Book Recommendations
Radical Compassion:
Learning to Love Yourself and Your World with the Practice of RAIN
Tara Brach
Tara Brach shares her knowledge and very profound insights with a beautiful vulnerability. At the beginning of the book, she says the following:
“Yet this very suffering—feeling deficient and disconnected – has also been my most fertile ground for waking up. It has led me to a spiritual path and practices that I cherish. And when I get stuck in painful emotions, it brings me to a repeating realization, an insight that has profoundly changed my life”. I have to love myself into healing. The only path that can carry me home is the path of self-compassion”.
About the author:
Tara Brach, PhD, is an internationally known teacher of mindfulness, meditation, emotional healing and spiritual awakening. She is the senior teacher and founder of Insight Meditation Center of Washington, DC. She is the author of other remarkable books like The Radical Acceptance. And her podcasts and her weekly talks are available weekly for any curious mind and heart.
Tara Brach not only serves as a mentor and amazing teacher but she is one of
my most beloved meditation guides. Anyone can find refuge in her talks on a variety of topics that might be of concern or wonder at any one moment in time.
The Wise Heart:
A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology
Jack Kornfield
A guide to the transformative power of Buddhist psychology—for meditators and mental health professionals, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike.
“You have within you unlimited capacities for extraordinary love, for joy, for communion with life, and for unshakable freedom—and here is how to awaken them.
About the Author
Jack Kornfield is a Buddhist teacher and meditation master on internationally renown and a cofounder of the Insight Meditation Society and of Spirit Rock Center in northern California. A former Buddhist monk, he holds a PhD in clinical psychology. He is also the beloved teacher and founder of the MMTCP program together with Tara Brach. He is the author of many books and his voice is one-of-a-kind, always bearing always tones of gentleness and giving you the impression he is smiling directly at you.
An insight into the river of emotions: “Buddhist psychology helps us distinguish two critical aspects of feeling. The first and most essential quality is called the primary feeling. According to this perspective, every moment of
experience is infused with a feeling tone. Like valence in chemistry, each sight, sound, taste, touch, smell or thought will have either a pleasant, painful or neutral quality” The stream of primary feelings is always with us, but we often have the mistaken notion that life is not supposed to be this way. We secretly believe that if we act just right ,then our stream of feelings will always be pleasant and there will be no pain, no loss.
The Miracle of Mindfulness:
An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation
Thich Nhat Hanh
About the author
Thich Nhat Hanh (1926–2022) was a Vietnamese Buddhist Zen Master, poet, and peace activist and one of the most revered and influential spiritual teachers in the world. Born in 1926, he became a Zen Buddhist monk at the age of sixteen. His work for peace and reconciliation during the war in Vietnam moved Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967. In 1982 he established Plum Village France, the largest Buddhist monastery in Europe and the hub of the international Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism. Over seven decades of teaching, he published a hundred books, which have been translated into more than forty languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide.
Here is one of my favourite and simple exercise to anchor ourselves in the present moment:
“Washing the dishes to wash the dishes” – which means that while she/he is doing that one should be completely aware of the fact that one is washing the dishes.
The translator of the book, Mobi Ho goes on and comments in the preface of the book — “At first, it sounds even silly- why putting so much emphasis on a thing that simple. But this is exactly the point, the fact that I am standing there at the sink and washing the bowls it is a wondrous reality. I am being completely myself, following my breath, conscious of my presence, and conscious of my thoughts and actions. “
Most of us are already thinking of the cup of tea that we will drink afterwards and thus we will hurry to finish the dishes.
“In fact, we are completely incapable in realizing the miracle of life happening while standing at the sink. If we cannot wash the dishes and be present, we cannot drink the tea either, we will only be thinking of other things, barely aware of the cup in our hands. Thus we are sucked up in the future – and we are incapable of actually living one minute of life”.
The Blooming of a Lotus: Essential Guided Meditations for Mindfulness, Healing, and Transformation
Thich Nhat Hanh
Guided meditations for Achieving the Miracle of Mindfulness
About the author : Thich Nhat Hanh is a Vietnamese monk, renowned Zen master, poet and peace activist. He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King Jr.. in 1967 and is the author of many books. He lived his last years in Plum Village in France a community set up following the Forrest Tradition in Vietnam and second branch to Plum Village in Vietnam.
One of the world's greatest meditation teachers offered thirty-four guided exercises that bring both beginning and experienced practitioners into closer touch with their bodies, their inner selves, their families, and the world. Compassionate and wise, Thich Nhat Hanh's healing words help us acknowledge and dissolve anger and separation by illuminating the way toward the miracle of mindfulness.
Who is Thay (as the students call him): Thich Nhat Hanh stands the test of time with his life story, his legacy and his strong belief in the goodness of people, his belief in non-violence, and always promoting compassion and self-compassion. His lessons in mindfulness and meditation reveal themselves in us through a steady rhythm. The repetitions, the poems, the simplicity of life transform our mind, translate the mundane symbols of everyday, of nature and emotions and by enhancing their connection to the present moment – they always serve as grounding material to me. I would always have this book with me when travelling as a safety net to reach out for comfort and awareness practice.
