A Lamp to Illuminate the Five Stages

How to Meditate on the Stages of the Path

Deepen your meditation by diving into the practices of the lamrim—the stages of the path to enlightenment.

Buddhist tradition tells us that enlightenment is possible for each and every one of us. It’s actually the best thing we can do for others and for the world, but also the best thing we can do for ourselves, because it means being free from all misery, pain, depression, dissatisfaction, and negative emotions, and abiding forever in peace, joy, love, and compassion. What could be more wonderful than that?

Kathleen McDonald (Sangye Khadro), a Western nun with decades of experience and author of the bestselling book How to Meditate, guides us through the next step in our meditation practice: the transformative meditations on the Tibetan lamrim stages to enlightenment. She helps us see that the whole purpose of meditation is to transform our mind in a constructive way. For this to happen, we need to become so thoroughly familiar with the lamrim topics that they become our natural way of thinking and living our life. This warm and encouraging guide takes us through meditations on these lamrim topics, such as:

• impermanence
• refuge
• karma
• the four noble truths
• bodhichitta
• the six perfections: giving, ethics, patience, joyous effort, concentration, and wisdom

How to Meditate on the Stages of the Path offers practical advice, support, and step-by-step guidance on how to meditate on the stages of the path to enlightenment that will transform the practice of new meditators and seasoned practitioners alike.

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Vajrayāna and the Culmination of the Path

The final volume of the Library of Wisdom and Compassion by His Holiness the Dalai Lama takes us to the uncommon practices and realizations of Vajrayāna and the culmination of the path to the full awakening of a buddha.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama skillfully illuminates the unique qualities and complexities of Vajrayāna, as practiced in Tibet, and illuminates the method to eradicate the subtlest obscurations preventing the full awakening of a buddha. Speaking to newcomers and advanced students alike, he explains the similarities and differences of the Sūtra and Tantra paths. Having gathered many of the doubts and difficult points concerning the tantric path, he clarifies the purpose of receiving proper empowerment by qualified gurus and the ethical restraints and commitments required to enter the path of secret mantra. The paths and stages of the four tantric classes are explained, as are the generation-stage and completion-stage practices of Highest Yoga Tantra. You are introduced to the practices of clear appearance and divine identity common to all tantric sādhanas, as well as the unique practices of illusory body and actual clear light that overcome the subtlest defilements on the mind and eliminate all obscurations quickly.

The understanding of emptiness in Sūtra and Tantra is the same, but the consciousness perceiving emptiness differs. In Highest Yoga Tantra that consciousness is great bliss, which arises from knowing the methods to manipulate the channels, winds, and drops of the subtle body. In short, in Vajrayāna and the Culmination of the Path the Dalai Lama sets out the path that leads to blissful awakening and enables us to be of great benefit to all sentient beings.

Learn more about the Library of Wisdom and Compassion series.

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Tsongkhapa

Tsongkhapa’s seminal contributions to Buddhist thought and practice, and to the course of history, are illuminated and celebrated by some of his foremost modern interpreters.

Few figures have impacted the trajectory of Buddhism as much as the great philosopher and meditator, scholar and reformer, Tsongkhapa Losang Drakpa (1357–1419), the founder of the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism and teacher of the First Dalai Lama. His Ganden tradition spread throughout Central Asia and Mongolia, and today, through figures such as the Dalai Lama, who calls Tsongkhapa a second Nagarjuna, his teachings are shaping intellectual conversations and ethical practice globally. To commemorate the 600th anniversary of Tsongkhapa’s passing, a special conference was held at Ganden Monastery in India in 2019, featuring some of the best translators and interpreters of his teachings today. Highlights of those incisive summations of Tsongkhapa’s special contributions are gathered in this volume. Here we discover Tsongkhapa the philosopher, Tsongkhapa the master of the Buddhist canon, Tsongkhapa the tantric adept, and Tsongkhapa as the visionary who united wisdom to compassion.

Each of the authors featured looks at a distinct facet of Tsongkhapa’s legacy. Donald Lopez provides a global context, Guy Newland distills Tsongkhapa’s Middle Way, Dechen Rochard uncovers the identity view, Jay Garfield examines the conceptualized ultimate, Thupten Jinpa highlights the seminal importance Tsongkhapa placed on ascertainment, David Gray looks at his approach to Cakrasamvara tantra, Gavin Kilty surveys his Guhyasamaja tantra commentary, Roger Jackson surmises his views on Zen and mahamudra, Geshé Ngawang Samten examines his provisional-definitive distinction, Gareth Sparham highlights his scholastic prowess, Mishig-Ish Bataa illuminates his impact in Mongolia, and Bhiksuni Thubten Chodron presents his instructions on how to cultivate compassion.

