Plum Village Retreat: Coming Home to Mother Earth (short film)

We're in a time of
of triple emergency

That many of us in many
parts of the world are experiencing

in very challenging ways.

We have a climate emergency,
an ecological or biodiversity emergency,

and Thay shares that we have our
social emergency as a human family.

If we look deeply we can see that the
cause of this crisis

comes from the illusion of
a separate self.

As humans we've disconnected from our
true nature that we are of the Earth.

When we look a little deeper we can
see that the calcium

in our bones and our teeth is the
same calcium

that's in the limestone
right under my feet at this moment.

We're told that we're 70% water,

and this water is cycling from
cloud to earth,

streams to rivers to oceans...

So this is our true reality:
we are of the Earth.

We're not separate from it,
the Earth is not inanimate matter,

but it's a living and beating planet,
and it's the Mother of all beings.

We wanted to offer
some medicine,

so that everyone can come to
have their lived and direct experiences,

of the teachings of the Buddha
and of Thay, Thich Nhat Hanh,

and the community of practice
in Plum Village

but taking our practice outdoors
into nature, into the natural world,

so that in the reflection of the healing and
transformation and regeneration of the land

that we're rewilding,

the healing and transformation and
regeneration of the land that
we're farming,

that we can see reflected
in those natural processes,

the potential for healing and
transformation and regeneration
for ourselves as

this human family.

For me now, I think - or I thought -
I already had that deep connection

with nature,
but actually after the retreat

I feel really like something happened
in my heart,

and a lot of things have really gotten
to another level for me of understanding.

I think I gained a deeper
understanding that

we're not these self-contained
individuals

that walk through life
in a very isolated manner,

but a deep sense of being
interconnected with the web of life

Coming Home to Mother Earth
retreat will be held

by the community of Upper Hamlet
in Plum Village

but we'll have special activities
in our daily schedules

and mornings will take time
out on rewilding lands,

to explore some of the teachings
of the Buddha and Thay,

seeing the healing, regeneration, and
transformation in the land occurring,

and in the afternoons we'll spend time
on the Happy Farm,

a project of agro-echology, of
regenerative practice of food production,

but also bringing our practice
of mindfulness

together to our gardening, to our
farming, doing this together as a family,

in community, on the lands,
in touch with the Earth.

I think for me
now of the two weeks,

the favorite was
to be on the Happy farm,

to work with the farmers,
to have my hands on the soil,

and to do this in mindfulness,
really stopping

not working
to achieve something

but really to have this togetherness
with all the others on the retreat.

The main thing I take away from here
and that I want to bring home,

is the message that if we stop
and if we just take time to

enjoy the beauty all around us
and be grateful for this,

that we'll start to feel way more
connected to everything else

and that we'll discover
a piece inside of ourselves

and then life becomes brighter.

Thay offers these words to help us
reconnect with our

our true reality:

he said that we are the Earth
that carries us,

so we are not separate
from our environments

but we are integrally
part of the Earth.

He also shared with us that

we can take refuge
in the outdoors, in the natural world,

and to go home to nature
and let nature heal you.

Go home to nature,
let nature heal you.

["I'm in love with
Mother Earth"]