Varanasi Cremations and Beliefs About Death

Welcome to a new episode of The Way Out Is In: The Zen Art of Living, a podcast series mirroring Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh’s deep teachings of Buddhist philosophy: a simple yet profound methodology for dealing with our suffering, and for creating more happiness and joy in our lives.

The first of a series of six episodes recorded during the pilgrimage ‘In the Footsteps of the Buddha’, this instalment was made in Varanasi, India, in February 2026.

In this opening episode, Zen Buddhist monk Brother Phap Huu and leadership coach Jo Confino are joined by Dharma teacher Shantum Seth to discuss the importance of understanding the Buddha as a fully human being; a boat journey on the sacred Ganges river at sunrise, from which it was possible to witness cremation and devotion; teachings on death and impermanence as daily practice; the importance of living in the present moment; and much more.

The speakers also share personal experiences and reflections on their spiritual journeys, the role played by the community, and the continuation of the Buddha’s teachings through their own lives and practice.

About the pilgrimage:

In 1988, Shantum Seth was invited by Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) to organize a pilgrimage to the sacred sites associated with the Buddha’s life across India. Subsequently, Thay encouraged Shantum to continue guiding such journeys each year, offering pilgrimage itself as a mindfulness practice—one that the Buddha had suggested. 

Shantum has been leading these transformative journeys ever since, offering people from around the world the opportunity to follow In the Footsteps of the Buddha with awareness and insight. After 15 years at the United Nations, Shantum left to volunteer with the Ahimsa Trust, which represents Thay’s work in India and promotes the practice of “peace in oneself and peace in the world”.

Through Buddhapath, his expression of Right Livelihood, Shantum continues to guide pilgrimages and share the wisdom and culture of the places he visits in India and across Buddhist Asia, cultivating community through these deeply meaningful journeys.

To learn more about upcoming pilgrimages, visit www.buddhapath.com, or follow Shantum on Facebook and Instagram at @eleven_directions. 

Shantum Seth, an ordained Dharmacharya (Dharma teacher) in the Buddhist Mindfulness lineage of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, teaches in India and across the world. A co-founder of Ahimsa Trust, he has been a student of Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings for the past 35 years, and, since 1988, has led pilgrimages and other multi-faith, educational, cultural, spiritual, and transformative journeys across diverse regions of India and Asia. 

He is actively involved in educational, social, and ecological programmes, including work on cultivating mindfulness in society, including with educators, the Indian Central Reserve Police Force, and the corporate sector. Across various Indian sanghas, Dharmacharya Shantum is the primary teacher of different practices of mindfulness from Thich Nhat Hanh’s tradition.

---

Co-produced by the Plum Village App:
https://plumvillage.app/  
And Global Optimism:
https://globaloptimism.com/
With support from the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation:
https://thichnhathanhfoundation.org/

---

Recording by Ann Nguyen
https://ann.earth
Sound editing by Joe Holtaway
https://joeholtaway.com
Publishing by Anca Rusu
Produced by Clay Carnill
https://claycarnill.com
Executive Producer: Catalin Zorzini

---

List of resources 

The Way Out Is In: ‘Ancient Path for Modern Times: Active Nonviolence (Episode #70)’
https://plumvillage.org/podcast/ancient-path-for-modern-times-active-nonviolence-episode-70 

Interbeing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interbeing  

Plum Village Tradition
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plum_Village_Tradition 

‘The Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings’
https://plumvillage.org/mindfulness/the-14-mindfulness-trainings 

Sarnath
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarnath 

Dharadun
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dehradun_district 

Bodh Gaya
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodh_Gaya 

Rajgir
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajgir 

Old Path White Clouds
https://www.parallax.org/product/old-path-white-clouds

Federico Fellini
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federico_Fellini 

Ghat
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghat 

Alara Kalama https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%80%E1%B8%B7%C4%81ra_K%C4%81l%C4%81ma 

