This is the third Dharma talk offered by Thay in the Together We Are One Retreat at Deer Park Monastery on the North American Tour, given on Friday, September 9th, 2011. Thay shares with us about the nature of God and the nature of the Buddha, and how the we can find the Buddha-nature in everyone. He continues to share about the project of the Beloved Community started by Martin Luther King, Jr., and specifically the history of how Thay left Vietnam, was exiled, and met Dr. King. "Everyone of us can make a step mindfully, everyone of us can look mindfully and recognize the beauty of life. If we can recognize the beauty of the Dharma, we can recognize the Kingdom of God--we get in touch with the Kingdom of God. We don't have to look anywhere outside, anywhere else.... You are the Buddha. You are the Dharma. You are the Sangha." Thay continues to share about store consciousness and mind consciousness, and specifically how they relate to the Four Noble Truths: 1) suffering, 2) the making of suffering, 3) it is possible to transform suffering into happiness, 4) the path to happiness. "When you bow to the Buddha, you don't view the Buddha as an entity wholly separate from you. I am in you, and you are in me. There is no longer any complex. That is the wisdom of non-discrimination: nirvikalpajnana."
Video and audio published by the Plum Village Online Monastery: monks, nuns, and layfriends making content from Thich Nhat Hanh and the monks and nuns of Plum Village available on the Internet.
