Unlimiting Mind: The Radically Experiential Psychology of Buddhism »

Both broad and deep, this eye-opening book is one of the best overviews available of the radical psychological teachings that underlie the Buddhist approach to living a life of freedom and peace. Sophisticated without being daunting, brilliantly clear without becoming simplistic, Andrew Olendzki’s writing is filled with rich phrases, remarkable images, and the fruits of decades of careful thought. Grounded in deep scholarship, psychological sophistication, and many years of teaching and personal practice, this much-anticipated collection of essays will appeal to anyone looking to gain a richer understanding of Buddhism’s experiential tools for exploring the inner world.

Publishers Weekly

Olendzki, executive director of the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies and editor of a Buddhist journal, has written a dense book on Buddhist psychology. The book consists of short essays grouped by themes; many of the essays first appeared elsewhere. This gives the book a bit of a sound-bite feel; no one idea is developed for very long, so the reader, given the difficulty of the material, must, like a good Buddhist, pay attention. Olendzki is himself a close reader of Buddhist texts and clearly grounds his reasoning in those texts. His academic prose—use of passive voice, Latinate words—unfortunately compounds the difficulty of comprehension (“If there is no regarding of phenomena as 'mine' then the self who suffers from attachment to phenomena is not constructed”). This is not for the nightstand Buddhist; readers will require some knowledge of the Buddhist understanding of how the mind works, and they will also need some patience with highly abstract prose. (Apr.)

Introduction 1

1 The Bigger Picture

What the Buddha Taught 21

An Organic Spirituality 25

The Non-Pursuit of Happiness 29

The Post-Copernican Revolution 33

2 Caring for the World

Caring for Each Other 39

Healing the Wounds of the World 43

War and Peace 47

Removing the Thorn 51

Burning Alive 55

3 Constructing Reality

Mind and Brain 61

This Fathom-Long Carcass 65

Making the Best of It 69

Unreal Imagination Exists 73

In the Blink of an Eye 77

4 The Practice

One Thing at a Time 83

Here and Now 87

Tug of War 91

Changing Your Mind 95

Calm in the Face of Anger 99

5 Understanding the Teachings

Interconnected ... Or Not? 105

Interdependence 109

Beyond Proliferation: Papanca 113

Disgusted with Dharma? 117

6 Self and Non-Self

Appearance and Reality 123

Keeping Your Balance 127

Self Is a Verb 131

This World Is Not Yours 135

No Essence 139

7 Karma

Karma in Action 145

Where the Action is 149

Whose Life Is This, Anyway? 153

Homo Sophiens 157

8 The Emergence of Mindfulness

An Abhidhamma Perspective 163

Notes 177

Acknowledgments 181

Index 183

About the Author 191