The Emergence of Awareness

The Emergence
of Awareness
Sister Kính Nghiêm shares about recognizing and
embracing suffering in yourself and your family.

During the pandemic I had the opportunity, the
practice of a lifetime, to go home and care for my
parents for a whole three years. If you really want
to test us monastics, our resilience in our practice,
put us at home. It’s easy to be in the monastery;
everybody’s doing the same thing: breathing and
smiling and letting go. But being at home all the
time is like being in a pressure cooker.
It was very hard, especially because I had an
expectation of having my own space. Sometimes
I could be a little bossy about the practice. For
example, saying you should not be eating while
watching the TV, and those kinds of things. And
one of the things that I realized in those years of
practicing being confined, was not only taking care
of my own emotions, but also my parents’ fear of
what was going to happen next. I think there was
collective fear for everyone surrounding the pandemic, and especially for my parents in San Diego,
California, US. They didn’t speak English, and they
didn’t know how to navigate everything, such as
how to do their grocery shopping online. It was
very stressful for them.
So I had to create my own space and also to
hold them in that space. Eventually, we got along
well. There were a few hiccups here and there,
We can learn to
embrace the pain
and hold that space
for ourselves,
recognizing what has
been transmitted
from generation to
generation.

with some big hiccups. But we grew to understand
each other better. I especially came to understand
myself and how I react to certain things.
But there was one time when my mother was
not feeling well, and I had to do a lot of things on
top of monastery work, on top of family work, including navigating all the doctors, the paperwork,
and everything else that went with that. So I was
sort of running thin. I asked my father to help prepare dinner for Mom; all he needed to do was put
food on a plate and heat it up in the microwave.
As he filled the plate I said, “Oh, no, that’s too
much. Mom doesn’t eat that much.” A very simple
statement on my part. All of a sudden, my father
put everything down, turned to the corner of the
kitchen, held his head down low, and said, “You
always tell me what to do.” At that moment, I saw
my father’s five-year-old child in the corner, almost
as if he was being punished. I thought, Where did
this come from?
I said, “It’s okay, Daddy. If you’re not ready,
then I will take care of this. You just go sit and relax.”
So I took the tray up to my mom and I told her what
was happening. And she said, “You’re very much
like your grandma.” I thought, Where did that come
from? How did I become Grandma all of a sudden?
And she said, “The way that you talk, you speak
with conviction, almost like a sense of authority.” I
know from my dad’s history that he was not loved
by his mother, my grandma. Yet he always wanted
to make his mother proud of him.
He was helping me, but somehow in his mind,
he thought he was helping his mom. When I said,
“That’s too much,” I saw this little boy that had let
his mother down. So it became my practice to be
his child, his daughter, and also to be the loving
mother, the kind mother that my father never
had. And that helped build the relationship: understanding where he was coming from. In those
moments, I could react in a certain way and put
Our practice is to simply
accept suffering as it is
and to help suffering
understand itself.

this expectation on him like, “You’re my dad. Be
my dad.” But at that time, I understood from my
own practice that I became like my grandma without even knowing, and somehow I reminded my
father of my grandma. I didn’t grow up with my
grandma, so I didn’t know that I was exactly like
my grandma.
In that image of my father, standing in the corner with his head hung low, I can see the deep pain
that he held inside of him. The guided meditation
[seeing my father as a five-year-old child*] helps
me to understand deeply without blaming him
and without blaming myself. We can learn to embrace the pain and hold that space for ourselves,
recognizing what has been transmitted from generation to generation.
We have so many things that have been transmitted down to us. And sometimes in this present
moment, we think that we are that problem or we
have this habit. And I don’t want to blame the past
by saying “Oh, it’s their fault. They gave this to me,
and now I’m like this, and this is who I am, and
now I have to fix everything.” But in fact, I don’t
think the teaching of awareness of suffering, the
Four Immeasurable Minds, is to blame suffering
for anything. Our habit is anything that we like to
keep with us, and anything that we dislike, we try
to eliminate it.
When we have a painful feeling and a negative
seed arises inside of us, we do everything we can
to get rid of it. But I have bad news for you. It’s
going to be there. You can’t get rid of it! You can get
rid of the idea of it, but it is still there.
Thầy said that when we recognize a negative
feeling arising in us, we can hold it like a baby. We
can smile to it, embrace it, and offer it comfort,
because more than anything else, that is what our
suffering needs the most. But instead, we punish
ourselves for suffering, because that is our habit.
I’m going to call you guys out on this one: We
sometimes use meditation to punish suffering by
saying, “Breathing in, I am calm. My suffering is not
there. I relax my whole body, letting go of all these
emotions.”
Thầy said that when we
recognize a negative
feeling arising in us, we
can hold it like a baby. We
can smile to it, embrace
it, and offer it comfort,
because more than
anything else, that is
what our suffering
needs the most.