Whether you are well acquainted with Tsongkhapa’s life and thought or you are encountering him here for the first time, you will find The Legacy of Tsongkhapa an illuminating survey of his unique explorations of the highest aspirations of humanity.

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Perfect Awakening

The Long Discourses, or Dīrghāgama, is a collection of the Buddha’s most well-known sermons that has circulated widely in the Buddhist world. Parallel collections in Pali and Chinese have long been known to scholars and practitioners, but it was not until the 1990s that a Mūlasarvāstivāda manuscript transmitted in Sanskrit was discovered, a major find with the potential to reshape our understanding of Buddhism in India and Central Asia. The present volume is the first in a three-volume series to present this rare manuscript, with a study, translation, and critical edition of two of the sūtras in the collection.

Around thirty years ago, a rare bookseller in London parceled out birchbark leaves of a manuscript bundle representing an ancient scripture that had likely been unearthed in the Gilgit region of Pakistan. Even as the fragile folios entered collections in Japan, Norway, and the United States, they were identified by a scholar as belonging to the previously lost Sanskrit Dīrghāgama, the Collection of Long Discourses of the Buddha, of the Mūlasarvāstivādins. Although the forty-seven separate sūtras in this āgama have parallel transmissions extant in the Pali Digha-nikāya and the Chinese Chang ahan jing, this Sanskrit witness, copied in the eighth century, was previously known only from partial quotations and from translations in Tibetan and Chinese. The discovery was thus one of major significance in the study of Buddhist literature.

This book, one of the first presentations of this manuscript in English, provides a translation, critical reconstruction, and study of two of the sūtras in the Dīrghāgama: the Prāsādika-sūtra and the Prasādanīya-sūtra. Both sūtras offer what appears to have been late teachings of the Buddha on the nature of faith and the preeminence of the Buddha over all other teachers. The Buddhist community was evidently concerned about the coming passing of the Buddha and, in these scriptures, laid the foundation for the tradition to continue with the Buddha at the center. The Prasādanīya-sūtra, in particular, is the locus classicus for the doctrine that only one Buddha and his teachings can exist in a world system at a time, ensuring that the Buddhist community would not be tempted to follow any other teacher who had not realized perfect awakening but would hold true to the Dharma of the Buddha.

These sūtras from the Mūlasarvāstivāda tradition are made available to the public for the first time in over a thousand years with philological reconstructions and translations. They are accompanied by synoptic parallels from the corresponding Pali Long Discourses of the Theravāda tradition and the Chinese Long Discourses of the Dharmaguptaka tradition along with citations and related passages from elsewhere in Buddhist literature. In addition, the work contains a full transliteration of the birchbark folios, an introduction to the two sūtras with a study providing paleographic and textual analysis of the manuscript, and notes providing insight and explanation throughout.

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Buddhism and The Senses

Across Buddhist traditions, the five senses—sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch—are perceived both positively and negatively. Share eminent scholars’ fascination and deep insight into what makes a sensuous experience good or bad.

Following the exhibition Encountering the Buddha: Art and Practice across Asia at the National Museum of Asian art, ten eminent scholars present their insights into Buddhism’s fascinating relation with the five senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch), which careens between delight and disgust, rarely finding a middle way. While much of Buddhist literature is devoted to overcoming the attachment that dooms us to rebirth in samsara, primarily by deprecating sense experience and showing that whatever brings us sensual pleasure leads only to all manner of physical and mental pain, in texts such as the Lotus Sutra, sensory powers do not offer sensory pleasure but rather knowledge, clear observation, and ability to preach the Dharma. Considering  such religiously and historically contingent ambiguity, this volume presents each of the five senses in two instantiations, the good and the bad, opening up the discourse on the senses across Buddhist traditions.

Just as the museum departed from tradition to incorporate sensory experiences into the exhibition, this volume is a new direction in scholarship to humanize Buddhist studies by foregrounding sensory experience and practice, inviting the reader to think about the senses in a focused manner and shifting our understanding of Buddhism from the conceptual to the material or practical, from the idealized to the human, from the abstract to the grounded, from the mind to the body.

