This survey of the Yogācāra school of Indian Buddhism makes its key texts and ideas accessible and relevant through engaging, contemporary examples. It interprets Yogācāra Buddhism as a coherent system of ideas and practices in relation to the path to liberation.

Mahāyāna Buddhism arose in classical India and flourished in China, Tibet, Korea, Vietnam, and Japan. While one of its major Indian schools, the Middle Way (Madhyamaka) focuses on the concept of emptiness—that all phenomena lack their own essence—the Yoga Practitioners school (Yogācāra) focuses on the cognitive processes whereby we impute such essences. Through everyday examples and analogues in cognitive science, author William Waldron makes Yogācāra’s core teachings—the three turnings of the Dharma-wheel, the three-nature theory, the store-house consciousness, and the idea of mere perception—accessible to a general audience. Countering the common view of Yogācāra as a form of idealism, he treats Yogācāra Buddhism as a coherent system of ideas and practices on its own terms, with dependent arising its guiding principle. He first examines early Buddhist texts that show how our affective and cognitive processes shape the way objects and worlds appear to us, and how we erroneously grasp onto them as essentially real—perpetuating the engrained habits that bind us to saṃsāra. After analyzing the early Madhyamaka critique of essences, he then examines how Yogācāra texts, such as the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra and Stages of Yogic Practice, build upon these earlier ideas to argue that our constructive processes also occur unconsciously. Not only are we collectively, yet mostly unknowingly, constructing our shared realities—our cultural worlds—they are also mediated through the store-house consciousness (ālaya-vijñāna)—functioning as a kind of “cultural unconscious.” Next, Vasubandhu’s Twenty Verses argues that we can learn to recognize such objects and worlds as “mere perceptions” (vijñāpti-mātra) and thereby abandon our enchantment with the products of our own cognitive processes. The author walks us through the Mahāyāna path to this transformation as gracefully laid out in Maitreya’s Distinguishing Phenomena from their Ultimate Nature. Finally, he considers how Yogācāra perspectives inspire us to rethink religion in our scientific and pluralistic age.

Central to Buddhism is knowing our own minds. Until we do, we are driven by unconscious, often destructive desire and aversion. We couldn’t have a better guide for inner transformation than the Dalai Lama.

The Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s Stages of the Path, Volume 2: An Annotated Commentary on the Fifth Dalai Lama’s Words of Mañjuśrī is the second volume of the Dalai Lama’s outline of Buddhist theory and practice. Having introduced Buddhist ideas in the context of modern society in volume 1, the Dalai Lama turns here to a traditional presentation of the complete path to enlightenment, from developing faith in the Dharma to attaining the highest wisdom. This book, compiled by the revered Tibetan lama Dagyab Rinpoché, comments on the Fifth Dalai Lama’s stages of the path titled Oral Transmission of Mañjuśrī. The volume will appeal to all readers interested in the Dalai Lama’s works, both those new to Buddhism and those looking to deepen their understanding of the Tibetan presentation of the Buddhist path.

Click here to read about His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s achievements.

The Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s Stages of the Path: Volume 1: Guidance for Modern Practitioners is available here.

An insightful examination of the end of suffering drawing much-needed attention to two overlooked factors of Nirvana: signlessness and deathlessness. Includes a foreword by Bhante Gunaratana.

Nirvana is at once a critical part of the Buddhist path and a concept difficult to fully understand for Buddhist practitioners. Canonical texts broach this mysterious and essential idea in a variety of ways, whether in the form of metaphor or literary description. In The Signless and the Deathless: On the Realization of Nirvana, scholar-monk Bhikkhu Anālayo sheds light on two key aspects of Nirvana that have gone underappreciated: signlessness and deathlessness.

Commanding an extraordinary mastery of canonical Buddhist languages, Venerable Anālayo breaks new ground, or rediscovers old ground, by presenting a new way of approaching Nirvana, based on the Buddha’s teachings on how our minds construct experience. This novel treatment, backed up by meticulous academic expertise, is valuable for scholars and practitioners alike.

Through practicing bare awareness…realizing Nirvana entails “a complete stepping out of the way the mind usually constructs experience.”

Written in a warm and accessible style by one of today’s most respected Tibetan Buddhist masters, Reality and Wisdom leads the reader on a journey of discovery beginning with the very first teachings of the Buddha and into the profound experience of emptiness. 

The first section of the book explores the bedrock Buddhist teachings of the four noble truths—insights into freedom from suffering from craving—which underpin all schools of Buddhism. Lama Migmar presents and explores these foundational Buddhist truths with humor and insight, explaining how, from a Mahayana Buddhist perspective, these truths serve as crucial supports for cultivating the transformative wisdom of emptiness.

In the book’s second half, Lama Migmar illuminates the terse and enigmatic lines of the Heart Sutra, perhaps the most studied and revered of all Mahayana Buddhist scriptures. The Heart Sutra presents the reader with a vision of reality as it is perceived by a buddha, a vision underpinned by and infused with the radical flexibility and possibility of emptiness and the engagement and responsiveness of profound compassion. 

The clarity, warmth, and vibrancy of Lama Migmar’s writing combined with the comprehensiveness and detail of his presentations of key Buddhist teachings make this book a valuable resource for a range of readers, from beginners to more advanced practitioners seeking to deepen their practice.

A new volume of original poetry from the bestselling creator of Poetry of Impermanence, Mindfulness, and Joy.

In Dharma Talk, award-winning poet John Brehm explores the perennial themes of aging, compassion, emptiness, nonseparation, and more. At once poignant and humorous, Brehm’s gentle, wry poems remind us that the personal and the universal are not different—and point us to the Dharma of everyday life.

Click here to watch the author read the poem “Something and Nothing” from Dharma Talk.

Listen to a Wisdom Dharma Chat with John and host Daniel Aitken recorded in October 2023.

Building on the practices taught in Dr. Alejandro Chaoul’s first Wisdom Academy course, this course provides valuable insight into the trulkhor (magical movement) practices emphasized in the blessed Zhang Zhung Nyen Gyu tradition. Experienced teacher Alejandro Chaoul provides practical guidance on a range of powerful yogas, meticulously demonstrating each individual movement. You’ll learn how to clear obstacles of body, breath, and mind and use these three purified doors of action to encounter your Buddha nature.

Grief sometimes leaves us without words. Yet narrating our feelings, thoughts, and experiences can be so helpful in relating to our inner world. These cards are an invitation to begin that process.