Norman Fischer on Spiritual Growth through Imagination
The One You Feed
Embracing Collective Joy
This chapter highlights Shantideva's philosophical perspective on prioritizing collective suffering over personal pain. It emphasizes the transformative power of compassion and sympathetic joy, encouraging individuals to find happiness in the joy of others while moving beyond self-centeredness.
Norman Fischer is a poet, author, Zen Buddhist teacher and priest. He’s a graduate of Iowa’s Writer’s Workshop and he’s been publishing poetry since 1979. He’s the author of 17 books of poetry, 6 books of prose on Zen and religion as well as numerous articles and essays. In this episode, Eric and Norman discuss his book, The World Could Be Otherwise: Imagination and the Bodhisattva Path.
If you are interested in learning more about how to integrate and embody spiritual principles into the moments of your daily life, Eric teaches people how to do just that in his 1-on-1 Spiritual Habits Program. Click here to learn more.
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In This Interview, Norman Fischer and I discuss Spiritual Growth through Imagination and…
- His book, The World Could Be Otherwise: Imagination and the Bodhisattva Path
- Redefining imagination and discovering it’s prevalence and role in life
- The role of imagination in spiritual paths
- How we don’t see the world exactly as it is, but rather through filters
- Loosening our grasp on what we think of as absolute reality
- Constructing useful stories in our mind rather than living by our default stories
- The essential ways in which imagination enriches the experience of our lives
- When we realize we are making our lives for ourselves, we have the power to make it differently
- The Bodhisattva: A Buddha in training
- Compassion, Love and Service for the benefit of others
- The Bodhisattva Path
- The myth of separateness and the truth of interconnection and love
- That holding two (seemingly contradictory) ideas in our mind at one time offers us depth perception
- How ideals can inspire us rather than put pressure on us
- The disease of perfectionism
- How to engage in “Joyful Effort” when you don’t feel very joyful and don’t have much effort to spare
- Patience: Just keep going and be of benefit to others
- Turning toward what’s arising: facing it, embracing it, breathing into it and going forward with it
- The problematic nature of favoring one’s own suffering over the suffering of others
Norman Fischer Links:
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