"Happiness and suffering are dependent upon your mind, upon your interpretation. They do not come from outside, from others. All of your happiness and all of your suffering are created by you, by your own mind," says Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

Commenting on an early-twentieth-century Tibetan text of instructions and practical advice for everyday spiritual living, Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches us how to be happy during hard times by adopting skillful attitudes--ways of interpreting reality that can permit us to live a joyful and relaxed life regardless of circumstance. In Transforming Problems Into Happiness, Lama Zopa Rinpoche brings his own special flavor and contemporary relevance to a timeless teaching on Buddhist psychology. This volume will be valuable to all, no matter the spiritual background of the reader or the kind of problems that have led them to ask that ageless question: How can I achieve happiness?

This new edition includes a translation of the root text, Dodrupchen Rinpoche's (1865-1926) Instructions on Turning Happiness and Suffering into the Path of Enlightenment, translated by Tulku Thundop.

Aura Glaser wrote this book to remedy a deficiency she discovered while engaged in psychological research–a nearly complete omission of the importance and cultivation of compassion. Other books exploring Buddhism and psychology have focused on what the Theravada school of Buddhism–which teaches personal liberation through enlightenment–can offer psychology. A Call to Compassion works with Mahayana Buddhism, in which practitioners commit to the liberation of all sentient beings, with compassion central to attaining that goal.In her fascinating and exceptionally clear and concise review of the work of Freud, Jung, and others, Glaser shows how psychology has been ambivalent about the subject of compassion and therefore has developed no methodology for helping individuals cultivate this essential quality in the service of helping others. Glaser introduces as a remedy the Buddhist practice of the lojong, expressed in the text of The Seven Points of Mind Training, for developing love and compassion. With modern-day life examples, she illustrates the four major points: compassion for self, compassion for others, exchanging self and others, and no self and no other–affirming that these points are indeed attainable. If we make the effort to contemplate, understand, and truly integrate these four essentials, we will have a sound basis for both psychological health and genuine transformation.

Few teachers in the West possess both the spiritual training and the scholarship to lead us along the path to enlightenment. Robert Thurman is one such teacher. Now, in his first experiential course on the essentials of Tibetan Buddhism, adapted and expanded from a popular retreat he led, Thurman -- the first Westerner ordained by His Holiness the Dalai Lama himself -- shares the centuries-old wisdom of a highly valued method used by the great Tibetan masters. Using a revered, once-secret text of a seventeenth-century Tibetan master, along with a thorough explanation for contemporary Westerners, The Jewel Tree of Tibet immerses you fully in the mysteries of Tibetan spiritual wisdom. A retreat in book form as well as a spiritual and philosophical teaching, it offers a practical system of understanding yourself and the world, of developing your learning and thought processes, and of gaining deep, transforming insight.
Tibetans think of their cherished tradition of Buddhism as a "wish-fulfilling jewel tree" for its power to generate bliss and enlightenment within all who absorb its teachings. Happiness, in fact, is the true goal of Tibetan spirituality, and the wish-fulfilling jewel tree will put you on the road to that reachable goal. This beautiful jewel-tree imagery, which acts like a mandala or a yoga pose to focus your attention on truths larger than yourself, will help you break through worn-out ideas and habits, strengthen positive abilities, develop more energy and creativity, and change your life -- and future -- for the better. As Thurman writes, "Readers learn to cultivate the sensitivity and appreciation to love more fully, feel compassion more intensely, and become a fountain of cheerfulness for all they meet and know."
Because the path to enlightenment requires more than sitting in meditation, The Jewel Tree of Tibet offers a rich, intellectually riveting course with many specific spiritual practices, including: eleven steps to create the spirit of enlightenment, here and now; the truths and stories of the ancient Indian and Tibetan sages; and guided meditations to experience the blessings of the wish-fulfilling jewel tree. You can do these practices with others or on your own, while living your daily life. And as you travel this road to deeper self-realization, self-understanding, and infectious happiness, you will also learn how the principles of Tibetan Tantra can open the doors to "infinite compassion and continuity," and how to discover states of consciousness that transcend even death.
One of the most explicit teachings of the steps to the path of enlightenment available, explained by a skilled Western teacher, The Jewel Tree of Tibet will enable you to honor the full subtlety and hidden depths of the Tibetan Buddhist path and realize at last its deeper mysteries and rewards -- for yourself and others.

In Tibetan, the word for Buddhist means “insider”—someone who looks not to the world but to themselves for peace and happiness. The basic premise of Buddhism is that all suffering, however real it may seem, is the product of our own minds.Rebecca Novick’s concise history of Buddhism and her explanations of the Four Noble Truths, Wheel of Life, Karma, the path of the Bodhisattva, and the four schools help us understand Tibetan Buddhism as a religion or philosophy, and more important, as a way of experiencing the world.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

This book contains methods for transforming everyday actions into the cause of enlightenment, anger into patience, and the ordinary view of phenomena as inherently existent into the wisdom realizing emptiness. It also includes several meditations led by Rinpoche, although everything in the book is a topic for meditation.
It would be hard to find a simpler, clearer, more practical explanation of the two fundamental paths of compassion and wisdom than the one Lama Zopa offers us here.
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