Posts Tagged ‘Wisdom’
The Four Noble Truths of Love – Book Review
Monday, July 9th, 2018
Susan Piver’s book, The Four Noble Truths of Love, is an inner course on navigating relationships and well-being. In her new book, New York Times bestselling author and mindfulness expert, Susan Piver applies classic Buddhist wisdom to modern relationships, including her own long-term marriage.
The Four Noble Truths of Love will challenge expectations we have about dating, love, and romance. This mindful approach towards relationships and love invites us to explore our heart fiercely, deepen communications with our partner, increase our compassion, and lead us toward a path of wisdom and happiness.
Through the lens of both her Buddhist practices and her own experience in a 20-year marriage, Piver interweaves personal anecdotes with practical wisdom to arrive at the Four Noble Truths of Love. Piver spends time in each truth: Relationships never stabilize; Expecting relationships to be stable is what makes them unstable; Meeting instability together is love; The path to liberation. While her practices come from a Buddhist background and her study of the Four Noble Truths, the Four Noble Truths of Love are an invitation to be questioned and examined from our own experience/s.
It’s when we stop trying to see a relationship as only an extended love affair that we gain access to its unique and often undercelebrated powers: of warmth; of solace; of protection; of friendship; a connection that slows and deepens until it subsumes both hearts and blurs the lines between you, me, and us. –Susan Piver
Piver shares from her own personal experience of marriage including some personal struggles and revelations. She shares that if a couple meets their instability together – this is love. This book is a teaching on love from a “big” mind. There are insights about the phases of relationships, from irritation to deep compassion. Piver also offers practical wisdom, including meditation practices. Meditation can be a practice of love.
Everything in this book is a practice – of the heart, of the mind, of the Self. Love at its core is about being vulnerable, open, and kindhearted. Love shows us our inherent goodness and it can also reveal our unhealed pain. Love isn’t about hiding the pain, rather its’ about uncovering it. This path takes great courage – and the noble truths of love offer wise insight to practice that courage.
*I received an advance review copy of Susan Piver’s The Four Noble Truths of Love. I have also met Susan Piver and taken courses with the Open Heart Project.
True Refuge of the Heart
Wednesday, May 15th, 2013
“We can find our true refuge within our our hearts and minds —right here, right now, in the midst of our moment-to-moment lives. We find true refuge whenever we recognize the silent space of awareness behind our busy doing and striving. We find refuge whenever our hearts open with tenderness and love. We find refuge whenever we connect with the innate clarity and intelligence of our true nature.”
—Tara Brach, True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart
What say you?
Where and how do you find your true refuge of the heart?
Listening to My Father’s Wisdom
Monday, May 10th, 2010
Growing up, my father had many expressions: “Take your time, but don’t be long”; “You can always replace money, but you can’t replace a person”; “It takes a lot longer to fill out an accident report than it does to take your time on the road” and on and on. He also had his way of imparting values of how his daughters ought to be in the world. If I had to sum up the four cornerstones of how to live life through my father’s expressions, it would be this:
Tell the Truth.
It’s a lot easier to remember the truth and own up if you have done something. It’s a lot harder to remember the lies or stories and the truth always gets revealed.
Say Please/Thank You.
Manners say a lot about a person. There is such respect in an exchange that includes a please or thank you. In the end, people feel connected and want to help when they hear polite words.
Never Hate (Disliking Is OK).
You don’t have to like everybody, but hating serves no purpose and is only draining. Plus, the cost to hate is more hurtful to the one hating. Do we really need more enemies?
Quiet Please Rather Than Shut Up.
There is nothing worse than being stifled or put down. We can be kinder and gentler with one another. Asking for quiet brings peace back to us.
Think about the wisdom your family has shared with you and how it has shown up in your life and the values you teach others. I am grateful that my parents demonstrated generosity, service, and strong work values.
Thank you, Dad.
Mary Anne
Effortless Zen Practices
Monday, March 8th, 2010
In the sutra it says, “There are no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body or mind…” This is Zen Mind, which includes everything.
It is not necessary to make an effort to think in a particular way. Your thinking should not be one-sided. We just think with our whole mind, and see things as they are without any effort. Just to see, and to be ready to see things with our whole mind, is zazen practice. If we are prepared for thinking, there is no need to make an effort to think. This is called mindfulness. Mindfulness is, at the same time, wisdom. By wisdom we do not mean some particular faculty or philosophy. It is the readiness of the mind that is wisdom. So wisdom could be various philosophies and teachings, and various kinds of research and studies. But we should not become attached to some particular wisdom, such as that which was taught by Buddha. Wisdom is not something to learn. Wisdom is something which will come out of your mindfulness. So the point is to be ready for observing things, and to be ready for thinking. This is called emptiness of your mind.
Excerpt from Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki
How do you become an observer of your thoughts? What practices allow you to see things as they are? As we open up to our whole self, mindfulness follows, and we can experience effortless Zen practices.
To the Zen of you,
Mary Anne