Nirvana Walking

Summary

The talk is a Dharma teaching delivered during a winter retreat at Plum Village’s New Hamlet and Full Moon Meditation Hall on January 22, 2013. It focuses on walking meditation as a profound practice of mindfulness, concentration, and insight, emphasizing that walking is not a lesser practice than sitting meditation. The speaker explains that practitioners should walk without being carried away by thinking, especially superficial or scattered thinking about the past and future. Instead, they should remain fully present with the contact of the feet on the ground, the breath, the body, and the feelings arising in the present moment. A central theme is the cultivation of solidity and freedom in each step. Solidity means being unshakable, not pulled by regret, fear, anxiety, or planning. Freedom means being released from the bondage of suffering, worry, and mental dispersion. The speaker presents these as two inseparable qualities of a Buddha or bodhisattva, and as qualities that can be trained through mindful walking. Each step, when made with awareness, becomes a miracle and a form of healing. The speaker repeatedly insists that every step can bring the practitioner into contact with nirvana, understood not as an abstract afterlife destination but as a lived reality of peace, cooling, and the extinction of afflictions. The teaching then turns to the three Dharma seals: impermanence, non-self, and nirvana. Impermanence is illustrated through examples such as rivers, clouds, and the transformation of matter and energy. Non-self is explained as the absence of a separate, permanent soul or identity; instead, all things are seen as streams of continuation, changing from moment to moment. The speaker warns against both eternalism and nihilism, presenting the Buddhist middle way as the recognition of continuity without fixed essence. Nirvana is described as the transcendence of notions such as birth and death, coming and going, existence and non-existence. The speaker uses the image of a cloud transforming into rain, snow, stream, and flower, and cites scientific ideas associated with Lavoisier and the conservation of energy to reinforce the point that nothing is truly born or destroyed, only transformed. The talk also explains the “other shore” as a metaphor for liberation. The other shore is the shore of freedom, safety, and non-discrimination, where one lets go of anger, fear, and the desire to make others suffer. The speaker gives a practical example of conflict with a partner, showing how mindfulness and deep looking can interrupt harmful speech and lead to compassionate action instead. The teaching connects this with Christian language such as “resting in God,” suggesting that different traditions point toward the same experience of ultimate release and peace. Another major section outlines the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. The speaker describes suffering, its causes, its cessation, and the path leading to cessation, then links the path to right view, right thinking, right speech, right action, right livelihood, and the other factors of the Eightfold Path. Right view is presented as the bridge from conventional truth, where distinctions and separations appear real, to ultimate truth, where interbeing and non-discrimination are realized. The speaker uses the example of a sheet of paper with recto and verso to show that apparently separate sides are actually one reality. The five mindfulness trainings are presented as concrete expressions of the path: reverence for life, true happiness, true love, mindful speech and deep listening, and mindful consumption. The speaker expands the idea of consumption to include not only food but also sense impressions, volition, and the collective environment. He warns against “ruminating” on anger and fear like a cow chewing cud, and encourages practitioners to consume wholesome nutriments and avoid harmful ones. True happiness is defined not by wealth, power, or reputation, but by understanding and love. True love is described as deep listening, compassion, and the transformation of suffering. The talk concludes with stories illustrating the power of mindful walking and presence. The speaker recounts how a person in Honolulu recognized his peaceful walking without hearing any speech, and how a tour guide in China was impressed by a mindful ascent of many steps to a sacred site associated with Manjushri. Another anecdote from Colorado involves a bear drawn by the smell of food, used humorously to show the vitality of monastic life and the speaker’s community. Throughout, the message remains consistent: mindfulness in daily life, especially in walking, can embody the deepest Buddhist truths and make peace, joy, and liberation available here and now.