The Canon / Living / Transpersonal & Somatic
Living · 1993
A Path with Heart
Transpersonal & Somatic PsychologyA Path with Heart is Jack Kornfield's guide to contemplative practice as a path of integration rather than escape, written from his training as both a Buddhist monk and a clinical psychologist. Its central claim is that genuine awakening must be lived in the body, the emotions, and ordinary relationships, and that meditation alone does not automatically heal psychological wounds.
The book pairs the practices and stages of insight (Vipassana) meditation with the cautions of Western psychology. Kornfield gives particular attention to "spiritual bypassing"—the use of spiritual ideas and states to sidestep unresolved pain—and argues that awakening experiences must be integrated into the unglamorous fabric of daily life rather than mistaken for the whole of transformation.
As a co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock, Kornfield helped bring Theravada practice to the West, and the book anchors the tradition's anti-bypass thread, insisting that high states are not, by themselves, healing.
In its words
In undertaking a spiritual life, what matters is simple: We must make certain that our path is connected with our heart.
In the end, spiritual life is not a process of seeking or gaining some extraordinary condition or special powers. In fact, such seeking can take us away from ourselves.
The things that matter most in our lives are not fantastic or grand. They are the moments when we touch one another, when we are there in the most attentive or caring way.
To see the preciousness of all things, we must bring our full attention to life.
Practices it teaches
Lovingkindness Meditation — Kornfield's guided blessing form
This is Jack Kornfield's particular guided form of metta (lovingkindness) — the same brahmavihara practice, but rendered in his characteristic wording and pedagogy.
Soft Naming — gentle labeling in the background of awareness
"Naming" (also called noting) is Jack Kornfield's gentle form of labeling experience as a support for mindfulness.
Meeting Emotion in the Body — name it, soften, hold it in compassion
This is Jack Kornfield's practice for working with a difficult emotion through the body — anger, fear, grief, loneliness, longing.
Forgiveness Meditation — the three directions (asking, self, offering)
This is Jack Kornfield's guided forgiveness meditation, one of his signature heart practices. Rather than treating forgiveness as a single act aimed outward, he structures it as three directions: first asking…
Reflection on Death & What Matters Most — reorienting the heart
This is a contemplative reflection Jack Kornfield teaches to cut through distraction and reorient the heart toward what truly matters.
Lineage
The author
Jack KornfieldWestern Buddhism, spiritual bypassing
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Key terms
Kindred books