Open Mind, Open Heart

Millions have found mindfulness to be a powerful practice for reducing stress, enhancing attention, and instilling tranquility. But it can offer so much more--it can transform you, make you more fully awake, alive, and aware of your connection to all beings. In Japanese, the character that best expresses mindfulness, 念, consists of two parts--the top part, 今, meaning "now," and the bottom part, 心, meaning "heart." Using stories from his own life as the son of an Irish father and a Japanese mother, a professor in Japan and America, a psychotherapist, a father, and a husband, Stephen Murphy-Shigematsu describes eight "heartfulness" principles that help us realize that the deepest expression of an enlightened mind is found in our relation to others.