Sangha Building and Growing Pains By Katie Hammond Holtz It is natural that we will experience growing pains as we go through the stages of life — and the same is true for Sanghas. If we expect our Sangha to fit our ego-definition of “perfect” all the time, we will…
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Heart to Heart
In each issue of the Mindfulness Bell readers take on a different topic, writing in short essays about their personal experience and their practice. We have covered the Five Mindfulness Trainings; now we ask for your thoughts on the role that art plays in your practice and your life. Keep…
The One Who Bows
By Ann Moore One day in January 2010, my friend and Dharma teacher Joanne Friday called me and shared that she had a significant birthday coming up, her sixtieth. Westerners are used to celebrating every birthday under the same zodiacal sign; but under the Chinese astrological calendar, one’s birth sign…
Finding Ways to Help
In 1975, Thich Nhat Hanh and I moved with several fliends to a house near Fontvannes, France. The war in Vietnam had ended and we were cut off from our country with no way to help. We named our community Les Patates Douces, Sweet Potatoes. In Vietnam, when peasants have no rice, they eat dried sweet potatoes.…
Remembering That You Have a Body
A Retreat for Software Developers and Designers Retreat for software developers and designers, 2015. Photo courtesy of Kenley Neufeld “I realized that I want to cultivate more joy, less fear, less self-loathing and comparing. And the way I use technology now is not filled with joy. It’s filled with duty,…
Love Letter from Auschwitz
By Peter Kuhn Auschwitz Memorial; photo by Peter Kuhn Dear Friends, Auschwitz, the site of the most notorious concentration camp in Nazi-occupied territory during World War II, may not sound like a vacation destination, but it is a powerful spot for retreat. Last summer, my wife Jackie and I joined…
Healing All Moments
A Retreat with Thich Nhat Hanh By Jill Siler The Vietnamese monk seemed to float onto the stage. He put his palms together and bowed his head. Then smiling, he folded his legs, effortlessly sank to the floor, and settled on a small round cushion. “Dear friends,” said Thich Nhat…
Free Where I Am
By Patrick Doyle I’m currently serving my fifth year of a ten-year sentence for armed burglary. I can get out in 2016. When I got arrested in 2007, I was an angry, young, confused gang member looking at a life sentence. I didn’t care about life anymore. I was adopted…
Wake Up Dreams
Wake Up Paris; photo courtesy of Wake Up Every year they ask me to write something for the magazine La Thu Lang Mai [the annual magazine of Plum Village in Vietnamese], and every year I feel confused. What am I supposed to write? Who is the audience? These are the…
Loving Deeply
By Allan Hunter Badiner A commentary on the fourth of the Five Awareness: "We are aware that understanding is the very foundation of love." While the foundation of love may be understanding, it is equally true that confusion and misunderstanding often surround love. The key to the Five Awarenesses is to understand ourselves as a…