If we want to liberate ourselves from the fight once and for all, we must reverse our approach and nurture our demons.In Feeding Your Demons, Allione adapts the revolutionary wisdom of Tibet’s greatest female spiritual master for the first time, providing a powerful method for coping with the inner enemies that undermine your best intentions. Based on an extraordinarily simple yet effective five-step practice, Feeding Your Demons outlines a strategy for transforming negative emotions, relationships, fears, illness, and self-defeating patterns. By recognizing your demons, giving them form, and then feeding them, you can free yourself from the battle. And the paradigm shift from fighting to feeding demons can apply not only to your personal challenges but also to the challenges of the world at large. Enriched with detailed examples to show how others have transformed their demons, Feeding Your Demons will give you remarkable new insight into the forces that threaten to defeat you, along with the tools to achieve inner peace.

    Beginning with the simplest breathing and sitting techniques, and based on three key skills—concentration, mindfulness, and lovingkindness—it’s a practice anyone can do and that can transform our lives by bringing us greater resiliency, creativity, peace, clarity, and balance. This updated 10th anniversary edition includes exercises, journal prompts, and ten guided meditations available for download online and through scannable QR codes.

    Burned out, laid up with back problems, disillusioned by relationships and religion itself, he was still hoping for that big journalistic break—and the answers to life’s biggest riddles as well. So he set out on a geographic, historical and personal expedition that would lead him around the world in search of those answers, and then some.First, to better understand the man who was born Prince Siddhartha Gautama, he followed the time-honored pilgrimage “in the footsteps of the Buddha” in India. From there, he tracked the historical course of Buddhism: to Sri Lanka, Thailand, China, Tibet, Japan and on to San Francisco and Europe. He found that the Buddha’s teachings have spawned a worldwide movement of “engaged Buddhism,” the application of Buddhist principles to resolve social, environmental, health, political and other contemporary problems. From East to West and back to the East again, this movement has caused a Buddhism Boom. Along the way he met a diverse array of Buddhist practitioners—Thai artists, Indian nuns, Sri Lankan school children, Zen archers in Japan, kung fu monks in China and the world’s first Buddhist comic (only in America). Among dozens of Buddhist scholars and leaders, Garfinkel interviewed His Holiness the Dalai Lama, an experience that left him speechless—almost. As just reward for his efforts, toward the end of his journey Garfinkel fell in love in the south of France at the retreat center of a leader of the engaged movement, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh—a romance that taught him as much about Buddhism as all the masters combined. In this original, entertaining book, Garfinkel separates Buddhist fact from fiction, sharing his humorous insights and keen perceptions about everything from spiritual tourism to Asian traffic jams to the endless road to enlightenment.From the Hardcover edition.

    Seldom has such a small handful of words provided a teaching as rich as has this famous opening line. In a single stroke, the simple sentence cuts through the pervasive tendency students have of getting so close to Zen as to completely miss what it’s all about. An instant teaching on the first page. And that’s just the beginning.In the forty years since its original publication, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind has become one of the great modern Zen classics, much beloved, much reread, and much recommended as the best first book to read on Zen. Suzuki Roshi presents the basics—from the details of posture and breathing in zazen to the perception of nonduality—in a way that is not only remarkably clear, but that also resonates with the joy of insight from the first to the last page. It’s a book to come back to time and time again as an inspiration to practice, and it is now available to a new generation of seekers in this fortieth anniversary edition, with a new afterword by Shunryu Suzuki’s biographer, David Chadwick.

    Our fear of intimacy—both with others and with ourselves—creates feelings of pain and longing. But these feelings can also awaken in us the desire for freedom and the willingness to take up the spiritual path. In this inspiring book, Sharon Salzberg, one of America's leading spiritual teachers, shows us how the Buddhist path of lovingkindness ( metta in Pali), can help us discover the radiant, joyful heart within each of us. This practice of lovingkindness is revolutionary because it has the power to radically change our lives, helping us create true happiness in ourselves and genuine compassion for others. The Buddha described the nature of such a spiritual path as "the liberation of the heart, which is love." The author draws on simple Buddhist teachings, wisdom stories from various traditions, guided meditation practices, and her own experience from twenty-five years of practice and teaching to illustrate how each one of us can cultivate love, compassion, joy, and equanimity—the four "heavenly abodes" of traditional Buddhism.

    / Thus we bow to life as it is. This verse is an important reminder, says Ezra Bayda, of what the spiritual life is truly about: the willingness to open ourselves to whatever life presents—no matter how messy or complicated. And through that willingness to be open, we can discover wisdom, compassion, and the genuine life we all want. In At Home in the Muddy Water , Bayda applies this simple Zen teaching to a range of everyday concerns—including relationships, trust, sexuality, and money—showing that everything we need to practice is right here before us, and that peace and fulfillment is available to everyone, right here, right now, no matter what their circumstances.

    In Zen Is Right Here, his teachings are brought to life powerfully and directly through stories told about him by his students. These living encounters with Zen are poignant, direct, humorous, paradoxical, and enlightening; and their setting in real-life contexts makes them wonderfully accessible.Like the Buddha himself, Suzuki Roshi gave profound teachings that were skilfully expressed for each moment, person, and situation he encountered. He emphasized that while the ungraspable essence of Buddhism is constant, the expression of that essence is always changing. Each of the stories presented here is an example of this versatile and timeless quality, showing that the potential for attaining enlightenment exists right here, right now, in this very moment.

