About this item
This lucid and beautifully written guide to Eastern meditation provides Westerners with a method of learning the skills of mindfulness - of being awake and fully aware. Modern medical developments have shown the positive effects of meditiation for psychological and physaial health, and the reader will need no particular religious orietation to benefit from the wisdom of this manual. Thich Nhat Hanh's gentle anecdotes and practical exercises focus the reader's attention on breathing and show that the contextx for being mindful are numerous and close at hand - washing the dishes, answering the telephone, drinking tea. His compassionate spirit and the method of meditation described here will help both beginners and advanced students arrive at greater self-understanding and peacefulness.
About the Author
Thich Nhat Hanh is a Vietnamese Buddhist Zen Master, poet, scholar, and peace activist, one of the most revered and influential spiritual teachers in the world today. Born in 1926, he became a Zen Buddhist monk at the age of sixteen. During the Vietnam War, his work for peace and reconciliation moved Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967. He founded the Van Hanh Buddhist University in Saigon and the School of Youth for Social Service. He was exiled as a result of his work for peace but continued his activism, rescuing boat people and helping to resettle Vietnamese refugees. He has written more than 100 books, which have sold millions of copies around the world. HIs teachings on Buddhism as a path to social and political transformation are responsible for bringing mindfulness to the West. In 1982 he established the international Plum Village Community of Engaged Buddhism in France, now the largest Buddhist monastery in Europe. He lives in Hue in Central Vietnam.
