Rick Hanson - Neurodharma: New Science, Ancient Wisdom, and Seven Practices of the Highest Happiness

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Id like to thank the readers who gave me useful feedback, including James Austin, James Baraz, Leigh Brasington, Annette Brown, Alisa Dennis, Andrew Dreitcer, Peter Grossenbacher, Forrest Hanson, Jan Hanson, Kathy Kimber, John Kleiner, Edward Lewis, Richard Mendius, Venerable Sanda Mudita, Stephanie Noble, Sui Oakland, Lily OBrien, Jan Ogren, John Prendergast, Tina Rasmussen, Ratnadevi, Jane Razavet, John Schorling, Michael Taft, Marina Van Walsum, Stephanie Veillon, Roger Walsh, and Jennifer Willis. Any errors that have survived their scrutiny are entirely my own.

Im grateful to my teachers, some of whom are listed just above. Others include Ajahn Amaro, Guy Armstrong, Steve Armstrong, Tara Brach, Eugene Cash, Christina Feldman, Gil Fronsdal, Joseph Goldstein, Thich Nhat Hanh, Jack Kornfield, Kamala Masters, and Ajahn Succito. Ive also learned greatly from Bhikkhu Anlayo, Stephen Batchelor, Thnissaro Bhikkhu, Bhikkhu Bodhi, Richard Gombrich, Mu Soeng, and Shinzen Young. And Im thankful for the larger lineages and communities that have created, protected, and fostered wisdom around the world for thousands of years.

Scientists, scholars, clinicians, and teachers have developed useful understandings of the body and mindincluding the neural basis of mindfulness, meditation, compassion, and kindness, and other aspects of awakeningas well as applications for practice. There are many more than I can name, but Id like to pay my respects in particular to Bernard Baars, Richard Davidson, John Dunne, Bruce Ecker, Barbara Fredrickson, Chris Germer, Paul Gilbert, Timothea Goddard, Steve Hickman, Britta Holzel, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Dacher Keltner, Sara Lazar, Antoine Lutz, Jonathan Nash, Kristin Neff, Andrew Newberg, Stephen Porges, Jeffrey Schwartz, Shauna Shapiro, Dan Siegel, Ron Siegel, Evan Thompson, Fred Travis, David Vago, Cassandra Vieten, Alan Wallace, Mark Williams, Diana Winston, David Yadenand to the memory of Francisco Varela.

Thank you both to the participants in the neurodharma retreats Ive taught and to my co-teachers: Leslie Booker, Alisa Dennis, Peter Grossenbacher, Tara Mulay, Tina Rasmussen, and Terry Vandiver. I also have special gratitude for Sui Oakland, who organized and managed these retreats, and for Kaleigh Isaacs, who produced the online program based on them. Shambhala Mountain Center has been a beautiful and sacred home for these retreats. And from my heart, a deep thank-you to Judi Bell, Stuart Bell, Tom Bowlin, Daniel Ellenberg, Lee Freedman, Laurel Hanson, Marc Lesser, Crystal Lim-Lange, Greg Lim-Lange, Susan Pollak, Lenny Stein, Bob Truog, and Lienhard Valentin for your friendship and support of the neurodharma express!

Im so grateful to the people who have come to our San Rafael Meditation Gathering over the years, and especially to our wonderful stewards, including Tom Brown, Nan Herron, Sundara Jordan, Lily OBrien, Laurie Oman, Rob Paul, Christine Pollock, Gabriel Rabu, Tarane Sayler, Bill Schwarz, Trisha Schwarz, Donna Simonsen, Mark Stefanski, Shilpa Tilwalli, and Jerry White.

Truly, this book would not have been possible without my agent, Amy Rennert, and her support over the years. Im also very thankful for my skillful and patient editor at Penguin Random House, Donna Loffredo, as well as for the whole team there. Additionally, the people who work with me at Being Well, Inc., have been absolutely instrumental in bringing this book to life; they include Forrest Hanson, Michelle Keane, Sui Oakland, Marion Reynolds, Andrew Schuman, Paul Van de Riet, and Stephanie Veillon.

Last and far from least, my precious, wonderful wife, Jan, has been endlessly encouraging and helpful with this bookand more profoundly, my whole life. She listened to me read it to her at night and gave me many useful suggestionsand, more fundamentally, her faith in its worth. With all my love: thank you.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rick Hanson, PhD, is a psychologist, senior fellow of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, and New York Times bestselling author. His books have been published in twenty-eight languages and include Neurodharma , Resilient , Hardwiring Happiness , Just One Thing , Buddhas Brain , and Mother Nurture with more than 900,000 copies in English alone. Founder of the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom, he has been an invited speaker at Google, NASA, Oxford, and Harvard, and taught in meditation centers worldwide. He has several online offeringsincluding the Neurodharma experiential programand more than 150,000 people receive his free weekly newsletter. He and his wife live in Northern California and have two adult children. He enjoys being in wilderness and taking a break from emails.

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