I Have Arrived, I Am Home | Dharma talk by Thich Nhat Hanh, 2014 07 13

This is the 1st Dharma talk by Thay for the 2nd week of Summer Retreat 2014 in Plum Village.
There is a song that we like to sing in Plum Village: I have arrived, I am home. This is a song of practice. Our practice is to always arrive in the here and the now. We have been running and we have not arrived. We have been looking for something. We have been longing for something and we haven’t found it, so we continue to run.
Maybe we are looking for some conditions of happiness that we don’t have. Running and searching has become a habit and we are not capable of stopping.
All the wonders of life are available only in the present moment. The past is no longer that and the future has not yet come. There is only one moment that we can be truly alive, that is the present moment.
I have arrived means I have arrived in the present moment. Every breath and every step help us to arrive in the here and now so that we can encounter life and get the nourishment and healing from life.
When I ordained as a novice monk, my teacher gave me many verses to learn by heart. The first one is "Waking Up this Morning". These verses were originally in classical Chinese and now they have been translated to many languages. These verses can be found in Plum Village Chanting Book. I suggest that you may practice at least five verses everyday and you may choose the five verses that you like.