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Sharon Salzberg
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Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness (Shambhala Pocket Library) Paperback – 20 July 2018

by Sharon Salzberg (Author)
4.7 out of 5 stars 1,391 ratings
In this inspiring book, Sharon Salzberg, one of America's leading spiritual teachers, shows us how the Buddhist path of lovingkindness can help us discover the radiant, joyful heart within each of us.

Throughout our lives we long to love ourselves more deeply and find a greater sense of connection with others. Our fear of intimacy--both with others and with ourselves--creates feelings of pain and longing. But these feelings can also awaken in us the desire for freedom and the willingness to take up the spiritual path.
The practice of lovingkindness is revolutionary because it has the power to radically change our lives, helping us cultivate true happiness in ourselves and genuine compassion for others. The Buddha described the nature of such a spiritual path as "the liberation of the heart, which is love." The author draws on simple Buddhist teachings, wisdom stories from various traditions, guided meditation practices, and her own experience from twenty-five years of practice and teaching to illustrate how each one of us can cultivate love, compassion, joy, and equanimity--the four "heavenly abodes" of traditional Buddhism.
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  1. Print length
    256 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Shambhala Publications Inc
  4. Publication date
    20 July 2018
  5. Dimensions
    10.85 x 2.06 x 17.12 cm
  6. ISBN-10
    1611806240
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1611806243
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  1. Metta is the ability to embrace all parts of ourselves, as well as all parts of the world.
    Highlighted by 832 Kindle readers
  2. Sometimes we take quite a journey—physically or mentally or emotionally—when the very love and happiness we want so much can be found by just sitting down.
    Highlighted by 770 Kindle readers
  3. So the intention is enough. We form the intention in our mind for our happiness and the happiness of all.
    Highlighted by 762 Kindle readers
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About the Author

SHARON SALZBERG is a cofounder and guiding teacher of the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, and a cofounder of the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies. She teaches meditation around the country and has been practicing Buddhist meditation for over forty years.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Shambhala Publications Inc
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ 20 July 2018
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 256 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1611806240
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1611806243
  • Item weight ‏ : ‎ 221 g
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 10.85 x 2.06 x 17.12 cm
  • Best Sellers Rank: 352,886 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • Customer reviews:
    4.7 out of 5 stars 1,391 ratings

About the author

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Sharon Salzberg

Sharon Salzberg

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Sharon Salzberg is a meditation pioneer, world-renowned teacher, and New York Times bestselling author. She is one of the first to bring mindfulness and lovingkindness meditation to mainstream American culture over 45 years ago, inspiring generations of meditation teachers and wellness influencers. Sharon is co-founder of The Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA, and the author of twelve books, including the New York Times bestseller, Real Happiness, now in its second edition, and her seminal work, Lovingkindness. Her forthcoming release, Real Life: The Journey from Isolation to Openness and Freedom, is set for release in April of 2023 from Flatiron Books. Her podcast, The Metta Hour, has amassed six million downloads and features interviews with thought leaders from the mindfulness movement and beyond. Learn more at www.sharonsalzberg.com

Customer reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
1,391 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the book easy to understand and appreciate its practical meditations and pearls of wisdom. The writing style is kind, and one customer notes it's written from the heart. They value the book's focus on developing compassion, with one mentioning it helps with metta meditation, while another describes it as a guide to becoming more at peace.

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AdviceInspirationCompassionPacingWriting styleEase of understanding
17 customers mention ‘Advice’16 positive1 negative

Customers appreciate the advice in the book, describing it as an amazing practice to take up, with one customer noting it provides lots of guidelines to help readers on their journey.

"...but this was the first that was really easy to understand, with practical examples and meditations to follow and full of day to day examples of the..." Read more

"A very comprehensive book. It's easily accessible with lots of stories to consolidate its message...." Read more

"...She provides great stories, deep understanding and, critically, the kind of precise, technical meditation tips that are the blessing of the..." Read more

"Great book giving advice on how to be more loving and kinder to yourself and everyone else which will enhance happiness and wellbeing...." Read more

13 customers mention ‘Inspiration’13 positive0 negative

Customers find the book inspiring, with practical meditations and useful exercises on compassion. One customer mentions it has helped them keep going, while another notes it is often borrowed by meditation students.