Includes essays by Bryan J. Cuevas, Debra Diamond, D. Max Moerman, Reiko Ohnuma, James Robson, Melody Rod-ari, Kurtis R. Schaeffer, John Strong, and Lina Verchery.

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A Monk’s Guide to Finding Joy

A profound and practical guide to uncovering your own wise mind and kind heart.

We all want to find happiness. But how do we go about it? In this easygoing and clear-sighted guide, celebrated Buddhist meditation and philosophy master His Eminence Khangser Rinpoche provides us with down-to-earth advice on how to train our minds and find our own innate wisdom and kindness along the way. He helps us see the profound insight that is open to us all, and how it can awaken us to the truth of the way things are. This insight into the truth, and the practices that help you cultivate this awareness, transform suffering into wisdom and compassion—and ultimately joy.

A Monk’s Guide to Finding Joy brings the ancient Tibetan mind-training tradition into our twenty-first-century lives. Through stories, real-life examples, reflections, and meditation practices—all told with warmth and humor—H.E. Khangser Rinpoche shows us how we can transform the suffering of our life into happiness. When we train the mind from within the context of our difficult emotions, we can find true joy, just as the oyster transforms sand into a pearl.

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The Blazing Inner Fire of Bliss and Emptiness

The Blazing Inner Fire of Bliss and Emptiness presents lucid translations of a pair of detailed commentaries by the famed Tibetan tantric master Ngulchu Dharmabhadra (1772–1851), illuminating a set of extremely secret and restricted tantric practices of highest yoga tantra.

The first of these commentaries details the practices of the Six Yogas of Naropa, one of the most celebrated and revered systems of completion-stage practice in Tibet. Dharmabhadra presents the Six Yogas by elaborating upon Lama Tsongkhapa ’s (1357–1419) masterpiece on the subject entitled Endowed with the Three Inspirations, which served as the basis for nearly all subsequent commentaries on the Six Yogas within the Gelug tradition. Ngulchu Dharmabhadra’s commentary is unique in that it presents the Six Yogas within the context of Vajrayogini practice, making this book a perfect companion piece to The Extremely Secret Dakini of Naropa (Wisdom Publications, 2020).

Also contained in this book is Ngulchu Dharmabhadra’s lucid and concise commentary on the First Panchen Lama’s (1570–1662) famous Supplication for Liberation from [Fear of] the Perilous Journey of the Intermediate State. The prayer—a beautiful literary contribution from the First Panchen Lama in its own right—invokes the immediacy of death and the potential to use the process of dying as an opportunity for liberation. The prayer extols the efficacy of the “nine mixings” of the completion stage as direct means of transforming our ordinary death process by using advanced yogas presented in the first commentary on the Six Yogas.

Together, these works present the reader with a vast and profound vision of spiritual transformation—one in which every aspect of human experience can be used as an opportunity for transcendence and spiritual liberation.

The Dechen Ling Practice Series from Wisdom Publications is committed to furthering the vision of David Gonsalez (Venerable Losang Tsering) and the Dechen Ling Press of bringing the sacred literature of Tibet to the West by making available many never-before-translated texts.

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Ocean of Attainments

This commentary on Guhyasamāja tantra is the seminal guide to deity yoga and tantric visualization for the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism.

The Guhyasamāja Tantra, called the king of all tantras, is revered in Tibet, especially by the Geluk school. Ocean of Attainments, a commentary on Guhyasamāja practice, was composed by Khedrup Jé Gelek Palsang (1385–1438), a key disciple of the Geluk school founder, Tsongkhapa Losang Drakpa. It explores the creation stage, a quintessential Buddhist tantric meditation that together with the completion stage comprises the path of unexcelled tantra.

In the creation stage, meditators visualize themselves as buddhas at the center of the celestial maṇḍala, surrounded in all directions by male and female buddhas, bodhisattvas, and other enlightened beings. Yet creation-stage practice is not merely visualization but deity yoga—indivisibly uniting the meditation on emptiness with the visualization of the maṇḍala. The creation stage uses the conceptualization in visualization to overcome conceptualization, thereby creating a nonconceptual and nonerroneous direct perception. Such a mind, profound and vast, can bring about a transformation that stops saṃsāric suffering. How can visions generated as mental constructs not be erroneous? To the awakened eye, the buddhas and other beings who dwell in the maṇḍala are “reality,” and in a sense they are more than real.

