Description
Book SynopsisA deep exploration of the direct experience of non-dual reality and its lessons for spiritual growth and development• Examines the direct perception of non-dual reality and shows its implications for navigating ordinary reality in an open, compassionate, and ever-maturing way
• Shares the author’s most significant awakening experiences and explores their psycho-emotional and psychospiritual foundations
• Offers practical teachings for spiritual understanding, emotional development, and the cultivation of compassion
Exploring the direct perception of non-dual, “non-ordinary” reality, Paul Weiss shares guidance for navigating ordinary reality in an open, compassionate, and ever-maturing way. He affirms our shared human potential for the “direct experience” of reality--unmediated by our more relativistic mental faculties--and reveals this experience as an essential dimension of our conscious capacity for growth. He shares his most significant awakening experiences and the circumstances leading up to them, exploring the personal and transpersonal dimensions of the experiences and their psycho-emotional and psycho- spiritual foundations. He points to such experiences as part of our ongoing integration as human beings and the essential path of practice that supports our availability to them.
Interweaving perspectives from psychology and neuroscience with important lessons from spiritual traditions around the world, Weiss explores how to live a life of integrity, reciprocity, and openness to reality, offering practical teachings for spiritual understanding, emotional development, and the cultivation of compassion, viewed by ancient Buddhist sages as the true meaning of existence. He addresses such human qualities as vulnerability, empathy, reciprocity, openness, and intimacy and shows how they express and participate in deeper conscious truths. The author also examines practical wisdom teachings within both Buddhist and Christian paths to realization.
Combining engaged mysticism with transcendent humanism, along with thought- provoking poetry, Weiss offers a living vision of a non-dual way of experiencing the world, a path that supports our functional, emotional, and spiritual maturity.
Trade Review“In
The Dharma of Direct Experience, teacher, poet, and therapist Paul Weiss shares with us the profound wisdom he has discovered. The real gift of this book is not just his wisdom but that he shows us how to search for our own.” * WES “SCOOP” NISKER, dharma teacher, award-winning broadcast journalist, and author of Be *
Table of ContentsPRELUDE All Reality Begins with this Moment of Experience
INTRODUCTION When Nothing Experiences Itself as Everything
PART ONE Tripping over the Light
someone does Early Foundations
jacob boehme Inexhaustible Non-exclusiveness
it’s that simple The District of Lu
0The Pterodactyl
good news A Feather on the Breath of God
the ecstasy of table manners
On the Subway
unwrinkled Dancing at a Festival
spring morningNeither Life nor Death
sign on the doorIn the Arc of the Fountain
imagine belovedI and My Father Are One
drink and you will see PART TWOWhen Our Life Becomes the Pathfairy tale Memos to Myselfin me the universe
Vulnerability
Nurture and Nature
Reciprocity
genesis Keep the Energy Circulating
whirling Stories and States
the comedian Identification and Intimacy
the blazeIntimacy and Healing
go to her nowIntention and
Openness
buddha field Transparency and Coherence
clearing The Path of PracticeThe Path within the Buddha Dharma
for our timeThe Path within the Jesus Dharma
why didn’t anybody tell us?The Reconciliation of Reality Compassion, Integration, and Healing
Tonglen
The Twin Principle
The Activity of Love
Being at Home
at the edge of the great marshEmbodying Mantra and Mudra
your left palm Comprehensive Detached Awareness
The Temple of the Body
Dimensions of Transparency
where the river widensEpilogue after the april retreat Useful Terms
Index
