The Heroic Heart

April 25, 2022
This sterling study by Palmo (Into the Heart of Life) looks at what the 14th-century Buddhist text The Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva has to say about living as a Buddhist today. She unpacks each of the 37 verses on changing one’s attitude and “the habitual ways that we respond to situations that happen to us” so as to live free of “delusion and ignorance.” For example, Palmo suggests the verse, “To abandon my native land is the practice of a bodhisattva,” encourages readers to question habits and thought patterns that might be stalling them on the path to enlightenment. The author says of the 12th verse—which concerns dedicating one’s “body” and “possessions” to someone who “seizes all my wealth”—that readers should embrace adversity because it’s the repayment of karmic debt and tests whether one has really let go of one’s anger and material concerns. Palmo’s compassionate voice and lucid explanations are a winning combination, though readers with some background in Buddhism will get the most out of it. The perceptive interpretations provide plenty of food for thought.