Quotes from Thich Nhat Hanh

What is essential is to train to sit quietly and mindfully. The more you train yourself, the more you can reach the deeper aspect of what you are thinking and feeling. You might think: I'm bored! This is stupid. I need to do something else right this minute. There may be old habits and old stories that are creating those thoughts and those feelings. What is getting in the way of your being able to experience the present moment? Keep breathing. Keep sitting. This is the practice.

Men cannot be our enemies--even men called Vietcong! If we kill men, what brothers will we have left? With whom shall we live then?

We know where we want to go, and we are very directed in getting there. This may be useful, but often we forget to enjoy ourselves along the route. There is a word in Buddhism that means "wishlessness" or "aimlessness." The idea is that you do not put something in front of you and run after it, because everything is already here, in yourself.

French philosopher Henri Bergson called élan vital. Like all species, we have a will to live and a strong desire to cling to and protect our life and to defend ourselves from danger. But we have to be cautious not to let our instinct of self-preservation and auto-defense mislead us into thinking we have a separate self.

We need to not only recognize the suffering, pain, and difficulties within us, we need to devote time to dealing with them and transforming them

La respiración consciente es la clave para reunificar cuerpo y mente y llevar la energía de la atención plena a cada instante de tu vida.

Many practitioners are inclined to think that sitting in meditation is a means for obtaining Awakening, which would thus be an end. However, a line of demarcation between the end and the means cannot truly be established. When we turn from forgetfulness to awareness of being, this state is already true Awakening. This is why the Ts'ao-t'ung [Soto] sect has said, To sit in meditation is to be Buddha. When one truly sits in meditation, one finds oneself Awakened; and Awakening is Buddha himself.

If we know how to create a moment of happiness, we get to enjoy that happiness ourselves, and we can also double it by sharing it with another person. That is the art of happiness, tasting and delighting in the little happinesses of daily life.

We can learn many practices to lessen our sadness and our suffering, but the cream of enlightened wisdom is the insight of no birth, no death.

Once a seed has been burnt, it cannot sprout anymore. If we are able to burn up the seeds of grief, sexual desire, and hatred, they will not sprout again.

To connect with others, however, we first have to be willing to look deeply into ourselves.

Avalokiteshvara means "the one who listens deeply to the sounds of the world.

Ignorance is in each cell of our body and our consciousness. It's like a drop of ink diffused in a glass of water. That ignorance stops us from seeing reality; it pushes us to do foolish things that make us suffer even more

Concentration, samadhi in Sanskrit, is a powerful force that you can generate to make a breakthrough, to see clearly what is there and understand its true nature.

To sit with only the intention of finding the meaning of a kung-an [koan] is not truly to sit in Zen; it is to spend one's time and one's life vainly. If one sits in meditation it is not in order to reflect on a kung-an, but in order to light the lamp of one's true being; the meaning of the kung-an will be revealed quite naturally in this light which becomes more and more brilliant.

Without understanding, your love is not true love. You must look deeply in order to see and understand the needs, aspirations, and suffering of the one you love.

The mind tends to dart from one thing to another, like a monkey swinging from branch to branch without stopping to rest.

Before you do the work of reconciliation with another, you need to restore communication with yourself.

Th?u hi?u ná»—i Ä'au c?a ng??i khác là món quà to lá»›n nh?t mà b?n có th? trao t?ng h?. Th?u hi?u là tên g?i khác c?a yêu thÆ°Æ¡ng. N?u b?n không th? th?u hi?u, thì b?n ch?ng th? yêu thÆ°Æ¡ng

The kung-an is the lamp-shade, while Zen is the lamp itself.

The home of the deer is the countryside, the home of the birds is the sky, the home of all phenomena is the mind; the mind contains everything that is.

It does not take more than one thoughtless phrase to hurt someone.

If we do not have peace and joy right now, when will we have peace and joy—tomorrow, or after tomorrow?

That's why at the start of each meal, we should remind ourselves to eat only our food and not our thoughts. We practice giving all our attention to eating. There's no thinking; we just bring our awareness to the food and to the people around us.