David Viafora

David Viafora, Chan Thien Son (True Zen Mountain) studied with Thich Nhat Hanh as an aspirant and novice monk in Plum Village and Deer Park Monastery for several years before finding his niche in community lay life. He later spent an entire year visiting and studying mindfulness communities and retreat centers around the world in the Plum Village tradition to understand how Sanghas can optimally grow and flourish. He currently lives at MorningSun Community, on the ancestral land of the Abenaki, ‘People of the Dawn Land,’ commonly known as New Hampshire. David first encountered Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings when he was a poor college student and an unknown bodhissatva offered him a free ticket to a public lecture. His forthcoming book is Conscious Communities: The Transformative Power of Sangha (Parallax Press, 2023). To learn more, visit Sanghabuild.org

David Viafora in Kosmos

Mindful Living at MorningSun

Building our retreat center taught me a lot about construction, but most of all I learned about building community. There’s an African proverb that says, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” I would like to add to that clever wisdom: “If you want to go joyfully, go in friendship.” There are some things, and some distances, that we can’t or wouldn’t want to cover alone.

Published in Volume 22 Issue 2

Coming Soon

The Village Way

Practices for Belonging in a Fragmented World

For thousands of years, we lived according to the principles of village life. Then, around the 14th Century, our lives were reorganized by rulers around growth and accumulation – often at the cost of community, equity, and the living Earth. What would it mean to return to simplicity, and mutual care?

Join us for a 9-month inquiry into this question, exploring how we participate together in a time that calls us back to community, resilience, and shared life,