Since its original publication, Chagdud Tulku has continued to teach widely and has met thousands of sincere, enthusiastic, and sometimes skeptical students. The frank questions inspired by these teachings form the basis of the material added to this revised edition.

    These teachings are on Dzogchen, the heart essence of the ancient Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Exploring this esoteric subject in print for the first time, His Holiness offers the reader insights into one of Buddhism's most profound systems of meditation. He discusses both the philosophic foundations and the practices of this system—taking into account the approaches of various schools and teachers. Paying tribute to the uniqueness of Dzogchen, His Holiness sets it within the wider spectrum of Tibetan Buddhism as a whole. He explains the essence of Dzogchen practice and addresses questions such as why Dzogchen is called "the pinnacle of all vehicles," what are its special features, and what are the crucial principles of the other Buddhist paths which a Dzogchen practitioner should know.

    Some of them accord with reality and serve us well throughout the course of our lives. Others are out of alignment with reality and cause us problems. Tibetan Buddhist practice isn't just sitting in silent meditation, it's developing fresh attitudes that align our minds with reality. Attitudes need adjusting, just like a spinal column that has been knocked out of alignment. In this book, B. Alan Wallace explains a fundamental type of Buddhist mental training which is designed to shift our attitudes so that our minds become pure wellsprings of joy instead of murky pools of problems, anxieties, fleeting pleasures, hopes, and frustrations. Wallace shows us the way to develop attitudes that unveil our full capacity for spiritual awakening. The author draws on his thirty-year training in Buddhism, physics, the cognitive sciences, and comparative religion to challenge readers to reappraise many of their assumptions about the nature of the mind and physical world. By explicitly addressing many practical and theoretical issues that uniquely face us in the modern world, Wallace brings this centuries-old practice into the twenty-first century.

    This work will appeal to readers with a general interest in Mahayana Buddhism, to those who wish to familiarize themselves with one of the great classics of Indian Buddhist literature, and to students who come across passages quoted in other Buddhist works and who wish to explore further. The great Indian Buddhist master Nagarjuna (first–second century A.D.) wrote his celebrated poem "Letter to a Friend" as a gift of advice to a South Indian king, and it has since become a monument in the Indian shastra tradition. Despite its short length (only 123 verses), it covers the whole Mahayana path, combining a practical approach to daily conduct with a theoretical exposition of the different stages leading to enlightenment. It has thus been an ideal source for many of Tibet 's great scholars seeking a scriptural authority to enhance their own descriptions of the Buddhist path. Any difficulties in understanding the poem are overcome by Kangyur Rinpoche's commentary, which turns Nagarjuna's sometimes cryptic poem into straightforward prose, expanding on each topic and ordering the different subjects in such a way that on returning to the original poem, the reader can easily make sense of the advice it contains. It includes headings to explain Nagarjuna's frequent changes in subject and full explanations of the ideas introduced in each verse. In addition to the commentary, this book presents the original poem in the Tibetan and in a new English translation that attempts to emulate Nagarjuna's lines of metric verse. Also included are Kangyur Rinpoche's structural outline (sa bchad), a Tibetan line index to enable students to locate quotations used in other Tibetan works, full notes, and a glossary.

    These captivating stories, legends and yarns — passed orally from teacher to student — capture the vibrant wisdom of an ancient and still-living oral tradition. Magical, whimsical, witty and ribald, The Snow Lion's Turquoise Mane unfolds a luminous vision of a universe where basic goodness, harmony, and hope prevails.

    Ordained at twelve, he would eventually become the first Buddhist chaplain at an American university, the founder of a retreat center and monastery, and a bestselling author. Here, Bhante G. lays bare the often-surprising ups and downs of his seventy-five years, from his boyhood in Sri Lanka to his decades of sharing the insights of the Buddha, telling his story with the "plain-English" approach for which he is so renowned.

