, have more peace and happiness, and be able to have other people suffer less.

In our modern time, everyone works very hard. We do not have time to take care of our body, our feelings, our emotions. We do not have enough peace and happiness in us. If you are not capable of taking care of yourself, how can you take care your beloved, your family?

(Dharma talk by Thay on 2013.12.22 in the Lower Hamlet of Plum Village France during the Winter Retreat 2013-4)