Dear Thay, dear Sangha:

This week, we will meet Monday evening, Oct. 7, from 7-8:30PM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW); Wednesday morning, Oct. 9, from 7-8AM EDT online; and Friday, Oct. 11, from 12-1PM EDT in person.

Jill will facilitate. She shares:

The first time I saw Thay’s calligraphy “Dwelling Happily in the Present Moment,” I felt that it expressed my deep aspiration to live a happy life. And yet, how could I achieve this precious state? That was my question.

The Venerable Master Linji, a root Patriarch of our lineage, exhorted us not to become ambitiously complicated in our practice. Rather, we simply need to wake up to our true nature, which is the Buddha within, and live as “an ordinary person doing nothing.” The words are simple, but achieving it is not. Why is it so difficult?  Why do we make everything complicated? Is it because we feel our worth is tied up in our achievements?  

To be an ordinary person doing nothing doesn’t seem special, and yet it is the very essence of freely dwelling happily in the present moment. Even if we want to become such a person, the mountain of obstacles seems overwhelming. How and where do we begin? 

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet Monday evening, Sept. 30, from 7-8:30PM EDT online, Wednesday morning, Oct. 2, from 7-8AM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday, Oct. 4, 12-1PM EDT online.

Our Monday night sangha will be facilitated by Ellen.

Ellen shares:  I am so glad to facilitate this Fourth Mindfulness Training. It brings me back to one of Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay)’s teachings about deep listening, which is something I value but also struggle with.  

Thay writes, “The roots of a lasting relationship are mindfulness, deep listening and loving speech” and “In the Lotus Sutra, we are advised to look and listen with the eyes of compassion. Compassionate listening brings about healing. When someone listens to us this way, we feel some relief right away. A good therapist always practices deep, compassionate listening. We have to learn to do the same in order to heal the people we love and restore communication with them." (quotes from How to Love and The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching).

Dear Thay, dear Sangha:

This week, we will meet Monday evening, Sept. 23, from 7-8:30PM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW); Wednesday morning, Sept. 25, from 7-8AM EDT online; and Friday, Sept. 27, from 12-1PM EDT in person.

Listen to a short video talk by Thay on how to live in community

What does community mean to you and, most importantly, how do you show up in community? 

The last chapter of the online course Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet offered by Plum Village is dedicated to creating communities of resilience. In one of the videos, Brother Pháp Dung introduces the concept of community as a verb: to be in community. He says that community offers us the chance to practice every moment precisely because community is not perfect, as They pointed out in this short talk.

If we think of community as a verb, then there is an action involved. Community is not static. It is ever-evolving, changing and shifting – just like a flock of birds in the sky that keeps on expanding, contracting, and realigning. Brother Pháp Dung says that the community is reciprocal. I asked myself, what does this mean exactly? I think he means that community is a constant give and take. Sometimes, we take more from it and other times we step in and give more.

This week we will meet Monday evening, Sept. 16, from 7-8:30PM EDT online, Wednesday morning, Sept. 18, from 7-8AM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday, Sept 20, 12-1PM EDT online.

Our Monday night sangha will be hosted by Magda with guest facilitator John Bell.

John shares:  Ever since I was a boy growing up in a small working class shipyard town in the great Pacific Northwest, near Seattle, I have experienced jaw-dropping beauty of the natural world and human kindness overflowing, right alongside of heart-numbing horror of human cruelty, war, racism, and environmental damage. It never made sense to me, so I found myself on a life’s mission to find ways of helping to heal my own brokenness and reweave a broken world. 

I came to social justice work through the civil rights and peace movements of the 1960s, and over the past 50 years I have had the good fortune of helping to create several national organizations engaging low income youth in self-development and leadership service to their communities. 

Dear friends,

This week, we will meet Monday evening, Sept. 9, from 7-8:30PM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW); Wednesday morning, Sept. 11, from 7-8AM EDT online; and Friday, Sept. 13, from 12-1PM EDT in person.

Last week Marie shared the topic of exploring and nourishing joy and happiness. It was a lovely evening as we listened to a teaching by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay), where he shared how easy it can be to generate joyful happy feelings in the present moment, right here, right now, without worrying about the past or the future, and how this practice can help reduce suffering.

