MAKING WAVES AND RIDING THE CURRENTS: Activism and the Practice of Wisdom

Halpern, Charles

ISBN 10: 1576754421 / ISBN 13: 9781576754429

Published by Berrett Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, 2008, 2008

About this Item

Octavo, hardcover, fine in fine white and blue pictorial dj. First edition. 290 pp. Halpern founded a law firm for litigating landmark environmental protection and constitutional rights cases. He is about working for a more just, compassionate, and sustainable world while cultivating the wisdom that supports and deepens this work. Foreword by Robert Reich and the Dalai Lama.

Seller Inventory # 78566

Bibliographic Details

• Title: MAKING WAVES AND RIDING THE CURRENTS: Activism and the Practice of Wisdom
• Publisher: Berrett Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, 2008
• Publication Date: 2008
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1576754421
• ISBN 13: 9781576754429
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Collectible - Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine
• Book Type: Book

About this title

Synopsis

This book is about working for a more just, compassionate, and sustainable world while cultivating the wisdom that supports and deepens this work.

Charles Halpern is a social entrepreneur with a remarkable record of institutional innovation. He founded the Center for Law and Social Policy, the nation’s first public interest law firm, litigating landmark environmental protection and constitutional rights cases. As founding dean of the new City University of New York School of Law he initiated a bold program for training public interest lawyers as whole people. Later, as president of the $400 million Nathan Cummings Foundation, he launched an innovative grant program that drew together social justice advocacy with meditation and spiritual inquiry.

In his years of activism, he had a growing intuition that something was missing, and he sought ways of developing inner resources that complemented his cognitive and adversarial skills. These explorations led him to the conviction that what he calls the practice of wisdom is essential to his effectiveness and well-being and to our collective capacity to address the challenges of the 21st century successfully.

With wit and self-deprecating humor, Halpern shares candid and revealing lessons from every stage of his life, describing his journey and the teachers and colleagues he encountered on the way—a cast of characters that includes Barney Frank and Ralph Nader, Ram Dass and the Dalai Lama. Making Waves and Riding the Currents vividly demonstrates the life-enhancing benefits of integrating a commitment to social justice with the cultivation of wisdom. It is a real-world guide to effectively achieving social and institutional change while maintaining balance, compassion, and hope.

About the Author

Charles halpern is an innovative social entrepreneur who has led the way in bringing inner work and the cultivation of wisdom into the world of social activism. As chair of the Board of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, he is helping to integrate contemplative practice into mainstream institutions, in order to develop greater clarity, compassion, and effectiveness to face the challenges of the twenty-first century.
With his extensive record of institutional creativity and achievement, supported by twenty years of meditation, Halpern is the ideal person to write about the intersecting arcs of effective work in the world and the cultivation of the inner wisdom to deepen and nourish it.