The Wheel of Great Compassion is the first book to provide Western readers with a complete understanding of the prayer wheel--an ancient and mystical practice that has long been popular with Buddhists throughout Tibet and Mongolia for its ability to bless the environment, promote healing, increase compassion, and assist practitioners on their journeys to enlightenment. This book offers a clear description of prayer wheel practice, its meaning and benefits, and its role as an essential ritual and symbol of Tibetan Buddhism. It contains a general introduction to the prayer wheel, photographs and illustrations, six commentaries by Tibetan lamas (including Lama Zopa Rinpoche), and instructions for both prayer wheel construction and proper use.
Hell realms, gods, and hungry ghosts—these are just a few of the images on the Buddhist wheel of life. In Awakening from the Daydream, discover how these ancient symbols are still relevant to our modern life. In Awakening from the Daydream, meditation teacher David Nichtern reimagines the ancient Buddhist allegory of the Wheel of Life. Famously painted at the entryway to Buddhist monasteries, the Wheel of Life encapsulates the entirety of the human situation. In the image of the Wheel we find a teaching about how to make sense of life and how to find peace within an uncertain world. Nichtern writes with clarity and humor, speaking to our contemporary society and its concerns and providing simple practical steps for building a mindful, compassionate, and liberating approach to living.
Now in paperback, this practical guide to cultivating compassion delivers Buddhist and psychological insight right where we need it most—navigating the difficulties of our daily lives. Compassion is often seen as a distant, altruistic ideal cultivated by saints, or as an unrealistic response of the naively kind-hearted. Seeing compassion in this way, we lose out on experiencing the transformative potential of one of our most neglected inner resources. Dr Lorne Ladner rescues compassion from this marginalised view, showing how its practical application in our life can be a powerful force in achieving happiness. Combining the wisdom of Tibetan Buddhism and Western psychology, Ladner presents clear, effective practices for cultivating compassion in daily living.
Vivid and varied images of Tibet spring to life in this first collection of fiction on the country ever translated into English. As the storytellers portray Tibetan hunting traditions, Buddhist lore, and burial rites, they lure readers into a haunting and unfamiliar land.
Each of us struggles with the existential questions of meaning, purpose, and responsibility. In The Meaning of Life, the Dalai Lama examines these questions from the Buddhist perpective, skillfully guiding us to a clearer understanding that can li...
It Is 256 Bce. Almost Three Hundred Years After The Death Of The Buddha And Four Since The Terrible Battle Of Kalinga... Upali, A Monk And An Embittered Survivor Of The War That Made The Emperor Ashoka Overlord Of The Whole Of India, Hates The Emperor With All His Heart. Yet It Is To Him That Ashoka, The Self-Proclaimed Beloved Of The Gods, Entrusts The Task Of Putting The Buddha'S Life And Teachings Down For Posterity. For The Emperor Is Set On A New Conquest - That Of Dhamma... And So Begins A Search For The Buddha And A Struggle Over The Past. Ht Really Was The Buddha'S Message? Ascetic Renunciation? Universal Salvation? Passive Disengagement? Tolerance - Even Of Intolerance? If His Message Was A Critique Of Violence, How Did It Come To Be Championed By The Most Successfully Violent Autocrats Of Ancient India? These Are Questions That Begin To Surface Among The Buddha'S Followers, Fearfully And Then Angrily, To Be Viciously Debated Even As Dhamma Rises To Glorious Imperial Patronage, A Patronage That Will Sustain It For Over A Millennium And Reach It To Half The World'S Populace. This Is A Story About The Buddha And His Disciples, Among Them An Ordinary Monk, One Of The Questioners, And An Extraordinary King, Who Seemed To Have All The Answers. It Is Also About How The Movement Called Dhamma Was Born, Spread, Changed Lives And Got Changed Itself. Alternating Upali'S Chronicle - A De-Glorified, Factual Account Of The Life Of Buddha - With That Of Upali'S Own Life During The Reign Of Emperor Ashoka, And Imbuing Both These Parallel Narratives With A Wealth Of Historical Detail And Philosophical Debate, A Spoke In The Wheel Is An Ambitious And Erudite Work Of Historical Fiction - Intricate In Its Craftsmanship, Vital In Its Ideas And Epic In Its Sweep.
