Introduction xi

PART ONE
THE GIVENS OF LIFE

1. Everything Changes and Ends 3
How We Avoid or Accept 4
Attracted or Repelled 5
A Changing Image in the Mirror 8
What Makes Us So Controlling 10
Nothing Separate 13
A Two-Handed Practice 15
Death and Renewal 16

2. Things Do Not Always Go According to Plan 20
Nature's Design 23
Our Calling 27
The Larger Life 29
It All Balances in Love 32

3. Life Is Not Always Fair
Revenge or Reconcile 35
Why Does Harm Come to the Innocent? 39
The Art of Taming Ego 41
Commitments beyond Ego 43
A Mindful Reply to Unfairness 45

4. Pain is Part of Life 47
Are We Victims? 51
A Yes to the Pain Nature Brings 53
Being With the Suffering of Others 55
When Cheer Doesn't Work 59
The Fertile Void 60

5. People Are Not Loving and Loyal All the Time 65
The Lifelong Influences of Childhood 68
Taking Care of Yourself As You Open to Others 70
Givens of Adult Relating 73
A Checklist on the Boundaries in Our Relationships 76
Egoless Love 79

6. Refuges from the Givens 82
Religion as a Refuge 82
Religion and Refuge in Nature 86
Three Refuges 89
Distraction or Resources? 91
Magical Thinking 92
Backstreet Refuges 94
Safety in No Refuge 96
Wisdom within Us 97

PART TWO
AN UNCONDITIONAL YES
TO OUR CONDITIONED EXISTENCE

7. How to Become Yes 101
Loving-Kindness 104
Tonglen Practice 108
No Outside 111
Nature Practices Yes 112

8. Yes to Feelings 116
Our Gifts from Nature 118
How Feelings Become SAFE 120
Love Liberates 122
How Fear Holds Us Back 124
The Life Span of a Feeling 127
How Do We Receive the Feelings of Others? 129
Tracking Our Feelings 130
What Feelings Are Not 132
Feelings Are Three-Dimensional 135

9. A Yes To Who I Am 137
Psychologically 138
Spirituality 140
Mystically 142
Self or No-Self? 144
A Stable Sense of Myself 146

EPILOGUE 155
ABOUT THE AUTHOR 161