About Deer Park Monastery
A beautiful 400-acre sanctuary in southern California, Deer Park is a refuge for mindfulness practitioners and a monastic training center in the Plum Village tradition.
A Peaceful Refuge
Deer Park Monastery is a refuge for all who wish to cultivate peace and happiness. Wherever you come from, however you look or identify, whomever you love, or whatever your religious or spiritual beliefs, you are welcome to join this peaceful and healing community.
The 400-acre sanctuary rests peacefully in chaparral mountains outside of Escondido CA, surrounded and protected by oaks and the natural landscape. Established in July 2000 by the Plum Village four-fold Sangha, today it is a safe and serene refuge for many mindfulness practitioners.
The Plum Village Connection
Founded by Vietnamese Zen Master and global spiritual leader, poet, and author Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay), Deer Park serves as a mindfulness practice and monastic training center in the Plum Village tradition. Plum Village, located near Bordeaux in southwest France is the first practice center and monastic community founded by Thay in the West. All other Plum Village mindfulness practice centers follow the traditions established there.
Deer Park is one of 12 Plum Village mindfulness practice centers around the world — and the first of three built in the United States. Due to our location in southern California, we most often serve mindfulness practitioners in the western U.S. as well as the Vietnamese diaspora across America.
Life at Deer Park
At Deer Park, the residential monastic community and lay community practice together year round in the tradition of engaged Buddhism, practicing mindfulness throughout everyday life. The on-site community lives in two hamlets: Solidity Hamlet (for monks, laymen, and couples) and Clarity Hamlet (for nuns and laywomen).
The monastery hosts days of mindfulness and a variety of related events, as well as multi-day mindfulness retreats for people of all experience levels. Whether you’re new to mindfulness or steeped in its practice, you are welcome.
Milestones Along the Deer Park Journey
Deer Park Monastery Established
In the late 1990s, Thay more and more frequently came to offer teachings in California and received numerous requests to establish a monastery here, in part, to serve the Vietnamese families that had settled in California and in part to respond to the growing interest in mindfulness in the United States. A Sangha member at the foot of the mountain dreams of brown-robed monastics walking in the hidden valley above her house — an abandoned property of wild chaparral already called “Deer Park.” In 2000, donors step up to help Plum Village buy the land where the monastery stands today.
July
2000
Ocean of Peace Meditation Hall Completed
Able to accommodate more than 800 people, the Ocean of Peace Meditation Hall is built. Thay and all of the 150 monastics in the Plum Village tradition at that time come to celebrate and practice the three-month Rains Retreat at Deer Park from January to March 2004. That same year, they celebrate the Linji Great Ordination Ceremony and the first People of Color Retreat.
2004
Environmental Efforts and Stupa Completed
Deer Park establishes Car-Free Days, installs solar panels to generate its own electricity, and converts cars to run off of used vegetable oil. At Thay’s suggestion, the Earth Peace Treaty is established where people commit to change their lives to reduce their carbon emissions, sparking a movement to respond to the climate crisis within the Plum Village tradition. The iconic stupa dedicated to the first abbot of Deer Park, Thay Giac Thanh, is completed.
2007
Thay’s Last Visit and Nuns’ Housing
After visiting Deer Park every two years since its opening, Thay leads his final retreat at Deer Park, Finding Our True Home, with more than 900 participants, in the fall of 2013. Deer Park ordains its first novice monk in 2014. The new nun’s residence in Clarity Hamlet is completed in 2015 — built with adobe and straw bales.
2013-15
Monks’ Housing Built
With construction beginning in early 2024, a team of monks, nuns, and volunteers come together to build our new monks’ residence to meet the needs of our expanding sangha. Deer Park is now home to sixty monastics and welcomes thousands of lay friends each year.
2024-25
Guided by Thich Nhat Hanh’s Teachings
Thay is revered around the world for his pioneering teachings on mindfulness, global ethics, and environmental and peace activism based on the Buddhist principles of non-violence and compassionate action. We carry these principles forward with the intent of transforming the world into a place where people live in harmony with each other and the Earth.
The Deer Park Sangha
The residential monastic and lay community live at Deer Park year round. They support each other’s mindfulness practices and operate the monastery. Throughout the seasons they work, eat, and meditate together and carry Thay’s teachings forward in cooperation with the full Plum Village family. Get to know the monks, nuns, and laypeople who reside at Deer Park.
Work or Volunteer at Deer Park
Deer Park Monastery has ongoing operations needs like any other organization. If you have skills that are helpful to our type of organization, please see our job listings.
Before, during, and after some retreats, we need additional help. When that happens we extend an invitation to mindfulness practitioners who have already attended a 7-day retreat (or longer) at Deer Park Monastery to apply as volunteers.
Pathways to Mindfulness
Explore the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh and others in the Plum Village tradition and immerse yourself in mindfulness practices and trainings.
Discover and explore our collection of teachings, trainings, mindfulness practices, meditations, music, and more.
Take Me There
Expand or begin your exploration of mindfulness practices through the Mindfulness page.
Take Me ThereVisiting Deer Park
Gain a broad understanding of the experience and expectations of visiting Deer Park.
Visitor Information
Explore Online Courses
From time to time we offer multi-week courses related to mindfulness, the teachings and life of Thich Nhat Hanh, and a variety of similar subjects. Please see our schedule of upcoming courses.
Plum Village App
Take the Deer Park Monastery and Plum Village community with you wherever you go. The Plum Village app is designed to cultivate mindfulness, compassion, and joy through guided meditations, deep relaxations, practice poems, bells of mindfulness, and other practices — all through a mobile device.
