I walked slowly and carefully to sit at the altar in the main meditation hall of Deer Park Monastery in Escondido, California. As I looked out at the hundreds of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) faces attending the 20th anniversary of the monastery’s first BIPOC retreat, memories of the Color of Compassion gathering in March 2004 came flooding back to me. The gathering was the first BIPOC retreat hosted by a Zen master. Thich Nhat Hanh and Plum Village.
In 2004, I arrived at the retreat relatively new to Buddhism. I had been ordained in the Order of Interbeing at Stonehill College in August 2003, but still felt inexperienced. I flew into San Diego a day early. Smog hung low over the city as if covered in cheesecloth. I got off the airport shuttle in downtown San Diego and headed to a $45-a-night room across from a strip mall and a fast-food Chinese restaurant. That night, I fell asleep to a public television fundraiser offering a box set of Peter, Paul, and Mary’s greatest hits. The next morning, I awoke to the smell of idling diesel and the sounds of early-morning workers. I remember appreciating the day’s leisurely pace as I went through my morning routine of yoga and meditation. Normally I’d leave home for a long, stressful day of fighting fires as a lawyer and lobbyist, but on this day I was in relaxed, retreat mode. After breakfast and packing, a Haitian taxi driver took me up the winding dirt roads of Merle Lane to the gates of Deer Park Monastery, where I was greeted with the words: Arrived.
The Colors of Compassion retreat, held at Deer Park Monastery in 2004, brought together over 300 Asian American, Pacific Islander American, African American, Latino, Native American, Southwest Asian and North African American people, as well as several European American families. Many were new to Buddhism and attended the retreat. Many identified as lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual. The retreat was the largest Buddhist retreat for people of color in North American history, and continues to this day. This first event was so inspiring that it led to efforts by Thich Nhat Hanh and Plum Village to hold BIPOC retreats more regularly. A film was also made. The colour of mercyand books, We are one: embracing diversity and celebrating connection.
The 2004 gathering was life-changing. I felt like Thay was speaking directly to me and to those of us who are BIPOC. He understood the complexity of our lived experiences, and our individual and collective legacies, burdens, and interests. At the time, and perhaps even today, I was one of the very few Black members of Interbeing. One of the reasons I felt immature in my Buddhist practice was because I realized that there were very few people like me among those attending the Plum Village retreat. This isolation created a sense of not belonging. At the 2004 retreat, Thay spoke on this theme: Isolation and Belonging His talk focused on how to cultivate a sense of home and belonging that comes from deep within, regardless of external circumstances. He spoke from his own experience of not being able to return safely to his hometown in Vietnam, saying,True Hometown” ” is not geographically limited, but rather refers to the present moment, free of hate.
Twenty years later, as a Dharma teacher in the Plum Village tradition, I walked to the altar to give a sermon. Phap Dung Brothers On the third day of this historic commemoration, I felt the poignancy of this moment. Looking out at a kaleidoscope of faces, I reflected on Thay’s legacy of activism and his teachings. Mutual existenceand his urgent message of mindfulness, concentration, and insight. I remembered how Thay had approached that same altar twenty years earlier. At the 2004 retreat, I always arrived early to Thay’s talks and sat at the front next to the door through which he would often enter. Thay took off his slippers and walked in silence to the front of the altar. I remember there was a sense of joy and solidity, of being grounded and not being in a hurry with each of his steps. It was an important reminder for me, a mindfulness bell to bring attention to my own hectic, anxious, and impatient life. During that retreat, feeling Thay’s energy and participating in the slow walking meditation with Thay and the community, I realized how I was always driven by an undercurrent of urgency, even panic. Slowly, as this realization deepened, I began to understand what was behind this urgency and was able to accept that part of myself and allow myself to change.
Although this anniversary retreat was historic, it was in many ways very similar to other Plum Village retreats I have attended in the United States as well as at Plum Village Monastery in Dordogne, France. As a community, we engaged in Plum Village’s unique mindfulness practice each day through sitting, walking, eating, resting, speaking, and listening. Every activity of daily life was guided by mindful awareness. This particular approach to mindfulness emphasizes stopping and pausing in everyday life so that we can be fully present in the moment. Through pausing, we can learn to release tension in our bodies, embrace our experiences, and cultivate happiness and joy.
With every step, with every breath, we Transforming our suffering.
