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Buddha's teachings were first delivered 2,500 years ago. It is said that Buddha gave 84,000 teachings, each one appropriate for the particular audience to whom it was delivered, yet each one useful for all. For two and a half millenia, his teachings have been passed from one generation to the next, always maintaining a deep understanding of and fidelity to the true meaning of the teachings, yet skillfully adapting the medium (the words) to each new generation of students. This passing of pure Dharma from one generation to the next is known as “turning the wheel of Dharma”.
Our Spiritual Guide, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, received the transmission of Dharma from his Spiritual Guide, Trijang Rinpoche, while a student in Tibet. After coming to the West in 1977, Geshe-la learned English, and began to write Dharma in English for the benefit of westerners, many of whom have a great need and desire for instructions on living a meaningful and happy life.
As a result of his great kindness and skill, we are now blessed with the most complete and authoritative collection of books on Buddha's teachings ever written in a western language. Please take advantage of this rare and precious gift of Dharma transmitted directly in English.
To purchase any of the books below, please click the image above, or click here.
This immensely practical book charts a complete path of spiritual development.
As a commentary to one of Buddhism's best-loved and most enduring teachings, Eight Verses of Training the Mind by the great Tibetan Bodhisattva Langri Tangpa, it explains how to transform every moment of our life into a step on the path to inner peace, and in particular how to transform all of life's difficulties into truly liberating experiences.
Geshe Kelsang shows how all our problems originate from a deeply ingrained tendency to cherish oneself more than others. He explains simple methods to eradicate this stultifying perspective and replace it with a genuine wish to cherish others - the source of all goodness and happiness in this world.
Buddha long ago pointed out that though humans universally seek happiness it consistently eludes them, and though they seek to avoid suffering it falls upon them like rain. The root of the problem, he taught, is a deep ignorance about the nature of happiness and suffering and their causes.
In his famous teaching on the Four Noble Truths Buddha explained:
- The truth about suffering
- The true causes of suffering
- How to achieve a true cessation of suffering
- The true path that leads to that cessation
In How to Solve Our Human Problems, Geshe Kelsang explains with characteristic clarity how we can easily apply this teaching to our modern day lives and begin to experience the taste of true, lasting happiness.
These days, many people are developing an interest in Buddhism and meditation, in part because of its practical approach to the problems we experience in our daily lives, and also because Buddhism is an open, flexible faith that may be practiced by anyone, regardless of their ethnicity or religious background.
Buddhism teaches us to take responsibility for ourselves, our actions, and the consequences of our actions. Through meditation we can follow the same path of inner transformation that Buddha followed and eventually attain a lasting inner peace and real power to benefit other living beings.
Introduction to Buddhism explains basic Buddhist view, intention, and action, and how to follow the Buddhist way of life in the modern world. It is the perfect manual for anyone with an interest in Buddhism and meditation.
This perennial bestseller is a perfect handbook for daily meditation. Written especially for the modern reader who is trying to incorporate a meditation practice into a busy lifestyle, it guides us through a sequence of 21 meditations, known as lamrim, that lead to an experience of true inner peace.
These meditations enrich our lives by helping us to develop special qualities such as mental clarity, kindness, patience, and insight. They empower us to deal positively with any situation we meet, gradually becoming a source of inspiration and joy for others.
With more and more people turning to the inner science of meditation to solve life's problems, this book is an indispensable companion to a productive meditation practice.
This very popular book is a manual for positive living. Characterized throughout by a thoroughgoing optimism, it shows with extraordinary clarity how we can transform an ordinary human life into a blissful spiritual path.
This transformation is entirely internal. No external changes are required. We continue living in our homes, maintaining our relationships and our jobs while inwardly changing our view, intention, and actions.
As we become more and more pure through this practice, those around us also benefit. Our fiends, family, neighbors, colleagues - everyone with whom we come into contact benefits from what we say, think, and do.
This is a journey that all of us in our hearts yearn to take.
A Bodhisattva is a person who, motivated by great compassion, has developed a spontaneous wish to attain enlightenment for the sake of all living beings. By taking the Bodhisattva Vow, he or she undertakes to follow the Bodhisattva's way of life by practicing the six perfections of giving, moral discipline, patience, effort, concentration, and wisdom.
This book shows how we can emulate the thoughts and deeds of a Bodhisattva and transform our ordinary daily life into the Bodhisattva's way of life. It also includes a powerful purification practice taught by Buddha for eliminating negative karma.