“When we meditate we use our stored consciousness (the deepest levels of our consciousness) more than our mind consciousness (our thinking and rationalization).
That is why images are more useful to the meditator than the abstract concepts. These exercises are to help us be aware and nourished by the involvement of all five senses with sensory impressions. They help us appreciate more the wonders of life that our senses make possible. They also help us be aware of any feelings — pleasant, unpleasant or neutral — that arise when our senses perceive sensed objects.
Outsmart Your Pain: Mindfulness and Self-Compassion to Help You Leave Chronic Pain Behind
Christiane Wolf
Pain can be a big, unwieldy box that we struggle to carry all day. But what if we could put down this box, unpack it, and tackle the contents one by one? Outsmart Your Pain is Dr. Christiane Wolf’s radically clear, evidence-based guide to relieving chronic pain with mindfulness, complete with twenty easy guided meditations and self-compassion practices, including:
rewriting the “pain story” you tell yourself
practicing loving acceptance of your body as it is
mindfully working through negative emotions
strengthening your inner and outer support systems.
By separating your pain from the stressful thoughts and troubled feelings that come with it, you can lay down your burden and live with joy.
About the Author
Christiane Wolf, MD, PhD, is a physician turned mindfulness and compassion teacher and a senior teacher at InsightLA in Los Angeles, California. She trains teachers and teaches Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and Mindful Self-Compassion to groups and individuals in the US and across Europe. With her medical background, one of her specialties is working with people who suffer from chronic illness and pain. Dr. Wolf is a lead teacher and program developer for the nationwide mindfulness facilitator training for the US veterans Administration. Dr. Wolf is also a Buddhist teacher in the vipassana (Insight) meditation tradition and has received teacher transmission from Trudy Goodman and Jack Kornfield. She is coauthor, with Greg Serpa, of A Clinician's Guide to Teaching Mindfulness.
Who is Christiane for me:
a wonderful teacher whose books have served as a constant guide. I had the pleasure to also attend a silent Vipassana (insight) retreat in Spain in 2024, which was led by Christiane together with yoga and pranayama breathing teacher Viveka Nguyen of Atmajoti Yoga in Sweden. And I’m looking forward to attending similar events in the future.
Awe:
The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life
Dacher Keltner
About the author: Dacher Keltner is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the faculty director of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center. A renowned expert in the science of human emotion, Dr. Keltner studies compassion and awe, how we express emotion, and how emotions guide our moral identities and search for meaning. His research interests also span issues of power, status, inequality, and social class. He is the author of The Power Paradox, the bestselling books Born to Be Good and Awe, and the coeditor of The Compassionate Instinct.
What this book represents to me:
This book stands as a testament to the practices long engaged in my own self-becoming and self-sustaining. This is a way of living that was never labeled before as a practice, a tool kit, or coping mechanisms. This book simply opened up my understanding that “awe” is more than accessible, and can reach out from within to its energy. It is fascinating to become aware of all the scientific studies that explore and showcase the power of awe.
“I have taught happiness to hundreds of thousands of people around the world. It is not obvious why I ended up doing this work: I have been a pretty wound-up, anxious person for significant chunks of my life and was thrown out of my first meditation class(for laughing while we chanted “I am a being of purple fire”). Life can surprise us, though, in giving us the work we are here to do. So nearly every day in classrooms of different kinds, I’ve taught people about finding the good life”
How can we live the good life?One enlivened by joy and community and meaning,that brings us a sense of worth and belonging ,and strengthens the people and natural environments around us?
Now twenty years into teaching happiness,I have an answer:
FIND AWE” - Dacher Keltner
There are 4 beautifully curated sections of the book:
A Science of Awe
Stories of Transformative Awe
Cultural Archives of Awe
Living a Life of Awe
You can also read my article on Substack here:
Compassion Cards:
Teachings for awakening the heart in everyday life
Pema Chödrön
Fifty-nine beautifully designed cards on the classic Buddhist practice of lojong for everyday inspiration and contemplation--with instructive commentaries by Pema Chödrön to make the teachings more accessible and applicable to contemporary life.
About the author: Pema Chödrön is an American-born Tibetan Buddhist. She is an ordained nun, former acharya of Shambhala Buddhism and disciple of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. Chödrön has authored several dozen books and audiobooks, and was the principal teacher at Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia until recently.
Who is Pema Chödrön is to me:
I came across her story and her book “When things fall apart” more than a decade ago at a cross roads in my life. I understood then, and pretty rapidly, that I was not equipped for heartbreak, for losing too many of my aspirations and from what I thought I knew about myself. I had to wake up very quickly to a new reality and the only way I knew how to do it was by reading and discovering meaningful teachers in authors. Her book's title made complete sense to me at that time, as I couldn't recall anything significant. It felt as if the world was crumbling apart and I had lost first and foremost what I knew as my own identity. I am eternally grateful for discovering Pema Chödrön. I keep going back to her courses and teachings, and follow updates about her on the Pema Chödrön Foundation page.
