A Path with Heart A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life

by Jack Kornfield

1993

Description

Jack Kornfield's A Path with Heart has been acclaimed as the most significant book yet about American Buddhism-a definitive guide to the practice of traditional mindfulness in America today. On this audio edition, Kornfield teaches the key principles of Buddhism's cherished vipassana (insight) tradition, and puts them into direct service, with the unique needs of the contemporary seeker in mind.

Library's review

'This improtant gidebook shows in detail and tith great humor and insight the way to practice the Buddha's universal teachings here in the West. Jack Kornfield is a wonderful storyteller and a great teacher.'-Thich Nhat Nanh

Perhaps the most improtant book yet written on meditation, the process of

inner transformation, thd the integration of spiritual practice into our American way of life, A Path with Heart brings alive one by one the challenges of spiritual living in the modern world. Written by a teacher, psychologist, and meditation master of international renown, this warm, inspriting, and expert book touches on a wide range of essential issues including many rarely addressed in spiritual books. From compassion , addiction, and psychological and emotional healing, to dealing with problems involving relationships and sexuality, to the creation of a Zen-like simplicity and balance in all facets of life, it speaks to the concerns of many modern spiritual seekers, both those beginning on the path and those with years of experience.

A Path with Heart is filled with practical techniques, guided meditations, stories, koans, and other gems of wisdom that can help ease your journey through the world. The author's own profound-and sometimes humorous-experiences and gentle assistance will skillfully guide you through the obstacles and trials of spiritual and contemporary life to bring a clarity of perception and a sense of the sacred into your everyday experiences. Reading this book will touch your heart and remind you of the promises inherent in meditation and in a life of the spirit: the blossoming of inner peace, wholeness, and understanding, and the achevement of a happiness that is not dependent on external conditions.

Sure to be a classic, A Path with Heart shows us how we can bring our spirituality to flower everyday of our lives. It is a wise and gentle guidebook for an odyssey into the soul that enables us to achieve a deeper, more satisfyying life in the world.

'Jack is helping to pave the path for American Buddhism, bringng essential basic's into our crazy modern lives. And the language he uses is as simple and as lovely as our breath.'-Natalie Goldberg

Contents

Acknowledgments
Part I A path with heart: The fundamentals
A beginning
Chapter 1 Did I love well?
A meditation on loving-kindness
Chapter 2 Stoppoing the war
A meditation on stopping the war within
Chapter 3 Take the one seat
A meditation on taking the one seat
Chapter 4 Necessary healing
Healing the body
Healing the heart
Healing the mind
Healing through emptiness
Developing a healing attention
A meditative visit to the healing temple
Chapter 5 Training the puppy: Mindfulness of breathing
Establishing a daily meditation
Walking meditation
Part II Promises and perils
Chapter 6 Trning straw into gold
Meditation: Reflection on difficulty
Meditation: Seeing all beings as enlightened
Chapter 7 Naming the demons
How to begin naming
Meditation on making the demons part of the path
Meditaton on the impulses that move our life
Chapter 8 Difficult problems and insistent visitors
Expand the field of attention
A full awareness of the feelings
Discover what is asking for acceptance
Open through the center
Five more skillful means
Chapter 9 The spiritual roller-coaster: Kundalini and other side effects
Attitudes toward altered states
Some ocommon altered states
Skillful means of working with the energetic and emotional openings
Meditation: Reflecting on your attidude toward altered states
Chapter 10 Expanding and dissolving the self: Dark night and rebirth
Buddhist maps of absorption and insight states
The entry to expanded consciousness: Access concentration
States of absorption
The realms of existence
Dissolving the self
The dark night
The realm of awakenings
Meditation on death and rebirth
Chapter 11 Searching for the Buddha: A lamp unto ourselves
Meditation: Becoming simple and transparent
Part III Widening our circle
Chapter 12 Accepting the cycles of spiritual life
Leaving retreat: Practice with transition
Meditation: Reflecting on the cycles of yor spiritual life
Chapter 13 No boundaries to the sacred
The near enemies
Meditation on compartments and wholeness
Chapter 14 No self or true self?
The nature of selflessness
Misconceptions about selflessness
From no self to true self
The unique expression of true self
Meditation: Who am I?
Chapter 15 Generosity, codependence, and fearless compassion
Meditation: Transforming sorrow into compassion
Chapter 16 You can't do it alone: Finding and working with a teacher
Chapter 17 Psychotherapy and meditation
Chapter 18 The emperor's new clothes: Problems with teachers
Naming the difficulties
Why problems occur
Transference and projection
How to work with teacher-community problems
The place of forgiveness
Leaving a community
Meditation: Reflecting on the shadow of your form of practice
Chapter 19 Karma: The heart is our garden
Meditation on forgiveness
Chapter 20 Expanding our circle: An undivided heart
Daily life as meditation
Moving into the world
Conscious conduct: The five precepts
Reverence for life
Meditation on service
Undertakng the five recepts: Nonharming as a gift to the world
Part IV Spiritual maturity
Chapter 21 Spiritual maturity
Chapter 22 The great song
Our individual song within the great song
A hundred thousands forms of awakening
Meditation on equanimity
Chapter 23 Englihtenment is intimacy with all things
Appendix Insight meditation teachers code of ethics
A treasury of books (bibliography)
Glossary

