#A strange love story download series

He cautions us: вЂњIf you ask what happened next, you are forgetting that the self is made of non-self elements.вЂќДЄnd this is when the book makes its strange transition. NhбєҐt HбєЎnh anticipates, too, that we will want to know what happened next-to him, to his beloved, to the love story we have been following. вЂњBut when you are stuck in the notion of a self, a person, a living being or a life span, you cannot understand the nature of my true love, which is reverence, trust, and faith.вЂќ вЂњWhen you are serene-smiling, breathing in and out mindfully, I know that you understand,вЂќ he writes. NhбєҐt HбєЎnh does not explain this transformation as carefully as Ram Dass has done, and he senses that it will be hard for some readers to swallow: So the love of the enlightened being is attached not to one love object but to everything. The enlightened being is always in that place, in love together withВ everything. If you and I are truly in love, then you go to the place within you that is love, and I go to the place within me that is love, and we are вЂњin loveвЂќ together. As oneвЂ™s consciousness evolves along the path, he says, one comes to realize that love isnвЂ™t located outside, where the beloved seems to be, but within. I recently read a beautiful explanation of this kind of transformation by the American spiritual teacher Ram Dass. вЂњOver time, my love for her did not diminish, but it was no longer confined to one person.вЂќ Cultivating the Mind of Love вЂњI began to see her everywhere,вЂќ he writes. He recognizes attachment in his feelings for the nun, recognizes the threat it presents to both of them, to their vows and to their self-realization, and through the teachings of the Buddha he transmutes his love for the nun into love for all beings, for all existence. Instead, NhбєҐt HбєЎnh finds a teaching moment. During many moments that night, I felt the desire to go and knock on her door and invite her to the sitting hall to continue our discussion.вЂќД«ut he does not knock on her door-another disppointment for the romance reader accustomed to tales of forbidden lovers overcoming the obstacles between them in passionate embrace.

вЂњI was still awake and I felt a strong desire to be with her-to sit with her, to look at her, to listen to herвЂ¦. She represented all that was important in my life, and I could not afford to shatter it.вЂќДЄs resolute as he sounds here, he also describes a sleepless night after they had spent hours talking together: That desire in me was so strong and sacred that anything like holding her hand or kissing her on the forehead would have been a violation. вЂњShe represented everything I loved-my ideal of compassion, loving kindness, bringing Buddhism into society, and realizing peace and reconciliation. The love NhбєҐt HбєЎnh feels for the unnamed nun blends with his love for their common vision-for a more service-oriented Buddhism that was struggling to emerge in 1950s Vietnam. He portrays their love as chaste-they touched only once, he tells us, a brief embrace when they parted ways. We have to read with faith that this important teacher treats honestly and openly a topic so taboo in Buddhist orders. Its aim is to deliver us from that disappointment-by teaching us through the scriptures that the romance need never end. The book may disappoint readers who want to linger in the romance, but the unusual structure of the book is, in an important sense, its message. The first 32 pages could fit on the Romance shelf, the next 88 in Eastern Religions. I call вЂњCultivating the Mind of LoveвЂќ strange because it transitions so suddenly from a tender love story to an annunciation of Buddhist scriptures.

#A strange love story download series

NhбєҐt HбєЎnh tells the story of his star-crossed love in a strange little book developed from a series of dharma talks he delivered in France in 1992, about 40 years after the love story occurred in his life. вЂњAs a monk, you are not supposed to fall in love,вЂќ he writes, вЂњbut sometimes love is stronger than your determination.вЂќ When he was a young monk in Vietnam, the Zen Buddhist teacher Thich NhбєҐt HбєЎnh fell in love with a nun.