Lojong, or mind training, is a core practice in all the lineages of Tibetan tradition. It can perhaps best be characterized as a method for transforming our mind by turning away from self-centeredness and cultivating instead the mental habits that generate bodhicitta, the awakened mind that puts the benefit of others above all else. The teachings on it are more diverse than many people realize, so we thought we would lay out a map of its origins and development for our readers, with some recommendations along the way for books through which the practice can be explored. (credits to Shambala publications).
“The positive seed that is within you, experienced as a yearning to practice and wake up” - one of the five strengths taught by Pema Chödrön in “The Condensed Heart Instructions.”
Practice the five strengths:
Strong determination to train in opening the heart and mind:
familiarization with the practices (such as tonglen) that help you do that: - note – explain what Tonglen is in Guideline about meditation forms and traditions where it is practiced.
the positive seed that is within you, experiences as a yearning to practice and wake up
reproach, which is a tricky one for Western students but is an important practice: realizing that ego-clinging causes you to suffer, you delight in self reflection, honesty, and in seeing where you get stuck; and
the aspiration to help alleviate suffering in this world, expressing that intention to yourself.
The Serviceberry:
Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World
Robin Wall Kimmerer
We learn that in the Anishinaabe worldview, all the sustenance that the land provides, from fish to firewood ,everything that makes our lives possible,” is provided by the lives of more-than-human beings.
“When we speak of these not as things or natural resources or commodities, but as gifts, our whole relationship to the natural world change. “
A very simple example to keep forever in our mind would be: should you receive a basket of berries from your neighbour, you would probably make a pie with them, or in our country, we would make berry preserves and most probably we would share with the same neighbours or others. It would not be only for ourselves. There is a sense of responsibility, a reverence, an appreciation and we would feel compelled to also give something back. Perhaps on another day, we would knock on the neighbour’s door and share produce from our garden. I was lucky enough to have grown up in such a community based on sharing. Food, produce, prepared meals, bread, polenta and cheese. I can still remember those days when we were bouncing back and forth from our place to the neighbour’s, or at my grandmother’s, where someone would bring a plate of milk porridge, or pears or some cuts of meat… there was a continuous giving and receiving and doing something with it, and sharing it again. Pay it forward, pay it back in the most natural way, following the seasons — just like Robin so eloquently describes.
You can also read my article on Substack here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/maggiehongkong/p/a-basket-of-berries?r=5nraa&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false (Dec.22,2024)
The Kindness Handbook:
A Practical Companion
Sharon Salzberg
Sharon Salzberg represents one of the most recognized voices in this arena and she has written extensively on this topic. You can find her podcast and her books on all platforms and I would recommend her teachings at anytime. Such an inspiration and such a great interpreter distilling knowledge and also life experience into accessible terms and sharings for everyone.
“Metta Meditation is part of the living tradition of meditation practices that cultivate spaciousness of mind and openness of heart”
Last month meditations were just preparing ourselves for this. Really.
I would leave you here with one sentence to take it from her book:
“May the power of loving-kindness sustain me”.
If we can repeat this every day. The space that you can create and hold internally will expand effortless. Try if for twenty one days. Morning and Evening. And any moment that you need a pat on your shoulder. You would feel it deeply in your heart and in your body and its embrace will increase slowly.
It works only if you commit to it. Say it internally and say it out loud. The power of your own voice will stun you in remarkable ways.
True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart
Tara Brach
Tara Brach reaches our deepest corners of our hearts with this insightful gem of a book called “True Refuge”.
Tara offers as always in her teachings relatable examples, life experiences, taking us on a journey of self-discovery. We can relate to all life stories shared here, no matter the protagonist.
I loved the clarity shed on the concept of false refuge versus the concept of true refuge.
For me, true refuge is not always a destination. It is the path itself of awareness, looking deeper and facing my own shadows and projections, being responsible and yet self-compassionate, and ultimately becoming diligent and taking mindful action.
Becoming diligent in my approach towards being authentic and kind does involve shedding old habits, does involve identifying the false refuge( where my energy does gets depleted.)
I loved the emphasis on mindfulness of the body, connecting us with the sensations of our own body as a first gateway towards a true refuge. There is a “truth in our body” that we tend to be disconnected from and we could teach ourselves to bring back to life.
I loved one of her analogy:the image of a great tree uprooted from the earth.
“Roots in the air we loose access to the aliveness and love and beauty that nourishes our deepest being. No false refuge can compensate that loss”.
We are transported with every chapter by modalities to assess and discern between false and true and also how we can all come back to the path of a true refuge.
“No matter how challenging a situation, there is always a way to twke refuge in a healing and liberating presence.”
And if you can add one more quote - one more page:- Quote available
"Often it is not until we are jolted by crisis—a betrayal of the heart, the death of a loved one, our own impending death—that we see clearly: Our false refuges don’t work. They can’t save us from what we most fear, the pain of loss and separation. A crisis has the power to shatter our illusions, to reveal that in this impermanent world, there really is no ground to stand on, nothing we can hold on to. At these times, when our lives seem to be falling apart, the call for help can become fully conscious. This call is the heart’s longing for a refuge that is vast enough to embrace our most profound experience of suffering.”
Tara Brach- True Refuge
NOTE:
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