To encourage this rest, all the clocks in the Plum Village monastery are Bell sound A bell rings every 15 minutes. Hearing the bell encourages us to stop, take a breath, breathe, and return to our breath and our bodies. As the days of the retreat progressed, it was so inspiring to see BIPOC people seriously engaging in mindfulness practices and actually enjoying stopping, taking a breath, breathing, and remembering their own unique humanity. As BIPOC, many of us feel like we don’t have enough time because we have to keep proving ourselves to a larger, dominant society. Many of us live with a daily sense that the world is not safe, that we will not be seen, heard, or understood just for being ourselves. We have to earn it. Sometimes it can feel like our worth is inextricably tied to what we do and how well we do it. So it’s important to slow down and just Become familiar.
I was reminded of this many years ago when I was hosting a BIPOC retreat in a log cabin along the Grand River in Michigan. After I introduced the practice of mindful eating, a Black woman in our group said, “This is the first time I’ve been kind to my food. I eat in a hurry. I don’t have time.” Over the years, I’ve heard similar comments from many BIPOC who say they feel guarded, anxious, or constantly doubting themselves. Simple mindfulness practices—sitting, walking, eating, breathing, resting, speaking, listening—help us reclaim our humanity. With every step, every breath, we Transforming our suffering.
The first day of retreat and orientation focused on settling in and feeling like I was coming home. Dang Nghiem Sisters Brother Man on Tuesday. The next day, Sister Tan NghiêDiane Little Eagle, an Indian Buddhist monk and Dharma teacher, led the ancestral ceremony in which all participants were asked to bring items from their homes that represented their ancestors and traditions to place on the altar. Later that day, Sister Anne Gye, who had been at the 2004 gathering,êM and Brett Cook shared their memories of the event and the impact it has had on their respective lives. Later in the day, a panel of participants discussed the five mindfulness training exercises under the skillful guidance of Sister Tan Nghi.êMeters.
Mindful Walking is a central meditation practice in the Plum Village tradition and an important teaching for Thailand. So on the third day of the retreat, many participants hiked to the top of a nearby mountain to have a mindful breakfast at sunrise in true Plum Village style. In our joint teaching that morning, Brother Phap Dung and I focused on Plum Village’s practice of new beginnings, practicing reconciliation, and maintaining healthy relationships. After the talk, a young Palestinian participant expressed concern about the Palestine-Gaza war, and the exchange ended in a tearful moment when Brother Phap Dung encouraged participants to practice hug meditation. That evening, Sister Phu Ngiem facilitated a panel on loving yourself.
The fourth day was entitled “Healing Self and the Collective” and featured a beautiful ceremony led by Sister Kinh Ngiem of the Five Earth Ancestor Touches, where we were invited to reflect on the lived experiences of our spiritual and blood ancestors, and the suffering and joy of our ancestors. Collective AncestorsAfterwards, we practiced prostrating to the Buddha and touching the earth, allowing the earth to accept and heal us. In the evening, we held a celebratory Be-In that included a variety of presentations on mindfulness practices, especially a revised version of Earth Touchings that paid homage to our SWANA (Southwest Asian and North African) ancestors.
The final day ended with inspiring closing talks by Sister Boi Nghiem and Dharma teacher Juliette Phan, and the joyous transmission of the Five Mindfulness Exercises to almost half of the participants as an expression of Buddhist spirituality and ethics. Seeing BIPOC practitioners receiving the Five Mindfulness Exercises made me grateful for my 20 years of practice and hopeful for the future of the Sangha. Thay often said that one Buddha is not enough. Many Buddha statuesThrough listening, speaking, eating, and walking, we can all become Buddhas. Through our thoughts, words, and actions, we can become instruments of peace. In this way, Thay’s legacy will never disappear like a cloud, but will live on through each generation of BIPOC practitioners. I don’t know if I’ll be able to attend the 40th anniversary of the first BIPOC retreat, but I do know that the teachings live on within us.
We can be instruments of peace through our thoughts, words, and actions, and in this way, Thay’s legacy will never disappear like a cloud, but will live on through each generation of BIPOC practitioners.
Twenty years later, Plum Village continues Thay’s legacy and its commitment to BIPOC communities, and while there is undoubtedly a need to go deeper into issues of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging within the tradition in the future, for at least five days the retreat offered hundreds of BIPOC participants an opportunity to experience the peace, serenity, and self-love that the dharma can bring.
