My new favorite book. I have so far started my own personal book club with my dad and mother in-law. I think Gelong has a great way of explaining meditation and his practices in his book are fantastic. I have been using his practices and have felt a noticeable shift in how I perceive my thoughts and feelings. I am not devoid of reactions, but I am more thoughtful and unattached. There is so much wisdom in Buddhism and I do not plan on branding myself a white girl Buddhist- but I will practice it everyday. I don’t know if I am breaking copyright rules- but I just had to share some of his writing.

Modern Living

“Modern life tends to be characterized by an overload of busyness and the stress hormone cortisol. A grasping mentality is exhausting, and the things we surround ourselves with to satisfy that grasping also tend to drain our energy. We can reach the end of our working day and feel as though we’ve been climbing a mountain or have been dragged through a series of hedges backward. Our bodies feel wrecked, even though in many cases there hasn’t been much physical activity. It is our minds that are worn out. Nowadays being busy is seen as a mark of success, a badge of honor. We ask each other “How are you?” and we automatically answer, “Busy,” which means that all is well. We live in a culture of doing rather than being. Keeping busy is somehow glamorous; it defines us. Of course, we need to work to pay the bills, support our families, and generally contribute to society. But we have constructed a culture in which we are no longer simply growing the food we need to eat and protecting ourselves from danger; we are now locked into a complex matrix of buying, selling, comparing, insuring, communicating, and endless growth. This system has become exhausting to maintain, the planet is unable to sustain our demands, and meanwhile we run around our cities, busy all day keeping the system running. We validate ourselves through this achievement. The real problem is that we are out of touch with the true beauty of our own minds, as described in chapter two, and so we become obsessed with an identity based on a veneer of external achievements.”

True, Enduring Happiness

“A myth we have believed throughout our lives is that we have to “get” happiness, and if we can just get the external details of our lives right, we will be happy. This is not happiness, it is a form of enslavement. We seem to assume that happiness, and suffering too, come to us from “outside.” Surely, however, it is our thoughts and reactions that are the real defining factors. Furthermore, if it’s the case that two or more people don’t always find that the same things make them happy or unhappy, then it means we are talking about a mental experience within us, not the things around us. This book is about turning within and finding the source of happiness that lies inside us. Rather than being a random feeling we might be lucky enough to experience, I think happiness is a skill we can learn; I see it as a product of mental training, and I believe we are hardwired for it at a deep level. Through learning meditation and mindfulness, we can choose to be happy, no matter what. Without these tools, we may constantly find ourselves victims of what might or might not happen. Of course, there are many people in this world going through extremely harsh times, where even the possibility of happiness seems incredibly remote. Perhaps all someone can do is try to survive, but once they have breathing space, meditation can provide them with powerful protection for when they are next in difficulty. This builds a mental resilience that can enable a person to get through even the most difficult situations.”