"...requires focus and concentration, I found it to be enlightening and inspiring...." Read more

"A truly excellent introduction to Buddhist meditation, which I now use as my constant companion, and have ordered three further copies to give to..." Read more

"Great book, really inspiring. I read this on a relaxing holiday and came back full of peace!..." Read more

"Great inspiring book. Timeless in its insights. Recommend heartily." Read more

8 customers mention ‘Compassion’8 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's focus on developing compassion, with one customer noting how it enhances happiness and wellbeing.

"A lovey book from a wonderful teacher. Sharon is a great guide with may many years of training and practice...." Read more

"...Buddha's teachings can inspire all of us to live more kindly and be more loving...." Read more

"...Gottta be the best book on becoming more at peace, self-loving and connected through cultivating Loving Kindness/Friendliness, Compassion,..." Read more

"...It also absolutely exudes lovingkindness, which is a main factor attracting me to a book, though I was not previously familiar with the term...." Read more

6 customers mention ‘Pacing’6 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's pacing, with one mentioning it helps cultivate loving kindness and friendliness, while another notes it brings up personal dilemmas.

"...Open, loving, fearless, accurate, non-narrow, non-petty; we've got a lot to thank the Buddha for, and this is a truly wonderful exposition by Sharon..." Read more

"...There are chapters on facets of lovingkindness, hindrances to lovingkindness, working with anger and aversion, developing the compassionate heart,..." Read more

"...what loving kindness meditation is all about, it brings up a lot of personal dilemmas which we come across in everyday life and how she managed to..." Read more

"...Gottta be the best book on becoming more at peace, self-loving and connected through cultivating Loving Kindness/Friendliness, Compassion,..." Read more

6 customers mention ‘Writing style’6 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the writing style of the book, describing it as kind and heartfelt, with one customer noting it provides fantastic insight into the author's life.

"...Cannot recommend enough. So well written." Read more

"Fabulous, kind & written from the heart" Read more

"...I greatly recommend this well-written and absolutely inspiring book to all those who wish to develop a loving heart...." Read more

"...It is written in a very kind and non judgemental way. I would definitively recommend it to anyone interested in the subject." Read more

5 customers mention ‘Ease of understanding’5 positive0 negative

Customers find the book easy to understand.

"...Buddhist philosophy recently but this was the first that was really easy to understand, with practical examples and meditations to follow and full..." Read more

"...away the most to friends, colleagues as the book is inspiring and so clear about how to incorporate loving kindness in our lives and how the Buddha..." Read more

"...I’ve been amazed by how easy and quickly the Metta meditations have an impact...." Read more

"...It s an inspiring book easy to read and understand, there are lots of guidelines to help us on our journey Thankyou" Read more

Top reviews from United Kingdom

  • Iona Main Stewart
    5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful book containing invaluable exercises that make you feel good
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 14 June 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Sharon Salzberg has practiced Buddhist meditation for many years, so the book provides much information about Buddhism. Though reading the book requires focus and concentration, I found it to be enlightening and inspiring. It also absolutely exudes lovingkindness, which is a main factor attracting me to a book, though I was not previously familiar with the term.

    Lovingkindness is a translation of the Pali word "metta", which is the first of the brahma-viharas, or the "heavenly abodes". The others - compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity - "grow out of metta, which supports and extends these states".

    The author is open about her own shortcomings and episodes that have contributed to her development, and provides us with many personal stories that add to the book's readability.

    The Buddha presented the metta meditation as an antidote to fear. A mind involved with lovingkindness cannot be overcome by fear. Lovingkindness overcomes the illusion of separatenesss and all its accompanying states - "fear, alienation, loneliness, and despair - all of the feelings of fragmentation".

    When we feel love, we can allow ourselves to be fully aware of the entirety of life - both pleasures and pains. "Love can uproot fear or anger or guilt, because it is a greater power".

    Metta begins with loving ourselves. We ourselves deserve our love and affection. We must focus on the goodness in others, and will thus forge a connection to them. The force of metta "allows us to cohere, to come together within ourselves and with all beings".

    What I most appreciated in the book was the numerous exercises. The first exercise advises us to call to mind kind or good actions we have done, or qualities we appreciate about ourselves. In the second exercise we practice befriending ourselves by repeating phrases relating to what we wish for ourselves.

    There are four phrases generally used:

    "May I be free from danger."
    "May I have mental happiness."
    "May I have physical happiness."
    "May I have ease of well-being."

