Both practical and whimsical, this book presents Tibetan Buddhist altars witha three-dimensional pop-up flair. Color illustrations, b&w photos.

Practical and spiritual advice for arranging and using a home altar.

Transform your home into a calm, balanced and harmonious oasis using architect Anjie Cho's helpful advice, drawing on her background in green design and feng shui. You don't have to get rid of all your possessions and become an ascetic to change your space and discover the benefits that living in a considered, organic way can bring. The easy suggestions in Holistic Spaces show you how to implement the principles of feng shui and green design in your home. Written for the way we live today, as we move toward a more mindful approach to health, diet and the way that we choose the objects in our homes, this is the perfect guide to help you to clear and refresh your living environment. Learn how to make every room in your home serve its highest purpose, create eco-friendly spaces, bring nature indoors, choose colours for maximum impact, select a space for meditation practice, and overall, create a peaceful and organic home. From the bedroom to the home office, these intuitive, straightforward tips will teach you to how improve your spaces to boost the flow of energy through your life.

There is a fine art to presenting complex ideas with simplicity and insight, in a manner that both guides and inspires. In Taking the Path of Zen Robert Aitken presents the practice, lifestyle, rationale, and ideology of Zen Buddhism with remarkable clarity. The foundation of Zen is the practice of zazen, or mediation, and Aitken Roshi insists that everything flows from the center. He discusses correct breathing, posture, routine, teacher-student relations, and koan study, as well as common problems and milestones encountered in the process. Throughout the book the author returns to zazen, offering further advice and more advanced techniques. The orientation extends to various religious attitudes and includes detailed discussions of the Three Treasures and the Ten Precepts of Zen Buddhism. Taking the Path of Zen will serve as orientation and guide for anyone who is drawn to the ways of Zen, from the simply curious to the serious Zen student.

The lamrim (stages of the path) presentation of Buddhist teachings has become a core topic of study at many Buddhist centers in the West. For busy practitioners, the lamrim gives a concise and easily graspable picture of the Buddhist path. Best-selling author Thubten Chodron has a unique ability to present these teachings. In this volume, she provides clear explanations of the stages of the path, while the accompanying audio program contains guided meditations on each of the topics covered in the text. The meditation teachings of lamrim, says Buddhist teacher Thubten Chodron, are like ready-made clothes that are easy to wear: they're systematized so that we can wear them right away, so we can learn and practice them in an organized fashion. Lamrim can be translated in various ways: "stages of the path," "steps on the path," or "gradual path." "Gradual path" reminds us that the process of transforming the mind, unlike so many other things in our hurry-up society, is a slow and thoughtful one. These systematic teachings are the subject of this book. The lamrim presents a step-by-step method to tame the mind, and each person will find meaning and insight according to his or her level of understanding. As readers practice these meditations repeatedly, their comprehension and experience will transform and deepen, even though the words used to spark the meditation sessions remain the same. The first section of guided meditations discusses how to establish a daily practice, how to set up an altar, and how to approach the two kinds of meditation—stabilizing and analytical. The second presents the meditations. The third supplies an overview, instructions for working with distractions, antidotes to mental afflictions, advice for newcomers, and suggestions on how to deepen Dharma practice. The accompanying audio program (available to eBook buyers as a free MP3 download) contains over fourteen hours of guided meditations, led by Thubten Chodron. Individuals who live far from Buddhist teachers or Dharma centers will appreciate the personal guidance offered with these meditations, enabling them to begin and continue a daily meditation practice. This is a new and expanded version of Guided Meditations on the Lam Rim, and the recording was previously published in a 14-CD format under that name.

Kalachakra is a system of highest tantra practice for overcoming the limitations imposed by historical, astrological, and biological cycles so as to become a Buddha for the benefit of all. His Holiness the Dalai Lama and other great Tibetan teachers have been conferring the Kalachakra initiation in the West, empowering prepared practitioners to engage in its meditations. Large numbers of people also attend this initiation as interested observers and gain inspiration for their spiritual growth. Introduction to the Kalachakra Initiation explains on a practical level and in everyday language the theory of tantra, the vows, commitments, and their implications, the factors to consider in deciding if one is ready to attend a Kalachakra initiation as a participant, how to visualize during the initiation, and the most important thoughts and feelings for participants and observers at each step of the empowerment. In preparing this guidebook, Alexander Berzin has done a great service to everyone interested in the Kalachakra initiation. It will help people to prepare for the ceremony and understand the essential points of each step of the procedure.

In Tibetan religious literature, Jamgön Kongtrül's Treasury of Knowledge in ten books stands out as a unique, encyclopedic masterpiece embodying the entire range of Buddhist teachings as they were preserved in Tibet. In his monumental Treasury of Knowledge, Jamgön Kongtrül presents a complete account of the major lines of thought and practice that comprise Tibetan Buddhism. This first book of The Treasury which serves as a prelude to Kongtrul's survey describes four major cosmological systems found in the Tibetan tradition—those associated with the Hinayana, Mahayana, Kalachakra, and Dzogchen teachings. Each of these cosmologies shows how the world arises from mind, whether through the accumulated results of past actions or from the constant striving of awareness to know itself.