Waking Up Together: Intimate Partnership on the Spiritual Path [Paperback]

Ellen Birx (Author), Charles Birx (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 15, 2005

Waking Up Together is written for those who want to journey to new depths of intimacy, both spiritually and in their love relationship. The book shows how a committed, long-term relationship can enhance spiritual development and how relationships can be transformed by spiritual practice. Written by two Zen teachers married for thirty-seven years, it shows that relationships and all that arise from them can be a help — not a hindrance! — as we seek greater freedom and joy. It is possible to wake up together! Going far beyond merely recommending skills and strategies to improve relationships, Waking Up Together serves as a guide in our ongoing process of spiritual discovery and intimacy. Throughout the book the authors intermingle stories and poems along with anecdotes from their married life, empowering couples to awaken to an ever-expanding experience of relationship that is full of spontaneity, mystery, awe, love, and unlimited possibility. Waking Up Together affirms and encourages couples to cultivate the richness of their own relationship, and open to the unbounded potential of love.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"How can... Zen meditation... help couples be partners in both life and... wisdom?" ask Ellen and Charles Birx, a husband-and-wife writing team and co-founders of New River Zen Community in Virginia. They set about exploring that question by drawing extensively on their own Zen practice and by sharing stories drawn from 37 years of marriage. In brief chapters, they address a variety of topics of interest to readers in committed, long-term relationships, from the ordinary (the importance of communicating spiritual values during financial planning, for example) to the esoteric ("the love you manifest in your relationship" has the power "to extend to the ends of the universe"). Indeed, the text walks a fine line between the accessible and the arcane. At times, the value of meditation is clear (on ending a relationship: "meditation practice helps you slow down and work through your pain and fear of being alone"), and the Birxes' frequent anecdotes of married life often helpfully illustrate a point. But at other times they merely assert, without real explanation, the value of advanced Buddhist insights, and their use of koans as teaching points in such brief discussions sometimes confuse, instead of illuminate, the topic. The result is an easygoing book that will appeal primarily to those already familiar with the techniques and benefits of Buddhist meditation. (May)

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Wisdom Publications (May 15, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0861713958
• ISBN-13: 978-0861713950
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #777,635 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Practical, Loving and Wise, October 7, 2005

By 

Zen Student (Pine City, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Waking Up Together: Intimate Partnership on the Spiritual Path (Paperback)

This is an immensely practical and detailed guide to enhancing spiritual and personal intimacy in the lives of couples committed to spiritual growth together. The Birxes do a wonderful job of speaking with wisdom, insight, compassion, and humor to a great number of issues and challenges that arise in any relationship. They write with passion and love. Their insights really challenged me to a higher level of committment, vitality and intimacy in my own marriage as my wife and I strive to deepen our contemplative practice together. This book fills a real void in the literature of Zen in the West, and I find it extremely welcome. Each page contains the fruit of years of devoted spiritual practice and a deep sense of loving, joyful intimacy with each other and with the One.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Change the way you see each other FOREVER, December 11, 2008

By 

J. Molina "Lily" (Queens, New York) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Waking Up Together: Intimate Partnership on the Spiritual Path (Paperback)

My boyfriend and I went through some really tough times and because of life we had to spend a couple of months away from each other. During that time he told me he wanted to learn more about meditation. I sent him this book along with a couple of others. A couple of days later he called me and asked me to get the book myself and read it along with him because he said this book spoke about the realtionship he always wanted with me.

This book has really helped us see each other. for my boyfriend it has awakened his spiritual side. It has taught me that i can pursue my spirituality while involved and through my relationship. It has helped us both really open up to each other.

Thank you to the authors of this amazing book!!! I really recommend this book to any couple who really wants to learn to truly love and appreciate each other.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Awakening, May 8, 2010

By 

Dr. Gunta M. Caldwell "Gunta On Silver Wings" (Melbourne, Australia) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Waking Up Together: Intimate Partnership on the Spiritual Path (Paperback)

Waking up together is the ultimate love journey. To be able to awaken to a spiritual journey with the love of your dreams must be the ultimate wonder. And yet, as Ferrini states, the only way that can occur is if we take full ownership of our own blames and offer ourselves true forgiveness. Then we are ready to embark on a meaningful relationship full of possibilities. Then we no longer live in projections but live in an ever deepening love.
Dr Gunta Krumins-Caldwell author of On Silver Wings