Drinking Tea as a Sacred Practice | Brother Phap Dung

Learning to drink tea, mindfully

I do that every day.

Lighting a candle and an incense.

That has become my ritual for

cultivating Mother Earth in me.

And you know, Thay drinks tea quite often

during Dharma talks and so on, and

I was able to be near him and around him

when he did drink tea

And yeah, I just very inspired

to see he was very consistent,
when he drinks tea, he's like

He's really drinking tea, you know!

It's very sacred

Yeah, so I was very impressed with that

So no matter where he is, what he's doing

even at the airport

when he grabs that cup of tea

It's just like, I don't know
but it's just like

trying to catch him
when he's like you know

like, you know

He's always like

You know he drinks the tea

really like, like a sacred act, you know

so for me I'm cultivating that,

that simple act and keeping it regular

when I drink tea

so I try to keep Thay alive in me

and Mother Earth in me,
and to see the water

that comes from the air, the sky,
the rain, the river

you know, the ancestors.

I mean the magic of water,

just contemplate on, wow

incredible what water does for us

when you say "Oh,
water is necessary for live"

but like, you know that stuff

It can go and becomes ice,

it can wash and make things clean

it's dirty, it doesn't care

it's clean, it's perfume,
it's clear, it's muddy

it doesn't, you know, it's just water, it doesn't

you know there's a lot of wisdom

in a cup of tea

so for me, that is the
wisdom of Mother Earth

so these kind of elements

just, we have time to
reguarly interact with it

with a cup of tea, with water,
with Mother Earth

you know it's just the depth
of your life

it comes, more, more and more

so for me it's an ongoing maintenance

to take care of it

so it's not like you have an insight

"Oh, water is Mother Earth,
water is in me"

but what do you do every day, you know

so when I take a shower,
when I brush my teeth

so drinking tea is somehow

kind of penetrated through
these other elements

so, but I enjoy drinking tea
and when I drink it

I feel Thay alive in me,
and he's smiling and

you know, cause I learned that from him

and I didn't drink tea before
I came to Plum Village

Well, I drank coffee, but like you know

you know, buffalo cups, you know

but here you drink in a small little thing

and there's a reason why it's small

It's just, you take your time.

So our culture drinking tea is

super this, super that, you know,

but we don't really enjoy it.

We just take it down
as if it's just material

you know you can come up with

all these great names for tea and stuff

but you don't know how to drink it

it's just, you know a commodity, you know.

A simple cup of tea can

that can change the way you
move through the day

so before sitting meditation

before even a lazy day

I wake up and light a candle

or some incense and

enjoy a cup of tea with my teacher
and Mother Earth.

That's one of my things
I receive from Thay,

not just a teaching,
but it's a living teaching