Dear Sangha,

Last year in January, I had the opportunity to facilitate and talk about the beginning of a new year as a chance for renewal and hope. I felt it was important to try to be optimistic and open.

As we enter 2024, I find myself much more anxious and worried about so much in my personal/family life, my career and most importantly the despairing state of the world. My anxiety has been, for the first time, affecting my health and well-being. And I’m surrounded by friends, family members and colleagues who are also suffering from stress, anxiety and fear.

So I started to research Thich Nhat Hanh’s (Thầy) writings on anxiety and worrying. As usual, he has much to say, which I found to be very helpful.

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet Monday evening in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW) from 7-8:30PM EST, Wednesday morning online from 7-8AM, and Friday online from 12-1PM EST.

On Monday we will enjoy a guided meditation on letting go of anything we don’t want to carry into the new year, and setting our mindful intentions for 2024. Our meditation will serve as a gentle guide in aligning our intentions with actions and embracing positive changes in our lives.

The new year often brings lots of resolutions, goals, and aspirations – a natural response to the chance for a new beginning. Yet, in the rush to change or improve our lives, we might lose sight of the profound beauty and completeness of the present moment.

Dear friends,

This week we will meet Monday from 7-8:30PM EST online, Wednesday morning from 7-8AM in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday 12-1PM EST in person.

Susie will facilitate on Monday evening, December 25.

Please join us as we read the Five Mindfulness Trainings together with a focus on the fifth mindfulness training - Nourishment and Healing.

We have a line item in our family budget for drinking. We don’t call it “drinking”, we call it “food & beverage”. In January of this year, I was sipping an expensive wine at a Georgetown restaurant with a large group of our best friends. Something hit me partway through the meal, something Godlike and undeniable. I had to close my eyes and be with this feeling. Something was telling me this was wrong for my body. I could hear my friends around me having a great time, and when they noticed my eyes were closed, I heard their questions to me, “Susie, are you ok?” “Is she ok? I don’t know.” etc. I held up my hand in a “wait” motion. I just needed to sit with this and hear what I needed to hear. After a couple of moments, I opened my eyes, and didn’t take another sip. I got sick later that evening and felt much better physically, but thought about all that money we just spent on the lovely food and the wine. Is there a line item for that?

Dear friends, This week Annie and Andy will co-facilitate and we will meet Monday evening in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW) from 7-8:30PM EST, Wednesday morning online from 7-8AM, and Friday online from 12-1PM EST.

We will reflect on one of the central understandings of Thich Nhat Hanh’s (Thay) teachings, Interbeing. This is a word that Thay created to reflect his insight that nothing can exist by itself. We depend upon everything else to be, or rather, to interbe.

This simple - but not easy - insight is the foundation for our practice. If we really know that we are a single cell in the cosmos, not a separate and lonely creature, we will live with more ease and feel greater belonging to all of life. Knowing that we interare releases our need to run after external things because we realize that we already have, and in fact are, everything we need.

Dear Thay, dear friends,

This week we will meet Monday from 7-8:30PM EST online, Wednesday morning from 7-8AM in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday 12-1PM EST online.

Marie will facilitate on Monday evening.

Over the last few months, I’ve been struck by the power of sangha. I had a health crisis, and while I didn’t attend sangha in traditional ways (meaning in body or via Zoom), that didn’t matter. I felt held and supported. I did not practice sitting or walking meditation, and that didn’t matter either. I knew the sangha body was practicing, at our sangha and at other sanghas. I rested into the hammock of this knowing, and oh did that feel good!

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet Monday from 7-8:30PM EST in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM EST online, and Friday 12-1PM EST online.

This is a newcomer’s week, so if you want a little extra instruction or to ask a question, please meet Annie at the OHMC meditation space at 6:15 PM. Sign up here

We will explore one of the basic practices taught by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) and one at the heart of Plum Village life – slowing down. In this upcoming holiday season, we may be pushed to move very fast, but we can find ways to resist the rushing and find more ease.