Show Less

User reviews

LibraryThing member dianemb

An extremely good book for anyone interested in meditation and Eastern spirituality.

7 more

LibraryThing member co_coyote

A guide to spiritual living in the modern world. I've always found Kornfield to be the most practical of spiritual guides. This book on Buddhist meditation is clear and convincing, without being all mushy about it.

LibraryThing member JNagarya

Could have been thinner by at least a quarter of an inch were Kornfield able to write, or had he a competent editor. The result is that the writing is sub-par, and as result unclear -- as in, not clearly thought about or through by the author. As in, inusfficnet rewriting. That reality should be

compared and contrasted with his "expertise" and claims about the results for him of his method. There are far too many Westerners (and no few Easterners) whose primary motivation in this field is power and money; unfortunately, it is less rare than one would ideally want and hope.

He should have left it to Gunaratana's "Mindfulness in Plain English".

Show Less

LibraryThing member stanlicious

I have read this book three times. Once to see what it contained, a second time to study it (it took me three years), the third time to remind me of The Path. This may appear to be a book for Buddhists but you'd be sadly mistaken. This is a valuable tool to anyone who is seeking to follow a

spiritual path.

Show Less

LibraryThing member etsmith

How do we connect the pieces of our lives in a way that makes sense of our relationship to those we love, our communities and the world? This is the ultimate spiritual question. Kornfield went off to Southeast Asia as a young adult seeking answers in the monasteries of the forest tradition of

Theravada Buddhism. When he returned to the United States, he began teaching the ideas and spiritual practices learned in the east in a way that modern Americans could understand. Much of the mythology is absent but the essence of the teaching is the same.

Kornfield's books have been a transformative force in my life and reading A Path With Heart was a worthwhile part of the transformation. The theme is compassion and the practice is harder than it sounds. By the time I read the book, I had already spent time on retreat at the Insight Meditation Society founded by Kornfield, Goldstein and others.

Kornfield is a born storyteller and Buddhism is replete with wonderful universal stories that capture the dilemmas of being human and the Buddhist vision of spirituality. So the book is enjoyable. It is also very practical--full of practices to try and new ways of thinking.

If you like this book, you might enjoy logging on to the Dharma Seed's library and listening to some of Kornfield's dharma talks. His series about the path of the householder is especially good.

Show Less

LibraryThing member gratefulyoga

Another great introduction to Buddhism. Kornfield presents the teachings in a direct manner with lots of illustrative stories and metaphors. This is much more than meditation instruction. He shows how we can live with more mindfulness and compassion in all parts of our life.

LibraryThing member lente

It's okay, if you are into buddhism that is.

LibraryThing member Velmeran

Clear, salient points. I appreciated the wisdom within this book. It is a beautiful snapshot in time of the author's philosophy and advice to himself and any who want it.

Fewer