While the previously published Essence of the Ocean of Attainments is a concise exposition on the practice of the Guhyasamaja sadhana, Ocean of Attainments is far more detailed, providing extensive scriptural citations, clear explanation of the body maṇḍala, arguments on points of contention, reference to other tantric systems, and critiques of misinterpretations. With its extensive and clear introduction, this volume is a vital contribution to the growing body of scholarship on Guhyasamāja and on Buddhist tantra in general.

Learn more about the Studies in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism series.

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The Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s Stages of the Path, Volume 2

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.

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Reality and Wisdom

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.

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Appearing and Empty

In Appearing and Empty the Dalai Lama skillfully reveals the Prāsaṅgikas’ view of the ultimate nature of reality so that we will gain the correct view of emptiness, the selflessness of both persons and phenomena, and have the means to eliminate our own and others’ duḥkha.

In this last of three volumes on emptiness, the Dalai Lama takes us through the Sautrāntika, Yogācāra, and Svātantrika views on the ultimate nature of reality and the Prāsaṅgikas’ thorough responses to these, so that we gain the correct view of emptiness—the selflessness of both persons and phenomena. This view entails negating inherent existence while also being able to establish conventional existence: emptiness does not mean nothingness. We then learn how to meditate on the correct view by cultivating pristine wisdom that is the union of serenity and insight as taught in the Pāli, Chinese, and Tibetan traditions. Such meditation, when combined with the altruistic intention of bodhicitta, leads to the complete eradication of all defilements that obscure our minds. This volume also introduces us to the tathāgatagarbha—the buddha essence—and how it is understood in both Tibet and China. Is it permanent? Does everyone have it? In addition, the discussion of sudden and gradual awakening in Zen (Chan) Buddhism and in Tibetan Buddhism is fascinating.

Learn more about the Library of Wisdom and Compassion series.

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Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics, Vol. 4

This fourth and final Science and Philosophy in the Indian Buddhist Classics volume provides, through extensive passages, a window into the works of the great thinkers from the flowering of philosophy in classical India.

This is the second philosophy volume in the Science and Philosophy series. Whereas the first philosophy volume presented the views of the non-Buddhist and Buddhist schools in sequence, the present works selects specific topics for consideration, including the nature of the two truths, the analysis of self, the Yogacara explanation of reality, emptiness in the Madhyamaka tradition, a survey of logic and epistemology, and the Buddhist explanation of language and meaning. Like earlier volumes, it provides, through extensive extracts, a window into the works of the masters of the Nalanda tradition. The final section on language is particularly unique and largely crafted by Thupten Jinpa.

Explore the entire series here.

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The Power of Mantra

Energize your practice with the potent energy of mantra.

In this book, beloved teacher Lama Zopa Rinpoche guides us through the most popular mantras in Tibetan Buddhism: Shakyamuni Buddha, Chenrezig, Manjushri, Tara, Medicine Buddha, Vajrasattva, and more.

A mantra—literally “that which protects the mind”—is a series of Sanskrit syllables that evoke the energy of a particular buddha or bodhisattva. It works as a sacred sound that brings blessings to ourself and others, and as a tool to transform our mind into one that is more compassionate and wise.

In clear and succinct teachings, Lama Zopa shows us why we need different mantras and how each mantra works. He also explains their importance and power, giving specific instructions for practicing them. The exquisite, full-color illustrations of the deities that accompany the text make this book a beautiful guide, one suitable for both beginners and experienced practitioners.

The Wisdom Culture Series, published under the guidance of Lama Zopa Rinpoche, provides English-language readers with key works for the study and cultivation of the Mahayana Buddhist path, especially works of masters within the lineage of Lama Tsongkhapa and the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism.

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Bodhichitta

An accessible, inspiring book on one of the most important topics in Tibetan Buddhism, written by one of its renowned masters who has an international following of thousands.

Bodhichitta is a Sanskrit word meaning “the mind of enlightenment” or “the awakening mind”—the mind that wishes to achieve enlightenment in order to lead all other beings into that same state. It is the attitude of the bodhisattva, of the person who makes the compassionate vow to save others from suffering. In this book, the renowned teacher Lama Zopa Rinpoche shows us how to achieve it.

First, Lama Zopa gives a clear and comprehensive explanation of bodhichitta, its benefits, and its importance to the path. Then, he walks us through the two main methods for achieving bodhichitta: the seven points of cause and effect, and equalizing and exchanging self and others. Finally, the book closes with meditation instructions to guide and strengthen our practice.

Readers will find Bodhichitta to be a comprehensive guide to this core Buddhist principle, one rich in both accessible philosophical explanation and concrete advice for practitioners.

