New Books in Spiritual Practice and Mindfulness

Gitte Bechsgaard and Gillian McCann's book Yoga and Alignment: From the Upanishads to B. K. S. Iyengar (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2021) offers an accessible and lively look at yoga philosophy and psychology. Following the model of the eight limbs of yoga the authors engage the tradition from its foundational ethics to the highest states of consciousness. Based on 30 years of research and practice, it connects the insights of this ancient tradition to our lives and the challenges facing us today. This work will appeal to a broad audience including scholars, yoga teachers and practitioners. and general readers who have an interest in philosophy, meditation and psychology.Raj Balkaran is a scholar, educator, consultant, and life coach. For information see rajbalkaran.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Today I talked to Martin Wells about his new book No One Playing: The Essence of Mindfulness in Golf and in Life (John Hunt, 2022). To imagine you’re in control, on a golf course or otherwise in life, is “absurd” explains Martin Wells. It’s not that one gets into the zone; instead, the zone finds you. In those and other ways, this delightful book and author both honor golf as a sport and find much more in playing it that offers us insights into human nature and behavior. Want to know which emotions may help you putt better? Why there’s a thin line between humility and humiliation? Want to hear about the saga that has been Tiger Woods’ career? Then this episode is for you. Addition highlights include Jean Van de Velde’s epic 1999 Open Championship meltdown and the profound wisdom of Bobby Jones’ observation that “The length of a golf course is five inches—the space between your ears.”Martin Wells has worked as a psychotherapist in the National Health Services (NHS) for over 30. He lives in Bristol, England, and at age 70 is still a single figure handicap golfer. He’s also played senior amateur and semi-professional soccer for nearly 20 years.Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Lingo. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Be, Become, Bless: Jewish Spirituality Between East and West (Maggid, 2019) presents a Jewish approach to transforming the way we see and live our lives. Join us as we speak with Rabbi Yakov Nagen about how he uses the weekly parasha as a springboard to converse with both Eastern spirituality and Western thinking, creating a synthesis that unifies "being" and "doing." Thought-provoking and original, this work draws on wisdom from the Bible, Talmud, Kabbala, as well as philosophy, poetry, literature, music and film.Yakov Nagen is a senior rabbi at the Otniel Yeshiva in Israel, where he teaches Talmud, halakha, Jewish thought, and Kabbala. He also serves as director of Ohr Torah Stone’s Beit Midrash for Judaism and Humanity.Michael Morales is Professor of Biblical Studies at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and the author of The Tabernacle Pre-Figured: Cosmic Mountain Ideology in Genesis and Exodus (Peeters, 2012), Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?: A Biblical Theology of Leviticus (IVP Academic, 2015), and Exodus Old and New: A Biblical Theology of Redemption (IVP Academic, 2020). He can be reached at mmorales@gpts.edu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Facing a terminal cancer diagnosis, Karen Derris—professor, mother, and Buddhist practitioner—instinctually turned to books. By rereading ancient Buddhist stories with fresh questions and a new purpose in mind, she discovered evolving ways to make them immediate and real. Storied Companions interweaves Karen’s memoir of her lived experiences of trauma and terminal illness with stories from Buddhist literary traditions, sharing with the reader how she found ways to live fully even with the reality that she won’t live as long as she needs—or wants.Using her knowledge, practice, and imagination, Karen illustrates how placing yourself within narratives can turn them from distant and static sources into companions, and from companions into guides. Reading along with her, you’ll realize how this practice of reading and these ancient narratives can help us come to terms with impermanence, develop empathy and compassion, and realize our own interconnectedness.Honest, powerful, and insightful, Storied Companions: Trauma, Cancer, and Finding Guides for Living in Buddhist Narratives (Wisdom Publications, 2021) itself becomes an invaluable companion, guiding the reader to discover new ways of facing and experiencing life, death, and impermanence.Natasha Heller is an associate professor of Chinese Religion and Buddhism at the University of Virginia. Find her on Twitter @nheller. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

