When Things Fall Apart

Pema Chödrön reveals the vast potential for happiness, wisdom and courage even in the most painful circumstances. Pema Chödrön teaches that there is a fundamental opportunity for happiness right within our reach, yet we usually miss it – ironically, while we are caught up in attempt to escape pain and suffering. This accessible guide to compassionate living shows us how we can use painful emotions to cultivate wisdom, compassion and courage, ways of communication that lead to openness and true intimacy with others, practices for reversing our negative habitual patterns, methods for working with chaotic situations and ways to cultivate compassionate, energetic social action Recently profiled in Oprah’s O magazine, Pema Chödrön is a spiritual teacher for anyone – whether they have a spiritual path or not. Her heartfelt advice and wisdom (developed in her 20 years of practice as a Tibetan Buddhist nun as well as her years previously as a normal ‘housewife and mother’) give her a wide appeal. This advice strikes just the right note, offering us comfort and challenging us to live deeply and contribute to creating a more loving world.

‘‘Pema’s deep experience and her fresh way of looking at things are like mountain water – clear and deep.’ Jack Kornfield, author of A Path with Heart and After the Ecstasy, the Laundry. ‘As one of Pema Chödrön’s grateful students, I have been learning the most pressing and necessary lesson of all: how to keep opening wider my own heart.’ Alice Walker ‘It is a lively and accessible take on ancient techniques for transforming terror and pain into joy and compassion.’ O, the Oprah Winfrey magazine

Pema Chödrön is an American Buddhist nun and one of the foremost students of Chogyam Trungpa, the renowned Tibetan meditation master. She is the author of The Wisdom of No Escape, Start Where You Are, The Places that Scare You and the best-selling When Things Fall Apart. She is the resident teacher at Gampo Abbey, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, the first Tibetan monastery in North America established for Westerners.