The Deer Park Dharmacast

Sister Chua Xua was a social worker and left a long-term relationship to become ordained as a nun at Bát Nhã, a Plum Village monastery that closed due to harassment from the Vietnamese government. "I also have a dream. I have a wish that I can support the young Western people to take the monastic life. The life that when you open your eyes, you see the moon and the star over your window. You feel very free. You light the candle with the hot cup of tea, the warm one, and you enjoy tea in the early morning. You look through the windows, you enjoy the moon and the star, and you enjoy your free life." 1:53 Visiting the Monastery, Social Work 6:27 Relationship Before Ordination 9:33 Wake Up Sangha 11:21 Working for a Company, Decision to Become a Nun 18:35 Bat Nha Monastery 28:02 Father's Illness and Death 31:42 Living at Different Practice Centers 33:21 Bringing Buddhism to the West 37:16 Difficulties in Monastic Life You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by s

Brother Phap Hoi is a Vietnamese refugee and the most senior Brother at Deer Park Monastery. "Because the Sangha embrace all of the people, even you are high level or low level of good background or not. You all have the chance in the Sangha if you go in the right direction of practice." 3:16 Meeting Thay 8:20 Arriving at Plum Village 11:30 Visa Trouble, First Stint at Deer Park 17:12 Bat Nha Monastery 26:25 Plum Village Thailand 32:00 Gratitude for Thay and the Path You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. In this episode of Meet the Monastics, Brother Minh An speaks with Brother Phap Hoi, the eldest brother at Deer Park Monastery, about his extraordinary journey into monastic life. Born in 1970 into a humble family in Hanoi, Brother Phap Hoi’s path led him across multiple countries, including Czechoslovakia, Germany, and eventually France, where he was ordai

Sister Phu Nghiem is one of three nuns in her immediate blood family and is passionate about bringing mindfulness to children. "So I focus a lot more on my steps. On how I choose the food when I come to a meal. I learn to enjoy the meal and enjoy my siblings. And that has supported me a whole lot now that I'm here at Deer Park. I'm learning how to do that. And I notice my relationship with my sibling is more honest. But I think the most important thing is that my relationship with myself is a lot more honest. So that made me very happy." 2:07  - Introduction to Spiritual Life 7:49 - Professional Life and Decision to Become a Nun 14:15 - Starting Magnolia Grove 18:46 - Stress and Working Mindfully 26:13 - Mother's Ordination 31:01 - Practicing with the name "Gift from Heaven" 34:47 - Advice for Those Considering Monastic Life You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Founda

Brother Phap Luu, the eldest non-Vietnamese American monk in the Plum Village tradition, graduated from Dartmouth College and started meditating after going through a depression.  "What is more satisfying in life than helping people to transform their suffering? I mean, who cares about money and all this other stuff? The biggest happiness I get is if I can help myself, first of all, but others to transform suffering in a real way. My goodness, if we can do that with only a few people in our life, that's already worth a lifetime, right?" Discourse on the Four Establishments of Mindfulness 2:16 Experiments in Community and Meditation 10:37 Returning to the US, Depression 16:04 Discovering the Four Establishments of Mindfulness 21:00 Returning to Dartmouth, Visiting Maple Forest Monastery 26:09 Decision to Become a Monk 31:00 Life as a Monk, Love for Thay, Ethics 40:10 Projects 51:39 Ideals of Monastic Life, Collective Awakening 1:09:17 The Monastic's Role, Advice for Potential Monastics You can support this p

Sister Le Nghiem came to the practice after the death of her brother, and typically does solo retreat at the monastery for a few weeks a year. "So the practice gives me the greatest happiness. And this practice gives me being with others. Being with friends on retreat. Being with my siblings. Spending time each other. So when I practice it gives me happiness. And when my practice is deep, my happiness gets deeper. So it's all to do with the practice, nothing else." 2:17 Death of Brother and Discovering Thay's Teachings 9:25 Meeting the Monastic Sangha, Deciding to Become a Nun 17:00 Spending Time with Family Before Ordination 23:08 Nourishment from Solitude 32:34 Advice for Potential Nuns 35:49 Greatest Happiness in Monastic Life You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. This is an interview from Meet the Monastics, hosted by Brother Minh An at Deer Park Monast

