Cultivating Stillness

Title: Cultivating Stillness
Author: Eva Wong
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
ISBN: 9780877736875

From the publisher: Equanimity, good health, peace of mind, and long life are the goals of the ancient Taoist tradition known as "internal alchemy," of which Cultivating Stillness is a key text. Written between the second and fifth centuries, the book is attributed to T'ai Shang Lao-chun—the legendary figure more widely known as Lao-Tzu, author of the Tao-te Ching . The accompanying commentary, written in the nineteenth century by Shui-ch'ing Tzu, explains the alchemical symbolism of the text and the methods for cultivating internal stillness of body and mind. A principal part of the Taoist canon for many centuries, Cultivating Stillness is still the first book studied by Taoist initiates today.

Simplified Life

Title: Simplified Life: A Contemporary Hermit's Experience of Solitude and Silence
Author: Verena Schiller
Publisher: Canterbury Press
ISBN: 9781848250253

From the publisher: Today, as increasing numbers of people try to make sense of their lives in the face of unexpected or unlooked for change, this direct and compelling memoir by someone who has voluntarily embraced a life of radical simplicity and solitude is a real message for our times. What makes a young, Cambridge educated woman first join a religious order and then, if that were not demanding enough, seek a hermit vocation, literally on the edge of the world with only a simple hut as protection against Atlantic winds and storms? Here the author tells her story. For more than forty years Sr Verena lived a solitary life at the tip of the Lleyn Peninsula, looking out across the sea to Bardsey, Wales' island of saints, and has only recently - with increasing age - moved nearer human habitation in the parish where R.S. Thomas was priest. For her, this narrow straitened place became a mirror of the whole of creation and the material poverty of her life became a means to 'having nothing yet possessing all things' in the words of St Paul. Over the decades, countless people have beaten a path to her door seeking spiritual counsel and direction for their own busy lives and her account speaks directly to those who may be facing an enforced simplicity leading them into something profoundly positive and life giving.

The Genesee Diary

Title: The Genesee Diary
Author: Henri J.M. Nouwen
Publisher: Darton, Longman & Todd
ISBN: 9780232527292

From the publisher: This touching observation is central to the probing spiritual journal of Henri Nouwen recorded during his seven-month stay in a Trappist monastery. During this period he had a unique opportunity to explore crucial issues of the spiritual life and discover ‘a quiet stream underneath the fluctuating affirmations and rejections of our little world’.

Henri Nouwen participated fully in the daily life and routine of the Abbey of the Genesee in upstate New York - in work and in prayer. He relates here the typical human experiences and questions that had somehow prevented Christ from being the centre of his existence. From the early weeks in the abbey - dominated by conflicting desires and concerns - to the final days of Advent, when he has found a new sense of calm expectation, Henri Nouwen never loses his critical honesty.

Insightful, compassionate, often humorous, always realistic, The Genesee Diary is both an inspiration and a challenge to those who are in search of themselves.

A Time to Keep Silence

Title: A Time to Keep Silence
Author: Patrick Leigh Fermor
Publisher: NYRB Classics
ISBN: 9781590172445

From the publisher: While still a teenager, Patrick Leigh Fermor made his way across Europe, as recounted in his classic memoirs, A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water. During World War II, he fought with local partisans against the Nazi occupiers of Crete. But in A Time to Keep Silence, Leigh Fermor writes about a more inward journey, describing his several sojourns in some of Europe’s oldest and most venerable monasteries. He stays at the Abbey of St. Wandrille, a great repository of art and learning; at Solesmes, famous for its revival of Gregorian chant; and at the deeply ascetic Trappist monastery of La Grande Trappe, where monks take a vow of silence. Finally, he visits the rock monasteries of Cappadocia, hewn from the stony spires of a moonlike landscape, where he seeks some trace of the life of the earliest Christian anchorites.

More than a history or travel journal, however, this beautiful short book is a meditation on the meaning of silence and solitude for modern life. Leigh Fermor writes, “In the seclusion of a cell — an existence whose quietness is only varied by the silent meals, the solemnity of ritual, and long solitary walks in the woods — the troubled waters of the mind grow still and clear, and much that is hidden away and all that clouds it floats to the surface and can be skimmed away; and after a time one reaches a state of peace that is unthought of in the ordinary world.”


Adam Haslett says: ...The writing is spare, exactingly precise, and then occasionally quite beautiful, just as the life of the monks we hear about are pared down, highly concentrated, and every now and then sublime. In short, it's a book about the contemplative life that delivers the reader into a contemplation of his or her own. read the full review or an extract from the book

Decision Making & Spiritual Discernment

Title: Decision Making & Spiritual Discernment: The Sacred Art Of Finding Your Way
Author: Nancy L. Bieber
Publisher: Skylight Paths Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-59473-289-8

From the publisher: Spiritual discernment is the traditional name for listening and responding to divine guidance. In this book you will approach decision making as an active participant, a co-creator with God in shaping your life. Drawing on twenty-five years of experience as a psychologist and fifteen years as a spiritual director, Nancy L. Bieber presents three essential aspects of Spirit-led decision making:

• Willingness—being open to God’s wisdom and love

• Attentiveness—noticing what is true, discerning the right path

• Responsiveness—taking steps forward as the way becomes clear.

With gentle encouragement, Bieber shows how to weave these themes together to discover the best path for you.

Each chapter is enriched by practical spiritual exercises to help you understand yourself and your specific situation, as well as to strengthen spiritual discernment as a daily way of life. An appendix includes a detailed guide for using the book in group study.