Cutting Off and Letting Go:Buddhist Practice in Daily Life

Brother Phap Dung teaches that letting go is not about denying experience, but rather acknowledging and accepting them with compassion. Drawing on Thich Nhat Hanh's vision of engaged, applied meditation, he shows how spiritual practice is inseparable from daily life—washing dishes, caring for children, opening doors mindfully—and how cultivating three Buddhist virtues (compassion, ethical conduct, and wisdom) transforms ordinary moments into genuine spiritual work. This is not about escaping the world but learning to show up with kindness to family, self, and the challenges we face.

What Does Letting Go Really Mean in Buddhist Practice?

Brother Phap Dung begins by reframing the concept of letting go. In Buddhist practice, he explains, letting go is not about suppressing or denying our experiences. Instead, it is the act of acknowledging and accepting them with compassion and understanding. This distinction is crucial: letting go does not mean pretending difficulty doesn't exist or pushing it away. Rather, it means looking directly at what arises—grief, regret, attachment, fear—and holding it with kindness rather than judgment.

The talk takes place during Plum Village's summer retreat, when families and children come to practice together. Brother Phap Dung uses this setting to illustrate a core insight from Thich Nhat Hanh's teaching: meditation and mindfulness practice are not separate from daily life. The presence of crying babies, children playing, parents learning to be more compassionate with their families—this is not a distraction from practice, but the practice itself. As he notes, some people think practice happens in the meditation hall, in structured sitting. But what about the ten to twenty hours outside the hall? That is where the real work unfolds.

How Can Ordinary Tasks Become Spiritual Practice?

One of Brother Phap Dung's most practical insights concerns something many people dismiss as a chore: washing dishes. In Plum Village, monks and nuns wash dishes three times a day, after each meal. Brother Phap Dung reflects that when he first arrived, he saw this as something to get through quickly so he could "do the real practice." This was a fundamental misunderstanding.

The teaching here is subtle but transformative. When you wash dishes, you can do so as if you were washing a baby Buddha, Jesus, or Allah—or someone you deeply love. You don't rush. You breathe in as you rinse a bowl. You take your time placing each spoon, each plate. You notice the water, the warmth, the texture. As Brother Phap Dung says, you "enjoy washing our dishes as if it is the most important thing for us to do." This is not about making an act seem more important than it is; it is about recognizing that presence and care transform any task into practice.

He also mentions other ordinary activities: getting a cup of tea without rushing, opening a door mindfully, sitting in the tea house and simply observing people rather than retreating into solitude because of a habit of preferring to be alone. The invitation is to use time at the retreat—a week with few distractions—to notice a habit you wish to cultivate. For some, this might mean learning to be present with others instead of withdrawing. For others, it might be the simple act of slowing down.

This is "engaged, applied meditation." It is Thich Nhat Hanh's vision made concrete: the practice is not something separate from your relationship with your family, your work, or your daily life. The challenges you face—a child crying, a conflict with a partner, frustration at work—these are not obstacles to practice. They are the practice.

What Role Do Family and Children Play in Spiritual Life?

Brother Phap Dung acknowledges that for many lay practitioners, family life presents both deep meaning and genuine difficulty. Some parents find it challenging to be at a retreat center with their children. Yet he frames this not as a liability but as essential to the work. By practicing with family, by learning to be more kind and compassionate with your partner, your children, and yourself in those moments, you embody the practice in its most alive form.

He notes that the monastic community deliberately maintains this integration. When monks express a desire to "practice more" by excluding family duties, Brother Phap Dung gently suggests that Thich Nhat Hanh would smile at such a notion—because there is no hierarchy of practice. Caring for children, being a husband or wife, dealing with conflict—these are not separate from spiritual development. They are where it happens.

