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Noble Heart: A Self-Guided Retreat on Befriending Your Obstacles

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After having enjoyed Pema Chodron's wonderful video set "Good Medicine" (6305642842), Her "Noble Heart" set of 6 cassettes was greatly enhanced. I could picture her orchestrating this retreat at her Monastery in Eastern Canada. That is exactly how this tape set is arranged. She provides an enjoyable, enthusiastic lecture with examples, stories, personal experiences, input from her Master Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, etc. For each of the 12 segments (sides of cassettes) she also includes meditations and visualizations as appropriate. Topics include:
1. Bodhichitta Practice--ego, 3 noble principles, etc.
2. cultivating friendliness through meditation--posture, calm abiding (shamatha), working with thoughts, non-grasping mind...
3. developing inner strength/trust--experiencing reality, the 4 limitless ones (loving kindness, compassion, joy, & equanimity, materialism...
4. The Practice of Maitri (loving kindness)--the roots of suffering and happiness, ignorance, etc. Great presentation on Maitri practice!
5. Compassion practice--your "soft spot," ego's weaknesses, addiction and obsession, dualistic thinking, far & near enemies of practice, pity/overwhelm/forgiveness
6. Unlimited joy & equanimity--stages of practice, openness, melting practice, big sky mind, etc.
7. Tonglen (sending & receiving)--shunyata--openness of being, awakening Bodhichitta, stages of tonglen practice, dissolving the armor of self-protection, etc.
8. Meditation & wisdom--post-meditation, purity, categories of meditation, prajna (wisdom/understanding), etc.
9. Generosity, discipline, & patience--categories of them, undoing deep-seated patterns, antidote to aggression, etc.
10. Joyful exertion--the nondual paramitas, contemplation, exertion, nonduality, etc.
11. Shunyata Meditation--groundlessness, nature of mind, opening mind, contemplating equanimity, nongrasping, etc.
12. Bodhichitta to the world--connectedness, limitless compassion, dissolving barriers, the Dharmic habit, Bodhichitta slogans (only touched on here--see her "Start Where You Are" for this).
Overall, it's almost like being there. A wonderful experience. She covers lots of ground in her easygoing, warm, and wise style that balances theory with practice. A gem.

If you are ready to hear what Pema has to say this tape series can change your life.Pema presents her information in clear and easy to understand terms.I believe she instructs us to confront reality than follow with a "chaser" of compassion.This method keeps your self-discovery from overwhelming you and keeping you from continuing.Actually Pema uses the word friendliness to discribe how we must approach this self-understanding.At first I thought that was such a wimpy term-'friendly'.It turns out if you can muster up friendliness for yourself when you begin to uncover your self you will be doing well indeed. Thank you Pema.

Pema Chodron is a Buddhist nun in the Tibetan Vajrayana tradition. Noble Heart: A Self-guided Retreat On Befriending Your Obstacles is a profound audiobook narration in which Pema Chodron guides her listeners into an awakening their compassion, an appreciation for the beauty of vulnerability as a spiritual resource, the realization of strength that comes only through embracing the pain of experience, the treasured teachings of the six paramitas that offer the Buddha's own guide to the journey of enlightenment, and so much more. Noble Heart is an dedicated and recommended contribution to contemporary Buddhist Studies collections and offers students of Buddhism and practitioners of Buddhist philosophies and lifestyles a transforming and profound exploration of an enduring Buddhist spirituality for a new generation.

the most enabling book on spiritual life-not clutching on in usual addictive style prevalent in american media life-but really letting go and being ungrounded-this book saved my soul in a critical moment-we can live without clutching and grasping-let the universe supply without grabbingi just showed it to two therapists-one a director of a group of therapists-they were amazed at the profundity and helpfulness-and in line with more enlightened therapeutic practice-not advice -lots of support -see where this new way leads you