A practice that helps me access those joyful happy feelings is smiling. When I smile, I bring more calm and peace into my body, and I release tension. When I feel anger or worry or regret coming on and my body tenses, I know that is the time to smile, and that is the time it can be difficult to smile. I was recently looking at some photos of myself as a child and noticed that I smiled a lot. Was it easier then than now? 

Dear Friends,

This week we will meet Monday evening, 9.2, from 7-8:30PM EDT online, Wednesday morning, Sept 7th, from 7-8AM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday, Sept 9th, 12-1PM EDT online.

On Monday night, Marie will facilitate, and we will explore the practice of nourishing joy and happiness.

She shares:  When last we gathered, we finished reading our summer’s book, Fragrant Palm Leaves by Thich Nhat Hanh. Over the weeks, several people shared how they felt moved and inspired by Thay’s insights and actions both in this book and in others. 

One of the teachings that resonates with me is the power of nourishing joy and how this practice can strengthen our ability to hold difficult emotions and to engage mindfully in the face of suffering.

With summer behind us, fall beckoning, and the bevy of intentions, actions, and emotions this change of season can bring, I feel like a “shot of Thay in action” (if you’ll pardon the expression) might be helpful. So, on Monday night we’ll watch part of a Dharma talk about Nourishing Joy and Happiness (from 1:58 - 10:50) and then have time to share from our lived experience of nourishing joy & how that affects us. 

Dear friends,

This week, we will meet Monday evening, Aug. 26, from 7-8:30PM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW); Wednesday morning, Aug. 28, from 7-8AM EDT online; and Friday, Aug. 30, from 12-1PM EDT in person.

This Monday, we'll focus on the third mindfulness training. Ellen will facilitate. Ellen writes:

I have found this particular training to be a very challenging one in trying to understand its full breadth.  I listened to a 5-minute video from the Plum Village website in which Thay reads the training.  He also says that this training is "... about learning to love ourselves, and learning to take care of our bodies."   

Dear Friends,

This week: we will meet Monday evening, Aug. 19, from 7-8:30PM EDT online, Wednesday morning, Aug. 21, from 7-8AM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday, Aug. 23, 12-1PM EDT online.

On Monday night, we will finish our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will be reading through to the end. 

Camille will facilitate and we will be discussing pages 179 - 212. 

Please note there is no need to own the book or read the section in advance to enjoy the practice with us. Nor is there a need to attend every practice to benefit from the readings, as each Monday practice will continue to be a stand alone and complete practice. For an introduction to the book, read this. 

In this section of the book, Thay moves between living in Saigon and in the “self-help villages” in rural Vietnam, which he has helped create along with the School of Youth for Social Service (SYSS). 

While life in the villages continues to be challenging, the villagers are supported and encouraged by Thay, his friends, the monks, and many volunteers at the SYSS.  The projects that the workers have started support the educational, health, and social needs of the villagers. Communication goes well in these villages as the SYSS encourages the villagers to be fully engaged in their own wellbeing and that of their neighbors.

Dear friends,

This week, we will meet Monday evening, Aug. 12, from 7-8:30PM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW); Wednesday morning, Aug. 14, from 7-8AM EDT online; and Friday, Aug. 16, from 12-1PM EDT in person.

On Monday, we will continue our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will read this book through August 19.

Please note there is no need to own or read the book in order to enjoy practicing together. Nor is there need to attend each gathering because each Monday’s sangha is a stand-alone and complete practice. 

This Monday, Bea will facilitate and we will be discussing pages 153-178. You can find the pages for each week’s reading at the bottom of the full write up.

Bea’s selected reading extracts follow:

“The best medicine to chase away the heart’s dark isolation is to make direct contact with life’s sufferings, to touch and share the anxieties and uncertainties of others. Loneliness comes from locking yourself in a false shell. You think of yourself as a separate, self-contained entity not in relation to others. Buddhists call this “attachment to self.” In reality, we are empty of a separate self. But we needn’t take the Buddhists’ word for it. Looking deeply, we can see that a person is not a separate self” (156).

Dear friends,

This week: we will meet Monday evening, Aug. 5, from 7-8:30PM EDT online, Wednesday morning, Aug. 7, from 7-8AM EDT in person at our meditation space (3812 Northampton Street NW), and Friday, Aug. 9, 12-1PM EDT online.

This Monday we will gather together online and Susie will facilitate. 

