(Class #27) Compost Nourishes the Flowers

This is a weekly class from Deer Park Monastery on the topic "The 40 Tenets of Plum Village" and it is based on a book called Plum Village Looks at Vulture's Peak written by Thich Nhat Hanh. The book describes the essential characteristics of Plum Village practice and teachings.

For an English translation of the tenets themselves, follow this link.

For this week's teaching, due to technical difficulties, we have no video recording, only a very clean audio recording of the class. Normally, Brother Phap Luu uses the white board extensively but this week he only used it to write the tenet. We will miss his beautiful expressions and hand motions.

Here is the tenet text: "Since the afflictions (kleśāh) and the awakening (Bodhi) are of an organic nature, the practice needs to be constant in order for transformation to continue and for regression not to take place. Samsāra is a continuation and the beautiful and wholesome things need to be continued for as long as possible, while the not beautiful and unwholesome need to be transformed so that they do not continue. The compost has to be used to nourish the flowers."