Sister Sr. Trung Chinh left Vietnam as a refugee and has been a nun for over fifty years. "The aspiration of a monk or a nun is that we have to arrive to the most peaceful place, the happiest place in ourselves. And there's only the daily practice. The daily practice only helps us to arrive to that place, that aspiration. It's the daily practice of each person. If each one of us do our best and lessen our hate, our love, our attachment, our anger, we let go of them day by day, then we can see we can love everybody." 2:44 Discovering Spirituality and Ordination 7:35 Dreaming of the Buddha and Meeting Great Teachers 12:39 Appreciation for Plum Village 16:55 Overcoming Difficulties, Waking Early, Balancing Practice  22:57 Chanting, Pleasing the Land Ancestors 33:23 Aspiration You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. This is an episode of the podcast Meet the Mona

Brother Minh Nhan, one of the only monastics in the Plum Village tradition of Mexican descent, is a monk of many interests: music, mushrooms, math, and more.  "To join a community that maybe looks different, maybe don't see others like myself in it, let's say. Yeah, I mean, that's one way to look at it, but look at it as also, you're the one entering that. And you needn't be the last one either." 1:54 Introduction to Spirituality 14:38 Dropping Out of College 20:33 Arriving at Deer Park 22:11 Depression 31:09 Practice, Study, Play, and Rest 36:32 Being a Mexican Buddhist Monk 40:14 Advice for Those Considering Monastic Life Source The Kalama Sutra You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. The “Meet the Monastics” podcast from Deer Park Monastery, hosted by Brother Minh An, features weekly conversations with monastics about their journeys and inspirations. In t

Sister Boi Nghiem studied nursing before being ordained, and works regularly as a nun with the BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and teen communities. "I think I have a very healthy relationship with myself. Very healthy mental dialogue with myself. There were times I comforted myself. There were times I'm very firm with myself, tell myself to stop thinking that way. And they help. This is why I kept on sharing the importance of self-love. Because by the end of the day, it is the self-love that helped me, that saved me, that keeps me going. Because if I continue to criticize myself or have excessive negative thoughts, I cannot do much. It's very tiring. So I think that is the reason why that helped me not to fall into burnout."" 3:07 Heartbreak, Visiting Green Mountain, Deer Park, and Plum Village 6:37 Novicehood at Plum Village  11:40 Magnolia Grove Monastery 25:00 Interest in Social Injustice 28:34 Teens 34:42 LGBTQIA+ 40:55 BIPOC 53:26 Burnout 1:07:07 Basic Practice 1:17:25 Advice for Potential Monastics You can support th

It's Meet the Monastics! Brother Phap Dung is a Vietnamese refugee who worked as an architect in Los Angeles before finding the practice, healing his relationship with his father, and changing the course of his life. "Now you get to choose, and it's deliberate. That is a monk. I choose to be in this intimate way with the community, with this path. I choose not to be in a romantic relationship. I choose to have real relationships with people I come across with. It's always a constant choice." 2:35 Meeting Thay and the Sangha 9:51 Joining the Buddhist "Enterprise" 14:40 Signs 19:28 Transformation 31:36 Advice for Potential Monastics 36:11 Love for Monastic Life 44:00 Engaged Buddhism You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. In this episode of Meet the Monastics, Brother Minh An interviews Brother Phap Dung, also known as Brother Fabian or Brother Embrace. They e