We will read the Five Mindfulness Trainings passed down from our spiritual ancestors and translated by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay). This week we will focus on the second of the five mindfulness trainings – True Happiness. True happiness means to live with happiness, even though we experience both negative and positive emotions, we know that happiness is an accessible state that can provide wellbeing and healing inside and outside of us. 

Sometimes I find life so challenging that I wonder when I will have time and space for happiness. Some mornings, I wake up completely happy and aware of all the conditions I have for happiness. However, most mornings, even before opening my eyes, my mind goes right to my  to-do list, work, and responsibilities. I come back to my breath and feel gratitude that I have responsibilities and purpose, meaningful work, and many opportunities ahead for being of service throughout my day. I remind myself of the opportunities for self-care, such as exercise, eating well, and sitting on my cushion.

Dear friends,

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

This week we continue our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will be reading through August 19. 

Please note there is no need to own the book or read the section in advance to enjoy the practice with us. Nor is there a need to attend every practice to benefit from the readings, as each Monday practice will continue to be a stand alone and complete practice. For an introduction to the book, read this.

This Monday, we will gather together in person and Annie will facilitate. We will be discussing pages 115-132. (Each week's reading pages are below.) 

I excerpted the below quote from our section of reading. In this section, Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) talks about what it means to be a true hero in our world. Specifically, he shares how using mindfulness can help us tame our monkey mind and our habits of chasing after money, fame and power. With a tame mind and relaxed body, we are able to see what is really happening inside of us and all around us.

The practice of using gathas (short verses that we can memorize or post around our house) can help us keep coming back to the present moment throughout the day and help us remember our deepest intention to serve the world. Thay was given a book of gathas to memorize when he became a novice monk in Vietnam.

Dear friends,

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

This Monday we will gather together online and Susie will facilitate. 

We will read the Five Mindfulness Trainings passed down from our spiritual ancestors and translated by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay). This week we will focus on the second of the five mindfulness trainings – True Happiness. True happiness means to live with happiness, even though we experience both negative and positive emotions, we know that happiness is an accessible state that can provide wellbeing and healing inside and outside of us. 

Sometimes I find life so challenging that I wonder when I will have time and space for happiness. Some mornings, I wake up completely happy and aware of all the conditions I have for happiness. However, most mornings, even before opening my eyes, my mind goes right to my  to-do list, work, and responsibilities. I come back to my breath and feel gratitude that I have responsibilities and purpose, meaningful work, and many opportunities ahead for being of service throughout my day. I remind myself of the opportunities for self-care, such as exercise, eating well, and sitting on my cushion.

Dear friends,

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

On Monday, we will continue our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will read this book through August 19.

Please note there is no need to own or read the book in order to enjoy practicing together. Nor is there need to attend each gathering because each Monday’s sangha is a stand-alone and complete practice. 

This Monday, Camille will facilitate and we will be discussing pages 79-115. You can find the pages for each week’s reading at the bottom of the full write up.

In the third part of Fragrant Palm Leaves, Thay writes from northern New Jersey and reflects on people and experiences (including the demise of “our paradise” in Vietnam) that shaped him, his practice, and what we now know as engaged mindfulness.

In this week’s section, Thay is in Princeton New Jersey just days before Christmas where Americans are festive and celebrating.  He contemplates his life in the States feeling peaceful and comfortable, and at the same time he feels homesick for New Year’s Eve back home with family and friends. He shares about his suffering and going through a dark and difficult time, or what he calls a “storm,” and how he made it through the storm to feel “reborn” and able to come back to the present moment to listen and look deeply at the flowers, clouds, and wind.

Dear friends,

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

This Monday, we will continue our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will read this book through August 19.

Please note there is no need to own or read the book in order to enjoy practicing together. Nor is there need to attend each gathering because each Monday’s sangha is a stand-alone and complete practice. 

On Monday, Marie will facilitate and we will be discussing pages 43-78. You can find the pages for each week’s reading at the bottom of the full write up.

In the second part of Fragrant Palm Leaves, Thich Nhat Hanh reminisces about his beloved practice center, Phuong Boi, in the highlands of central Vietnam.

In this week’s section, Thay writes from northern New Jersey and reflects on people and experiences (including the demise of “our paradise” in Vietnam) that shaped him, his practice and what we now know as engaged mindfulness. 

I’ve chosen some excerpts that struck me. They are both heavy and light; his humor and human-ness resonate as deeply as does his wisdom.  