Thay wrote: "Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves – slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future; live the actual moment. Only this moment is life.”

How often do we do anything reverently, slowly, and evenly? And what happens when we do?

During my most recent visit to Plum Village, I had the time to practice slowing down in each activity and found a lot of benefits.

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet Monday from 7-8:30PM EST online, Wednesday morning from 7-8AM EST in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday 12-1PM EST online.

Annie will facilitate on Monday evening. After we enjoy guided deep relaxation, walking meditation and silent sitting meditation, we will read the Five Mindfulness Trainings together and focus on the Fourth Training: Loving Speech and Deep Listening.

The Fourth Mindfulness Training reminds us of all of the suffering that can be caused by speaking unmindfully and not listening well to others. During the holidays, we often spend time with our families, whether chosen or blood. We can reflect on how we might practice loving speech and deep listening using the Fourth Mindfulness Training…

Dear friends,

This week we will meet in person (3812 Northampton Street NW in DC) on Monday 7-8:30PM EDT, online on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and online on Friday 12-1PM.

On Monday evening, Camille will facilitate.

Plum Village, the practice center in France founded by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay), has sought to create an environment where people can learn to “live in harmony with one another and with the Earth.” On their website they recently shared that the conflict in the Middle East and in many other places in the world are “painful to civilians on both sides and they appeal to all combatants to put an immediate stop to killing and acts of violence.” The Buddha said that “hatred cannot respond to hatred; only love and compassion can respond to hatred.” Thay says “there is no way to peace, peace is the way.”

I often sit these days of late with feeling the pain, suffering and despair of others all over the world. It is exhausting and I often feel depleted. What helps me is to be reminded by Thay to first recognize the suffering within myself and to transform the unwholesome seeds of anger, hatred or violence into seeds of peace, joy, and loving kindness. I take time to breathe in and breathe out, and then in that moment when I can cultivate those positive qualities in myself, I can begin to generate more compassion to my family and all beings who suffer.

Dear friends,

This week we will meet online on Monday 7-8:30PM EST, in person on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM EST, and online on Friday 12-1PM EST.

Magda will facilitate on Monday evening. The Chesapeake Earth Holders and members of Virginia, Maryland and Washington, DC sanghas will join us to celebrate Native American Heritage Month in a gathering dedicated to water mindfulness and contemplation. Maggie Morris, a member of the Chesapeake Earth Holders and the Cloud Floating Free sangha from Charlottesville, Virginia, will conduct a water blessing. Please bring a cup of tea - or any other beverage of your choice - to our gathering. You may also bring water you hold sacred or dear for any reason.

THE SCENT OF WATER IN THE DESERT

My reflections on water begin in an unlikely place: the desert of New Mexico. Recently, as I was practicing walking meditation through the stone labyrinth of Ghost Ranch, my sanctuary, I thought back to my conversation with Hollis, a kind young biologist I had met on a previous visit. Hollis had shown me formations of precious cryptobiotic soil, a sign of new life in the desert. He also showed me a blue sage that was growing next to the labyrinth. Encountering this plant in the desert was special, as it requires ample water in its early stages.  As I thought back to that day in Ghost Ranch I looked around me and realized that I was in the middle of a yellow wild flower oasis bordered by cottonwoods whose leaves had turned bright yellow in the fall.

Dear friends,

This week we will meet in person (3812 Northampton Street NW in DC) on Monday 7-8:30PM EDT, online on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and online on Friday 12-1PM.

On Monday evening, Camille will facilitate.

Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) says our daily life is like a prayer. He also says praying is like an energy that we can touch at any time. He says if we are in touch with reality in the present moment, then “when you practice mindfulness while sitting, walking, cooking, washing, you don’t feel that you waste your life. You are living every moment of your life deeply. Your life becomes a prayer. Much happiness and peace result from that kind of living.”

