Buddhism for Busy People: Finding Happiness in an Uncertain World

This quote on the book's Amazon description really sums it up: "Michie demystifies the ancient teachings of Buddha, and writes about them with easy style. -- Australia Sunday Mail

This book is a great intro to Buddhism, making it easy for the modern person to digest the main teachings of the Buddha in a light and simple way. The author uses personal experiences to describe how he came to the philosophy and how it changed his life. This book (and his other one Hurry Up and Meditate) changed my life as well... I was struggling with grief over my father's death and nothing I tried was really making a difference. With the help of this book, as well as others, I found a much more peaceful path in my life and I'm stronger and happier than I've show more ever been!

Highly recommended for anyone wanting a simple introduction to the Buddhist practice or anyone who needs help curbing overwhelming emotions. It's life-changing. show less

OK, more about the author than the topic. He has strong opinions on life, which I don't agree with. It distracted from the rest of the book.

Not a bad, simple overview but felt it a little superficial and anecdotal

“Buddhism for Busy People” by David Michie

BIBLIOGRAPHIC DETAILS
PRINT: © 5/16/2017; 978-1611803679; Shambhala; 256 pages; unabridged. (Paperback info from Amazon.com)
*DIGITAL: © 2008; 9780834840430; Shambhala Publications, Inc.; 235 pages; unabridged. (Kindle info from digital version obtained from Libby library app-LAPL loan)
AUDIO: © 11/21/2008; Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd; 07:36:00
FILM: No.

SERIES: No

SUMMARY/ EVALUATION:
SELECTED: This is another book that Don (hubby) added to our Audible library a few years ago.
ABOUT: This book is instructive as to how to meditate. The author shares his own practices and how they have benefitted him. The last hour, give or take, provides real-time meditation instruction, allowing readers to show more practice as they listen.
OVERALL IMPRESSION: Its helpful that David emphasizes that practice will not yield striking instant results. Initial benefits are subtle and its common to wonder if anything is being accomplished beyond losing minutes of ones life. The reader is admonished to practice regularly, disregarding these doubts.

AUTHOR:
David Michie. I did not find a Wikipedia entry, but David has a website at:
https://davidmichie.com/

NARRATOR(S):
Nicholas Bell. Excerpt from Wikipedia:
“Nicholas Bell (born 15 August 1958) is an English actor who has worked in Australia for more than 20 years.[1] He works regularly with the Melbourne Theatre Company as well as with all the major television broadcasters in Australia, most notably the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. In addition to his work in film and television, Bell has also recorded over a dozen audiobooks with Bolinda, a company based in Melbourne, Australia.[2]

In 2001 he accepted on behalf of the cast and crew of the Australian comedy series The Games the TV Week Logie Award for Most Outstanding Comedy Program.[3]”

*Nicholas has the right voice for meditation instruction.

GENRE: Nonfiction; Personal Development

SUBJECTS:
Meditation; Religious Life; Tibetan Buddhism—Doctrines; Happiness – Religious aspects; Mental Discipline

DEDICATION:
“THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED with heartfelt gratitude to my dharma teachers: Geshe Acharya Thubten Loden, founder of the Tibetan Buddhist Society, and Les Sheehy, director of the Tibetan Buddhist Society in Perth, Western Australia, whose kindness I can never repay, and without whom this book could never have been written.”

SAMPLE QUOTATION:
From Chapter 1. “What Does It Take To Be Happy?”
“WHAT DOES IT TAKE to be happy? Of all the questions in the world, this is the most universal. It is also the great leveler because all of us—comfortably off or financially struggling, single or in a relationship, awkwardly overweight or elegantly slim—are equal in our desire to achieve true happiness. Not the happiness we’ve all experienced which comes and goes depending on circumstance, but a happiness which endures regardless of change. A happiness we feel deep down inside.
By any objective standard, our efforts to attain this simple goal have met with decidedly mixed results. As a society we now enjoy a level of affluence that would have left our grandparents breathless—but our medicine cabinets have never been so replete with sedatives, tranquilizers, and antidepressants to cocoon us from our new, “improved” reality. We have at our disposal an unprecedented range of labor-saving devices—but never have we had to work such long hours. We are succeeding in the cozy notion of creating a “global village”—but never have we felt so under siege from international terrorism, volatile stock markets, viral infections, and other threats. And so the list of paradoxes continues.
On an individual basis, our striving for happy, purposeful lives often doesn’t fare much better. Money, relationships, and fulfillment in work are the core ingredients of most people’s recipes for happiness, but if we were to send in the Happiness Auditors to check up on their effectiveness, could they really withstand close scrutiny?
Successive studies of lottery winners, for example, show that within months of multimillion-dollar wins, happiness levels return pretty much to where they were before. Amazingly adaptable creatures that we are, we adjust to new conditions so quickly that what was once fabulous soon becomes the norm, and we’re back where we started, in search of fresh excitement. Even when we do achieve that much sought-after promotion, that big-ticket deal, that amazing breakthrough, all too often we are mystified to discover that we fail to experience the wonderful feelings we’d always thought we would. “Is this all?,” we find ourselves wondering.
And in our relationships, we don’t have to look very far to recognize just how swiftly and how often that first giddying rush of romantic intensity can turn into something quite different.
Yet somehow we manage to convince ourselves that it’s not the recipe that’s at fault—it’s the ingredients we’re working with. If only we were to land this particular job or contract, the difference would be life changing. That man or woman is just so right that life with them would transport us to a state of great bliss. The fact that we once entertained similar thoughts about our now very-ex partner is not a subject we like to think about And if we do, we have an outstanding ability to convince ourselves that this time it will all be completely different!”

RATING: 4 stars.

STARTED-FINISHED
1/17/24-1/21/24 show less

Excellent for a beginner struggling with the process