This book is a translation of a famous and universally loved poem for daily living composed by the 8th century Buddhist Sage Shantideva. It charts the spiritual journey of a Bodhisattva, one who is committed to attaining full enlightenment for the sake of all living beings.
The poem is written from the point of view of a practitioner and provides an extraordinary insight into the process of inner transformation one goes through while traversing the Bodhisattva path.
Geshe Kelsang provides a detailed commentary to the poem in his book Meaningful to Behold.
This book is an essential manual for anyone who aspires to be a sincere practitioner of Kadampa Buddhism. It contains two essential practices that are practiced daily by Kadampa practitioners around the world.
The first, the Guru Yoga of Je Tsongkhapa, is a powerful method for receiving profound blessings and laying the foundation for making genuine progress on the spiritual path.
The second, Relying upon the Dharma Protector, is a special practice for removing obstacles and creating favorable conditions for our spiritual practice by relying upon the Wisdom Buddha, Manjushri.
The Heart Sutra is probably Buddha's most well-known discourse; and yet it reveals an aspect of his teaching - ultimate truth emptiness - that is one of the most difficult to realize. In this extraordinary book, Geshe Kelsang takes us line by line through the Sutra and explains its hidden meaning with remarkable clarity.
Sincere study of this book lays a firm foundation for meditation on ultimate truth emptiness, which leads to the complete eradication of the ignorance of self-grasping and the experience of permanent inner peace.
The book also includes a special practice based on the recitation of the Sutra for overcoming obstacles and hindrances.
Buddha demonstrated how to follow a path of inner transformation that leads to the complete eradication of all traces negativity and confusion from the mind and the attainment of sublime qualities such as universal compassion and wisdom realizing the true nature of all phenomena.
During his life he gave many teachings revealing how the practices that lead to this realization of enlightenment. Later, the great Indian Pandit Atisha arranged all these teachings in theo order in which they are to be practiced. This special arrangement became known as the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment, or Lamrim.
In Joyful Path of Good Fortune, Geshe Kelsang provides a systematic, step-by-step commentary to these teachings rendering completely accessible to the modern reader. It is an invaluable compendium of essential Buddhist practices.
One of the few certainties in life is death. If death were the end of our problems, perhaps we need not be so concerned but, as Buddha taught, for as long as we remain ordinary beings, one life is followed by another as surely as day is followed by night.
Despite the inevitability of our death and the complete uncertainty of its time or manner, few of us give it a moment's thought until it is too late. Given that many future lives lie ahead and that these will be shaped by our actions in this and previous lives, it does not pay to die unprepared.
In this beautiful book, Geshe Kelsang shows how coming to terms with our mortality enriches our life and enables us to meet our passing with dignity, confidence, and joy. He teaches us how to live a pure, liberating lifestyle in which every moment is meaningful. The book includes special practices to perform as our death approaches and how to pass with confidence to a higher level in the next life. There are also practices to assist others who are dying.
Meaningful to Behold provides a complete map of the Mahayana Path, from generating the altruistic motivation of bodhichitta through to attaining complete enlightenment.
As a commentary to the great Buddhist classic, Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life, it focuses on the Bodhisattva's practice of the six perfections of giving, moral discipline, patience, effort, concentration, and wisdom - devoting a full chapter to each. It is especially renowned for the sections on learning to cherish others and gaining insight into ultimate reality.
It is an immensely practical commentary that show how we can follow this noble way of life within the context of our daily lives.
When Buddha taught the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras he explained ultimate truth emptiness by elaborating all the different categories of phenomena and showing how each in turn exists as mere imputation of the mind and does not exist from its own side. This teaching touches the very core of reality and understanding it and fully realizing its meaning is the key to liberating the mind from the ignorance of self grasping and attaining true inner peace.
Over the centuries, great Mahayana scholars - especially Nagarjuna and Chandrakirti - have elucidated the meaning of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras in their commentaries. In Ocean of Nectar, Geshe Kelsang continues this noble tradition by providing an explanation of Chandrakirti's famous commentary Guide to the Middle Way. With breathtaking clarity and insight he guides us step by step through a matrix of profound subjects, making them easy to understand for the modern day reader and bringing the Mahayana Path within reach of all of us.
This book is about transformation. Based on a famous Buddhist poem, Training the Mind in Seven Points, it shows how true mental freedom and lasting happiness can be achieved by transforming our mind.
The fundamental insight underlying this book is that the world we experience is a reflection of our mind and so if we want to experience the world in a positive way we need to develop a positive mind. The supremely positive mind is universal compassion, which is developed using the special meditations in this book.
