Synopses & Reviews
The Dalai Lama, Tibet's leader-in-exile and greatest spiritual teacher, is someone who can help ordinary, everyday people.
A Nobel Peace Prize winner, the author of numerous bestselling books, a thinker, and a leader, The Dalai Lama continues to be a global voice of spiritual awakening. He continues to work tirelessly on behalf of the Tibetan people and speaks out for human rights worldwide. He is a preeminent spiritual leader among other global leaders such as the Pope and Nelson Mandela.
An Open Heart clearly lays out a course of meditations, simple to challenging, that will enable anyone of any faith to become a more compassionate person. What are these meditations? Basically, they are are a series of mental training techniques involving self-reflection, focus, reason, and persistence.
So what then is an open heart?
In the Buddhist worldview, the mind is located in the middle of the chest. Therefore, for a Buddhist, an open heart is an open mind, and a change of heart is a change of mind. In order to become more compassionate people, we have to train our minds. You do not have to be a Buddhist, though, to learn the practice of letting go of bad habits and becoming lighter and less dragged down by anxieties and greed. Happiness and practicing compassion spring from an open mind.
When His Holiness the Dalai Lama came to New York City in 1999, he spoke simply and powerfully on the everyday Buddhist practice of compassion. Weaving together the contents of three sacred texts one by the eighth-century Indian master Kamalashila, another by the fourteenth-century Tibetan Togmay Sangpo, and a third by the eleventh-century sage Langri Tangpa His Holiness showed that the path to compassion is a series of meditations. An Open Heart lays out this course of meditation, from the simplest to the most challenging, describing the mental training techniques that will enable anyone of any faith to change their minds and open their hearts. In this book the path begins with simple and clear ruminations on the advantages of a virtuous life and moves on to practices that can temper destructive and impulsive emotions. Such practices can be undertaken at odd moments of the day, at once transforming the aimless or anxious mind into a disciplined and open mind. Gradually, the book introduces the more challenging and sustained meditation practices. In these meditations the deepest and most profound insights of Buddhist practice become part of one's way of knowing and experiencing the world.
An Open Heart is a clear and simple introduction to the Buddhist path to enlightenment, by its greatest teacher, His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Review
"With great finesse, this Tibetan Buddhist teacher delineates the art of cultivating compassion as developing empathy, closeness, and recognition of the nature of suffering. He holds up equanimity as the practice that enables us to reach out to others by transcending any feelings we have of discrimination and partiality. An Open Heart is a timely resource for anyone looking for guidance on the path of compassion." Spirituality & Health
Synopsis
Compassion-sympathy for the suffering of others and the desire to free them from it-is wrestled with in all spiritual traditions. Yet how does one actually become a compassionate person? What are the mechanisms by which a selfish heart is transformed into a generous heart? In this acclaimed bestseller, His Holiness the Dalai Lama writes simply and powerfully about the everyday Buddhist practice of compassion, offering a clear, practical, inspiring introduction to the Buddhist path to enlightenment.
About the Author
Recognized at the age of two as the reincarnation of the thirteenth Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso was brought to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, and enthroned two years later as the fourteenth Dalai Lama. In 1959, following the Chinese suppression of the Tibetan national uprising, he was forced to seek asylum in India. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, His Holiness is today universally acknowledged as one of the world's foremost spiritual leaders.