Showing titles in Zen

There is a famous Zen story about a disciple, Riko, who once asked his master, Nansen, to explain to him the old Zen koan of the goose in the bottle. Namely, if a man puts a gosling into a bottle and feeds the gosling through the bottle's neck until it grows and becomes a goose - and then there is simply no more room inside the bottle - how can the man get it out without killing the goose or breaking the bottle? In response, Nansen shouts, "Riko!" and gives a great clap with his hands.

Based on Dharma talks by Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh and insights from participants in retreats for healing the inner child, Reconciliation is an exciting contribution to the growing trend of using Buddhist practices to encourage mental health and wellness. Reconciliation focuses on the mindful awareness of our emotions and the healing of our relationships as well as meditations and exercises to acknowledge and transform the hurt that many of us experienced as children.

Observant and relentlessly honest, Long Quiet Highway starts out as a reflection on the people, places, and experiences that helped best selling author Natalie Goldberg discover the transformational power of writing. Soon it crystallizes into a winding koan that cuts through sentiment to get at the truth of the spiritual life and the discipline needed to achieve it.

Proven to be invaluable resources for anyone in a position of power, here are three of China's greatest classical works on leadership, warriorship, and strategy: The Art of War, Zen Lessons, and The Book of Leadership and Strategy.

It is almost impossible to understand Zen by studying it as you would other intellectual pursuits. The best way to understand Zen is, simply, to Zen. This is what author Eugen Herrigel allows us to do by sharing his own fascinating journey toward a comprehension of this illuminating philosophy. In Japan, an art such as archery is not practiced solely for utilitarian purposes such as learning to hit targets. Archery is also meant to train the mind and bring it into contact with the ultimate reality.

An inspiring audiobook that will help listeners rediscover their values and discover a way to truly live life to the fullest. Each of us has an enormous capacity for love - a deep well of attention and care that we can offer to ourselves and others. With guidance that is both simple and wholly transformative, Koshin Paley Ellison, Zen teacher and psychotherapist, shows us how to uncover it: pay attention, be of service, and be with others.

The Buddhist approach to death can be of great benefit to people of all backgrounds - as has been demonstrated time and again in Joan Halifax's decades of work with the dying and their caregivers. Inspired by traditional Buddhist teachings, her work is a source of wisdom for all those who are charged with a dying person's care, facing their own death, or wishing to explore and contemplate the transformative power of the dying process.

The book The Way of Zen Buddhism & Zen Mind for Beginners goes beyond teachings of spirituality. The main focus of the book is to empower you to reach your full potential as an individual. Here, you’ll be introduced to Zen minimalist aesthetics, which will help you go from zero to abundance in no time.

Alan Watts introduced millions of Western listeners to Zen and other Eastern philosophies, but he’s also recognized as a brilliant commentator on Judeo-Christian traditions as well as a celebrity philosopher who exemplified the ideas — and lifestyle — of the 1960s counterculture.

In this book, Mark Westmoquette speaks from a place of profound personal experience. A Zen monk, he has endured two life-changing traumas caused by other people: his sexual abuse by his own father, and his stepfather’s death and mother’s very serious injury in a car crash due to the careless driving of an off-duty policeman. He stresses that by bringing awareness and kindness to these relationships, our initial stance of “I can’t stand this person, they need to change” will naturally shift into something much broader and more inclusive.

The Lankavatara Sutra, dating from the early years of the Common Era, sometime before 443, is one of the most important Mahayana Buddhist texts, not least because of its influence on later Tibetan, Chinese and Japanese Buddhism. One of its possible early translators in the 8th century was Gunabhadra, who is sometimes regarded as the first father of Zen in China. The Sutra takes the form of a dialogue between the Buddha in his cosmic form (as opposed to the historical figure of the Pali Canon) and the Bodhisattva or ‘Great Being', Mahamati.

Is meditation an escape from - or a solution to - our psychological problems? Is the use of antidepressants counter to spiritual practice? Does a psychological approach to meditation reduce spirituality to "self-help"? What can Zen and psychoanalysis teach us about the problems of the mind and suffering?

Not believing, but only experiencing, says Osho in this inspiring series of talks, is a way of finding truth and meaning. While Nietzsche's declaration that "God is dead, therefore man is free" was an incredible step in understanding, he argues, it is in itself a negative solution and does not bring freedom. Simply removing God is not enough. Osho is no atheist by far and not in favor of any "anti-believe" system either. "It is meditation that fulfills your inner being and takes away the vacuum that used to be filled by a great lie, God."

What we want is to live a life of true pleasure—a life infused with meaning, marked by genuine relationship, and aligned with what matters most to us. How do we create a life of true pleasure, one that is worth living? Untangled is a welcoming guidebook to finding expansive ease and joy through what is traditionally called the eightfold path, one of Buddhism’s foundational teachings. Psychotherapist and Zen teacher Koshin Paley Ellison walks listeners through this time-tested map for transformation and lasting happiness.

Each of us carries a song inside us, the song that makes us human. Zen Guitar provides the key to unlocking this song - a series of life lessons presented through the metaphor of music. Philip Sudo offers his own experiences with music to enable us to rediscover the harmony in each of our lives and open ourselves to Zen awareness uniquely suited to the Western mind. Through 58 lessons that provide focus and a guide, the listener is led through to Zen awareness, with quotes from sources ranging from Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix to Miles Davis.

Inspired by the Japanese concept of kurashi, or “way of life,” Kurashi at Home invites you to visualize your best life from the moment you wake up until the end of each day. By applying Marie Kondo's time-tested query—“Does it spark joy?”—to your mindset and behaviors, you are invited to take an even more holistic and personal approach to curating your environment by imagining what your life could look like full of connection and free from any limitations.

Zen Golf Deck is a collection of brief lessons and exercises drawn from Zen Golf: Mastering the Mental Game. Applied in actual on-course sessions with golfers, including many PGA TOUR and LPGA players, they will introduce you to a unique perspective that brings together techniques of modern psychology and ancient wisdom traditions. Each lesson in the Zen Golf Deck will give you ways to make your mind an ally instead of an enemy, helping to reduce frustration, increase consistency, and lower your scores.

Legend has it that more than a thousand years ago an Indian Buddhist monk named Bodhidharma arrived in China. His approach to teaching was unlike that of any of the Buddhist missionaries who had come to China before him. He confounded the emperor with cryptic dialogues, traveled the country, lived in a cave in the mountains, and eventually paved the way for a unique and illuminating approach to Buddhist teachings that would later spread across the whole of East Asia in the form of Chan—later to be known as Seon in Korean, Thien in Vietnamese, and Zen in Japanese.

Reiki is an ancient and profoundly simple system of "laying on of hands" healing derived from Tibetan Buddhism. In the West, Reiki has been kept highly secret for many years. Essential Reiki presents full information on all three degrees of this healing system, most of it in audio for the first time. Teaching from the perspective that Reiki healing belongs to all people, Diane Stein breaks new ground in her classic guide to this ancient practice.

In a distant city, an old cat considers himself as wise as can be, until he hears of an ancient pine far away, under the boughs of which infinite wisdom can be found. Thus, the Cat embarks on a journey deep into the forest to search for the tree. Along the way, he meets new friends—the Hare, the Magpie, the Wolf Cub, the Monkey, the Tortoise, and the Tiger—and comes across the energetic young Kitten. What wisdom does the Cat have to impart to his friends, and, perhaps more importantly, what does he still have to learn?