Sister Kinh Nghiem, one of the funniest and most stylish nuns in the world, was ordained when she was only 14. "Get rid of all of your ideas of what monastic practice is. You know, you come here, I mean, the practice is wonderful. And it's for you to come and see for yourself. But if you start getting ideas of what you expect monastic life to be like, you'll have a hard time. Because there's two sides to the coin, if you want to say it, you know? Sometimes the sisters have some expectation, and then you and yourself have some expectation. "Oh, I thought this was a Buddhist community. I think we're supposed to practice loving kindness and compassion and help, and everybody's so mean." You know, I mean, honestly, if you let go of the ideas and just focus on your bodhichitta, focus on what you want. And those other things of how people say things to you, which is sort of like, be a minor, it's not important." You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing i

Brother Minh Luong was raised in Laguna Beach, California, and went to NYU, where he read a book that changed his life. "I realized recently that there really is no separation between the practice and everything we do in our daily life. Either we're creating conditions for a practice space, like an internal practice space, or we're taking conditions away. And so if I can live in a calm and peaceful and serene way and do things that contribute to mindfulness and peace in my daily life, then I'll have a lot of success in my spiritual practice."   2:03 Introduction to Buddhism 5:58 Moving Home 8:50 Ideas about Monastic Life 13:49 India Trip and Meeting the Sangha 19:29 Why Monastic Life? 25:12 Sacrifice and Aspiration 31:19 Bhikshu Ordination 34:22 Moving to Thailand 39:03 Being a Western Monastic and Advice for those Interested   You can support this podcast by leaving a comment or review in your podcast application and by sharing it with friends. Financial support can be offered through the Thich Nhat Hanh Fou

Weekly Episodes Starting October 15   From Deer Park Monastery, it's Meet the Monastics, a new podcast featuring interviews with fully ordained monks and nuns, hosted by Brother Minh An and produced by Kenley Neufeld. As monastics, the most common question asked of us is, you guessed it, why did you become a monastic? This podcast is for anyone who's ever wanted to ask that question. Each week, we'll bring you conversations with fully ordained monks and nuns about their journey to monastic life and what inspires them now. We hope they inspire you to live a happier, kinder, and more meaningful life. And who knows, maybe some of you will even consider monastic life yourself. Listen wherever you get your podcasts (search for Meet the Monastics) or on the Deer Park Monastery YouTube channel.   Get a preview here: https://meetthemonastics.org

A Dharma talk with Br. Man Tue from the Ocean of Peace Meditation Hall at Deer Park Monastery during our Day of Mindfulness, Sunday, July 23, 2023. Our theme is how to stop, rest, and heal. 

Sister Áo Nghiêm offered this beautiful and personal Dharma talk for our Day of Mindfulness on Sunday, July 16, 2023. 

From our series of questions and responses on March 26, 2023 in the Ocean of Peace Meditation, we heard this question. When moments of personal suffering take over and have a combustable quality, what advice do you have for a person experiencing this? Or someone who is helping that person?  Our response is offered by Sister Phu Nghiem. 

From our series of questions and responses on March 26, 2023 in the Ocean of Peace Meditation, we heard this question. Thich Nhat Hanh says that anxiety means not being able to dwell in the present moment. But there are times when it is very difficult. In this kind of situation, what other suggestions do you have for coming back to the present moment? Our response is offered by Brother Phap Luu. 

From our series of questions and responses on March 26, 2023 in the Ocean of Peace Meditation, we heard this question. How can I let go of attachment to worldly love? Our response is offered by Sister Huong Nghiem. 

From our series of questions and responses on March 26, 2023 in the Ocean of Peace Meditation, we heard this question. Regarding the goals of the practice. What are the goals of the practice? Do I need to change my needs in life to be happier? Then there is the other end of the spectrum. How to practice? What exactly to relate to ones own needs for the purpose of alleviating suffering? Our response is offered by Sister Phu Nghiem. 

On March 26, 2023 we held a session of Questions and Answers during our weekly Day of Mindfulness. Rather than release the entire session as one recording, we are offering question and response one at a time. This is the first question.  How can we work with, in our practice, racial bias and cultural insensitivity? The response was offered by Brother Phap Dung. 

From our Day of Mindfulness on Sunday, March 12, 2023 we hear a Dharma talk by Brother Ngo Khong, also known as Brother Freedom.