The Wise Heart: Buddhist Psychology for the West

anger, and grief. I counseled her to let it all be, to just sit and walk on the earth and let things settle in their own time. But as she sat, the feelings and stories got stronger. I recited to her Ajahn Chah’s teaching of sitting like a clear forest pool. I encouraged her to acknowledge, one by one, all the inner wild animals that came to drink a

where all the opposites exist. T. S. Eliot calls this the “still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;/Neither from nor towards;… neither arrest nor movement.” The sage Shantideva calls the middle way “complete non-referential ease.” The Perfect Wisdom Text describes it as “realization of suchness beyond attainment of good or bad

Release opinions, free yourself from views. Be open to mystery.

It is an open inquiry into what is painful, pleasant, joyful, or shameful, without judging anything as right or wrong. This is the first step in healing, a clear seeing and deep acceptance of what is. But this acceptance is only the first step in the transformation of human experience.

As Shunryu Suzuki says, “When we understand the truth of impermanence and find our composure in it, there we find ourselves in nirvana.”

Ginger was a fifty-one-year-old social worker who had worked for years in a clinic in California’s Central Valley. A committed meditator, she took a month off to come to our spring retreat. At first it was hard for her to quiet her mind. Her beloved younger brother had reentered the psych ward where he had first been hospitalized for a schizophreni

EXAMINING THOUGHTS

If you are a person who has regular, repeated destructive thoughts, thoughts of self-judgment, criticism, shame, or unworthiness, work with this training for a week or, even better, for a month. First, become more carefully aware of the content and rhythm of the voices inside. What are their regular, unhealthy remarks and devastating comments? What

A MEDITATION ON GRATITUDE AND JOY