Q: I have a lot of trouble letting go of things:  relationships, jobs, feelings, and so on.  How can I reduce these attachments?

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Give big this year. By big, I don’t mean you need to spend a lot of money at the mall, or gather multiple gifts for everyone on your list.  I mean that you can enhance your gift giving tradition by enlarging your view of the gift—by choosing something that nurtures your loved ones and our global community at the same time.

Q.  How can we practice consistent mindfulness in a world that seems to demand hurrying and rushing wherever we go? Is it possible to be mindfully busy and mindfully hurried?

Q:  How can we deepen our practice?

A: Deepening our practice means having a genuine practice, practicing not in form only.  When your practice is genuine, it will bring joy, peace, and stability to yourself and to the people around you.  

This passage is from Savor: Mindful Eating. Mindful Life.

Q:  I’ve been practicing compassionate listening but it is very difficult to listen to people who rant and rave.  How long is it necessary to practice compassionate listening?

Cooking can be one of the most peaceful, mindful and loving of acts. But often we are stressed when preparing food.  We’re racing the clock.  We’re hungry – perhaps too hungry, uncomfortably so.  or past the point of hunger when preparing food. This can turn a beautiful act into a chore. And the unpleasant feelings we cultivate in the kitchen may manifest in our creations.

When you pay attention to your in breath and out breath, you abandon the future and go back to the present moment.  This is the practice of mindfulness.

When you eat, if you eat mindfully, that's mindful eating.

We are starting a new feature in our Blog.  Each week, we will share with you a question that has been posed to Thich Nhat Hanh and his answer to the question.  We welcome your thoughts on the question and his response.

Mindful eating is an effective way to incorporate mindfulness into one of the most fundamental activities of our existence.

Mindful eating nourishes our bodies and minds.