    The text describes the Four Foundation Practices that all practitioners of Vajrayana Buddhism must complete. The nature of impermanence, the effects of karma, the development of an enlightened attitude, and devotion to the guru are among the subjects treated in this book. Three eminent contemporary Tibetan Buddhist masters—Kalu Rinpoche, Deshung Rinpoche, and Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche—explain the significance of The Torch of Certainty for modern-day students and practitioners of Tibetan Buddhism.

    Shor tracks down the surviving members of this visionary expedition and entwines their remarkable stories of faith and adventure with his own quest to discover the reality of this land known as Beyul. What emerges is a breathtaking story alive with possibility, bringing the reader as close to the Hidden Land as a book possibly can. As the astounding account unfolds, the reader is sure to repeat the question constantly raised by the author in his interviews: And then what happened?A Step Away From Paradise tells the story of Lama Tulshuk Lingpa’s life and his unlikely expedition to a land beyond cares while reflecting on what this means for the rest of us. It draws on both research and extensive interviews with the surviving members of this extraordinary expedition. The book is richly illustrated with portraits of those who went with Tulshuk Lingpa and the places he traveled to. The book also delves into the tradition within Tibetan Buddhism of Shambhala and the hidden valleys, which mirror legends around the world of utopias and lands of milk and honey, thus showing that the quest for the hidden land is a universal urge of humanity.WRITER AND PHOTOGRAPHER Thomas K. Shor was born in Boston, USA, and studied comparative religion and literature in Vermont. With an ear for unusual stories, the fortune to attract them and an eye for detail, he has travelled the planet’s mountainous realms—from the Mayan Highlands of southern Mexico in the midst of insurrection to the mountains of Greece and, more recently to the Indian Himalayas—to collect, illustrate and write stories, with a uniquely personal character often having the flavor of fable.Shor has lectured widely on his writings and has had solo exhibits of his photographs in Europe and in India. He is the author of Windblown Clouds and can often be found in the most obscure locales, immersed in a compelling story touching upon fundamental human themes.The author’s website is www.ThomasShor.com

    Many men have written about Tibet and its secret lore, but few have actually penetrated it to learn its ancient wisdom. Among those few was Madame Alexandra David-Neel, a French orientalist. A practicing Buddhist, a profound historian of religion, and linguist, she actually lived in Tibet for more than 14 years. She had the great honor of being received by the Dalai Lama; she studied philosophical Buddhism and Tibetan Tantra at the great centers; she meditated in lonely caves and on wind-swept winter mountains with yogi hermits; and she even witnessed forbidden corpse-magic in the forests. Her experiences have been unique.Magic and Mystery in Tibet tells the story of her experiences in Tibet, among lamas and magicians. It is neither a travel book nor an autobiography but a study of psychic discovery, a description of the occult and mystical theories and psychic training practices of Tibet. She tells of great sages and sorcerers that she met; of the system of monastic education; the great teachers and their disciples; Tibetan folklore about their spiritual athletes; reincarnation and memory from previous lives; elaborate magical rites to obtain siddhis; the horrible necromantic magic of the pre-Buddhist Bonpa shamas; mental visualization exercises to create disembodied thought forms (tulpas); visions; phenomena of physical yoga, control of the body heat mechanism; breathing exercises; sending “messages on the wind”; and much similar material.An unusual aspect of Madame David-Neel’s book is that she herself experienced many of the phenomena she describes, yet she describes them with precision and in a matter-of-fact manner, permitting the reader to draw his own conclusions about validity, interpretation in terms of psychology, and value. Particularly interesting for the modern experiencer are her detailed instructions for tumo (the yoga of heat control) and creation of thought projections.

