An Open Heart: Practicing Compassion in Everyday Life pdf

The Dalai Lama is the supreme religious leader of Tibetan Buddhists and until 1959 AD, the Dalai Lama represented the spiritual and worldly leadership in Tibet.
He is, of course, a Buddhist monk of the Gelugpa group, which was founded by Tsongkhapa (1357-1419).
The title of King of Tibet and the successor of Buddha in the eyes of his followers. The last to hold this title was the 14th Dalai Lama, born in Shanghai in 1935, when he was four years old when a group of lamas considered him to be the successor to the 13th Dalai Lama. It was then erected in Lhasa in 1940 and came to be considered a "living Buddha".
He was a pacifist. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 for his peaceful struggle for the liberation of Tibet. He has consistently advocated nonviolent policies, even in the face of extreme aggression. He also became the first Nobel Prize winner to be honored for his interest in global environmental problems.

An Open Heart: Practicing Compassion in Everyday Life pdf by Dalai Lama

COMPASSION--SYMPATHY FOR THE suffering of others and the desire to free them from it--is wrestled with in all spiritual traditions. Yet how does one actually become a compassionate person? What are the mechanisms by which a selfish heart is transformed into a generous heart?

When His Holiness the Dalai Lama came to New York City in 1999, he spoke simply and powerfully on the everyday Buddhist practice of compassion. Weaving together the contents of three sacred texts-- one by the eighth-century Indian master Kamalashila, another by the fourteenth-century Tibetan Togmay Sangpo, and a third by the eleventh-century sage Langri Tangpa--His Holiness showed that the path to compassion is a series of meditations. An Open Heart lays out this course of meditation, from the simplest to the most challenging, describing the mental training techniques that will enable anyone of any faith to change their minds and open their hearts. In this book the path begins with simple and clear ruminations on the advantages of a virtuous life and moves on to practices that can temper destructive and impulsive emotions. Such practices can be undertaken at odd moments of the day, at once transforming the aimless or anxious mind into a disciplined and open mind. Gradually, the book introduces the more challenging and sustained meditation practices. In these meditations the deepest and most profound insights of Buddhist practice become part of one's way of knowing and experiencing the world.