In that way, if we are unskillful, our meditation practice can become like spiritual bypassing.
The practice of being 100 percent aware is not to
bypass suffering. It is about being present for
whatever comes to me. I establish myself in my
own body, in my footsteps, and I am prepared to
embrace what is. Instead of trying to breathe it
away, I am being there 100 percent. (Or, for the
beginners, 10 percent.) Being in our footsteps
can help us to embrace ourselves, our suffering,
and our despair. It’s not about learning the text or
sutras, but instead establishing presence and not
pushing anything away.
So now I’m more aware of when I become my
grandma. And when I’m with my dad, I just say,
“Good morning, Daddy,” and allow myself to be a
child of my father. But I’m an adult, and on top of
that, I’m a nun, and on top of that, I’m a Dharma
teacher, too. So the pressure is high, and I have an
expectation of myself that I need to be at my best.
But really I can just enjoy being my father’s daughter. Because I have the practice, I can embrace that
little girl inside of me. I can hold my father’s little
boy hand and say, “Let’s do this together.” We don’t
have to punish suffering or eliminate it. That is an
illusion. Our practice is to simply accept suffering
as it is and to help suffering understand itself. It
also means to help us understand ourselves.
[ Bell ]
My father used to be a smoker. I guess for him
it was a way to relieve stress. He is a victim of the
Vietnam War and was also a soldier during the
Vietnam War for the US side. He suffered a lot of
fear, a lot of pain. He used to smoke as a way to forget things, because he didn’t know how to process
all that he went through.
My younger sister didn’t like him smoking, because when you go to school in the US, you learn
that smoking is bad; you’re going to get cancer. We
were little kids and we didn’t know any better. So
my sister would take his cigarettes and hide them
all the time. She would hide them in a little corner
somewhere, and she would pretend that she didn’t
do it. My dad got very mad at her one time, and he
spanked her, saying, “You do not touch my cigarettes!” Of course, my sister cried. When he saw my
sister crying, he realized that he had hurt her.
That day he made a vow to quit smoking, because it didn’t make him the person that he wanted
to be. He became a victim of his own suffering, and
he unintentionally transmitted it to his daughter.
He has three daughters who became nuns. I don’t
know if it’s a good sign or not, but I have two other
sisters who ordained with Thầy.
Eventually my dad came to Plum Village, attended retreats, and meditated as best he could.
One day, Thầy was teaching about Beginning
Anew, and my father was a bit fidgety. There was
something inside really bothering him.
He came to my sister and said, “I need to talk
to you.” My sister was so nervous, thinking, “What
happened? Why did Dad change? He never wants
to talk to me.” She was a nervous wreck, really
shaking. He said, “I really need to talk to you. I need
to get this done now.” My sister didn’t know what to
do, so she just had to sit there.
My father mustered up the courage to say, “I’m
sorry.” And my sister said, “What?” He said, “I’m
sorry that I hit you for hiding my cigarettes. And I
never told you that I was sorry.” It took him fifteen
years to get the courage to say that. And for my sister, it was awkward. In Asian families, we don’t hug
and we don’t say, “I love you.” My mom was there
witnessing this, and she said, “Just hug already!”
because it was so awkward. And they hugged, and
then my dad was like, “Okay, that’s enough.” It irks
him to get emotional, but it was a breakthrough for
him to be able to communicate his pain and suffering to his daughter. Sometimes as adults, we think,
I’m supposed to know everything. I’m supposed to be
okay. We don’t allow ourselves to be vulnerable because we want to be a good role model. Sometimes
that can be a little bit toxic if we cannot model for
our children how to communicate in a constructive
way. It took my father fifteen years to apologize. We
were being naughty, hiding his cigarettes. Little did
we know that we had transformed him very deeply.
He never smoked again, and he has been
clean for more than thirty years. That event really woke something up in him. But he could not

communicate because he was so afraid of losing
himself, losing the identity that he built of himself:
I’m the father. I have this authority. I get to do what
I want to do because I’m the adult in the house. And
then if I say sorry, what does that make me? I’m no
longer a person of authority or teaching. My father is
a man of few words; I’m sure most fathers are. But
sometimes he may feel very alone. Maybe we can
all tune in to our father and say, “Daddy, I’m here
for you.”
Now my father and I have a very good relationship. But the healing and transformation doesn’t
just happen overnight. It’s not going to be fixed at
the end of one retreat and everything is dandy. I’m
warning you: this is just the beginning of a deeper
transformation and healing.
It took my father fifteen years to say “I’m sorry”
to my sister for something that had happened when
she was five years old. We may forget the story, the
details, the date, and the time, but we don’t forget
the feeling. And I think that feeling sat with my father for so long.
Being 100 percent, establishing ourselves,
gives us the energy so that we can come to face and
embrace the things that come to us, whether they
are in our present moment or from our past. That
then will lay the foundation for how we will be in
the future. So being 100 percent can heal us now.

• You can read more about this practice in “Taking Care
  of Our Suffering,” a Dharma talk by Thích Nhất Hạnh,
  available in issue 84 at mindfulnessbell.org.
  This is an excerpt from a Dharma talk given on August
  20, 2024 in the Assembly of Stars Hall and in the YMCA of
  Estes Park, Colorado, US during the Our Earth, Our True
  Nature Retreat. It has been edited for clarity.
  Sister Kính Nghiêm, translated to “Adorned with
  True Reverence” (pronouns she/her),  is a senior
  Dharma teacher in Thích Nhất Hạnh’s international
  community of Engaged Buddhism. She ordained in
  1998 at the age of fifteen. As Thích Nhất Hạnh’s
  personal attendant for over fifteen years, she has
  traveled around the world leading mindfulness
  and
  meditation
  retreats
  for
  communities,
  schools, universities, and business corporations.
  She received full ordination in 2001 and Lamp
  Transmission in 2006. She currently resides at
  Deer Park Monastery in Southern California, US,
  where she enjoys picking wild sage, studying deep
  Buddhism, and sharing tea and laughter with her
  sisters and brothers.

We Still Have Each Other
A L E T T E R F RO M T H Í C H N H ẤT H ẠN H
UPPER HAMLET, PLUM VILLAGE1
SECOND WEEK OF SUMMER RETREAT,
My dearly beloved students,
We are in the second week of the Summer 2000
retreat. Each of us has responsibilities, each of us
has to stay up late and get up early, but Thầy still
has time to think of his students and write you letters, and Thầy knows that you will also have time
to read them. Whether you are in Upper Hamlet,
Lower Hamlet, New Hamlet, Green Mountain,
Maple Forest, or Deer Park, our responsibility and
practices are exactly the same: take each step in
solidity and breathe each breath mindfully, cultivating faith and happiness for each other and for
those who come to us. We are able to maintain the
mind of love: we all look in the direction of service,
and none of us looks just for comfort or praise. Thầy
is aware that we are living together; Thầy feels the
presence of each of his students and Thầy is very
happy. Just a few days ago, Sister Anh Nghiêm
came to sit next to Brother Pháp Niệm and said:
“Thầy praised you for being able to approach everyone in the Sangha and connect with everyone.
I would like you to show me the way so that I can
do this too.” Hearing Brother Pháp Niệm share his
practice, Thầy was very happy. If all of us have the
same wish as Sister Anh Nghiêm, then how can the
happiness of our Sangha not increase day by day?
In the past, Thầy’s class at Báo Quốc Temple
was quite large. We were very close, and it seemed
like we would have each other forever.2 But now
that Thầy looks back, there is almost no one left.
Even the youngest brothers are no longer here,
like Brother Châu Toàn and Brother Châu Đức.
Now only Venerable Thiện Hạnh and Venerable
Thiện Bình are left. I remember Hoàng Cầm’s
verses about Đông Hồ paintings: “Mother pig and
her yin yang piglets are separated, the mouse
wedding was once bustling with excitement, now
where do they go?” Have you seen the Đông Hồ
paintings of yin yang pigs and mouse weddings? At
Upper Hamlet, Thầy has a complete set of Đông Hồ
paintings. If anyone wants to see it, come here and
Thầy will show it to you. Looking back, we see that
we are still together, we are all following the same
practices, and we can call on each other anytime
we want. We can do walking meditation together,
we can sit and eat mindfully together, we can have
the Rains Retreat together.3 This is really a rare gift.
How can Thầy not feel happy?
Although some of us may sometimes act unskillfully, causing difficulties and sadness, we do
not do it intentionally. Thầy is also sometimes unskillful, and he knows that you are always ready to
forgive him. Thầy is grateful to you, deeply grateful.
You give Thầy a lot of happiness, and his happiness
grows more and more when you love each other
and forgive each other’s mistakes. All of us know
that the more we get along and love each other,
the more we can serve, becoming a refuge for
many people. Thầy sees that all of us have taken
many steps on the path of practice and transformation. Everyone has transformed—some faster,
some slower, that’s all. Thầy hopes that everyone
will become a Dharma teacher, and that every novice will receive the Great Precepts at some point.4
Thầy doesn’t want anyone to be left behind, but
Thầy needs the Sangha to help him provide support to the ordinees, and Thầy also needs you to
give Thầy a hand.
Times are changing very quickly and maybe in
the near future we will be entrusted with new responsibilities, especially in our homeland. Thầy is