Includes: Dance through Religion for the Hell of It; The Physics of Synchronicity; James Joyce and Finnegan's Wake; The Godfather and the Goddess; The Poet as Early Warning Radar; Mammary Metaphysics; and, The Married Catholic Priests Convention.

    Building on theories from his acclaimed Mind and Nature, Bateson goes beyond his earlier milestone work in this inquiry into the essence of science and the importance of the "sacred" in the natural world.

    Author B. Alan Wallace has nearly thirty years' practice in attention-enhancing meditation, including a retreat he performed under the guidance of the Dalai Lama. An active participant in the much-publicized dialogues between Buddhists and scientists, Alan is uniquely qualified to speak intelligently to both camps, and The Attention Revolution is the definitive presentation of his knowledge.Beginning by pointing out the ill effects that follow from our inability to focus, Wallace moves on to explore a systematic path of meditation to deepen our capacity for deep concentration. The result is an exciting, rewarding "expedition of the mind," tracing everything from the confusion at the bottom of the trail to the extraordinary clarity and power that come with making it to the top. Along the way, the author also provides interludes and complementary practices for cultivating love, compassion, and clarity in our waking and dreaming lives.Attention is the key that makes personal change possible, and the good news is that it can be trained. This book shows how.

    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.

    That's the premise of this book: how to cook what Zen Buddhists call "the supreme meal"—life. It has to be nourishing, and it has to be shared. And we can use only the ingredients at hand. Inspired by the thirteenth-century manual of the same name by Dogen, the founder of the Japanese Soto Zen tradition, this book teaches us how we can "enlarge the family we're feeding" if we just use some imagination. Bernie Glassman founded Greyston Bakery in Yonkers, New York, in 1982 to employ those whom other companies deem unemployable—the homeless, ex-cons, recovering addicts, low-skill individuals—with the belief that investing in people, and not just products, does pay. He was right. Greyston has evolved into an $8 million-a-year business with clients all over New York City. It is the sole supplier of brownies to Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream, and has even sold cakes to the White House. But financial profit is only one of two bottom lines that Greyston is committed to. The other one is social impact, and this goal is certainly being met. The bakery enterprise has led to the creation of the Greyston Foundation, an integrated network of organizations that provide affordable housing, child care, counseling services, and health care to families in the community. Using entrepreneurship to solve the problems of the inner city, Greyston has become a national model for comprehensive community development. Its giving back is more than just sloughing off a percentage of its profits and donating it to charity; it's about working with the community's needs right from the beginning—bringing them from the margins to the core. As its company motto goes, "We don't hire people to bake brownies. We bake brownies to hire people." This book is as much a self-manual as a business manual, addressing such concepts as    • Beginner's mind    • The Middle Way of Sustainability    • The "hungry ghosts" of Buddhism as a picture of all humanity    • Working with our faults    • Indra's Net and the interconnectedness of life    • Leaving no trace

    The Lankavatara Sutra is the holy grail of Zen. Zen’s First Patriarch, Bodhidharma, gave a copy of this text to his successor, Hui-k’o, and told him everything he needed to know was in this book. Passed down from teacher to student ever since, this is the only Zen sutra ever spoken by the Buddha. Although it covers all the major teachings of Mahayana Buddhism, it contains but two teachings: that everything we perceive as being real is nothing but the perceptions of our own mind and that the knowledge of this is something that must be realized and experienced for oneself and cannot be expressed in words. In the words of Chinese Zen masters, these two teachings became known as “have a cup of tea” and “taste the tea.” This is the first translation into English of the original text used by Bodhidharma, which was the Chinese translation made by Gunabhadra in 443 and upon which all Chinese Zen masters have relied ever since.In addition to presenting one of the most difficult of all Buddhist texts in clear English, Red Pine has also added summaries, explanations and notes, including relevant Sanskrit terms on the basis of which the Chinese translation was made. This promises to become an essential text for anyone seeking to deepen their understanding or knowledge of Zen.

    And as one of the three most important expressions of Stoicism, this is an essential text for everyone interested in ancient religion and philosophy. Yet the clarity and ease of the work's style are deceptive. Pierre Hadot, eminent historian of ancient thought, uncovers new levels of meaning and expands our understanding of its underlying philosophy. Written by the Roman emperor for his own private guidance and self-admonition, the Meditations set forth principles for living a good and just life. Hadot probes Marcus Aurelius's guidelines and convictions and discerns the hitherto unperceived conceptual system that grounds them. Abundantly quoting the Meditations to illustrate his analysis, the author allows Marcus Aurelius to speak directly to the reader. And Hadot unfolds for us the philosophical context of the Meditations, commenting on the philosophers Marcus Aurelius read and giving special attention to the teachings of Epictetus, whose disciple he was. The soul, the guiding principle within us, is in Marcus Aurelius's Stoic philosophy an inviolable stronghold of freedom, the "inner citadel." This spirited and engaging study of his thought offers a fresh picture of the fascinating philosopher-emperor, a fuller understanding of the tradition and doctrines of Stoicism, and rich insight on the culture of the Roman empire in the second century. Pierre Hadot has been working on Marcus Aurelius for more than twenty years; in this book he distills his analysis and conclusions with extraordinary lucidity for the general reader.

