Kornfield, Jack

The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology

You have within you unlimited capacities for love, for joy, for communion with life, and for unshakable freedom—and here is how to awaken them. In The Wise Heart, one of the leading spiritual teachers of our time offers the most accessible and illuminating guide to Buddhism’s transformational psychology ever published in the West.

Trained as a monk in Thailand, Burma, and India, Jack Kornfield experienced at first hand the life-changing power of Buddhist teachings: the emphasis on the nobility and sacredness of the human spirit, the fine-grained analysis of emotion and thought, the precise techniques for healing, training, and transforming the mind and heart. In contrast to the medical orientation of most Western psychology and psychiatry, here is a vision of radiant human dignity, and a practical path for realizing it in our own lives.

The Wise Heart is the fruit of a life’s work that includes such classics as A Path with Heart and After the Ecstasy, the Laundry. Filled with stories from Kornfield’s Buddhist psychotherapy practice and portraits of remarkable teachers, it also includes a moving account of his own recovery from a violence-filled childhood. For meditators and mental health professionals, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike, The Wise Heart offers an extraordinary journey from the roots of consciousness to the highest expression of human possibility.

A Path with Heart: A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life

In undertaking a spiritual life, we must make certain that our path is connected with our heart, according to author and Buddhist monk Jack Kornfield. Since 1974 (long before it gained popularity in the 1990s), Kornfield has been teaching westerners how to integrate Eastern teaching into their daily lives. Through generous storytelling and unmitigated warmth, Kornfield offers this excellent guidebook on living with attentiveness, meditation, and full-tilt compassion.

Part of what makes this book so accessible is Kornfield's use of everyday metaphors to describe the elusive lessons of spiritual transformation. For example, he opens with "the one seat" lesson taught to him by his esteemed teacher. Literally it means sitting in the center of a room and not being swayed or moved by all the people and dramas happening around you. On a spiritual level it means sticking "with one practice and teacher among all of the possibilities," writes Kornfield; "inwardly it means having the determination to stick with that practice through whatever difficulties and doubts arise until you have come to true clarity and understanding." The same could be said for this "one book." Among all the spiritual self-help books, this is a classic worth sticking with and returning to--a highly approachable teacher that can only lead to greater clarity and understanding. --Gail Hudson

Guided Meditation: Six Essential Practices to Cultivate Love, Awareness, and Wisdom

Since the time of the Buddha, meditation has been taught under the guidance of an expert as the easiest way to begin, and for the most powerful results. Celebrated teacher Jack Kornfield leads listeners through six essential meditations, a simple way to progressively deepen a practice--whatever your level of experience. With Guided Meditation, listeners join the author of the bestseller A Path with Heart (Bantam, 1993) on two transformational CDs that include: * Breath meditation for stilling the body and quieting the mind * Mind Like Sky meditation for releasing the ego's attachments and resting in pure awareness * Visualization practice to meet the "inner sage," and more Meditation has its challenges--especially for beginners. With practices you can listen to again and again, Guided Meditation gives listeners a concise training "of the heart and mind" to enjoy the fruits of this centuries-old art.

After the Ecstasy, the Laundry: How the Heart Grows Wise on the Spiritual Path

Jack Kornfield, one of America's most beloved teachers of meditation, assures us that enlightenment does occur on the spiritual path but warns that it is not the end of the road. Bringing his thoughts to a personal level, Kornfield looks up many of the notable spiritual teachers of our times (Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Sufi, etc.) and presents extended quotations of their trials and epiphanies. These anecdotes are woven together with fables and ruminations from Kornfield's own decades-long experience as a practitioner and teacher, creating an image of the spiritual life as challenging, multidimensional, rewarding, and, yes, mundane. In the old days in China, Zen monks were encouraged to travel for instruction under a variety of masters. Here, Kornfield introduces us to today's masters, but off their podiums, as equals. Genuine experiences of awakening, despair, fault, serious transgression, and simple childlike joy all appear as bridges on the way to the divine. After the Ecstasy, the Laundry is not just another inspirational bestseller, it is a lasting record of concrete insights forged from the fires of dedicated practice. --Brian Bruya

“Enlightenment does exist,” internationally renowned author and meditation master Jack Kornfield assures us. “Unbounded freedom and joy, oneness with the divine ... these experiences are more common than you know, and not far away.”

But even after achieving such realization — after the ecstasy — we are faced with the day-to-day task of translating that freedom into our imperfect lives. We are faced with the laundry.

Drawing on the experiences and insights of leaders and practitioners within the Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Hindu, and Sufi traditions, this book offers a uniquely intimate and honest understanding of how the modern spiritual journey unfolds — and how we can prepare our hearts for awakening.

Through moving personal stories and traditional tales, we learn how the enlightened heart navigates the real world of family relationships, emotional pain, earning a living, sickness, loss, and death.

Filled with “the laughter of the wise,” alive with compassion, After the Ecstasy, the Laundry is a gift to anyone who is seeking peace, wholeness, and inner happiness. It is sure to take its place next to A Path with Heart as a spiritual classic for our time.

Meditation for Beginners: Six Guided Meditations for Insight, Inner Clarity, and Cultivating a Compassionate Heart

Listen with Real Player. For readers who have thought about trying meditation but werent sure how to get started, Meditation for Beginners presents a complete introduction to Insight meditation with bestselling author and trusted teacher Jack Kornfield. Through step-by-step instruction in everything from breathing, posture, and attention to working with difficult emotions and physical discomfort, readers from any spiritual tradition will learn the essentials for creating a daily meditation practice. CD includes five guided meditation sessions to help cultivate the inner tranquility, natural joy, and mental clarity that are just some of the fruits of meditation.

Jack Kornfield, Ph.D. is a meditation teacher, author, and psychotherapist. After returning in 1972 from Asia, where he lived as a Buddhist monk for five years, Jack Kornfield cofounded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, and obtained a doctorate in clinical psychology. His books include A Path with Heart; Seeking the Heart of Wisdom (with Joseph Goldstein); and Stories of the Spirit, Stories of the Heart (with Christina Feldman). Dr. Kornfield currently lives with his wife and daughter near California's Spirit Rock Center, where he is a guiding teacher.

88-page hardcover book, CD, 1.25 hours

Being Peace

The Beginner's Guide to Forgiveness: How to Free Your Heart and Awaken Compassion (Beginner's)

Forgiving someone who has wronged you holds power far beyond the act itself. On The Beginner's Guide to Forgiveness, Jack Kornfield explores why forgiveness is essential to our health and happiness and how anyone can begin its practice. Drawing from his background in meditation and psychology, Kornfield reveals the roots of the forgiveness process within our own internalized pain. By embracing our own suffering, compassion arises naturally, so we can extend it to others as well as ourselves. With guided meditations and insights from the world's wisdom teachings, Kornfield teaches that when forgiveness is practiced, it is a gift we give not only to others - but ultimately to ourselves.

Jesus and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings

Mindfulness, Bliss, and Beyond: A Meditator's Handbook

Buddha's Little Instruction Book

Just as the serene beauty of the lotus blossom grows out of muddy water, Buddha's simple instructions have helped people to find wholeness and peace amid life's crisis and distractions for more than 2,500 years.  For this small handbook, a well-known American Buddhist teacher and psychologist has distilled and adapted an ancient teaching for the needs of contemporary life.  Its practical reminders and six meditations can infuse smallest everyday action with insight and joy.