In the practising life, choices must be made. Those choices occur at all levels from big picture views of the world, a whole life, and society, to the everyday choice of how to be in the world, how to act, and what to commit to. In this three part series on Secular Buddhism, we find figures who have made a specific choice to stick with Buddhism and attempt to change it. Winton Higgins notes that there are two lines that characterise the loose network of groups and individuals who identify as Secular Buddhist, one is more scientific, the other philosophical, though inevitably there is overlap. Data or ideas? Experience or observation? Dichotomies such as these never truly exist but signal a stance we might take towards what is.Winton is a useful figure to start off our series; intelligent, well-read and more towards the philosophical line, Winton is happy discussing Martin Heidegger and Pope Francis and does so in our chat today. One interesting observation the more critical listener may notice is the unashamed reliance of Secular Buddhists on the idea of an original Buddha and an original Dharma and going back to the source. In my preparation for this conversation, the most interesting critique I found was not the contemporary criticisms of the more traditional forms of Buddhism, but a more academically informed concern about the degree to which an original Buddha or Dharma can be traced.The Pali Canon being like the Bible is a mishmash of reconstruction with wide ranging takes on both the figure of the Buddha and the Dharma and therefore all readings of it end up being necessarily selective. The critique then is not the interpretation but the reliance on a text which has a contested present and contested past. Apart from this tension, Higgins openly states that Secular Buddhism is in line with the lineage of Buddhisms stretching back to our archetypal origins. This is not a problem in my view and the conversation is interesting for what it reveals about an individual working with the present and the past in making sense of how Buddhism may be brought into a contemporary, lived practising life.Enjoy, the next step in this series will be with the man himself, Stephen Batchelor. Matthew O'Connell is a life coach and the host of the The Imperfect Buddha podcast. You can find The Imperfect Buddha on Facebook and Twitter (@imperfectbuddha). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Take a trip to the Great Feast in this first in a series of posts on the practising life. Non-Buddhism meets post-traditional slants on practice, whilst tackling complexity, doubt, and ecological thought. Practise questions and suggestions are woven throughout as a response to all you who desire practical things and have asked for them. This might just be a revolution in rethinking meditation and the practising life.An audio read. Original text located here.Matthew O'Connell is a life coach and the host of the The Imperfect Buddha podcast. You can find The Imperfect Buddha on Facebook and Twitter (@imperfectbuddha). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

In Elizabeth J. Harris' Buddhism in Five Minutes (Equinox Publishing, 2021), academic specialists offer answers to 75 questions about Buddhism that people curious about Buddhism might ask. The questions cover the Buddha, what the Buddha taught, Buddhist monasticism and the role of lay people, the historical development of Buddhism, Buddhist art, Buddhist ethics, Buddhist responses to other religions, and Buddhist thought on contemporary issues. They include: Who is the fat Buddha figure? Can we know what the historical Buddha taught? What is Nirvāṇa? Why do Buddhists meditate? Does Buddhism support gender equality? What is Zen Buddhism? Are Buddhists pacifist? What do Buddhists think about those who are LGBTQI? Are alcohol and drugs ever acceptable to Buddhists? How do Buddhists view Artificial Intelligence? Taken together the questions cover most aspects of Buddhist belief and practice in the contemporary world.The collection is sponsored by the UK Association for Buddhist Studies but contributors are drawn from Asia, North America and Latin America, as well as Europe. The questions are answered in accessible, non-specialist language without too many footnotes. Each should take not much more than five minutes to read.Olivia Porter is a PhD candidate at Kings College London. Her research focuses on Tai Theravada Buddhism in Myanmar and its borders. She can be contacted at: olivia.c.porter@kcl.ac.uk. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Meaningfulness is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Susan Wolf, the Edna J. Koury Professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This fascinating conversation explores what it is to live an ethical, meaningful life in keeping with her book, Meaning in Life and Why It Matters, the role that love, fulfillment, self-interest and happiness play in giving meaning to one’s life, and how meaningful activities occur when “subjective attraction meets objective attractiveness”.Howard Burton is the founder of the Ideas Roadshow, Ideas on Film and host of the Ideas Roadshow Podcast. He can be reached at howard@ideasroadshow.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Today I speak to Stephen Batchelor, figurehead for Secular Buddhism, well known author, and Scot. I present the lovely man some of the critique aimed at his work in the book Secularizing Buddhism, and from my previous interview with Richard K. Payne. We also discuss some of his intellectual influences, touch on phenomenology, Gianni Vattimo, and whether Stephen is fixated on the past in his relationship with early Buddhism. Stephen was game throughout for what turned out to be a constructive and illuminating conversation.Next up will be one of Stephen’s collaborators and philosophically informed secular Buddhist teachers, Winton Higgins, all the way from Australia. Matthew O'Connell is a life coach and the host of the The Imperfect Buddha podcast. You can find The Imperfect Buddha on Facebook and Twitter (@imperfectbuddha). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness

Welcome to the Queer Voices of the South podcast on the New Books Network. In this episode, host John Marszalek interviews Richard Harrold about his book My Buddha Is Pink: Buddhism from a LGBTQI Perspective (Sumeru Press, 2019)Although today’s podcast doesn’t focus on the Queer South per se, it continues a series of interviews Marszalek has conducted from time to time on our podcast with authors of books with themes on the intersection of queer identity and religious/spiritual identity. This is something important for many queer people, but especially for queer southerners who grew up in communities intertwined with their churches.My Buddha Is Pink is a collection of essays designed to help LGBTQI practitioners followed the Buddha’s path without getting lost in dogma. As with other major religions of the world, there are portions of Buddhism that have persisted through the years that can come off as homophobic at worst, or at the minimum, restrictive toward the LGBTQ community. My Buddha is Pink seeks to slice through the dogma and hone in on Buddhism’s basics to guide the solo practitioner on a skillful course toward a more fulfilling life. Moreover, it is a fun and light-hearted look at being a happy and healthy modern queer Buddhist in an environment where homophobia remains an issue.John Marszalek III is a host of the podcast Queer Voices of the South on the LGBTQ+ Channel of the New Books Network. Follow our podcast on Twitter: @voices_south Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/spiritual-practice-and-mindfulness