The Sun My Heart: Reflections on Mindfulness, Concentration, and Insight

Description

Title Page; Introduction; 1 -- SUNSHINE AND GREEN LEAVES; Thanh Thuy's Apple Juice; A River of Perceptions; Sunshine and Green Leaves; Darkness Becomes Light; A Poem for Buttoning Your Jacket; Three Hours for a Cup of Tea; Bathing a Newborn Buddha; Nourishing Awareness while Working; The Precious Smile; Breathing Rhythmically; A Poem and a Peppermint Plant; Establishing a Spiritual Homeland; Singing, Really Singing; From Sleep to Awakening; Awareness, Concentration, Understanding; Cooking a Pot of Corn; Examining a Koan; Awareness Is Both Cause and Effect; Conceiving the Inconceivable.;The Sun My Heart is one of Thich Nhat Hanh's most beloved books. Using the objects and events of everyday life in his hermitage in Plum Village -- the gradual settling of the pulp in a glass of apple juice or the wind blowing into the room and scattering papers about -- Thich Nhat Hanh draws from Buddhist psychology, epistemology, and the world of contemporary literature and science to guide the reader along the path of clarity and understanding. This book can be read straight through, but is also designed to be opened randomly and experienced chapter by chapter, paragraph by paragraph. Nhat Han. Title Page Introduction 1 -- SUNSHINE AND GREEN LEAVES Thanh Thuy's Apple Juice A River of Perceptions Sunshine and Green Leaves Darkness Becomes Light A Poem for Buttoning Your Jacket Three Hours for a Cup of Tea Bathing a Newborn Buddha Nourishing Awareness while Working The Precious Smile Breathing Rhythmically A Poem and a Peppermint Plant Establishing a Spiritual Homeland Singing, Really Singing From Sleep to Awakening Awareness, Concentration, Understanding Cooking a Pot of Corn Examining a Koan Awareness Is Both Cause and Effect Conceiving the Inconceivable. A Grain of Salt Enters the Sea2 -- THE DANCE OF THE BEES Don't Leave Your Fate in the Hands of Others Do Not Take a Cold Shower When You Have the Flu Taking Care of the Apple Tree in Your Yard Don't Become a Colony The Known Is Not Separate from the Knower Letting Go of "In" and "Out" Reality Cannot Be Contained Understanding Is the Fruit of Meditation, Not of Thought The Dance of the Bees Knowledge Is a Barrier to Understanding Unable to Describe It Who Knows? Knowing in the Blue Sky There Is Knowing in the Wind Each Action Its Own Subject. Inanimate Objects, Do You Have a Soul?The Known Manifests Itself in Countless Ways Tasting Yourself at the Foot of an Apple Tree 3 -- THE UNIVERSE IN A SPECK OF DUST Mind and Object Are One Small Is Not Inside, Big Is Not Outside The Sun My Heart Interbeing and Interpenetration Eyes Opening in Samadhi Seeing and Loving Always Go Together Heartbreak Reconciliation Originates in the Heart of Compassion Little Room for Compassion Fearless in Life and Death Past, Present, and Future on the Tip of a Hair Entering the World of Interdependence with the Theory of Relativity. A Raft to Cross the RiverThe Ability to Abandon and the Capacity to Discover 4 -- CUTTING THE NET OF BIRTH AND DEATH Mind Creates the Form of Reality Observer and Participant Mountains Are Again Mountains, Rivers Are Again Rivers Neither Form nor Emptiness The Udumbara Flower Is Still Blooming The Tathagata neither Arrives nor Departs The Net of Birth and Death Can Be Torn Asunder A Leaf Can Lead Us Directly into Non-conceptual Reality Unobstructed Mind and Unobstructed Object The Great and Perfect Mirror Manyana and Vijñapti To See Reality with the Eyes of Understanding. Is Alaya One or Many?Let the Sun of Awareness Shine on the Dharmakaya From Interdependence (Paratantra) to Perfect Reality (Nispanna) Conditioned Reality and Ultimate Reality Cannot Be Separated 5 -- LOOK DEEPLY AT YOUR HAND Happiness Arises from Awareness of Being Providing Conditions Conducive to Living in Mindfulness My Love, Who Are You? Standard for Orientation A Love Letter If You Want Peace, Peace Is With You Immediately Effect Follows Cause More Quickly than a Bolt of Lightning Everything Depends on Your Peace A Bodhisattva Looks at All Beings with the Eyes of Compassion.