Praying has been always been part of my life but has sometimes been elusive to me - not always sure about what I was looking or asking for in prayer. In the last few weeks I have been better able to bring prayer into my life in the present moment in “body, speech and mind” with the help of “meditation, concentration and insight” or “mindfulness” as Thay describes. With mindfulness Thay shares we can “produce the energy of faith and love necessary to change a difficult situation."

Dear friends,

This week we will meet online on Monday 7-8:30PM EDT, in person (3812 Northampton Street NW in DC) on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and online on Friday 12-1PM.

On Monday evening, Ellen will facilitate. Our focus will be on Thich Nhat Hanh’s important teachings about our “habit energy.” We’ll watch a very short video from Thich Nhat Hanh that helps us recognize our habit energy and how to compassionately tend to it.

This is a very timely topic for me. The world seems frayed, pained, pulled apart and almost at its limits these days. Pain and tension seem to be everywhere. Tragedies abound. For me, that’s somehow made my habit energies intensify. Maybe it’s a false sense of being ok if I’m busy.

Dear sangha friends,

This week we will meet on Monday evening in person 7-8:30PM at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM online, and Friday 12-1PM online.

On Monday evening, we will read the Third Mindfulness Training: True Love, and share our reflections on how this Training plays out in our own lives.

The Third Precept of Buddhism originally was “Refrain From Sexual Misconduct.” With great wisdom and compassion, Thay renamed the Third Mindfulness Training, “True Love” to reflect an expanded perspective on the third precept. Last year, the training was additionally revised to be more compassionate and inclusive of our LGBTQIA+ siblings.

Nowadays, we find ourselves living in a highly sexualized society, where we, and particularly our young people, are exposed to pressures to conform in terms of dress, speech and behavior. At the same time, there is often a cloud of shame and fear that prevents us from speaking openly about this topic. I hope that we may come together on Monday evening to share openly and respectfully about how we as mindfulness practitioners respond to the teachings embodied in this Training.

Dear friends, 

This week we will meet online on Monday 7-8:30PM EDT, in-person (3812 Northampton Street NW) on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and also online on Friday 12-1PM.

On Monday evening, we will host two special guests - Joann Malone, friend of the Washington Mindfulness Community, and Eliza King, friend of Still Water Mindfulness Practice Center - to talk about their contributions to the new book Tears Become Rain: Stories of Transformation and Healing Inspired by Thich Nhat Hanh, edited by Jeanine Cogan and Mary Hillebrand (Parallax Press).  

Susie will facilitate. 

About the book: 32 mindfulness practitioners around the world reflect on encountering the extraordinary teachings of Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, who passed away in January 2022, exploring themes of coming home to ourselves, healing from grief and loss, facing fear, and building community and belonging.

This week we will meet in person on 7-8:30PM at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM online, and Friday 12-1PM online.

Annie will co-facilitate with her friend and guest facilitator Dr. Deidre Combs on Monday evening, October 9th. 

“When you begin to see that your enemy is suffering, that is the beginning of insight..” – Thich Nhat Hanh

Across the spiritual traditions we are counseled to be grateful for those with whom we may not agree. The challenging people in our lives can be stressful and even dangerous, yet the Buddha taught that our worst enemies can be our best teachers. In fact, there is a story about a Buddhist monastery in which there was a monk who the other monks all disliked and found difficult. Finally, after many years of disharmony, the difficult monk decided to leave. Surprisingly, the abbot of the monastery went out and found the monk and begged him to come back.

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet online on Monday 7-8:30PM,  in-person (3812 Northampton Street NW) on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and also in person on Friday 12-1PM.

On Monday evening we will have a very exciting guest teacher, Esther Freinkel Tishman, coming to us by way of sangha friend Andy Richman. 

Esther is a Zen teacher, Tarot expert, interfaith chaplain and mindfulness instructor (her full bio is below). 

Esther will be uniquely bringing together mindfulness practice and Tarot card reading! How can we use this ancient art to deepen our awareness and understanding? 