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How to Face Death without Fear

“Helping our loved ones at the time of death is the best service we can offer them, our greatest gift. Why? Because death is the most important time of life: it’s at death that the next rebirth is determined.”—Lama Zopa Rinpoche

For years Lama Zopa Rinpoche envisioned a practical book to inform students of how to help loved ones have a beneficial death. How to Face Death without Fear has been compiled from years of Rinpoche’s teachings and has been lovingly edited by Venerable Robina Courtin.

Rinpoche provides detailed advice on how to help your loved ones prepare for the end of their life with courage, acceptance, and a mind free of fear. With great care, he explains what to do in the months, weeks, and days before death, how to handle the moment itself, what to do after the breath has stopped, and finally, what to do after the mind has left the body. Rinpoche provides the mantras, prayers, and meditations appropriate for each stage. This new edition of Rinpoche’s modern classic How to Enjoy Death makes it easy for the reader to find the right practice at the right time.

This handbook is an essential reference for Tibetan Buddhist caregivers, hospice workers, and chaplains. But, as Rinpoche points out, it is not only for people who work with the dying; it is education we all need.

You’ll find solace in this wealth of advice, and you’ll also gain the confidence to ensure that your loved one’s death—and your own—will be joyful and meaningful.

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Patience

The sixth chapter of Shantideva’s classic A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life is a beacon of inspiration that shows what patience—one of the essential actions of the bodhisattvas—can really mean, leading us to profound self-realization and a heightened determination for awakened action in the world.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche—a teacher whose very name means “patience”—explores Shantideva’s teachings verse by verse, unpacking their lessons for the modern reader, including:

• overcoming anger,
• accepting suffering,
• and respecting others and finding happiness in their happiness.

In explaining this quintessential quality of a bodhisattva, Rinpoche shows us ordinary beings the profundity of the practice of patience and the relevance it has in our everyday lives.

“Shantideva was like us, but he worked on his mind until he became completely free from delusions . . . A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life has inspired countless people since it was written over thirteen hundred years ago. It tells us that we too can develop our mind to the levels of realizations that the great masters have attained—and it shows us how to do it.”—Lama Zopa Rinpoche

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The Six Perfections

The six perfections are the actions of the bodhisattvas—holy beings who have transcended selfless concerns. But they’re also skills we can and should develop right now, in our messy, ordinary lives.

In this clear, comprehensive guide to the backbone of Mahayana Buddhist practice, Lama Zopa Rinpoche walks us through each of the six perfections:

• charity
• morality
• patience
• perseverance
• concentration
• wisdom

As he carefully describes each perfection, he not only reveals the depth of its meaning and how it intertwines with each other perfection, but he also explains how to practice it fully in our everyday lives—offering concrete ways for us to be more generous, more patient, more wise. With the guidance he gives us, we can progress in our practice of the perfections until we, like the bodhisattvas, learn to cherish others above ourselves.

“The perfections are the practices of bodhisattvas, holy beings who have completely renounced the self; they have transcended selfish concerns and cherish only others. Each perfection is perfect, flawless. Each arises from bodhichitta and is supported by the other perfections, including the wisdom of emptiness. Because of that, a bodhisattva generates infinite merit every moment, whether outwardly engaged in working for others or not. A bodhisattva’s bodhichitta never stops.”
—Lama Zopa Rinpoche

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Dear Lama Zopa

Unconventional wisdom, affirmation, and advice from one of Tibetan Buddhism’s most influential living teachers.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche was a master at explaining Buddhism’s radical but effective methods for transforming suffering into happiness, which have been practiced and taught by Tibetans for a thousand years. It’s a challenging way to think—how can it be that the things that cause us pain are actually blessings?

In Dear Lama Zopa, Rinpoche applies that challenge to our everyday, real-life problems—from the littlest to the biggest. Every year he received thousands of letters from people around the world asking for advice—on coping with everything from addiction, grief, and depression, to war, terrorism, and death.

In his detailed and deeply caring responses to these letters, reproduced here, Rinpoche shows again and again that the best method for solving our problems is to radically change the way we perceive them; that by emphasizing their inner causes we can even change the resulting outer circumstances.

Even people familiar with notions like karma and reincarnation, which imply that we are the creators of our own experiences, may find the advice difficult. Yet uncountable thousands of people of all backgrounds have put Rinpoche’s loving guidance into practice—and have seen real and positive change in their lives. Now, with Dear Lama Zopa, you can see for yourself…

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