    We left the ground—I with Christian mantras and a great sense of destiny, of being at last on my true way after years of waiting and wondering..." With these words, dated October 15. 1968, the late Father Thomas Merton recorded the beginning of his fateful journey to the Orient. His travels led him from Bangkok, through India to Ceylon, and back again to Bangkok for his scheduled talk at a conference of Asian monastic orders. There he unequivocally reaffirmed his Christian vocation. His last journal entry was made on December 8, 1968, two days before his untimely, accidental death. Amply illustrated with photographs he himself took along the way and fully indexed, the book also contains a glossary of Asian religious terms, a preface by the Indian scholar Amiya Chakravarty, a foreword and postscript by Brother Patrick Hart of the Abbey of Gethsemani, as well as several appendices, among them the text of Merton's final address.

    In the West, Marpa is best known through his teacher, the Indian yogin Nâropa, and through his closest disciple, Milarepa. This lucid and moving translation of a text composed by the author of The Life of Milarepa and The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa documents the fascinating life of Marpa, who, unlike many other Tibetan masters, was a layman, a skillful businessman who raised a family while training his disciples. As a youth, Marpa was inspired to travel to India to study the Buddhist teachings, for at that time in Tibet, Buddhism has waned considerably through ruthless suppression by an evil king. The author paints a vivid picture of Marpa's three journeys to India: precarious mountain passes, desolate plains teeming with bandits, greedy customs-tax collectors. Marpa endured many hardships, but nothing to compare with the trials that ensued with his guru Nâropa and other teachers. Yet Marpa succeeded in mastering the tantric teachings, translating and bringing them to Tibet, and establishing the Practice Lineage of the Kagyüs, which continues to this day.

    Twenty-four of the Buddha's most distinguished disciples are brought to life in ten chapters of rich narration. Drawn from a wide range of authentic Pali sources, the material in these stories has never before been assembled in a single volume. Through these engaging tales, we meet all manner of human beings - rich, poor, male, female, young, old - whose unique stories are told with an eye to the details of ordinary human concerns. When read with careful attention, these stories can sharpen our understanding of the Buddhist path by allowing us to contemplate the living portraits of the people who fulfilled the early Buddhist ideals of human perfection. The characters detailed include: Sariputta Nanda Mahamoggallana Mahakassapa Ananda Isidasi Anuruddha Mahakaccana Angulimala Visakha and many more. Conveniently annotated with the same system of sutta references used in each of the other series volumes, Great Disciples of the Buddha allows the reader to easily place each student in the larger picture of Buddha's life. It is a volume that no serious student of Buddhism should miss.

    Exploring eight of Zen's most essential and universal liturgical texts, Living by Vow is a handbook to walking the Zen path, and Shohaku Okumura guides us like an old friend, speaking clearly and directly of the personal meaning and implications of these chants, generously using his experiences to illustrate their practical significance. A scholar of Buddhist literature, he masterfully uncovers the subtle, intricate web of culture and history that permeate these great texts. Esoteric or challenging terms take on vivid, personal meaning, and old familiar phrases gain new poetic resonance.

    He taught that Zen is not about achieving a goal, but about acting spontaneously from "don't-know mind." It is from this "before-thinking" nature, he taught, that true compassion and the desire to serve others naturally arises. This collection of teaching stories, talks, and spontaneous dialogues with students offers readers a fresh and immediate encounter with one of the great Zen masters of the twentieth century.

    Using humorous analogies and his profound understanding of the Western mind, Dzogchen Ponlop makes the mysterious Tibetan teachings on the bardos--the intervals between waking and sleep, between life and death, and beyond--completely available to the modern reader. Drawing on a breathtaking range of material, this young, popular teacher shows us how the bardos can be used to conquer death. Working with the bardos means taking hold of life and learning how to live with fearless abandon, and Mind Beyond Death demonstrates that the secret to a good journey through death and beyond lies in how we live. Walking skillfully through the bardos of dream, meditation, and daily life, we then travel deep into the mysterious death intervals and become familiar with their dazzling mindscape. This tour de force gives us the knowledge to transform the greatest obstacle of death into the most powerful opportunity for enlightenment.