Nice sharing by a student of Thich Nhat Hanh (redacted)
Like many students of the Dharma, I’ve noticed from time to time in my life of practice that certain sutras and their related teachings and practices will speak very strongly to me. If I try to ignore their call, it will seem as if their lessons are being placed right in front of me every time I turn around!
Over the years, I’ve learned to be attentive and listen, not only with my ears, but with my whole body and mind to the Dharma that wants to come forth and be heard. I’ve learned to honor what’s arising rather than dismiss it, since often the inspirations that I’m quick to dismiss end up being the most transformative and important at that point in my life.
When I’m struck by a sutra, a teaching, or a practice, I sit, eat, walk, and breathe with it as if it were a friend on the path. I do this for a period of time—sometimes days or years—allowing it to sink deeply into my mind-stream, using the lens of insight and the perspective that it provides as a framework to reflect on my own life and the world around me. In the Plum Village tradition founded by Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh—the tradition to which I belong—we emphasize practicing with the teachings in each moment of our daily lives, as well as during formal meditation sessions. Mindful of my teacher’s guidance that every hour of study needs to be balanced with at least seven hours of practice, I begin my research.
Dear friend, every single time I’ve allowed myself to practice with a sutra in this way, I have been profoundly surprised by the discoveries that have emerged…
Truthfully, I would have to say that in my early years of monastic training, I found the sutra boring and pedestrian, almost like a shopping list. I remember stoically enduring its recitation many, many times. I would close my eyes and zone out whenever I heard the first line and then breathe a big sigh of relief when I heard the final words…
But over the years I’ve learned to trust these inspirations, so I began reading one insight from the sutra each morning and practicing with it throughout the day. After some time, I noticed that each realization was incredibly condensed, and that I would discover something new each time I practiced with and reflected upon it. To give each realization more time to unfold in my mind and life, I then decided to practice one per week, and had a similar experience. Later on, I found that what worked best for me was to sit, walk, breathe, and eat with each realization for about a month at a time.
I recommend that you read the sutra slowly, perhaps a chapter a month. Then you might like to start over again, because I think you’ll find—just as I did—that the teachings contained in the sutra are profound and they’ll keep revealing themselves to you just like a rose that slowly opens its petals to reveal layer upon layer of beauty…I hope that you’ll savor these realizations, letting them sink deeply into your body and mind until you experience them welling up from within yourself. In this way, you may go deeper and further…
So, with this in mind, it bears repeating: please don’t approach the sutra like a novel, rushing through it in order to reach the “big reveal” in the final pages, where all the plot points come together. In Buddhist practice, as in life itself, the big reveal is in each and every moment. The advanced practices are the most basic, and the deepest insight is often the simplest—the kind of insight that will bring you back to what part of you has known all along...
A Chinese doctor once told me that there’s a saying in Chinese medicine that if you’re too lazy to brew the medicine, you can just sleep next to the herbs and their medicinal qualities will permeate your being. Reading and chanting those few sutras and chants again and again, I felt that, like the medicinal herbs, they’d entered my mind-stream.
