Interbeing

Description

By Thich Nhat Hanh:

"Emptiness does not mean nothingness. Saying that we are empty does not mean that we do not exist. No matter if something is full or empty, that thing clearly needs to be there in the first place. When we say a cup is empty, the cup must be there in order to be empty. When we say that we are empty, it means that we must be there in order to be empty of a permanent, separate self.

About thirty years ago I was looking for an English word to describe our deep interconnection with everything else. I liked the word “togetherness,” but I finally came up with the word “interbeing.” The verb “to be” can be misleading, because we cannot be by ourselves, alone. “To be” is always to “inter-be.” If we combine the prefix “inter” with the verb “to be,” we have a new verb, “inter-be.” To inter-be and the action of interbeing reflects reality more accurately. We inter-are with one another and with all life."

(https://www.garrisoninstitute.org/blog/insight-of-interbeing/?)

Discussion

Second Renaissance:

“Thích Nhất Hạnh on Interbeing: recognising radical interconnectedness with all life

Faced with breakdown across multiple dimensions of society, many agree that we’re overdue a reckoning with the deep, collective worldviews* that underpin dysfunctional modern life. Some advocates for cultural transition identify a particular shift necessary to transform rivalry and exploitation towards a wiser, life-respecting future: from a worldview of separateness to one of interbeing.

• (roughly, core beliefs about what reality is and what it means to be human)

Zen Buddhist monk Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926-2022) was a revered peace activist and spiritual leader. Exiled from Vietnam, he founded Plum Village monastery in France. Among his many gifts to contemplative activism, the term “interbeing” points to the fundamental truth of interdependence: all that exists does so by virtue of relationship with everything else.

“There is no such thing as an individual separate self,” he wrote:

“A flower is made only of non-flower elements, such as chlorophyll, sunlight, and water. If we were to remove all the non-flower elements from the flower, there would be no flower left. A flower cannot be by herself alone. A flower can only inter-be with all of us. It’s much closer to the truth. Humans are like this too. We can’t exist by ourselves alone. We can only inter-be. I am made only of non-me elements, such as the Earth, the sun, parents, and ancestors.” (Thích Nhất Hạnh, How to Love)

Reflecting upon a troubled modern society founded on destructive individualism, Thích Nhất Hạnh saw a profound need to reorient the sense of human identity from self to world. Inescapably, to be is to inter-be: clouds, people and blades of grass are equally dependent on all else that is. Realising this, we may begin to see that another’s suffering is our suffering, and likewise that our wellbeing is inseparable from that of others, and of our world. Thus we might behave with greater care towards everything around us: not only other humans, but animals, rivers, forests…

Interbeing is a way of seeing that must be practiced. Thích Nhất Hạnh’s teaching emphasises mindfulness of relationship, embedding a felt sense of shared existence. For example, when we walk with attention to the ground that supports us, eat with gratitude to the people, plants and elements that nourish us, or breathe with conscious awareness of the fragile atmosphere that sustains us, we encounter directly our own continuity with the living world. Through mindful inquiry, we can gradually dissolve the illusion of separateness and inhabit the living web that connects all life. The more we cultivate this awareness, the more naturally compassion arises—not because we are told to care, but because we experience the truth of our interbeing. The food on our plate as sun and rain; the body arising from Earth and ancestry, reflected in the stranger we meet outside.

Interbeing is a core insight of Engaged Buddhism, a movement likewise founded by Thích Nhất Hạnh. During the Vietnam war, as Buddhist renunciates questioned whether to attend to practice or to the suffering beyond the monastery walls, he perceived both as a single path - turning not only inwards but outwards, responding actively to the suffering of the world.

“Meditation is not to escape from society, but to come back to ourselves and see what is going on. Once there is seeing, there must be acting.” (Thích Nhất Hạnh)

Engaged Buddhism is the living practice of interbeing—encompassing everything from courageous activism to small acts of kindness and conscious consumption. Above all, practitioners recognise that personal awakening and social transformation are not separate paths, but interdependent; two expressions of a single truth. Interbeing is not merely a spiritual insight but a revolutionary ethic: a way of seeing and being that draws us towards a more compassionate, life-sustaining future.”

(https://news.secondrenaissance.net/p/seeds-of-a-second-renaissance-thich-nhat-hanh-interbeing_