Jack Kornfield
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kornfield

Upanishads
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upanishads

Sister Chan Khong
https://plumvillage.org/about/sister-chan-khong 

Bodhi tree
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhi_tree 

Moksha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moksha 

Rishi Joan Halifax
https://www.joanhalifax.org/ 

Daily Contemplations on Impermanence & Interbeing
https://plumvillage.org/daily-contemplations-on-impermanence-interbeing#the-five-remembrances  

Sutras: ‘Discourse on Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone’
https://plumvillage.org/library/sutras/discourse-on-knowing-the-better-way-to-live-alone

Sutras
https://plumvillage.org/genre/sutras 

Leila Seth
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leila_Seth

On Balance
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1754796.On_Balance_an_Autobiography

---

Quotes

“Every step is a miracle. Every breath is an offering.”

“The transformation is both individual and collective – and not just right now; it is something which seeps into our understanding and informs our life. The real journey begins when you get home. When you see your familiar surroundings with these pilgrimage lenses, those are very, very important moments. When you see your familiar surroundings slightly differently, and you see what brings you suffering, what brings you joy, what brings a sense of ease, then you can tweak your life.” 

“Siddhartha always says, ‘I’m on this path not for power, not for leadership, but to find liberation within us.’ And that means we have to be ready to let go of all of the ideology that we have received from our ancestors, not from just us, but from the lineage of our whole ancestors and society.” 

“We can be free amidst the suffering. We can still find our calm, our peace with every storm that arises, that manifests. We find a way to understand it, to embrace it even, because we see that that storm is a part of us.”

“In the Mahaparinirvāṇa Sutta, the Buddha said, ‘Go to the places where I was born, died, where the first teachings were given, where I awakened.’ But I think he’s saying, ‘Leave your familiar surroundings and explore, and you’ll find different seeds in your consciousness being touched, which are not touched when you go every day to work or in your familiar surroundings.’ And that is the learning of yourself. It’s an interior journey on this exterior part.”

“In India, your path to God is through your guru – but in the Buddha Dharma, the guru shows you the path, and you walk it. In the classic example of the Buddha pointing to the moon, he says, ‘Don’t get caught looking at my finger; look at the moon.’”

“Somebody once asked Thay, ‘What happens when we die?’ He said, ‘I don’t know, but I can tell you what happens when we’re alive.’” 

“The only ingredient that you have any control about for the future is the present. We can only act in the present. As you know, the past is gone, the future is an idea – but all these situations that arise in our lives, how do we respond appropriately? With ethics, with a sense of calm, with a sense of love, how can we respond appropriately to each situation? Because that is the ingredient for the future.” 

“The Buddha is saying, ‘Stay open, stay alive. This is the most precious moment. This is a gift. And when we die, we’ll have no control over it.’” 

“In Indian philosophy, we don’t have only yes or no. We say, yes, no, neither yes or no, both yes and no. So it’s the idea that I am the same person, I’m a different person, I’m neither the same or a different person, and both the same person and the different person. That’s the Buddha Dharma’s understanding of continuity, birth and death, and in that we don’t get caught.”

“Awakening is a collective awakening.”

“The Buddha was teaching us how to be a human being, how to take both the joy and the happiness of being a human being, but also to understand the suffering of a human being, and then take suffering as a noble truth. But it’s a noble truth only because we can transform it – otherwise it’s just plain old suffering. Use suffering as the compost for liberation. Looking at the cause, knowing the path to overcome suffering. And that’s key in Buddha. Otherwise, death is suffering, loss is suffering. The Buddha is saying, ‘Take that and look at it deeply, transform it, and live your life today as if it’s your last moment, your first moment, your present moment, our present moment.’”

“Secular in India means different from secular in the West. Secular in India means respecting all religions. It doesn’t mean non-religious. I was brought up in a household like that, where we had Hindu icons, Christian icons, Islamic icons, everything. And we would go to midnight mass or go to a mosque or go to a temple, but we were not religious. It was just respecting people like that. And we had friends from every religion.”