I feel restored by my stay at Pomona... I’ve done all the things the children do - nature walks, crafts, ping pong and volleyball. I’ve run races, helped put on skits and played games. The children always walked with me back to Pomona when they had time.   We’ve really enjoyed each other’s company.

Dear friends,

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

On Monday evening, we will continue our summer book club reading of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves. We will read through August 19. 

Please note there is no need to own the book or read the section in advance to enjoy the practice with us. Nor is there a need to attend every practice to benefit from the readings, as each Monday practice will continue to be a stand alone and complete practice. For an introduction to the book, read this.

This Monday, Annie will facilitate and we will be discussing pages 21-42. (Each weeks reading pages are below.) 

In the first part of Fragrant Palm Leaves, Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay), while staying in the woods of Northern New Jersey, writes and reminisces about the creation of his first practice center, Phuong Boi, in the highlands of central Vietnam. At the end of the first section, Thay describes the evening that he and a few others spent their first night in their new home.

Dear friends,

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

This year we will carry on our summer book club tradition, using a section of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Fragrant Palm Leaves as the meditation and dharma sharing topic on Monday nights, starting the book on June 24 and completing it on August 19. 

Please note there is no need to own the book or read the section in advance to enjoy the practice with us. Nor is there a need to attend every practice to benefit from the readings, as each Monday practice will continue to be a stand alone and complete practice. More details below.

This Monday,  Magda will facilitate and offer an introduction to the book. We will be discussing pages 1-20.

Fragrant Palm Leaves comprises two journals that Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) kept when he was in his 30s. He wrote the first between 1962 and 1963 when he was a student and research assistant at Princeton and Columbia Universities. The second journal starts in 1964, when Thay returned to Vietnam and ends in 1966, one day before the beginning of his exile. 

Dear friends,

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

Annie will facilitate Monday night. She shares:  

We will read the Five Mindfulness Trainings together. Reading and practicing the trainings is a way to deepen our understanding of the world and our part in it. 

This week after we read the trainings, we will focus on the First Mindfulness Training: Reverence for Life.

Aware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life, I am committed to cultivating the insight of interbeing and compassion and learning ways to protect the lives of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I am determined not to kill, not to let others kill, and not to support any act of killing in the world, in my thinking, or in my way of life. Seeing that harmful actions arise from anger, fear, greed, and intolerance, which in turn come from dualistic and discriminative thinking, I will cultivate openness, non-discrimination, and non-attachment to views in order to transform violence, fanaticism, and dogmatism in myself and in the world.

Dear friends,

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

We invite you to join us for online sangha with special guest, singer, songwriter, social worker and ordained Dharma Teacher, Joe Reilly.

Joe has been writing and singing songs with the Plum Village community for many years, and he received the dharma lamp from the Plum Village community in 2021 and wrote about that experience:

As you can see, my insight gatha became an entire song! Singing and songwriting are my primary modes of Dharma expression, and thanks to the encouragement of one of my mentors Peggy Rowe Ward, I sang my gatha and it grew into three verses.

Dear friends,

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

Marie will facilitate Monday night. She shares:  

On Monday, we’ll continue to explore the topic of sangha, which Ellen introduced last week, from the lens of the Fifth Mindfulness training, Nourishment and Healing.  

I was moved by Ellen’s written description, and I’ve been reflecting on sangha and my gratitude for it. To me, sangha inter-is with the Fifth Mindfulness Training, Nourishment and Healing.  The practice of coming to sangha - whether it is here at Opening Heart or elsewhere - is like an anchor, calling me back to my true self.  I know and take comfort in knowing that sangha will accept me just as I am, and that, in turn, helps me to accept and better understand myself. 

Dear Friends,

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

On Monday, Annie will facilitate.

We will watch a video of a talk by the Dharma teacher Mitchell Ratner (Thich Nhat Hanh’s student for over 30 years) given last month at the Order of Interbeing retreat at Deer Park Monastery. 

Over the years, our sangha has had many conversations about what it means to be an engaged mindfulness practitioner and how we live our practice in the world. Since October 7, I have heard from several sangha members, worried about statements and activities coming out of Plum Village, ARISE (Awakening through Race Intersectionality and Social Engagement), and Opening Heart – especially those that are calling for peace in Israel and Gaza.