Skip to content

Book description

Practical Buddhist wisdom and mindful methods for finding the silver lining in all circumstances—from a remarkable new voice in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

Chakung Jigme Wangdrak gives concrete advice on how to reorient your thinking when faced with the challenges, mess, and chaos that inevitably occur in life. By embracing pain and suffering, you can learn to see their roots, begin to work with them, and eventually let them go. This will create joy and ease, allowing you to fully savor happiness.

In clear language, Jigme Wangdrak conveys the steps, stages, and categories of mental exercises and methods that everyone—from beginner to experienced practitioner and non-Buddhists—can use to train their mind toward happiness:

  • Take happiness and suffering as the path
  • Cultivate courage, gratitude, and compassion
  • Practice contentment (not complacency)
  • Recognize outer and inner obstacles when faced with challenging situations
  • Dispel self-grasping to reduce suffering
  • Develop patience and tolerance


A true Buddhist master and unique lineage holder, Jigme Wangdrak offers a roadmap to freedom with teachings that will benefit your spiritual practice and daily life—he shows you how to love your life as it already is!

Chakung Jigme Wangdrak

Chakung Jigme Wangdrak

Author Bio

CHAKUNG JIGME WANGDRAK RINPOCHE was born in eastern Tibet as the fourth descendant of the nineteenth-century Buddhist master Dudjom Lingpa. He studied Buddhist philosophy with remarkable twentieth-century teachers, including Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche and Dakini Kunzang Wangmo. He lives and teaches in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he is the spiritual director of the Abhaya Fellowship.

Praise for the book

Sharon Salzberg

author of Lovingkindness

“Desire, attachment, and turmoil have changed the collective consciousness of our world—Chakung Jigme Wangdrak welcomes readers to remember that incorporating our awareness of this when we meditate and engage in spiritual practice will contribute to our individual freedom, which ripples out into our collective freedom, creating a healing impact that is so urgent to the future of our world.”

Rick Hanson

author of Neurodharma

“Like crystal-clear deep water, this book is both inviting and profound. It comes from a true master, with helpful ideas and suggestions on each page. The writing is fresh and alive, full of heart, and always encouraging. It is a real gem.”

James Baraz

author of Awakening Joy

“Loving Life as It Is explains how skillfully meeting suffering is the direct path to the highest happiness. This book provides an excellent roadmap to navigate life’s ups and downs with wisdom and an open heart. A much-needed book for these times.”

Norman Fischer

author of When You Greet Me I Bow

“Chakung Jigme Wangdrak offers a wonderfully heartwarming expression of Tibetan Buddhism’s profound and gentle way of understanding and living this human life. To read the book is itself to rest in the luminous nature of mind, to be comforted and encouraged to love this life, with all its troubles and sorrows, as a life of joy and ease. The text gives you all you need for a robust spiritual life. Born, raised, and trained in rural Tibet, but now living in the West, Chakung Jigme Wangdrak reflects the charm and magic of the original tradition in a way the Western reader can appreciate.”

Publisher's Weekly

“[A] lucid English-language debut from Tibetan Buddhist teacher Wangdrak. . . . Buddhists of all stripes will find value.”

Lion's Roar

“Chakung Jigme Wangdrak eloquently addresses the dual nature of human experience—happiness and suffering—and provides a transformative perspective on both, encouraging readers to embrace each as a vital component of strength and spiritual growth. In clear language, he teaches methods that everyone—from beginners to experienced practitioners as well as non-Buddhists—can use to train their mind toward happiness when faced with the challenges of life.”

Author: Chakung Jigme Wangdrak

Loving Life as It Is: A Buddhist Guide to Ultimate Happiness

Regular price $14.99 USD
Sale price Regular price