Rating: 
Summary: Finding our own true nature.
Review: "Each of us has all that it takes to become fully enlightened," Pema Chodron writes in this book. "We have basic energy coursing through us. Sometimes it manifests as brilliance and sometimes it manifests as confusion" (p. 22). Chodron's 108-page book is based on a series of "talks" she delivered in the spring of 1989 at Gampo Abbey, a Buddhist monastery in Nova Scotia founded by Chodron's teacher, Chogyam Trungpa. "The message . . . for the reader," Chodron writes in the book's Preface, "is to be with oneself without embarrassment or harshness. This is instruction on how to love oneself and one's world" (p. x).This book is nothing less than liberating. It offers the power to awaken your heart, and the power to awaken your courage. "Working with obstacles is life's journey" (p. 68) Chodron tells us. "The purpose of your whole life is not to make a lot of money, it's not to find the perfect marriage, it's not to build Gampo Abbey. It's not to do any of these things. You have a certain life, and whatever life you're in is a vehicle for waking up. If you're a mother raising your children, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're an actress, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a construction worker, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a retired person facing old age, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're alone and you feel lonely and you wish you had a mate, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you have a huge family around you and you wish you had a little more free time, that's the vehicle for waking up. Whatever you have, that's it" (p. 71). Written before her perhaps better known books, this may be my favorite Pema Chodron title. I have returned to it many times since it was first published in 1991. This is a good dharma book, written with Chodron's characteristic wisdom and clarity. G. Merritt
Rating:
Summary: Finding our own true nature.
Review: "Each of us has all that it takes to become fully enlightened," Pema Chodron writes in this book. "We have basic energy coursing through us. Sometimes it manifests as brilliance and sometimes it manifests as confusion" (p. 22). Chodron's 108-page book is based on a series of "talks" she delivered in the spring of 1989 at Gampo Abbey, a Buddhist monastery in Nova Scotia founded by Chodron's teacher, Chogyam Trungpa. "The message . . . for the reader," Chodron writes in the book's Preface, "is to be with oneself without embarrassment or harshness. This is instruction on how to love oneself and one's world" (p. x). This book is nothing less than liberating. It offers the power to awaken your heart, and the power to awaken your courage. "Working with obstacles is life's journey" (p. 68) Chodron tells us. "The purpose of your whole life is not to make a lot of money, it's not to find the perfect marriage, it's not to build Gampo Abbey. It's not to do any of these things. You have a certain life, and whatever life you're in is a vehicle for waking up. If you're a mother raising your children, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're an actress, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a construction worker, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a retired person facing old age, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're alone and you feel lonely and you wish you had a mate, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you have a huge family around you and you wish you had a little more free time, that's the vehicle for waking up. Whatever you have, that's it" (p. 71). Written before her perhaps better known books, this may be my favorite Pema Chodron title. I have returned to it many times since it was first published in 1991. This is a good dharma book, written with Chodron's characteristic wisdom and clarity. G. Merritt
Rating:
Summary: Finding our own true nature.
Review: "Each of us has all that it takes to become fully enlightened," Pema Chodron writes in this book. "We have basic energy coursing through us. Sometimes it manifests as brilliance and sometimes it manifests as confusion" (p. 22). Chodron's 108-page book is based on a series of "talks" she delivered in the spring of 1989 at Gampo Abbey, a Buddhist monastery in Nova Scotia founded by Chodron's teacher, Chogyam Trungpa. "The message . . . for the reader," Chodron writes in the book's Preface, "is to be with oneself without embarrassment or harshness. This is instruction on how to love oneself and one's world" (p. x). This book is nothing less than liberating. It offers the power to awaken your heart, and the power to awaken your courage. "Working with obstacles is life's journey" (p. 68) Chodron tells us. "The purpose of your whole life is not to make a lot of money, it's not to find the perfect marriage, it's not to build Gampo Abbey. It's not to do any of these things. You have a certain life, and whatever life you're in is a vehicle for waking up. If you're a mother raising your children, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're an actress, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a construction worker, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're a retired person facing old age, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you're alone and you feel lonely and you wish you had a mate, that's the vehicle for waking up. If you have a huge family around you and you wish you had a little more free time, that's the vehicle for waking up. Whatever you have, that's it" (p. 71). Written before her perhaps better known books, this may be my favorite Pema Chodron title. I have returned to it many times since it was first published in 1991. This is a good dharma book, written with Chodron's characteristic wisdom and clarity. G. Merritt
Rating: 
Summary: On befriending the world, including oneself.
