Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #33376 in Books
• Published on: 2002-07-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 208 pages

Synopsis
This perennially popular guide to cultivating compassion and equanimity through meditation is from the frequent contributor to O magazine, Sharon Salzberg. She shows us how the Buddhist practice of lovingkindness (known as metta) can help us discover the radiant, joyful heart within each of us. Salzberg draws on simple Buddhist teachings, wisdom stories from various traditions, personal experiences and guided meditation practices.

Customer Reviews

Crisp, fresh, uncompromising
This may be personal to me, but I tend to fear that books on this topic will be a bit drippy, nebulously positive feelgood items. Happily, Sharon Salzberg is a true teacher in the Theravadan tradition and helps me move towards lovingkindness as i think it was meant. As she presents it, lovingkindness is clarity about the flaws in the world, ourselves, other people. Lovingkindness is a compassionate non-denial of what things are like. Oddly, lovingkindness turns out to be the antidote to fear. It opens us up to the world, rather than trying to drape existence in pink positive soft-focus light. Open, loving, fearless, accurate, non-narrow, non-petty; we've got a lot to thank the Buddha for, and this is a truly wonderful exposition by Sharon Salzberg. She provides great stories, deep understanding and, critically, the kind of precise, technical meditation tips that are the blessing of the Theravadan tradition. There are a lot of solid, traditional metta practices straight from the canon summarised in here. A book that I will be mining for years.

A fantastic book, with practical meditations on compassion
I first came across this book in a monastery in Thailand, it can truly be life changing. It has practical meditations that help you learn forgiveness for yourself and others as well as greater compassion. I would recommend this book to anyone and frequently do :-)

Amazingly eye opening
This is one of the few books I would actually read over and over. It's incredibly down-to-earth and is full of great quotes you keep in mind all day long. It invites you to think about your perception of yourself and others in a very different light. There is so much common sense in the buddhist way of relating to each other, but we don't often use our common sense.