Who Am I?

Summary

This transcript captures a question-and-answer session at Plum Village’s Stillwater Meditation Hall during the summer opening on July 30, 2014. The gathering is structured around children, teenagers, young adults, and adults asking practical questions about mindfulness practice, suffering, family life, and ethical living. The speaker, Thay, repeatedly emphasizes that the retreat is not a course in Buddhist studies but a place to ask real questions rooted in lived suffering and practice. He encourages participants to breathe with the bell, sit calmly, and ask concise questions that can benefit many people. A major theme is the relationship between children and parents. In response to a playful question about “eating our parents,” Thay explains that love must not be possessive or consuming. Instead, to “eat” a mother or father means to nourish them, offer them joy, and help them recover and grow. He uses the image of an orange tree to show that love requires care, understanding, and patience. Children are encouraged to ask their parents about their suffering and needs, rather than assuming parents can endlessly absorb the children’s demands. He also stresses that children can help their parents suffer less by practicing breathing, relaxing, and becoming less angry or lonely themselves. Thay then answers a question about his own path to monastic life. He describes seeing suffering from a young age, especially adult anger and conflict, and being deeply moved by a calm image of the Buddha in a magazine. That image watered the seeds of peace, compassion, and joy in him. He recounts a formative childhood mountain trip, where he expected to meet a hermit but instead found a clear natural well. Drinking the water brought him a profound sense of satisfaction, peace, and fulfillment, which became a turning point in his aspiration to become a monk. He later connects this personal story to the historical flourishing of Buddhism in Vietnam under the Lý and Trần dynasties, when rulers and citizens practiced meditation and the country enjoyed long periods of peace. This leads into his explanation of engaged Buddhism: a Buddhism practiced not only in temples but also in schools, workplaces, government, business, and daily life, in order to reduce suffering in society. Another important section addresses tears, sadness, and loneliness. Thay explains that crying can express both sorrow and joy. Tears of joy arise when one is deeply moved by reunion or beauty, while tears of sorrow can also be healing. He encourages people to embrace sadness, anger, and loneliness rather than pushing them away. He shares a poem born from his anger over the bombing of My Lai during the Vietnam War, showing how he practiced holding his face in his hands to keep loneliness warm and anger from taking over. The poem becomes a teaching on mindfulness, self-embrace, and healing through compassionate awareness. The discussion then turns to environmental ethics and the Five Mindfulness Trainings. A participant expresses concern that Plum Village speaks of respecting Mother Earth while serving food that is not always organic and is sometimes imported from far away. In response, the community shares about Happy Farm, which is growing more organic produce locally and aims to support the sangha’s future food needs. Thay broadens the answer by explaining that not eating meat and not drinking alcohol are major ways to protect the Earth. He notes the environmental damage caused by livestock production, deforestation, pollution, and the grain wasted on alcohol. He also mentions Plum Village’s no-car day and encourages continued progress toward a more coherent, sustainable way of living. The transcript also develops Thay’s teaching on no-self and interbeing. In response to the question “Who am I?”, he explains that the self is a continuation of parents, ancestors, country, and cosmos. A person is made of “non-me” elements just as a flower is made of non-flower elements. He uses the image of a wave and the ocean to show that individual identity and larger reality are not separate. Through meditation, one can see that there is no isolated self, only interbeing with all life. This insight reduces loneliness, fear, and discrimination, and helps one rest in the “cosmic body” or true nature of no-birth and no-death. A substantial portion of the talk addresses loneliness, suffering, and true love. Thay explains that loneliness comes from not seeing one’s deep connection to sunshine, water, air, plants, animals, ancestors, and the cosmos. He teaches that love is an art of understanding and connection, not merely desire or attachment. Sexual desire is explicitly distinguished from true love. True love requires respect, reverence, deep listening, and the ability to recognize the other person’s suffering. He warns young people not to confuse sexual intimacy with love and emphasizes the importance of bodily boundaries and cultural respect. He also advises that if a relationship is exhausting or not nourishing, one should not simply abandon the other person, but instead seek help from friends and the sangha, cultivate more compassion and patience, and decide carefully whether to continue. Even if intimacy ends, the Buddhist commitment is not to abandon anyone. Overall, the session presents a practical, compassionate, and socially engaged vision of Buddhism. It links personal healing, family relationships, environmental responsibility, historical suffering, and ethical intimacy into one integrated path of mindfulness. The talk concludes with an invitation to walking meditation and a picnic lunch at Sơn Hà Temple, reinforcing the central message that practice continues in ordinary life, in community, and in the world.