Esther’s work is about “stress reduction, mindfulness training and life path discernment” and she will be sharing with us about what she calls The Dharma of Tarot:

Tarot’s origins are modest and unspectacular. Today’s 78-card deck, used for everything from spell-casting to self-help, emerged simply as a pack of playing cards in Renaissance Italy. But all the same - perhaps even because of its modest origin - the Tarot offers a powerful dharma. It’s imagery and structure echoes Buddhist teachings regarding self, interdependence and emptiness.

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet in person on 7-8:30PM at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM online, and Friday 12-1PM online.

Annie will facilitate on Monday evening and we will read the Five Mindfulness Trainings together and focus on the Second training: True Happiness.

In this training (full text below), we are reminded that suffering is created when we steal, exploit or oppress others, which we do when we forget that we “already have more than enough conditions for happiness.” We don’t need to grasp or push away anything when we recognize that this moment is already enough. 

Dear Friends.

This week we will meet on Monday evening online 7-8:30PM, Wednesday morning from 7-8AM in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday 12-1PM online.

Annie will facilitate on Monday evening and shares:

This week we will come back to reflect on the basics of mindfulness practice as taught by Thich Nhat Hanh. What are some of the basic practices and why and how do we practice sitting meditation, following the breath, deep relaxation, walking meditation, listening to the bell, and dharma sharing? 

Annie will share some techniques for our practice as well as what obstacles and outcomes we might encounter. And we will reflect together on the challenges and joys of our practice, including any questions you might have about mindfulness and meditation.

This week we will meet on Monday evening in person 7-8:30PM at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM online, and Friday 12-1PM online. 

I hope everyone has had a wonderful August, enjoying the outdoors and especially last week’s “super blue” rare moon.

I have been working for a long time to truly understand and act on Thay’s many lessons about not identifying ourselves with or by our emotions and thoughts.  This relates to his larger guidance about impermanence, a concept I’ve also struggled to fully grasp.

I recently heard a podcast from Tara Brach that talked about the power of “mindful witnessing” what is happening inside us.  That made me think again of some of Thay’s writings, so I went back to his “The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh” book and found a very relevant reading, “Blocks and Knots.”  

Dear Friends,

This Monday is Labor Day, an annual celebration of American workers. The holiday has been around since the late nineteenth century, when labor activists pushed for a federal holiday to recognize the contributions of workers. 

We will meet online Monday evening, 7-8:30PM, Wednesday morning 7-8AM in person at 3812 Northampton Street, and Friday 12-1PM online.

On Monday evening, we will meditate together and then reflect on how we might consider our own labor – our work, using the lens of mindfulness.

We will listen to part of a talk by the monastic Sister True Dedication on Mindfulness and business and then reflect together on what we heard and how we might apply this to our lives.

Sister True Dedication reminds us that  in our practice, the ends of our work - our work “product” is not the only aspect that matters. How we accomplish our work is also important. What we leave behind from our work is much more than our output. What is the quality of our impact?

Dear Friends, this week we will meet on Monday evening in person 7-8:30PM at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), Wednesday morning from 7-8AM online, and Friday 12-1PM online. 

On Monday, Susie will facilitate. We will be reading and referencing the final pages in Thich Nhat Hahn’s book, Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet, pages 297-end. He writes: “Be alive – Be the miracle”

If you are looking for a way to connect with others while growing your awareness, please join us.

On the last pages in the Afterword, Sister Chan Khong writes: 
You are the Future

I have been young like many of you, and full of determination to change the situation of suffering in myself, my family, and the world. And yet, often when I achieved what I thought was "right," it was at great cost to myself and my close relationships. It was only when I met Thay that I learned how to handle those difficult moments when I felt lost and overwhelmed by anger, fear, and despair. Thay taught me to always remember to come back to my breathing, and dwell only with the breathing, from within. In this way we can be our best: we can be stillness and give rise to a clear mind. Then, deep awakening and compassion can manifest, right in that moment, in our own hearts, and it becomes possible to see it and touch it even in the heart of our so-called "enemy."