Solid Ground: Buddhist Wisdom for Difficult Times

A lively, topical guide on how to respond to life’s inevitable difficulties—from personal crises to broader societal challenges
 
The issue of difficulty in life is at the very essence of Buddhism. One can reasonably translate the first noble truth as, “life is full of difficulties,” with the remaining noble truths serving as Buddhism’s analysis of those difficulties and how to work with them. In Solid Ground, celebrated Buddhist teachers Sylvia Boorstein, Zoketsu Norman Fisher, and Tsoknyi Rinpoche use their diverse wisdom to address the immediate and practical concerns of our lives, including individual crises as well as the political, economic, and social challenges society is currently facing. Together, they explore the most basic and profound questions of Buddhism: the difficulty of life in general and how we can work with that and ameliorate it.

Filled with humor and personal stories, Solid Ground offers specific teachings for concrete situations as well as a way to explore the larger questions of finding equanimity in difficult times.

Sylvia Boorstein teaches mindfulness and leads retreats across the United States. She is a co-founding teacher at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, California, and a senior teacher at the Insight Meditation Center in Barre, Massachusetts. Boorstein is also a practicing psychotherapist. Her previous books are It's Easier Than You Think and Don't Just Do Something, Sit There.

Norman Fischer is co-abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center, where he has practiced for many years. He was ordained as a Zen priest in 1980, and teaches Zen meditation regularly in Canada, Mexico, and the Bay Area. He has published six volumes of poetry and two prose books, most recently Taking Our Places.

Tsoknyi Rinpoche has been teaching students worldwide for over 15 years about the innermost nature of mind in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. He is widely recognized as a brilliant meditation teacher and is the author of Carefree Dignity and Fearless Simplicity.