The World We Are

Summary

This talk presents a Dharma teaching given during a winter retreat at the Dharma Nectar Temple in Lower Hamlet, within the Plum Village tradition, as the year 2008 comes to an end and 2009 approaches. The speaker opens with a playful but serious meditation on time, asking where the departing year goes and from which direction the new year arrives. This inquiry leads into a broader Buddhist reflection on coming and going, suggesting that when one looks deeply, the apparent movement of time cannot be grasped in ordinary dualistic terms. The speaker uses this as a doorway into the central themes of mindfulness, nonduality, and interbeing. A major portion of the talk is devoted to a walking meditation experience in the Upper Hamlet and the Sơn Hà temple area, where the speaker observes oak leaves decomposing into topsoil. This natural process becomes a vivid illustration of impermanence and continuation. The leaves do not disappear into nothingness; rather, they transform into soil that nourishes the trees, which in turn produce new leaves. Through this image, the speaker explains that death is not annihilation but transformation. The leaf “returns home” to the soil and later reappears in another form. This insight is presented as a source of freedom from fear of death and a way to recognize life as a continuous process of manifestation. The talk then shifts to the Buddhist teaching of the emptiness of giving. Using the example of one’s body, the speaker explains that the giver, the gift, and the receiver cannot be separated. Parents are the visible givers of the body, yet they are also present within the body through genes and continuation. A similar example is given with a corn seed planted by retreat participants in Italy: the seed becomes the plant, and the plant is the continuation of the seed. In this way, the speaker emphasizes that the giver is in the gift and the receiver is also in the gift. This is presented as an insight into the absence of a separate self and into the deep continuity of life. The speaker extends this logic to the relationship between life and death, and then to left and right, showing that apparent opposites depend on each other and cannot exist independently. Life and death are described as embracing each other, just as left and right do. This nondual understanding is offered as a remedy for fear, anger, and conflict. The speaker suggests that if people truly saw the interdependence of all things, there would be less war and separation. The talk also explains Buddhist ethics through the lens of right thinking, right speech, and right action. The speaker argues that thoughts are not merely internal events but forms of action that can heal or harm. Thoughts of compassion, forgiveness, understanding, and joy are described as life-giving and beneficial to both body and mind. Similarly, speech can be healing when it is loving and forgiving, whether spoken directly or sent through a phone call or email. Right action is defined as bodily action that protects, saves, and helps. These three forms of practice are presented as ways to become a giver of life in daily life. Another important teaching concerns karma and continuation. The speaker explains that one’s thinking, speech, and actions are energies that continue beyond the disintegration of the body. This continuation is compared to a cloud becoming rain or a leaf becoming soil. The speaker rejects the view of annihilation and cites Lavoisier’s principle that nothing is created or destroyed, only transformed. The talk also introduces the idea that retribution is double: one continues as both a person and an environment. The speaker emphasizes that human beings are not separate from the world around them; they are their environment. This ecological insight becomes a practical call to action. The speaker refers to a book titled The World We Have, and notes that a better title might be The World We Are, because people are inseparable from the planet. The audience is encouraged to make concrete commitments for the coming year 2009: reducing car use, using solar energy, observing no-car days, eating less meat and animal products, conserving water, turning off lights, carpooling, biking, walking, and using public transit. These practices are framed not merely as environmental habits but as acts of love, compassion, and enlightenment. The speaker mentions examples from Deer Park Monastery and Plum Village, where communities have already adopted such commitments. The talk concludes by inviting the Sangha to write down personal commitments to loved ones and to the environment, then to gather for a walking meditation and a bonfire ceremony to offer these resolutions. The new year is presented as an opportunity to practice love in concrete ways, to heal oneself and the world, and to embody the Buddha’s teaching that one is not separate from others or from the Earth. The overall message is that mindfulness reveals the deep continuity of life, and that ethical, compassionate action is the natural expression of that insight.