As we gradually replace our habitual self-cherishing with a genuine cherishing of others, we find our powers of transformation increase. Eventually we reach the point where we can transform any situation, however unpleasant, into a positive experience and an opportunity to make progress in our spiritual development.
Fundamental to the entire Buddhist way of life is the teaching that everything depends upon the mind. The world we experience is the result of our karma, or actions, and all our actions of body, speech, and mind originate in the mind. To change our world we have to start by changing our mind, and this depends upon first gaining an thorough understanding of the mind and how it works.
In Understanding the Mind, Geshe Kelsang provides a comprehensive explanation of the different types of mind and functions of mind.
Though dealing with a profound and complex subject, this book is immensely practical, at every turn offering clear advice on how we can use our understanding of the mind to improve the quality of our lives and eventually to attain the true mental freedom of enlightenment.
Clear Light of Bliss is an advanced Tantric meditation manual that reveals the most profound secrets of the ancient yogis and makes their blissful experience accessible to the modern world.
In Clear Light of Bliss, Geshe Kelsang principally explains the Completion Stage of Highest Yoga Tantra, which is the highest level of Buddha's teachings. He also introduces in great detail the elements of the subtle body - the channels (nadi), winds (vayu), and drops (bindu) - and shows how they can be purified through meditation. Various meditations are taught to gain mastery over the channels, winds, and drops and attain the complete purification of the very subtle mind within the heart chakra - the clear light of bliss.
With this blissful awareness we can uncover our true nature, destroy all traces of ignorance at its root, and pass completely beyond suffering. We then become a source of inspiration and benefit for all living beings.
Essence of Vajrayana is a truly unique book. It is the first complete explanation in any Western language of the uncommon Tantric practice of the Heruka body mandala generation stage.
Buddha Heruka is a manifestation of enlightened compassion. By training in the generation and completion stages of Heruka Tantra, and in particular by training in the uncommon body mandala practice taught in this book, we can swiftly attain a sublime realization of profound inner peace and great bliss that we naturally impart to others.
This book is a comprehensive manual for the Heruka practitioner, containing a clear explanation of both the generation and completion stages, along with all the sadhanas and other ritual instructions necessary to engage in the practice.
At every level of Buddhist practice, relying upon the Spiritual Guide is regarded as the source of inspiration, understanding, and progress on the spiritual path. But nowhere is this practice more important than in Tantra.
Great Treasury of Merit is a commentary to a sublime practice called Offering to the Spiritual Guide, which is performed publicly twice a month in all Kadampa Buddhist centers, and often daily by individual practitioners. It is the supreme gateway to receiving blessings for all practitioners, but especially for those practicing Tantric Mahamudra.
In this a line-by-line commentary to the practice, Geshe Kelsang explains the essential stages of the path of Sutra and Tantra and shows how we can greatly increase the efficacy of our meditations by relying sincerely upon a qualified Spiritual Guide.
In Guide to Dakini Land, Geshe Kelsang provides a comprehensive explanation of the Highest Yoga Tantra practice of Vajrayogini, the female Buddha of wisdom.
The instructions on the eleven yogas of generation stage teach how we can create for ourselves a new enlightened world through meditation.
The detailed explanations of completion stage explain how to then consolidate that experience through further meditation and achieve the ultimate realization of permanent inner peace and the power to benefit all living beings.
The appendices include a comprehensive collection of sadhanas and other supporting material for the dedicated practitioner.
This exciting book introduces a new world of meditation. It explains how we can use our imagination as a powerful tool in our spiritual practice.
Mahamudra is a Sanskrit word that means union of bliss and emptiness, the very essence of Buddhist Tantric meditation.
Mahamudra Tantra is a practical manual for gaining deep experience of meditation and discovering the peace and happiness that lies within.
Tantra is a term that is often mentioned but rarely understood. Sadly, there are very few qualified Teachers left in this world who can explain how to enter into, progress on, and complete a qualified Tantric practice. One such Teacher is the contemporary Tantric Master Geshe Kelsang Gyatso.
In Tantric Grounds and Paths, Geshe Kelsang gives an explanation of the four classes of Tantra, with special emphasis on the Generation and Completion stages of Highest Yoga Tantra. Drawing on his own experience and the teachings of Je tsongkhapa, Geshe Kelsang renders even the most profound, esoteric aspects of Tantra accessible to the modern reader.
This book represents a significant milestone in revealing these profound mysteries to the contemporary world.
