A guidebook to making life meaningful by cultivating compassion, embracing adversity, and training the mind - from one of the foremost living Buddhist nuns.

Freeing ourselves from our habitual emotional patterns starts with taming the mind. Why is this so important? Because a wild mind tends to hurt rather than heal. Taming the mind helps us uncover our true nature and connect with those around us from a grounded place of self-awareness. Through caring for others you can walk the Buddhist path of bodhisattvas, becoming a spiritual hero of compassion.

Based on the classic fourteenth-century mind training text of Tibetan Buddhism called the Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, this guidebook shares pithy advice on how to act as bodhisattvas in our everyday lives, enabling us to possess compassion in an authentic way. Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, an exemplary spiritual teacher who spent over a dozen years meditating in the Himalayas and one of the first Buddhist nuns to be ordained in the West, shares her reflections on this famous teaching and how to live a life of mindfulness and selflessness.

The Heroic Heart: Awakening Unbound Compassion, Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo; Shambhala Publications; Paperback; 232 pp; $18.95

Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo was raised in London and became a Buddhist while still in her teens. At the age of twenty she traveled to India, becoming one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Buddhist nun. The international bestseller Cave in the Snow chronicles her twelve years of seclusion in a remote cave. Deeply concerned with the plight of Buddhist nuns, she established Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery in India. In 2008 His Holiness the Twelfth Gyalwang Drukpa, head of the Drukpa Kagyu lineage, gave her the rare title of Jetsunma (Venerable Master).

CONTENTS: The Heroic Heart
Acknowledgments		ix
Introduction		1
1.	Making Life Meaningful	11
2.	Abandon Attachment and Aversion	19
3.	Benefiting from Solitude	26
4.	Remembering Impermanence	31
5.	Valuing Good Friends	34
6.	Relying on Spiritual Teachers	37
7.	Going for Refuge	44
8.	Valuing Virtue	52
9.	Recognizing the Truth of Things	58
10.	Valuing Others	62
11.	Practicing Kindness and Compassion	70
12.	Embracing Adversity	78
13.	Bringing Suffering onto the Path	85
14.	Not Retaliating When We Are Harmed	88
15.	Respecting Even Our Enemies	94
16.	Showing Kindness When We Are Wronged	97
17.	Respecting Those Who Disrespect Us	102
18.	Being Compassionate When Things Are Difficult	110
19.	Recognizing What Is Truly Valuable	113
20.	Giving Peace a Chance	118
21.	Dropping Greed	127
22.	Embracing the Nondual	133
23.	Recognizing the Illusion	148
24.	Letting Go of the Illusion	156
25.	Practicing Generosity	167
26.	Practicing Discipline	171
27.	Practicing Patience	175
28.	Practicing Diligence	177
29.	Practicing Concentration	182
30.	Practicing Wisdom	186
31.	Examining Oneself	189
32.	Abandoning Criticizing Others	192
33.	Not Profiting from the Dharma	194
34.	Giving Up Harsh Speech	197
35.	Cutting Negative Emotions	199
36.	Being Mindful	202
37.	Dedicating on Behalf of Others	208
Notes		213
Suggested Further Reading		217
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