How Can We Live More Mindfully?
Thich Nhat Hanh has been a pioneer bringing mindfulness in the West since the early 1970s, developing new ways to apply Buddhism to the challenges of modern life.
Mindfulness is the energy that we generate when we bring our mind back to our body and get in touch with what is going on in the present moment, within us and around us in a non judgemental way. We become aware of our breathing and come home to our body, fully present for ourselves and whatever we are doing.
Developing Your Practice
Exploring Mindfulness Practice
You can explore the meaning and practice of mindfulness at the Plum Village website.
The Plum Village App
The Plum Village App is free and can be downloaded from the Apple app store or Google Play. It has a wealth of resources including guided meditations, mindful movement videos, talks, a meditation timer and more. A particular feature of the App is the podcast The Way Out Is In. You can also find the podcast on Spotify, Apple Music and other streaming services.
How To Enjoy Our Practice
This downloadable booklet introduces you to the core practices in the Plum Village tradition in a friendly and accessible way.
Gathas
Gathas are short poems to support your mindfulness practice. The create a moment of mindfulness as you go about your daily life.
The Five Mindfulness Trainings
The Five Mindfulness Trainings are the foundation of our practice. For those who have made a commitment to practice in the Plum Village tradition there is a transmission ceremony of the Mindfulness Trainings and participants are given a spiritual lineage name. The trainings are available to download below.
The fourteen mindfulness trainings are transmitted to those that are ordained.
The Five Mindfulness Trainings represent the Buddhist vision for a global spirituality and ethic. They are a concrete expression of the Buddha’s teachings on the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, the path of right understanding and true love, leading to healing, transformation, and happiness for ourselves and for the world. To practice the Five Mindfulness Trainings is to cultivate the insight of interbeing, or Right View, which can remove all discrimination, intolerance, anger, fear, and despair. If we live according to the Five Mindfulness Trainings, we are already on the path of a bodhisattva. Knowing we are on that path, we are not lost in confusion about our life in the present or in fears about the future.
Joining a sangha
A local community of mindfulness practitioners who gather to meditate, to share their joys and difficulties, and to encourage each other on the path of practice, is traditionally called a sangha.
We encourage everyone to join a sangha near you or online, to sit and share regularly and deeply. In this way you can profit from the collective energy of mindfulness, peace and joy. You can search for a sangha in your area by clicking on this link.
Through readings and other people’s sharings we can be inspired to explore different elements of the Plum Village practice. For many people, their practice group has become a deep source of support and friendship.
“Without a sangha you lose your practice very soon”. Thich Nhat Hanh
Finding a Plum Village Sangha Near You
In addition to the sangha search facility you can find an online or affinity sangha at Plumline, this is an international resource.
Affinity Sangha
Plum Village recognise the wisdom and need of being in safe spaces for affinity communities. These sanghas have become increasingly more accessible as many of these groups meet online.
Our current affinity sanghas include:
– Colours of Compassion Sangha for People of Colour / Black Asian Minority Ethnic / Mixed Racial Heritages
– Rainbow Sangha UK for those who self-identify as LGBTQIA+
– White Awareness Sangha for members who have been socialised as or who identify as ‘white’
– Family Sangha for all ages, with special programmes for children and teens
– Wake Up which is group of sanghas for those aged 18 – 35
– Neurodiversity Sangha for those with PTSD, ADHD and neurodiversity-related conditions
Being volunteer-run, there will be a variety of styles and formats, while all our groups have Plum Village practice at their heart.
Thich Nhat Hanh, Mindfulness and the Plum Village Tradition
Mindfulness Bell Magazine
The Mindfulness Bell is the journal of the Plum Village tradition. The digital edition is published twice a year and the subscription allows you to also access every copy of the magazine since it began publication. The digital subscription can be paid annually or monthly.
Mindful Living Books for Beginners
The Miracle of Mindfulness is considered a classic and was Thich Nhat Hanh's first book. It lays out foundation thinking about how to incorporate mindfulness into our lives in an accessible way.
The Art of Living by Thich Nhat Hanh is also a good place to start your exploration of mindfulness within the Plum Village tradition.
Here are other Plum Village books we, as a sangha have appreciated and have helped us gain much insight.
Guided Meditations and Daily Practices
The Blooming of the Lotus is a book of meditations to address the challenges of everday life. Written in an accessible and very readable style it is a book that moves from dharma to daily practice.
A Plum Village Practice Centre for the UK
Being Peace UK Centre
Following fundraising the Being Peace Centre is being developed near the Forest of Dean and will be the first dedicated practice centre in the Plum Village tradition in the UK. The Being Peace Practice Centre will be a place for young people, families, activists, and people from all walks of life to come together and practice peace and transformation, inspired by the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh.