The First 8 Exercises of Mindful Breathing | Thich Nhat Hanh (short teaching video)

There is a text called
'Mindfulness of Breathing'

in which the Buddha proposes
16 exercises on mindful breathing.

It's very practical.

And everyone can do it.
Not complicated.

You can already notice the effect
of the practice after one or two hours.

The first exercise is so simple.

To be aware of your in-breath
and out-breath.

This is what we practiced this morning.

Breathing in,
I know this is an in-breath.

To identify the in-breath as in-breath,

and to identify the out-breath
as an out-breath.

Breathing in, I know
I am breathing in. So simple.

And yet the effect can be great.

Aware of...

Aware of in-breath and out-breath.

[1. aware of I + O]

As you breathe in, you pay attention
to your in-breath only.

Your in-breath becomes
the only object of your mind.

And if you are truly focused,
mindful of your in-breath,

you release everything else.

You release the past, you release
the future, your projects, your fear,

your anger, because the mind
has only one object at a time.

And the object of the mind now
is the in-breath.

Breathing in, I know I am breathing in.

So you focus your mind on your in-breath
and you release everything else

and you become free.

There is regret concerning the past,
sorrow concerning the past.

There is fear and uncertainty
concerning the future.

All of that you release in just 1 or 2
seconds because you are focusing

all your mind into your in-breath.

So breathing in mindfully sets you free.
You have freedom.

If you are to make a decision, it's better
you have enough freedom to make it.

You are not under the influence
of anger or fear,

and your decision is much better
than if you are not free.

So just breathing in makes you free.

And it is pleasant also,
it's pleasant to breathe in.

So the exercise is so simple
but the effect can be great.

The second exercise is to follow
your in-breath all the way through

and to follow your out-breath
all the way through.

And you may enjoy these two exercises
at any time and anywhere.

Breathing in, I follow my in-breath
from the beginning to the end.

Suppose this marker represents
my in-breath.

It begins here
and this finger is my mind.

Breathing in, I follow my in-breath
all the way through.

There is no interruption at all,
not a millisecond of interruption.

So during the time you breathe in mindfully,
you cultivate concentration.

You are not only mindful of your in-breath
but you concentrate on your in-breath.

The energy of mindfulness carries
within herself the energy of concentration.

And it is also pleasant,

because to be mindful and to concentrate
on your in-breath can be very pleasant.

You don't have to suffer.

In fact you can feel wonderful,
just breathing in,

especially when the air is fresh
and if the nose is free.

So the second exercise is...

[2. follow I + O]

to follow your in-breath and
your out-breath all the way through.

We know we can do these two exercises

anytime we like.

The third exercise is
to be aware of your body.

[3. aware of body]

Breathing in, I'm aware of my body.
You bring your mind home to your body.

And your mind becomes an embodied mind.

That will help you to be established
in the here and the now,

you are fully present,
you are fully alive.

And you can live that moment
of your daily life more deeply

if body and mind are together.

The oneness of body and mind is
what you realize with the third exercise.

When you spend 2 hours with your computer,

you forget entirely that you have a body.

You are not truly alive in that moment.

You are truly alive only
when the mind is with the body.

You are fully in the here and the now
and you touch the wonders of life

in you and around you.

Many of our brothers
and sisters in Plum Village

program a bell of mindfulness
in their computer.

And every fifteen minutes,
they hear the bell, they stop working,

they go back and enjoy
their in-breath and out-breath,

smile and enjoy their body.

And release the tension in their body.

That is what the Buddha recommended
2600 years ago.

There's the fourth exercise.

Breathing in, I calm my body,
I release the tension...

in my body.

[4. calm body]

When you come back to your body,

you may notice that
there is a lot of tension in your body.

Then you may like to do something
to help your body to have more peace,

to suffer less, and with your out-breath
you allow the tension to be released.

That's the first four exercises of mindful breathing

recommended by the Buddha

so that we can take good care of our body.

And with the fifth exercise
we go to the realm of the feelings.

The fifth exercise is to generate
a feeling of joy. Generating joy.

[5. Generating Joy]

A good practitioner knows
how to generate a feeling of joy,

because she knows that
mindfulness allows her to recognize

all the conditions of happiness
that are already available.

We can remind ourselves and we can remind
our beloved ones that we are very lucky.

We can be happy right here and right now,

we don't have to run into the future
to look for happiness.

There is a teaching given by the Buddha.

That is the teaching of
"living happily in the present moment."

Life is available only
in the present moment.

And if you go back to the present moment

you will notice that there are
so many conditions of happiness

already available.

That is why joy and happiness
can be born right away.

The expression living happily
in the present moment

was found in a sutra...

five times.

The Buddha was teaching Anathapindika,

a businessman, in the city of Sravasti.

That day Anathapindika, the businessman,

came with many hundreds
of businessmen to visit the Buddha.

And the Buddha gave them that teaching.

"Gentlemen", he said, "you can be happy
right here and right now.

You don't have to run into the future,

you don't have to look for success
in the future in order to be happy."

I think the Buddha knew very well
that businessmen,

they think a little bit too much
about the future and their successes.

And that is why
the expression living deeply,

"living happily in the present moment"
was used by the Buddha five times

in the same sutra, the same scripture.

Drstādharmasukhavihara.

[drstādharmasukhavihara]

"Vihara" means to dwell or to live,
"sukha" means happily,

and "drstā-dharma"
is the present moment.

(Chinese: 現法樂住)

So a good practitioner
does not look for happiness in the future.

He knows how to go home
to the present moment

and recognize all the conditions
for happiness that are available

and make joy and happiness
available right away.

And she does that for herself
and she does that for the other person.

Creating happiness is an art.
The art of happiness.

So the fifth exercise is to generate joy
and the sixth is to generate happiness.

[6. Generating Happiness]

The seventh is...

to be aware
of a painful feeling or emotion.

Breathing in, I know there is
a painful feeling, a painful emotion

that is coming up in me.

[7. Aware of Pain]

The practitioner does not try to fight
the pain, to cover up the pain inside

or to try to run away from the pain.

In fact, because she is a practitioner

she knows how to generate
the energy of mindfulness.

With that energy she recognizes the pain
and she embraces the pain tenderly.

'Hello my little pain. I know you are
there. I will take good care of you.'

Whether that is anger or fear
or jealousy or despair.

We have to be there for our pain.

There is no fighting.

There is no violence
done to our suffering.

Yesterday we spoke about a mother
holding the crying baby.

Our pain, our suffering is our baby

and the energy of mindfulness generated
by our practice is the loving mother.

And the mother has to recognize
that the baby suffers.

She takes the baby up and holds
the baby tenderly into her arms.

That is exactly
what a good practitioner will do

when a painful feeling arises.

You have to be there
for your painful feeling or emotion.

You continue to breathe
and to walk in such a way,

that the energy of mindfulness
continues to be produced.

With that energy of mindfulness
you recognize the pain

and you embrace the pain tenderly.

In Buddhism we speak of consciousness
in terms of "store" and "mind."

There are at least
two layers of consciousness.

The lower layer
is called "store consciousness."

Our fear, our anger, our despair are
there in the bottom of our consciousness

in the form of seeds.

There is a seed of anger here

and if the seed of anger
accepts to sleep quietly down there,

we are okay.

We can laugh, we can have a good time.

But if someone comes and says something
or does something

and touches off that seed of anger,
it will come up as a source of energy.

Down here it is called a seed.

[seed]

(Chinese: 種子)

Bija.

[bija]

And when it comes up here
on the level of "mind consciousness,"

it will become a kind of energy
called mental formation.

[mental formation]

And this is the mental formation
called anger.

[M.F.]

So when the practitioner notices
when anger is coming up,

she, right away, breathes

and invites the seed of mindfulness
to come up as energy.

Mindfulness is another seed that is here.

If we are a good practitioner,
the seed of mindfulness in us has grown

to become a very important seed.

