Gathas Help Us Stay Present
Here in Lower Hamlet, wherever you go you see signs with little poems that describe the present moment and help us to be present.
Brushing my teeth and rinsing my mouth
I vow to speak purely and lovingly.
When my mouth is fragrant with right speech
A flower blooms in the garden of my heart.
This gatha reminds us to be aware of what comes out of our mouth and which seeds it waters in the depth of our consciousness.
Another gatha:
Before I start the car, I know where I am going
The car and I are one.
If the car goes fast, I go fast.
Before I use the car I ask, “Do I need to use the car?” Before I start the car, I am aware of where I plan to go. I am aware that the car and all the passengers in the car are one, and if the car goes fast, all of us go fast. This gatha brings us to the present moment. When we drive, we are aware of how we are driving. We pay attention to what is happening around us. Other cars may be going faster than is advised and may cut us off. We know that person must be in a hurry; maybe they are on the way to the hospital. With our mental attention, we are either watering a seed of anger or watering a seed of understanding, compassion and space.
These gathas help us to practice appropriate attention throughout the day.
The mind can go in a thousand directions
But on this lovely path I walk in peace.
With each step, a gentle wind blows.
With each step, a flower blooms.
Walking meditation is an important Dharma door in Plum Village. Our teacher, Thầy, tells us that if we do not practice walking meditation when in Plum Village, we cannot say we were in Plum Village. We can say we were in Loubès-Bernac but we cannot say we were in Plum Village. Whenever we take a step, we enjoy taking a step. We practice walking meditation because we enjoy it, and we find freedom. Aware of every step, we are no longer carried away by non-stop thinking. At first we may be able to do this for one step, two steps, maybe three. Then ten, twenty, thirty, forty steps in awareness (mindfulness) and with continued practice we find freedom, peace, calm and clarity with every step.
As the essence of Plum Village practice is walking meditation, you can bring Plum Village home with you. When you walk to your car, when you walk to the bus or the train, wherever you are going, you can be in Plum Village in the present moment, in the here and the now. (I think of Kristin Hamilton's Still Water Sangha's - Takoma Park, MD - talk on Cultivating Patience: June 2025)
Once a day we shall practice walking meditation together, generating the energy of mindfulness, of being truly present in the here and the now, the energy of joy, peace, freedom, and healing. One moment of stopping the non-stop thinking radio channel is one moment of freedom and healing. We have a song we like to sing:
I have arrived, I am home
In the here and in the now
In the ultimate I dwell.
I have arrived in the here and in the now, that is our true address. That is where our true home is. Taking steps in freedom, there is no way to freedom, freedom is the way.
Touching the Past, Creating the Future
When we look deeply into the present moment, we can see the past and we can touch it. Today we spend time together in Lower Hamlet, practicing walking meditation, mindful eating, working, and sharing. Tomorrow, today will be our past. Actually, this morning is the past already, five minutes ago is already our past. The way we live the present moment is the way our past will be. This week we are going to create a beautiful past together. Every moment we create our past. The best way to take care of the past is by taking care of the present moment. The way we live our day today grows out of the way we lived yesterday, the day before yesterday, a few weeks and months ago, because what did we do? A few months ago, a week ago, we decided to come to this retreat, something we decided in the present moment that is now the past. All the choices we make today are going to shape our future.
What we pay attention to today waters seeds in our consciousness that will manifest sometime in the future, in our thinking, speaking and doing. If we want to take care of the future, we can only do so in the present moment. When we need to make a decision concerning the future in our personal life or for our companies, we do so in the present moment. We need to be well established in the present moment to have appropriate attention, to make the choice that gives us the future we are hoping to live when it becomes the present moment.
“I have arrived, I am home” is to come back to the here and the now, and by doing so we take care of the present, the past, and the future.
We have another song called “Breathing in, Breathing out.” For those of you who are not familiar with our practice songs, you may think they are a bit silly. But let us look into what these songs tell us? Breathing in, breathing out, I am blooming as a flower. When I first heard this song I thought, “Oh, it’s obviously a child’s song, children must have made this song.” However, when we pay attention to the sound of the bell, and we know how to let go of all of our anxieties, worries, concerns, hopes, wishes and dreams, we are free. We don’t need to be anything but what we are. A flower is not trying to be a flower, let alone a particular flower. It’s just being itself, according to causes and conditions. Why is it blooming? Because it is the nature of a flower to bloom. It doesn’t start coming out of the Earth because it wants to be a full-bloomed flower. It comes out of the Earth because conditions are sufficient for it to do so at that moment. The flower is totally aimless in its being, and thereby it’s the most beautiful it can be.
Aimlessness, Busi-less-ness
Aimlessness doesn’t mean we are just roaming or floating about like a boat on the ocean without a rudder, being thrown hither and thither. No, we bring our mind home to our body, we are fully present with what we are doing, for the sheer joy of doing it. When we are fully present while doing something, it is joyful, it is nourishing. We are our most beautiful self. We’ll have a result. We may even say, “I want to go in this direction.” But while we are doing it, we are not lost in “I want to get there, I want to get there, I want to get there.” With that kind of state of mind, we are not truly in the present moment; we are trying to be in the future, which is not possible. The only moment we can be in is the present moment. To be present, to practice aimlessness, is being our most beautiful self.
This is a retreat for business people. We in Plum Village are also business people. We are aware that it is very easy to be busi-ness. The word already says it. I am a busi-ness person. When we practice aimlessness, we become busi-less people. Isn’t that wonderful? In Plum Village we have organized our environment and our daily life in a way that helps us be busi-less people, to practice aimlessness, to be truly present.
We can get very busy because we want to be Number One. Maybe number one in our corporation, number one as a corporation, number one in life. There is nothing wrong with being number one, somebody has to be number one. There was a nine-year-old child who came home from school. They had had some kind of competition in sports, and the child said, “Mommy, Mommy! I won as the very last one!” What a great insight for a young child like that: “I won as the very last one.” The joy! Obviously that child had done whatever they did with great joy. You can win as the first, the second, the third, the fourth, or the last one. That nine-year old child chose to be happy, and that child is in us. Every one of us has a nine-year old child in us.
Do we want to be number one or do we want to be happy? If we want to be number one, we may be a busi-ness person; if we want to be happy, we may be a busi-less person and still achieve a lot.
I want to go back to yoniso manaskara, appropriate attention. Appropriate attention depends on the object of our attention (what) and the way we look into that object (how). The practice of appropriate attention is very important.
Mental attention is present when there is contact between a sense organ and an object. It is mindfulness that gives us a say into whether that attention is appropriate or inappropriate. We practice in a way that generates the energy of mindfulness so that we become inhabited by it, then we will have appropriate attention with whatever we do. Or if it is inappropriate attention, we will become aware of it and we will know how to turn it into appropriate attention.
So who’s the real boss? With the practice of mindfulness we can take care of our mental attention. Then the seeds of understanding, compassion, inclusiveness, and happiness will grow stronger, and those strong seeds become the inclination of our mind. Through the practice of mindfulness and appropriate attention we create a wholesome inclination of the mind. The practice of mindfulness gives us a choice.
We may or may not work from home, but we can all live from home, bringing our mind home to our body and being established in the present moment, the only moment we have.
Before lunch we will practice walking meditation together. We will enjoy every step we make. Walking on this beautiful planet, allowing gratitude to arise, the healing energy of gratitude for all that Mother Earth gives us. Gratitude for all of us here giving each other support in our practice. Gratitude for our loved ones at home without whom our life would be very different. Gratitude for our colleagues, employees, employers. We will generate mindfulness and be inhabited by the energy of mindfulness. We will be able to listen deeply, to understand the people in our life whom we consider difficult but who may need our help. Walking in freedom, in peace, we heal ourselves. Then we can offer that peace, that freedom and that healing to others.
Let us enjoy this retreat together. We will hear a lot more about how to take care of ourselves so we can take care of others. We can become a busi-less business person.
I wish you all a happy retreat. Thank you all for listening.
There is also the statement by Thay that we can shape o ur continuation by paying attention to our words, actions and thoughts... this is from July 17 Still Water Sangha, Takoma Park, MD thrusday evening meditation meeting. Certainly this idea of mind, speech and actions as our continuation is in the spirit of patiently attending to (paying attention to) the actions (dishwashing, cleaning, moving mindfully, etc) at hand...