    I personally have chosen the phrases:

    "May I be healed, completely healed."
    "May I fulfill my life purpose."
    "May I be loving."
    "May I be blissful."

    We begin by reflecting on the good within us or our wish to be happy. Then we repeat the four phrases we have chosen, again and again. After doing this exercise I feel really good.

    In later exercises we repeat the chosen phrases directed towards others - a benefactor, a neutral person, a difficult person, difficult aspects of oneself, all beings, all females, all males, all enlightened beings, all those in ignorance, etc, etc.

    There are chapters on facets of lovingkindness, hindrances to lovingkindness, working with anger and aversion, developing the compassionate heart, the power of generosity, etc, etc. (There is also a useful exercise on compassion for those who cause pain.)

    I found this to be a most wonderful book, which I will need to re-read several times. I greatly recommend this well-written and absolutely inspiring book to all those who wish to develop a loving heart. I will be looking out for other books by this author.
    25 people found this helpful
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  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Crisp, fresh, uncompromising
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 March 2008
    Verified Purchase
    This may be personal to me, but I tend to fear that books on this topic will be a bit drippy, nebulously positive feelgood items. Happily, Sharon Salzberg is a true teacher in the Theravadan tradition and helps me move towards lovingkindness as i think it was meant. As she presents it, lovingkindness is clarity about the flaws in the world, ourselves, other people. Lovingkindness is a compassionate non-denial of what things are like. Oddly, lovingkindness turns out to be the antidote to fear. It opens us up to the world, rather than trying to drape existence in pink positive soft-focus light. Open, loving, fearless, accurate, non-narrow, non-petty; we've got a lot to thank the Buddha for, and this is a truly wonderful exposition by Sharon Salzberg. She provides great stories, deep understanding and, critically, the kind of precise, technical meditation tips that are the blessing of the Theravadan tradition. There are a lot of solid, traditional metta practices straight from the canon summarised in here. A book that I will be mining for years.
    64 people found this helpful
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  • Krystyna
    5.0 out of 5 stars Surprised and delighted.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 23 May 2022
    Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
    I bought the book after it was mentioned in Self-Compassion by Kristen Neff.
    I was struck by how similar Buddhist practices are to what’s recommended in neuroscience and mental well-being advocacy programs. It’s as though we’ve recently discovered what Buddha already knew.
    I’ve been amazed by how easy and quickly the Metta meditations have an impact. I had been really struggling with my mental health, I’ve seen an improvement in a short space of time and I’m motivated to continue.
    4 people found this helpful
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  • Ivan Sayer
    4.0 out of 5 stars Four Stars
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 26 June 2018
    Verified Purchase
    A very useful book.
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  • Zandra
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 16 August 2021
    Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
    Every word of this book spoke to me. Yes, it is a retelling of some classic Buddhist teachings, nothing new, but how could 'new' be better? She explains how to do the Metta practice, what might go 'wrong', and how to proceed if you feel you are getting nowhere. She makes no extravagant claims but shows at times how her own state of mind changed by doing the practice and how it helped her. Following the exercises had an effect for me almost immediately - when one of my 'enemies' looked as if she was about to get her comeuppance, which would have made my life considerably easier, I found that I felt real compassion for her rather than just relief or pleasure. It's a great book that I feel lucky to have found.
    6 people found this helpful
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  • K. P. Ripton
    5.0 out of 5 stars Sincere and profound
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 2 March 2012
    Verified Purchase
    I find the book truly wonderful. It's a great supplement to my daily lovingkindness meditations. It offers an honest and very profound study of the mind. It goes into detail about the traditional lovingkindness practice, how you can integrate it in daily life and what pitfalls you are likely to encounter once you start practicing lovingkindness. It is written in a very kind and non judgemental way. I would definitively recommend it to anyone interested in the subject.
    9 people found this helpful
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  • Norfolkboy7
    5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Book
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 28 May 2013
    Verified Purchase
    I have recently been down to my local fwbo and enroled on 2 meditation courses and also an essential buddhism course and this book was recommended to me to help with the metta meditation and back up what was been taught to us, it has been a fantastic insight to the writers life and has helped me understand what loving kindness meditation is all about, it brings up a lot of personal dilemmas which we come across in everyday life and how she managed to overcome those issues.An inspiring read.
    4 people found this helpful
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  • Stefan P
    5.0 out of 5 stars So clear and inspiring
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 31 October 2015
    Verified Purchase
    This is the book that I give away the most to friends, colleagues as the book is inspiring and so clear about how to incorporate loving kindness in our lives and how the Buddha's teachings can inspire all of us to live more kindly and be more loving. The book is one I always come back to and though for me I have a long way to travel on the path, the book has helped me keep going.
    8 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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  • Emily
    5.0 out of 5 stars Deep, timeless work
    Reviewed in the United States on 2 September 2017
    Verified Purchase
    Such a deep thoughtful book. This book is timeless and has so many golden insights that it filled up my Kindle highlights. I'd love to re-read it.