It needs a touch lightly,

then there will be a lot of that energy
coming up for us to use.

If we are not a practitioner, the seed
of mindfulness is there but very tiny.

If you practice mindful breathing,
mindful walking everyday,

the seed continues to grow.

Whenever you need that energy,
you just touch it,

and you have a powerful source of energy

to help you to deal with
whatever is happening up there.

So the practitioner begins
to breathe or to walk mindfully.

The second mental formation
is manifested on this level.

Another mental formation...
And this one is mindfulness.

So it is the energy of mindfulness that
will take care of the energy of anger.

There is no fighting.

Mindfulness does at least two things.
First of all to recognize,

a simple recognition of the pain.

And that is the seventh exercise.
Breathing in, I know anger is in me.

Or despair is in me or jealousy is in me.

Recognize simply, not fighting.

The second thing mindfulness will do
is to embrace.

And that is seen in the eighth exercise
is to calm down the pain

[Calm Pain]

like a mother holding the baby.

The mother does not know
what is wrong with the baby.

But the fact that
she's holding the baby gently

can help the baby suffer less right away.

The same thing is true
with the practitioner.

She does not know what is the cause
of that kind of anger or fear.

But the fact that she is recognizing
and holding that energy of fear and anger

can help her suffer less right away,
after one or two minutes.

So this is...

the art of suffering.

This is the art of happiness.

How to generate a feeling
of joy and happiness.

How to take care
of a painful feeling and emotion.

How to calm it down, how to get a relief.

And with the exercises that follow
you can go further

and you can transform pain, sorrow, fear
into something more positive,

like making good use of the mud
in order to grow lotus flowers.

So a good practitioner
is not afraid of pain.

She does not try
to run away from the pain.

In fact, she tries to be with the pain.

She knows how to handle
a feeling of pain,

a strong emotion.

And she knows how to make
good use of that mud

in order to create
understanding and compassion

which are factors of true happiness.

So with global ethics,
with the practice of mindfulness,

with a spiritual dimension
in our daily lives,

we know how to overcome difficulties
that present themselves in our daily life.

And that is why each one of us
should bring a spiritual dimension

to our daily life.

Without that kind of practice, we
don't know how to handle the difficulties

that come everyday.

The image of a mother holding a baby
is very helpful.

If your mindfulness is powerful enough,

you embrace your pain, your sorrow,
you continue to breathe

or to practice walking meditation.

It's like giving your fear,
your anger a mindfulness bath.

Maybe 3 minutes, maybe 5, 10 minutes.

After that, she will lose
some of her strength

and go back to the original place,
down there in the store consciousness.

After having taken a mindfulness bath,

she goes down into the store and
goes back to where she had been before.

Losing some of her strength.
That is the power of mindfulness.

In the Buddhist tradition,

we speak about 51 categories
of mental formations.

As a novice monk, I had to know by heart
all these mental formations,

so that every time one of them came up,

I should be able
to call it by its true name,

'Hello my fear, I know your name,
I am going to take good care of you.'

Recognizing and embracing.
That's the first step of the practice.

There are wholesome, positive seeds
down here, we mentioned mindfulness.

We mentioned concentration,
we mentioned insight,

we mentioned non-violence,
we mentioned joy, we mentioned compassion.

There are many good things down there.

And as a good practitioner,
we know how to recognize them

and help them to come up
as frequently as possible,

because they will make the landscape
of the mind consciousness beautiful.

We are happy if we know

how to invite them to manifest
as mental formations up here.

As for the negative, unwholesome mental
formations like fear, anger, despair,

we better keep them down there,
do not give them a chance to come up.

And they will grow weaker
and weaker and weaker.

We do that for ourselves and we do that
to help our beloved ones to do the same.

(Bell)

(Bell)

If we speak about
the life of a school teacher,

we know that there is suffering
inside of the teacher,

and there is also suffering
inside of the students.

That is why if school teachers know
how to handle their own suffering,

if teachers know how to generate
joy and happiness

they will become happy teachers,

they will suffer less,

and when they go to their class, they can
help their students to do the same.

