Finding Our True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh

Author:Thich Nhat Hanh [Hanh, Thich Nhat]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Parallax Press
Published: 2001-08-09T00:00:00+00:00

Making Our Community into the Pure Land

You can make the kitchen a part of the Pure Land, a corner of the Kingdom of God. When it is your turn to cook for the Sangha you come into the kitchen and practice mindfulness. You light a stick of incense and offer it on the altar to the kitchen bodhisattva before you begin to cook. For the whole of the time you are working in the kitchen, whether it be one and a half or two hours, you know how to follow your breath, you know that you are cutting or peeling vegetables, you know that you are washing up a pan or frying vegetables in mindfulness. Therefore you continue to dwell in the Pure Land.

If you do not know how to practice and if while you are cooking you are angry, sad, or jealous or are saying unkind things about other people, then, although the kitchen is as beautiful as the Pure Land, the realm you are in is the saha world. If we practice the mindfulness trainings, concentration, and insight in the kitchen, then the kitchen is the Pure Land and not the saha world. Everything depends on our way of practice.

Anything we see, anything we are in touch with can become a Dharma instrument. The broom and the saucepan are Dharma instruments. Anything can become a favorable condition for our practice. Buddha Amitabha’s skill is to be able to use everything that is present to bring the people of his land further along on the path of practice. As a Sangha we can have the same skill as Amitabha, using cooking, cleaning, gardening, or looking after the trees as instruments to advance on the path of practice and transformation.

In a Pure Land, people cook, eat, drink, pick flowers to offer to the Buddhas, listen to the sutra, and practice walking meditation. They feel free, peaceful, and joyful when they are doing these things. We do not need to go somewhere else to cook, eat, and offer flowers to the Buddha. Right away we can do the things which the people are doing in the Pure Land like chanting the sutra, listening to the sutra, washing up, and doing walking meditation. The Pure Land is definitely here for us. The only question is, are we here for the Pure Land?

In the Sangha, whenever we wash the pots, make tea, bathe, or garden, each of our actions and our footsteps should become a Dharma talk. One step alone can be a Dharma talk. Holding up a cup of tea to drink can also be a Dharma talk when you hold up the tea with solidity, freedom, and grace. Eating a meal in such a way that you have happiness, peace, and joy as you eat is a Dharma talk about eating. Others who see us will see a bodhisattva who lives in the Pure Land. You do not have to wait until tomorrow to do this, you can do it right away today.

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