    In Let Go, Martine Batchelor leads the way there.Negative patterns of mind may manifest as fear, avoidance, depression, addiction, judgment of self or other, and any of a host of other physical, mental, or psychological forms. Let Go aims at understanding what really lies at the root of these behaviors so we can reclaim control. Each chapter concludes with an exercise or guided meditation as a tool for the reader to work with negative habits in new and creative ways. You don't have to be a Buddhist for them to work. You just need to want to move on.Helpful exercises and guided meditations - designed to build understanding of our negative habits, as well as the confidence and skill needed to instead embrace our greatest qualities - appear throughout the book.Batchelor also looks at Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) for depression, Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz's use of meditation to deal with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), successful combinations of meditation and Twelve-Step programs, and offers her own innovations.

    This anthology draws on traditional Indian, Chinese, Japanese, and Tibetan sources as well as teachings by contemporary Buddhist masters. Among the contributors, both classical and modern, are: Ajahn Chah, Pema Chödrön, The Second Dalai Lama, Dogen, S.N. Goenka, Dainin Katagiri, Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi, Milerepa, Padmasambhava, Reginald Ray, Shunryu Suzuki, Nyanaponika Thera, Thich Nhat Hanh, Chögyam Trungpa, and Burton Watson.

    Using step by step instructions, the author illustrates how to be fully present in the moment without clinging to joy or resisting sorrow. This opens the door to a kind of wellness that goes beyond circumstances. Actively engaging life as it is in this fashion holds the potential for awakening to a peace and well-being that are not dependent on whether a particular experience is joyful or sorrowful. This is a practical book, containing dozens of exercises and practices, all of which are illustrated with easy-to-relate to personal stories from the author’s experience.

    Written in a style that is simple and engaging, it explores the history of Buddhism, its philosophies, and its relevance in today’s society. The book provides numerous meditative exercises that will allow you to experience the wondrous teachings of this ancient wisdom. Inside you will read about... ✓ A Brief History of Buddhism ✓ The Spread of Buddhism ✓ The Servant or the Master: Which One are You? ✓ Self-Identification with the Mind and Body ✓ Meditation ✓ The Presence of Mindfulness ✓ The Principle of Karma ✓ Dualistic versus Non-Dualistic Perspectives ✓ The Principle of Non-Substantiality ✓ One’s Life and the Environment ✓ Sentient and Non-Sentient Beings ✓ Attachment ✓ The Ten Worlds The author explains how Buddhism is more than a religion; it’s an internal science. Rather than relying on dogma or sacred texts, Buddhism teaches us to look inward and challenge our most deep-seated beliefs for the purpose liberating ourselves from our minds.

    “3:15 A.M. Wake Up. 3:20 300 Bows. 4:00 Ma. 4:15 Sitting. 4:45 Walking.” And so it goes, for 100 days. Dobisz, inspired by her Korean Zen master’s discipline of long, solitary retreats, has decided to embark on a retreat of her own. The unfolding story of her experience is related here. The suburban-raised Dobisz weaves amusing anecdotes about learning to live a Walden-like existence — water comes from a well, wood needs to be chopped — with Zen teachings and striking insights into the miracles and foibles of the human mind when there’s nothing on hand to distract it. Entertaining and inspiring, the book is a joyous testament to the benefits that solitude and reflection can bring to all.

    That’s the premise of this first book by Buddhist teacher Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel. How do we find a resting place in a world that is complex and always changing? How do we practice spirituality beyond the limits of blind acceptance and doubt? Elizabeth proposes that we access our deepest intelligence through asking these kinds of questions. “When we ask a question,” she suggests, “our mind is engaged yet open. The process of inquiry protects us from our tendency to reach static conclusions. Instead, we can respond to uncertainty and change with inquisitiveness and a sense of wonder.” Her book guides us on a provocative, playful, and spiritually enriching journey of contemplation that could last a lifetime.

    The director of two feature films with Buddhist themes (the international sensation The Cup and Travelers and Magicians), this provocative teacher, artist, and poet is widely known and admired by Western Buddhists.Moving away from conventional presentations of Buddhist teachings, Khyentse challenges readers to make sure they know what they're talking about before they claim to be Buddhist. With wit and irony, Khyentse urges readers to move beyond the superficial trappings of Buddhism beyond a romance with beads, incense, and exotic people in robes straight to the heart of what the Buddha taught.In essence, this book explains what a Buddhist really is, namely, someone who deeply understands the truth of impermanence and how our emotions can trap us in cycles of suffering. Khyentse presents the fundamental tenets of Buddhism in simple language, using examples we can all relate to.

    Designed to provide just such a framework, In the Buddha's Words is an anthology of the Buddha's works that has been specifically compiled by a celebrated scholar and translator. For easy reference, the book is arrayed in ten thematic sections ranging from "The Human Condition" to "Mastering the Mind" to "The Planes of Realization." Each section comes with introductions, notes, and essays to help beginners and experts alike draw greater meaning from the Buddha's words. The book also features a general introduction by the author that fully lays out how and why he has arranged the Buddha's teachings in this volume. This thoughtful compilation is a valuable resource for both teachers and those who want to read the Buddha on their own.