A Truthful Heart: Buddhist Practices for Connecting with Others [Paperback]

Jeffrey Hopkins (Author), Dalai Lama (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 4, 2008

The Dalai Lama often says, Kindness is society. His former translator, Jeffrey Hopkins, writes that by learning to live from a more compassionate viewpoint, we can create a better life not only for ourselves but for everyone. In A Truthful Heart, Hopkins uses Buddhist meditations (including the Dalai Lama's favorite), visualizations, and entertaining recollections from his personal journey to guide us in developing an awareness of the capacity for love inside us and learning to project that love into the world around us. Delivering a potent message with the power to change our relationships and improve the quality of our lives, A Truthful Heart is the ideal book for an age in which our dealings with each other seem increasingly impersonal--and even violent and aggressive. Anyone seeking release from anger and hurt, or simply wanting to increase the love and caring among us, will welcome this timely vision for humanity.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Down-to-earth...peppered with...stories from [Hopkins'] days with the Dalai Lama...refreshingly methodical." -- Tricycle

"The beauty of [the book] is that it's easy to take its message with you. Every day can be brighter." -- Feminist Review

"A clear how-to meditation manual on cultivating compassion...This book is refreshingly jargon-free, with everyday life applications." -- Publisher's Weekly

"...a must-read for those who are searching for a path to a more joyful and fulfilling life." -- Goldie Hawn, actress

"...an especially lovely book on the need for compassion and the way to cultivate it." -- Buddhadharma

"Jeffrey Hopkins has spent his life helping others to cultivate wisdom, compassion, and openheartedness...warm and wonderful book." -- Lama Surya Das, author of Awakening the Buddha Within

"One of the finest presentations of Tibetan Buddhist mind-training in print." -- Stephen Batchelor, author of Buddhism Without Beliefs

These practices are central to Hopkins' life, and he gives an unprecedented, vivid account of his own incremental transformation. -- Shambhala Sun

"Hopkins offers the reader a series of practices and meditations that move from equanimity to compassion in a gently confrontational way designed not to make his audience feel warm and fuzzy, but instead to make them feel genuinely and sincerely connected (as the best Buddhist texts often do). Hopkins admits that he struggled living up to the ideals presented by his gurus and offered in this book, which only lends power to his words...one of the most outstanding books on human relationships to come along in a while." --Elephant Journal

"Jeffrey Hopkins is one of the tallest Buddhist scholars in the world today. Some of his books deal with complex issues of Buddhist philosophy beyond the ken and grasp of ordinary readers. However, the book under review is remarkable for its lucidity of thought and clarity of expression. It deals with the basics of the Buddhist thought and is a must read for beginners and equally useful for advanced learners of Buddhist philosophy" The Tibet Journal --The Tibet Journal, Winter 2007

From the Back Cover

The Dalai Lama often says, "Kindness is society." His former translator, Jeffrey Hopkins, writes that by learning to live from a more compassionate viewpoint, we can create a better life not only for ourselves but for everyone. In A Truthful Heart Hopkins uses Buddhist meditations (including the Dalai Lama's favorite), visualizations, and entertaining recollections from his personal journey to guide us in developing an awareness of the capacity for love inside us and learning to project that love into the world around us. Delivering a potent message with the power to change our relationships and improve the quality of our lives, A Truthful Heart is the ideal book for an age in which our dealings with each other seem increasingly impersonal--and even violent and aggressive. Anyone seeking release from anger and hurt, or simply wanting to increase the love and caring among us, will welcome this timely vision for humanity.

"In six unobstructed steps [Hopkins] offers a clear how-to meditation manual on cultivating compassion, a major theme found in all Buddhist traditions. This book is refreshingly jargon-free, with everyday life applications. [A Truthful Heart] helps readers to explore the implications of the Dalai Lama's oft-heard refrain, 'We all want happiness and do not want suffering.'"--Publisher's Weekly

"Delivered in straightforward prose and peppered with Hopkins's wry observations and personal anecdotes, [the] exercises [in A Truthful Heart] have an appealing practicality."--Shambhala Sun

"Jeffrey Hopkins has spent his life helping others to cultivate wisdom, compassion, and openheartedness. Read this warm and wonderful book and learn how, just as I have."--Lama Surya Das, author of Awakening the Buddha Within

"...a must-read for those who are searching for a path to a more joyful and fulfilling life."--Goldie Hawn, actress

"One of the finest presentations of Tibetan Buddhist mind-training in print."--Stephen Batchelor, author of Buddhism Without Beliefs

Jeffrey Hopkins served as the chief interpreter to the Dalai Lama for a decade. Professor Emeritus of Tibetan and Buddhist Studies at the University of Virginia, he lives in Charlottesville, Virginia and Vancouver, British Columbia.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 190 pages
• Publisher: Snow Lion Publications (February 4, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559392908
• ISBN-13: 978-1559392907
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #575,631 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vivid testimony, reliable guidance, March 5, 2008

By 

globally homeless "V" - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Truthful Heart: Buddhist Practices for Connecting with Others (Paperback)

The Midwest Book Reviewer summed it up well. It is in part a vivid memoir of the author's transformation from the self-confinement of hostility to the open-heart of love. At the same, it is a systematic and authoritative guide to bringing that same change into our own lives. Highly recommended. If you have found some of Hopkins's other works tough going, don't worry: this one is a great read for all.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Cultivating Compassion--Again, For The First Time, July 28, 2008

By 

Kirtland Peterson "Psy.D." (Baltimore, MD, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Truthful Heart: Buddhist Practices for Connecting with Others (Paperback)

With a bookcase full of books about Buddhism with many takes on developing equanimity and cultivating compassion, I was skeptical that Jeffrey Hopkins' A TRUTHFUL HEART would add anything "new." A quick skim through HEART at an airport Borders convinced me I was wrong. I plopped down my money and got reading.

Hopkins does a fabulous job of making traditional, well-known meditation practices real--and feelingful. I suspect he has grounded these practices in Western culture in such a way they are now just as fresh for us as they might be to a novice monk. This grounding is much appreciated.

The only "negative" is the realization that other traditions seemed less focused on the practical steps required to "love they neighbor as thyself"--and are unlikely to read/adapt HEART.

Recommended, even if you have a stack of meditation books already. Enjoy.

Dr. Kirtland Peterson

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A welcome resource not only for Buddhist practitioners and those curious about the faith, March 4, 2008

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Truthful Heart: Buddhist Practices for Connecting with Others (Paperback)

Written by Jeffrey Hopkins, who served as the interpreter for the Dalai Lama for a decade, and featuring a foreword by the Dalai Lama himself, A Truthful Heart: Buddhist Practices for Connecting with Others is a guide to developing a more compassionate outlook, and therefore improve one's ability to project love and accomplish positive endeavors. Chapters guide the reader in using Buddhist meditations (including the Dalai Lama's favorite!) and visualizations, as well as offering vignettes from the author's own life. A welcome resource not only for Buddhist practitioners and those curious about the faith, but also for any reader regardless of religion seeking surcease from anger and pain, and desiring an increase of love and compassion within the world at large.