Tao Te Ching

The Power of Goodness, the Wisdom Beyond Words
Search Quotes Search Sages Search Chapters

Thích Nhất Hạnh tʰǐk ɲɜ̌t hɐ̂ʔɲ

1926 CE –

Peace activist, Zen monk, Princeton and Columbia University lecturer in the 1960s, author of more than 100 books, influence on Martin Luther King, Jr; Thích Nhất Hạnh blended teachings from many different Buddhist traditions with Western psychology, mindfulness, and social engagement. As a young monk in Viet Nam, he worked on poverty alleviation and development projects in rural Viet Nam rebuilding villages, setting up schools, and establishing health care clinics. Following in the tradition of a 13th century Vietnamese emperor-turned-Buddhist monk, he coined, popularized, and practiced "Engaged Buddhism" promoting nonviolent solutions to problems, vegetarianism, and peace.

Lineages

Eras

Unlisted Sources

Quotes by Thích Nhất Hạnh (35 quotes)

“When we are capable of loving ourselves, we are already protecting and nourishing society. When we are able to smile, when we are peaceful, at that moment there is a change in the world already.”

Themes: Change

Comments: Click to comment

“The present moment is the door to all moments.”

Themes: Here and Now

Comments: Click to comment

“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.”

Themes: Sacred World

Comments: Click to comment

“There is no way to happiness - happiness is the way.”

Comments: Click to comment

“We will be more successful in all our endeavors if we can let go of the habit of running all the time, and take little pauses to relax and re-center ourselves.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.”

Comments: Click to comment

“People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.”

Themes: Suffering

Comments: Click to comment

“My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Hope is important because it can make the present moment less difficult to bear. If we believe that tomorrow will be better, we can bear a hardship today.”

Themes: Hope

Comments: Click to comment

“Keeping your body healthy is an expression of gratitude to the whole cosmos - the trees, the clouds, everything.”

Comments: Click to comment

“People deal too much with the negative, with what is wrong. Why not try and see positive things, to just touch those things and make them bloom?”

Comments: Click to comment

“When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.”

Themes: Meditation

Comments: Click to comment

“If you truly get in touch with a piece of carrot, you get in touch with the soil, the rain, the sunshine. You get in touch with Mother Earth”

Comments: Click to comment

“We need enlightenment, not just individually but collectively, to save the planet. We need to awaken ourselves. We need to practice mindfulness if we want to have a future, if we want to save ourselves and the planet.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Anger is like a storm rising up from the bottom of your consciousness. When you feel it coming, turn your focus to your breath.”

Themes: Anger

Comments: Click to comment

“True self is non-self, the awareness that the self is made only of non-self elements. There's no separation between self and other, and everything is interconnected.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Freedom is not given to us by anyone; we have to cultivate it ourselves. It is a daily practice...”

Themes: Freedom

Comments: Click to comment

“To meditate means to go home to yourself. Then you know how to take care of the things that are happening inside you, and you know how to take care of the things that happen around you.”

Themes: Meditation

Comments: Click to comment

“Buddhism teaches us not to try to run away from suffering. You have to confront suffering. You have to look deeply into the nature of suffering in order to recognize its cause, the making of the suffering.”

Themes: Buddhism

Comments: Click to comment

“People sacrifice the present for the future. But life is available only in the present. That is why we should walk in such a way that every step can bring us to the here and the now.”

Comments: Click to comment

“If you breathe in and are aware that you are alive - that you can touch the miracle of being alive - then that is a kind of enlightenment.”

Comments: Click to comment

“When we have peace, then we have a chance to save the planet. But if we are not united in peace, if we do not practice mindful consumption, we cannot save our planet.”

Themes: Consumerism Peace

Comments: Click to comment

“When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?”

Themes: Love

Comments: Click to comment

“People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore.”

Themes: Belief

Comments: Click to comment

“There are many, many Christians who practice Buddhism, and they become better and better Christians all the time.”

Themes: Christianity

Comments: Click to comment

“There are many levels of Christianity. There are many notions about God. To believe that God is a person is just one of the notions of God that you can find in Christianity. So, we should not say that there is one Christianity. There are many Christianities.”

Themes: Christianity God

Comments: Click to comment

“Civilizations have been destroyed many times, and this civilization is no different. It can be destroyed. We can think of time in terms of millions of years and life will resume little by little. The cosmos operates for us very urgently, but geological time is different.”

Comments: Click to comment

“The situation the Earth is in today has been created by unmindful production and unmindful consumption. We consume to forget our worries and our anxieties. Tranquilizing ourselves with over-consumption is not the way.”

Themes: Materialism

Comments: Click to comment

“If you're a politician, you might want to learn the Buddhist way of negotiation. Restoring communication and bringing back reconciliation is clear and concrete in Buddhism.”

Comments: Click to comment

“In the past there were people who were not rich but contented with their living style, laughing and happy all day. But when the new rich people appear, people look at them and ask, 'why don't I have a life like that too, a beautiful house, car and garden,' and they abandon their values.”

Themes: Wealth Ambition

Comments: Click to comment

“If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper... If the cloud in not here, the sheet of paper cannot be here either.”

Themes: Books Poetry

Comments: Click to comment

“It is not impermanence tht makes us suffer. What makes us suffer is wanting things to be permanent when they are not.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Meditation is not to escape from society, but to come back to ourselves and see what is going on. Once there is seeing, there must be acting. With mindfulness we know what to do and what not to do to help.”

Themes: Meditation

Comments: Click to comment

“We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness.”

Comments: Click to comment

“Mindfulness must be engaged. Once there is seeing, there must be acting. Otherwise, what is the use of seeing?”

Themes: Meditation

Comments: Click to comment

Quotes about Thích Nhất Hạnh (0 quotes)

Comments (0)