The Art of Power by Thich Nhat Hanh

"To me a civilised society is one where people have the time to live their daily lives deeply, to love and take care of their family and community" wrote Thich Nhat Hanh in his book The Art of Power.

The cover slip says "Power is good for one thing only: to increase our happiness and the happiness of others. Being peaceful and happy is the most important thing in our lives and yet most of the time we suffer, we run after our cravings, we look to the past or the future for our happiness".

The world renowned Vietnamese monk laid out five spiritual powers: faith, diligence, mindfulness, concentration and insight. Under each of these he explains how they work as powers. However, none of these tools are like new apps that you can purchase and install for your hand held device. They are gained by practice, by constant mindfulness. And after the discipline we must learn how to handle power skillfully through cutting off our cravings, offering love and cultivating insight.

None of this is new. It's as ancient as the Buddha himself. Sound as the teachings of Jesus, the leadership of Moses and the courage of Mohammed. It's not rocket science; the lessons are not difficult to read, and you don't have to have an Einsteinian IQ to understand. Also there are many popular books about power that offer similar teachings. They are saying that true power comes from within, and if we practice what they preach, we shall be powerful and happy. Every generation has great thinkers and great teachers, capable of imparting the power of their knowledge on the rest of us.

Are the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh, Simone Weil, Martin Luther King, Jr., Pema Chodron, Eckhart Tolle, the Dalai Lama - simply new ideologies that could turn against the humanity it proposes to revere, if they suddenly possessed hegemonic weapons?

Why is the measure of power in our current world most noted in terms of its ability to control through death and destruction?  Why do right wing political campaigns appear to win on the premise that fear works? How is it that power, as we have learned it, turns people and institutions into monsters?

Why are some of us, so impressed with this kind of power?

Well, at the moment, I would guess that it takes less effort to avoid self-interrogation, and so we do what is easiest.  In this way we enable bullies, we support systems of oppression.

For me, the difference between the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh and other ideologies is the former values life itself and others promote exploitation.

Ultimately it is up to us how we investigate, probe, question and interrogate all the information that competes for our attention. The way of moving forward without causing more pain in this world is through love and hope, and the understanding that even though I am not in control of the world, I am part of its desire to thrive.

The Power of Insight

The fifth of the five spiritual powers is the power of insight. Thich Nhat Hanh maintains that the power of insight "is a sword that cuts painlessly through all kinds of suffering, including fear, despair, anger, and discrimination." He goes on to say that an insight is more than a notion and Hanh's key teaching is the insight of impermanence.

I look for stability through democracy and social justice perhaps because it offers some comfort that others might do unto me as I would do to them.



Because of my attachment to social justice I act according to what I believe is just and fair. I raise my family on ideas of justice and kindness and empathy.   Self-interest to me is contributing to a world guided by laws based on a reverence for life.

But at the moment what I hear and see in the news, in social media, on the internet, on the radio, goes against all the notions of justice, kindness and empathy. I feel outraged not just because I fear something bad will happen to me or my loved ones, but because I believe that when we get rid of that social contract built on the golden rule then all that remains is fear, despair, anger and discrimination.

As I look deeply into this problem I realize that my community is rich with many acts of social justice and kindness. Every day yields signs of  this. One on one, in small business, there are many acts of generosity, signs of care and concern. The violence that fills media is happening to someone else. But this insight does not make me feel better, or powerful.

Hearing about the massacre of women and children in Houla chills my bones even though it is far away from my children and grand-children. Yet impermanence suggests there is nothing to guarantee the safety of my loved ones - that the justice I expect today will not always be here. But impermanence means also that I can't anticipate how we will deal with this horror and how we will respond to it on a global scale.

So as I watch my expectations eroding in the face of impermanence, feeling absolutely powerless to find a response that is likely to hold what I value, all that remains is the civil acts I do here and now.  And these acts demand more than the golden rule - they demand compassion.

The Power of Concentration

"Mindfulness brings out the fourth power ... of concentration" says Hanh.  The power of concentration can lead to a breakthrough, to see deeply into the object of your focus. If we are suffering some ill-health, say a back ache, we can concentrate on that pain and perhaps link it to an emotional event that we have brushed aside.  Someone told me once that back ache is a sign of needing support, a lack of support. When I think of those who have suffered back pain I wonder if their active independent personality keeps them from seeking the support they need.

I often get headaches that rob me of my energy.  Would these aches be telling me that my head is resisting the work I plan to do, to concentrate on?  Or are they telling me I should concentrate on the thoughts I am having in regards to the way I  respond to the outer world? Are they telling me to stop living in my head and have some faith in action?

If someone gets angry with me my first response is to move out of ear range and get on with my day, but if I concentrate on what was said, the way it was said, and the body language at the time I can attain some insight perhaps.

Thich Nhat Hanh advises us to concentrate on what we are doing.  If we are having tea, drink tea, don't drink in the worries and the suffering. If we concentrate on what we are doing after tea or after dinner or before breakfast, we gain some nourishment from our rituals and gain some peace and strength.