    Favorite quotes:
    Abandoning unskillful states that cause suffering is not something we do out of fear of or contempt for those states, or out of contempt for ourselves for having those states arise in the mind. Abandoning the unskillful isn’t accomplished by angrily shoving or pushing away our habits of separation. Rather it comes as we learn to truly love ourselves and all beings, so that love provides the light by which we bear witness to those burdens, watching them simply fall away.

    We can travel a long way and do many different things, but our deepest happiness is not born from accumulating new experiences. It is born from letting go of what is unnecessary, and knowing ourselves to be always at home. True happiness may not be at all far away, but it requires a radical change of view as to where to find it.

    There is a word in Buddhist psychology, tathata, that can be translated as “thusness” or “suchness.” It describes a state in which the totality of our being is present; our awareness is not fragmented or divided. In the state of suchness, some part of ourselves is not sitting elsewhere waiting for something better or different to happen. We are not relating to our experience with either desire or aversion, but rather we accept what comes into our lives and let go of what leaves our lives. We are completely present and not beguiled by the token happiness promised by conventional assumptions. In experiencing the freedom of suchness, we discover who we actually are.

    The simple act of being completely present to another person is truly an act of love—no drama is required.

    A friend may disappoint us; she may not meet our expectations, but we do not stop being a friend to her. We may in fact disappoint ourselves, may not meet our own expectations, but we do not cease to be a friend to ourselves.

    As we lose touch with our inner life, we become dependent on the shifting winds of external change for a sense of who we are, what we care about, and what we value. The fear of pain that we tried to escape becomes, in fact, our constant companion.

    We so often in our lives serve as mirrors for one another. We look to others to find out if we ourselves are lovable; we look to others to find out if we are capable of feeling love;

    Imagine taking a very small glass of water and putting into it a teaspoon of salt. Because of the small size of the container, the teaspoon of salt is going to have a big impact upon the water. However, if you approach a much larger body of water, such as a lake, and put into it that same teaspoonful of salt, it will not have the same intensity of impact, because of the vastness and openness of the vessel receiving it. Even when the salt remains the same, the spaciousness of the vessel receiving it changes everything. We spend a lot of our lives looking for a feeling of safety or protection; we try to alter the amount of salt that comes our way. Ironically, the salt is the very thing that we cannot do anything about, as life changes and offers us repeated ups and downs. Our true work is to create a container so immense that any amount of salt, even a truckload, can come into it without affecting our capacity to receive it. No situation, even an extreme one, then can mandate a particular reaction.

    Forgiveness allows us to recapture some part of ourselves that we left behind in bondage to a past event. Some part of our identity may also need to die in that letting go, so that we can reclaim the energy bound up in the past.
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  • Client d'Amazon
    4.0 out of 5 stars lovingkindness
    Reviewed in France on 24 January 2016
    Verified Purchase
    Le livre est arrivé en mauvais état , visiblement un vieux livre usagé ayant déjà servi: pages jaunies,couverture abimée,etc...Suite à ma réclamation, le site m'a proposé un remboursement ( je ne l'ai pas encore reçu mais bon...) et de garder le livre ...Cela me semblait correct...mais j'aurais malgré tout préféré avoir un livre neuf !!!
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  • Femme
    5.0 out of 5 stars Hermoso
    Reviewed in Mexico on 9 December 2018
    Verified Purchase
    Hermoso
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  • Kamilla Naves
    5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing book that provides guidance to all people in pursuit of happiness
    Reviewed in Brazil on 3 December 2014
    Verified Purchase
    By teaching you simple yet profound Buddhist thoughts, this book is going to change the way you see the world. It praises love and compassion for all beings, inspiring and motivating readers to take the lead in their own lives in a positive and optimistic manner.
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  • CherylM
    5.0 out of 5 stars Great book
    Reviewed in Canada on 23 June 2024
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Great read
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