During the last two decades
of the last century,

there was a professor of mathematics here,
in Toronto.

He taught at the French Toronto School.

He came to a retreat
organized in Montreal.

He came back
and tried to put into practice

the practice of mindful breathing
and walking.

His name is Henry Keekoo

and he is director
of the program of mathematics

in the Toronto French School.

Two journalist from The Globe and The Mail

came to his class to interview him

about why he wanted to introduce
Buddhism into his class.

This is forbidden here in Canada.

And then he invited the two journalist
to come to his class

and see how he taught his students.

The day he came home from the retreat
and resumed his class

he walked in mindfully,
slowly and mindfully.

And he came up to the blackboard
and he erased things mindfully,

and the students asked him,
'Papa, are you sick?'

(French) 'Papa, es tu malade?'

'No, I am not sick,
I am practicing mindfulness.'

(Laughter)

So he told the students about
what he has learned in the retreat.

Breathing, walking, easing,
calming and so on.

And he proposed that
every half an hour, 15 minutes

a boy would clap his hands three times,
replacing the bell of mindfulness

and everyone practice mindful breathing
in and out to calm themselves.

And the class made a lot of progress.

there's a lot of joy
and progress in his class.

And he taught in many classes
of mathematics in that way.

So when the two journalist came,
they witnessed that,

teacher and students sit down
and enjoy breathing together,

breath out laughing together.

And every time they hear that (clapping),

everyone stopped teaching, learning,
and enjoyed breathing in and out.

That had a good impact on the learning
and the teaching of the school.

So when the time for retirement came, they
asked him to stay for another three years.

And other classes have adopted
his way of teaching.

So for a teacher,

or school teachers,

the first thing to do
is to come home to himself or herself.

The way out is in.

Go back to oneself
and take care of oneself.

Learning how to generate a feeling of joy,

learning how to generate
a feeling of happiness,

learning how to handle
a painful feeling, a painful emotion.

Listening to the suffering

allow understanding and compassion
to be born and suffer less.

This is the first step and he or she
has to do that. That is the first step.

A sangha, a community of practice
in the neighborhood can help him,

can help her to deepen their practice.

You have to begin with yourself.

And the school teacher also
has members of his family;

a partner, children. So like that.

So after he has done it for himself,
he can help the other to do the same.

It's much easier. When you
have not changed yourself,

it's very difficult to help
change the other person.

To help him or her suffer less.

So with loving speech and deep listening,
with more peace and gentleness in yourself

you become more pleasant.

That is why you can help
the other person much more easily,

and she or he will be able
to do the same thing.

And we become co-practitioners.

We share the same values,
we share the same spiritual practice.

Because we know that each day
the situation improves;

there's more peace, less suffering,
more joy, more happiness

and the children will profit from that.

Because the children
can practice very well also.

And when you have
a united harmonious family,

then you can bring that
into your workplace.

Then maybe first you have your class
and you transform your class.

Your class becomes a happier place.

Your class can become a family

because there are many children
who are unfortunate.

Their parents are not in good terms
with each other. They fight,

they make each other suffer

and the child has had no chance
to learn what love is.

The class may be the second chance
for the child.

And the school teacher can play
the role of the father or of the mother

and can teach the young person
how to love, what is love.

It's something real.

I remember this summer opening
in Plum Village

there was a child that
came up for questions and answers

and she made the whole sangha cry.

She said that her parents are divorced.
They fight each other,

they make each other suffer

and when they come, they still fight
each other in front of the child.

And the child asked, 'What is love?
I don't know, what is love?

Why do they fight so much,
even in front of us?'

Many people cried. Very disturbing.

So it is possible to give children
like that one a second chance

by transforming the classroom
into a family,

and Henry Keekoo was able to do so.

There are other classes in the school
and there is the administration,

and of course they will do everything
in order to improve the quality of life,

the quality of teaching and learning
in the whole school.

We continue tomorrow.

(Bell)

(Bell)

(Bell)

(Bell)