Zen Awakening

Those moments in your life when there was openness, a spacious quality to your existence - those are the moments that truly make life remarkable. Creating those moments is the focus of this program by Ram Dass, a spiritual teacher who has studied and practiced meditation for many years.

You lost your friends. A work promotion has by-passed you for who knows what consecutive time. You have no time to think of your personal needs, caught up in the 9 to 5 hustle. You’re lonely. You’re surrounded by too many irrelevant people. You can’t find fulfilling connections. So many challenges to address in our busy, hectic and nearly insane lives. What if we learn to take a step back, slow down, and look inside? Wouldn’t such an approach halt the daily grind and contribute to something much more meaningful, much more exciting?

Buddhism aims for the development of a flexible mind and skillful responsiveness-whether toward problems in one's personal life or broader issues like the ecological crisis. But in a culture now saturated with cliches about mindfulness and unrealistic fantasies about happiness, what does it truly mean to walk this path? The key practice is that of embodied aliveness.

Love might not be what we think it is. We all seek the happiness that comes from loving and being loved, yet we often find ourselves dissatisfied in our relationships and unable to grasp the cause. Thich Nhat Hanh here shows the way to overcome our recurrent obstacles to love - by learning to be mindful, open, and present with ourselves and others. As he explains, "training is needed in order to love properly; and to be able to give happiness and joy, you must practice deep looking directed toward the person you love."

Unburden is an invitation to examine ideas, identities, and concepts that bind and limit us. We begin to access the power and potency that comes from trusting the silence underlying all thoughts and experiences.

Koans are the record of paradoxical and provocative exchanges between Zen masters and their students that developed in medieval China. These exchanges, though often elaborated through commentary, have also been boiled down to one-line questions or statements to be held in meditation and daily life. Famous examples include, "What is the sound of one hand?" and "Not knowing is most intimate." In Through Forests of Every Color, renowned Zen teacher Joan Sutherland reimagines the koan tradition with allegiance to the root spirit of the koans.

In The Way of Tenderness, Zen priest Zenju Earthlyn Manuel brings Buddhist philosophies of emptiness and appearance to bear on race, sexuality, and gender, using wisdom forged through personal experience and practice to rethink problems of identity and privilege.

Pause...breathe...smile. Three small words, yet each contains a universe of wisdom. Let the title be your guide in this inspiring book on awakening to the full depths of mindful living. The Pause is about setting our intention before we think, speak, or act - the ethical dimension of mindfulness. When we Breathe, we unite mind, body, and spirit, making every moment an opportunity for meditation. With a Smile, we open to a wisdom beyond words. This simple trio will water your innate seeds of awakening to help you pave your own path to fulfillment and peace.

Connecting with your mind and body are the first steps to greater insight. This collection is designed to help you gain wisdom from your divine self, increase your insight, and further your spiritual development.

In clear words, Zen Master Zensho W. Kopp shows us in an inspiring way how we can see through the deceptive nature of our concepts so that we rise up above our self-made limitations. Through this we transcend our identification with the unreal and reach the absolute reality of our true self. We experience a liberating transformation to a deeper and all-embracing universal consciousness and thus to freedom of the mind.