For parents, there is a particular power in this teaching. Often, parenthood is experienced as an obstacle to one's own spiritual growth. Brother Phap Dung invites a different view: the time you spend with your children, the patience you cultivate, the way you learn to respond rather than react when they cry or misbehave—this is the practice. And through this, your children inherit something far more valuable than accomplishment or achievement: they learn how to be present and kind.

What Are the Three Virtues of Buddhist Practice?

Toward the end of the talk, Brother Phap Dung introduces three elements he calls "virtues" or "powers" in Buddhist teaching. These are not the powers most people think of—wealth, fame, political control. Instead, they are qualities that mark a spiritual person, whether a monk, nun, teacher, or respected community member.

The first is compassion. In Buddhist understanding, compassion is not mere sentiment. It is a concrete capacity to recognize suffering in others and in yourself, and to respond with kindness and presence rather than judgment or rejection.

The second is ethical conduct or virtue. This is the quality of acting in alignment with your values, of taking responsibility for your impact on others and the world.

The third is wisdom or understanding—insight into the nature of things. This means seeing clearly: that all things change, that suffering arises from attachment and misunderstanding, that happiness comes from letting go and accepting what is.

Brother Phap Dung does not elaborate extensively on these three in the excerpt provided, but he signals that the week ahead will explore them. His point is that these qualities—not willpower or ambition—are what define authentic spiritual maturity. And they are cultivated in the ordinary moments: in how you wash dishes, how you sit with a difficult emotion, how you respond to your child's tears, how you treat a stranger at the tea house.

What Is the Difference Between Meditation in the Hall and Meditation in Life?

A recurring theme in the talk is the danger of compartmentalizing practice. Some people sit in meditation for thirty minutes in the morning and another thirty minutes in the evening and think the work is done. The remaining hours—when you are working, parenting, eating, walking—become "life" rather than "practice."

Brother Phap Dung challenges this division. In fact, he suggests that the meditation hall is the easier part. When you sit in silence while your children have not yet woken, away from the pressures of the world, it is relatively simple to find some quietness. What is harder, and more important, is to bring that same mindfulness and presence into the messiness of daily responsibility.

This is why he emphasizes small habits: washing dishes without rushing, taking tea without tension, opening a door with awareness. These practices are not exotic or elevated. They are humble. But over time, they rewire your nervous system and your relationship to experience itself. You begin to realize that there is no separation between the sacred and the ordinary. Both contain the potential for awakening.

Why Does Plum Village Include Work and Family in Its Teaching?

Brother Phap Dung reflects on why Thich Nhat Hanh created a monastery that welcomes families, children, and visitors—rather than maintaining a monastery exclusively for monastic practice. The reason is philosophical: practice is not abstract. It must be embodied and tested in the real conditions of human life. A monk sitting in silence may achieve states of peace, but can that peace withstand the presence of a crying child, a conflict with a partner, the ordinary frustrations of work?

By integrating family life, children, and the "challenges the suffering whatever we face in our business in our work in the environment that we're in," Plum Village becomes a training ground for what Brother Phap Dung calls "applied meditation." You don't learn mindfulness to escape the world; you learn it to show up more fully to the world as it is.

This is also why work duties like washing dishes and sanitation are not seen as distractions from practice but as its foundation. In a lay context, you cannot avoid these tasks. So why not transform them into opportunities for awareness and care? In doing so, you discover that the teaching is not located in words or in special moments but in the texture of the moment itself.

Where to Go From Here

The invitation Brother Phap Dung extends is practical and immediate: use the next week (or the next few days, or right now) to notice a habit you wish to cultivate. It might be washing dishes slowly, sitting with people rather than retreating, or simply remembering to breathe when you feel rushed. The point is not to add another layer of achievement to your life but to soften your relationship to what is already there. By bringing mindfulness to ordinary moments and by touching compassion in your interactions with family, you embody the three virtues—compassion, ethical conduct, and wisdom—that mark a spiritual life. And you discover that you don't have to go anywhere or become anyone different. You just have to wake up to what you are already doing.