Silence by Thich Nhat Hanh

I'm an admirer and a follower (at least intentionally :-)) of the famous Vietnamese Buddhist mont Thich Nhat Hanh. I have read a number of his amazing books. However, I started reading them in the time I stopped blogging, this is why you did not see any review of his books here.

I hope to have some time soon to review the best of them. Now this post is just a signal that my current morning reading (replacing for a short while when I was in hospital, the book about S. Ulam) is now:

Thich Nhat Hanh - SILENCE. The Power of Quiet in a World Full of Noise.

As all books written by him, this one is very simple, modest and bright explanation why we do need silence. Sounds trivial? Perhaps... But when you start reading Thich's words, you will never think it is trivial or naïve ...

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"(...) You don't need a lot of modern gadgets in order to be civilized. You need only a small bell, a quiet space, and your mindful in-breath and out-breath. (...) That is what I call true civilization."

"People usually think that their ancestors have died, but that's not correct. Because we are here, alive, our ancestors continue to be alive in us. (...) They are fully present in every cell of our body. (...) We are a community of cells, and all our ancestors are within us. We can hear their voices; we just need to listen."


I will be coming back to this post again...

Cheers
Mirek

Dalai Lama meets western business culture

„The Leader's Way” by His Holiness Dalai Lama and Van Den Muyzenberg is the book of unusual meeting. It describes the important, yet metaphorical meeting between 14th Dalai Lama (Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso) and the modern businessman who was consultant and business developer for many large corporations. The book shows how one can practise buddists doctrines in the modern world of corporate citizenship.
It shows that practicing Buddhist Perfections (Generosity, Ethical discipline, Patience, Enthusiastic effort, Concentration & Wisdom) gives enormous benefits to responsible business practices.

But what was very interesting in this book, was the sincere admission by Dalai Lama, that in the past he was fascinated by socialism and its ideas. He used to read Marx and was sure that socialism/communism was the right way for humanity happiness. He also describes how he slowly discovered the plain untruth in communism. He then read Adam Smith and his rendering of this author's thoughts is just amazing. The important part of the book is then devoted to the importance of freedom — Dalai Lama describes deep reasons why the lack of freedom cannot balance the prosperity in nation's search for hapiness. There are also some strong between-the-lines references to Tibet.

He also have noticed how important European Union „project” is in human history....

These two last thoughts of Dalai Lama, i.e. the initial fascination with socialism and approval of the greatness of EU - I dedicate to all who used to blame many people for the choices ot their youth and to all sceptics of EU - who are so many among us....