Seems like a simple idea doesn't it? But throughout our lives we have been told to strive, to improve, to be a better person, and in our striving we may have forgotten to look after ourselves until we are exhausted, worried and spent, then dive into a box of doughnuts or a bottle of whiskey to escape.

Concentrating on the simple care of ourselves really is quite a radical notion.

The Power of Mindfulness

This is the third of the Five Spiritual Powers.  Hanh says "Mindfulness is the energy of being aware of what is happening in the present moment. When we have the energy of mindfulness in us, we are fully present, we are fully alive, and we live deeply every moment of our daily life."

The challenge for me is that I think a lot about what is happening globally in terms of peace and social justice.  I think about the reservist, Trevor Greene, who was severely injured during his term  fighting in Afghanistan and how the government has cut back on services to soldiers who return needing health care.

This is not considered mindfulness or is it?  Reaching out in empathy (and outrage) to someone who puts himself on the front line for his country but who believes he doesn't get the medical care he needs.

The trick is that no matter what discipline I practice there are so many things I have no control over. So is awareness going to make me more powerful in this regard?

Moving further away from the moment and into the thinking place, I return to the notion that what is happening today is because of what happened a thousand years ago.  Each action for control is a problem when the control is not ourselves but others, and how we might have internalized the power of the state with our own sense of power.

So getting back to mindfulness I think about the moment and what I can do in this moment in response to what has happened over the last millenium. "If we lose this power of mindfulness, we lose everything" claims Hanh and the fact that his writing travels all over the world, and that his Plum Village is built on these Buddhist values, is perhaps an indication of his power.

I am working on the premise that mindfulness is more than simply paying attention to the toast I eat for breakfast, and that in practice I hope for further insights.

The Power of Diligence

Hanh says we are capable of going back to our best selves but we must maintain this practice of diligence.

He says there are two kinds of consciousness - the open consciousness (the living room) and store consciousness (the basement).  But the store consciousness is described also as the land where seeds lay underground that we don't pay much attention to until something happens to remind us of those seeds.

In most people's lives, there have been times when we have felt threatened, angry, victimized and in despair - not knowing where to turn next. These feelings are seeds, hidden underground, when we are happy and life is good, but when fears arise we feel those seeds lying there, and must decide whether to water them or let them dry up.

There are four aspects of diligence: first - when negative emotions haven't manifested in your mind, you don't give them a chance to manifest; second - is calming and replacing negative seeds (anger, hate, fear, despair) in your conscious mind; third - is to always invite good seeds to manifest (love, forgiveness, joy, peace, happiness); fourth - is trying to keep a good mental formation such as compassion, joy, peace, by nurturing it.

Last night it took me awhile to get to sleep, so rather than water the seeds of frustration, I lay in bed thinking about how comfortable it was listening to the rain outside.  Focusing on positive emotions I turned on the light and began reading Naomi Beth Wakan's book The Way of Haiku, marvelling at the beautiful language there and the culture that has enabled us to create poetry. Filled with gratitude I eventually went to sleep.

Yes I know that beautiful thoughts and words can't defend us against guns and bombs, but they do inspire us and other people to act on behalf of peace and justice.

The Power of Faith

Thich Nhat Hanh translates the word faith into confidence and trust "because it is something inside you and not directed toward something external".

So I shift into a place of confidence that I am a being of integrity and that I have a right to be here.

Working through the night and the following day with this particular power enabled me to give up anxiety, to second guess and question everything I do and say.  What is that about? And - what was that?

After spending so many years looking to the external world for assessment of what is good and what is troubling, I can see how moving to a place of faith in my ability to create some goodness in a changing and unpredictable world, I can bring my focus back to my own energy.

For a start I told myself that I had faith that I could sleep through the night so that I could get up early the next morning to do what I had promised to do. It worked and I felt less like a creature oppressed by the whims of fate.

During the waking hours it soon occurred that mindfulness was also wedded to the power of faith because I need to be mindful of the tasks to do them satisfactorily.

This also reminded me of a time when I was younger and took confidence for granted, assuming I would always have that strength and ability.  How did I lose my confidence? Perhaps a few mistakes made me feel like a fumbling old lady and I questioned my abilities more and more.

Getting back to that place of comfort with the self is quieter, more peaceful, than the angst and apologies, and the continual self-reprimands grieving over a more youthful confident self.

The Five Spiritual Powers

In Thich Nhat Hanh's book The Art of Power he lays out five spiritual powers he teaches to  ground us in the power from within that many would not associate with power.

They are:

1. The Power of Faith
2. The Power of Diligence
3. The Power of Mindfulness
4. The Power of Concentration
5. The Power of Insight

Over the next few days I plan to write about these individually in the hope that I will learn how to access my own spiritual powers.

Not wanting to simply plagiarize Hanh's work, I feel it necessary to focus on my responses to what he teaches.