Pay Attention, for Goodness’ Sake: The Buddhist Path of Kindness

According to the Buddha, the path of kindness is the path of happiness. Now Sylvia Boorstein, nationally bestselling author of It's Easier Than You Think, has taken the 2500-year-old practice of developing the qualities of a compassionate heart--the core of the Buddha's own practice--and made it accessible to all. Pay Attention for Goodness' Sake is the first book ever to guide Western readers on the path of the Buddha's Ten Paramitas, the Perfections of the Heart. Boorstein combines traditional Buddhist teachings and parables with stories from her own life, as well as easy-to-follow meditations, to show how the practice of Mindfulness--paying attention in everyday life--can lead to these perfections that all of us strive for, including Generosity, Morality, Wisdom, Energy, Patience, Determination, and Equanimity.

When we take on this practice, Boorstein notes, "our vision becomes transformed. We see, with increasing clarity, the confusion in our own minds and the suffering in our own hearts. . . . And we also see the extraordinariness of life, how amazing it is that life exists." Boorstein's lively and practical lessons about everyday generosity, morality, making and mending mistakes, the bliss of blamelessness, and other human concerns and frailties, help to clarify our distractions and connect us with our own goodness, "the part of ourselves that wishes it had done differently."

For Buddhist and non-Buddhist alike, Pay Attention for Goodness' Sake is a cheerful, inspiring book that offers the possibility of a transformed life.

Sylvia Boorstein is a cofounding teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre and a senior teacher at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts. She has a Ph.D. in psychology and teaches and lectures widely. She is the author of It’s Easier Than You Think; Don’t Just Do Something, Sit There; and That’s Funny You Don’t Look Buddhist. She and her husband, Seymour, live in Sonoma county, California.