The Courage to Feel: Buddhist Practices for Opening to Others

by Rob Preece

When circumstances are challenging how do we react? This book offers methods to help us develop greater inner strength and openness to life by changing the habit of what Rob Preece calls "self-preoccupation"—the tendency to act from a narrow perspective dominated by insecurity and isolation. When we learn to look outside this mentality and truly cherish others as well as ourselves, we create a happier, relaxed mind and more fulfilling relationships, as well as realizing our life's purpose in a meaningful way. A long-time Buddhist practitioner and psychotherapist, Preece shares traditional meditations and practices for awakening the mind and heart, including tonglen, but he also offers a Jungian perspective on these and his own sense—cultivated during many years experience—of the ways in which Westerners may need to re-see these practices to benefit most from them. Preece's insightful fusion of East and West will help readers tap inner resources of compassion and integrity in order to flourish in times of uncertainty, and ultimately generate the altruistic aspiration to realize the awakened mind for the benefit of all living beings. Preece offers meditation practices at the end of many chapters to help the reader digest and integrate the book's information.

Genres: Buddhism, Spirituality

160 pages, Paperback

First published October 16, 2009

About the author

Rob Preece has been a practicing Buddhist since 1973, principally within the Tibetan tradition. He has spent many years in intensive retreat in the Himalayas under the guidance of eminent Tibetan lamas. Preece has been working as a psychotherapist since 1987 and gives workshops on comparative Jungian and Buddhist psychology. An experienced meditation teacher and thangka painter, he lives in London and is the author of The Wisdom of Imperfection and The Psychology of Buddhist Tantra. (Bio from his publisher)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Preece

Reviews

[Apple · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most important books I’ve ever read. I have been savoring it for almost three years as I digest each morsel and let the teachings seep in. I have healed personally from the meditations and I have a much more integrated sense of bodhicitta from the way Preece weaves the Buddhist teachings together with western psychology. I will be keeping this by my bed for frequent rereadings in the years to come.

[Ludmila Kovaříková · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kniha mého oblíbeného autora, psychoterapeuta, obsahuje meditace o tom, jak pěstovat soucit a lásku. Opět porovnává přístup východu s problémy "vyspělého" neurotického západu a upravuje meditace tak, aby byly přínosné pro naše vlastní problémy.