    The two works translated in this book, Mumonkan (The Gateless Gate ) and Hekiganroku (The Blue Cliff Record), both compiled during the Song dynasty in China, are the best known and most frequently studied koan collections, and are classics of Zen literature. They are still used today in a variety of practice lineages, from traditional zendos to modern Zen centers. In a completely new translation, together with original commentaries, the well-known Zen teacher Katsuki Sekida brings to these works the same fresh and pragmatic approach that made his Zen Training so successful. The insights of a lifetime of Zen practice and his familiarity with both Eastern and Western ways of thinking make him an ideal interpreter of these texts.

    We're all looking for new ways of thinking that can bring about real solutions to modern problems, from the pursuit of inner serenity to solving world conflicts. In Do You QuantumThink? author Dianne Collins shares her ingenious discovery that reveals a critical missing link to make sense of our changing times. Her discovery provides us with the understanding and methodology to rise above problems of today by laying the foundation for an entirely new way to think.Part science, part philosophy, part spirituality, Do You QuantumThink? draws on a wide spectrum of sources, from cutting edge innovations in the sciences to the insights of the world's greatest spiritual leaders. This book will make you laugh, free you from limiting ideas, and introduce you to the most advanced principles and practical methods for living. Do You QuantumThink? will rock your world in the best of ways as you experience one revelation after another.

    Laozi de zhi hui=老子的智慧

    It is often rational to act against our own best interests, he argues, and most of us have moralviews that are self-defeating. We often act wrongly, although we know there will be no one with serious grounds for complaint, and when we consider future generations it is very hard to avoid conclusions that most of us will find very disturbing.

    A modern Buddhist Bible is the first anthology to bring together the writings from Buddhists, both Eastern and Western, that have redefined Buddhism for our era.Forging a universal doctrine from the divergent traditions of China, Sri Lanka, Japan, Burma, Thailand, and Tibet, the makers of modern Buddhism saw it as a return to the origin, as renowned scholar Donald Lopez shows. Modern Buddhism is for them a homeward journey to the vision of Buddha himself. Putting far more stress on meditation and spirituality than on ritual and relics, it embraces the ordination of women and values of science, social justice, tolerance, and individual freedom.

    Written in Bob Frissell's warm, personal style with updated commentary, Something in This Book Is True is both an account of Frissell's journey to inner discovery and empowerment and a most unusual reader's guide. Delving into topics as eclectic as polarity consciousness, emotional body clearing, and higher selves, Frissell affirms that humanity is composed of spiritual beings having human experiences—not vice versa. This new edition incorporates photos and illustrations into Frissell's engaging text.

    But that's much more easily said than done. What does being happy actually mean? And how do you even know when you feel it?Across the millennia, philosophers have thought long and hard about happiness, and come up with all sorts of different definitions and ideas for how we might live a happier life. Here, Derren explores the history of happiness from classical times until today, when the self-help industry has attempted to claim happiness as its own. His aim is to reclaim happiness for us all, and enable us to appreciate the really good things in life for what they are.Fascinating, entertaining and revelatory, this is a book for anyone who has ever wondered if there must be more to life...

    But it doesn't have to be this way. In City Dharma, Arthur Jeon suggests that it’s not what happens to us, but how we react to events and thoughts that causes most of our suffering.City Dharma is the essential guide for everyone living in the accelerated world most of us call home. Offering smart, practical ways to overcome daily stresses and the crazy-making reactivity of our own minds, Jeon explores the most challenging aspects of modern urban and suburban life, including:Another Day, Another DollarAvoid Working StiffnessWalking Down a Dark AlleyAwareness and Violence Sex and the City DharmaSeeking Love vs. Expressing LoveScaring Ourselves to DeathTranscending Media NegativityRoad RageDealing with Mad Max Within and WithoutDrawing wisdom from the ancient Eastern teachings of Advaita Vedanta and filled with engaging stories, City Dharma offers a new way of seeing the world--one that is based on connection rather than separation, direct experience rather than belief, and love instead of fear.From the Hardcover edition.