Review: A collection of talks given during a month-long meditation retreat, by an American teacher of Tibetan Buddhism. Emphasizes the cultivation of loving-kindness toward everything, including ourselves and our busy, crazy brains. When I picked this book up a number of years ago, the first sentence was just what I needed to hear: "There's a common misunderstanding among all the human beings who have ever been born on the earth that the best way to live is to try to avoid pain and just try to get comfortable." (I also highly recommend "The Myth of Freedom" and "Cutting through Spiritual Materialism" by Chödrön's teacher, Chögyam Trungpa.)
Rating:
Summary: On befriending the world, including oneself.
Review: A collection of talks given during a month-long meditation retreat, by an American teacher of Tibetan Buddhism. Emphasizes the cultivation of loving-kindness toward everything, including ourselves and our busy, crazy brains. When I picked this book up a number of years ago, the first sentence was just what I needed to hear: "There's a common misunderstanding among all the human beings who have ever been born on the earth that the best way to live is to try to avoid pain and just try to get comfortable." (I also highly recommend "The Myth of Freedom" and "Cutting through Spiritual Materialism" by Chödrön's teacher, Chögyam Trungpa.)
Rating:
Summary: The Art of Accepting and Embracing Life
Review: Based on talks given during a dathun (one month practice period) in Gampo Abbey, the contents of this book "speak" to each of us about embracing life's pain rather than running away from it, and about the down-to-earth benefits of practicing lovingkindness in our every day lives, both in formal meditation and informal meditation. The latter includes all aspects of our lives, and in this series of talks, the author shows us how we can utilize our own life's experiences as the source of our wisdom and compassion. Highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: The Wisdom of The Wisdom of No Escape
Review: I found this book to be extraordinarily simple to ingest. I enjoyed reading it one short chapter at a time and contemplating that chapter until I had time to read another. Pema has an elegantly straightforward manner of writing, and she has a great deal of helpful information to convey.
Rating:
Summary: A very gentle look at meditation and loving kindness
Review: I found this book to be very clearly written in plain english on a topic that could easily become obscured by its own sublety. My favourite chapter is the one on precision, gentleness and letting go. The idea of hard discipline that I had previously associated with Buddhism evaporated as I read it. I really wanted to buy a 100 copies and send them to all the people I care about! I think its a great book and an excellent text for anyone learning to be gentle with themselves and others.
Rating:
Summary: Marvelous
Review: Marvelous book. Very well written, you feel like the author was there with you, talking to you. It all sounds so truthful, like you always knew, yet how come we chose the opposite? There's no escape , unless you want to keep dying day after day. Let's wake up. It's worth it, and this book is a good start. It was for me. Probably the best I've read of all so-called "self-help" books.
Rating:
Summary: Gem of a book
Review: Pema Chodron has a wonderful way of making the complex seem simple. In a gentle, non-parochial, non-confrontational manner, the author transmits, explains, and supports basic Buddhist principles so as to make them understandable to Westerners not versed in Tibetan assumptions, cosmologies, mythologies, etc. For example, her explication of Tonglen (sending and receiving) is presented in relation not only to Bodhicitta (universal compassion) but also in terms of personal development, mindfulness and presence, and acceptance of life's challenges as challenges (not restrictions or compulsions). Her chapter on renunciation is a classic as are other of her talks to her month-long meditation retreat class (which totally comprise this volume). It's difficult to escape the comprehensive wisdom of this book. It's one of her best which is saying a lot.
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