Bernie - Ordinary Freedom

About the Author

JON BERNIE is a contemporary spiritual teacher in the lineage of Adyashanti, leading regular classes, retreats and intensives in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. As a counselor in private practice, Jon also works with individuals directly to facilitate consciousness development and deep emotional healing. A lifelong resident of the Bay Area, Jon has been at various times a Zero Balancing practitioner, a teacher of the Alexander Technique, a concert violinist and an ordained Zen Buddhist monk.

Jons spiritual journey began with a spontaneous awakening experience at age sixteen, which led him to spend many years practicing in the Zen and Theravada Buddhist traditions, first as a monk in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki-roshi, and later as an early student of Jack Kornfield. In the late 1980s, Jons spiritual trajectory was profoundly altered when he met Advaita master Jean Klein, with whom he studied intensively for an extended period. Jon subsequently spent time with H.W.L. Poonja and Robert Adams, both direct disciples of Ramana Maharshi. Jons spiritual development was also greatly aided by Brother David Steindl-Rast, a Benedictine monk who studied with several well-known Zen masters and has since been instrumental in building interfaith networks worldwide. After Jon met Adyashanti in 2002, his journey came to fruition, and subsequently Adya asked Jon to teach.

CLEAR WATER SANGHA

Clear Water Sangha, a non-profit organization, was established to support the teachings of Jon Bernie. The board of directors and dedicated volunteers help coordinate a variety of activities including the production of written publications, management of satsangs, retreats and other events, and ongoing maintenance of Jons website.

For further information, please visit:
www.jonbernie.org

Praise for Ordinary Freedom

TO FIND AN ACCOMPLISHED SPIRITUAL TEACHER IS A RARE GIFT. To find a book that puts you in a most lively way in the presence of such a teacher is even more rare. But here it is! Jon Bernies Ordinary Freedom has all the power of the spoken word and vibrates with the overtones of that teachers caring, compassionate nearness. Deep, yet always simple; simple, yet never simplistic; clear, eloquent, and always to the point, Ordinary Freedom is not an ordinary book. It springs from freedom and breathes freedom. Caution: This book may be hazardous to your current level of consciousness!

BROTHER DAVID STEINDL-RAST, OSB, author, lecturer, co-founder of www.gratefulness.org

WHAT A BEAUTIFUL, SIMPLE, HEARTFELT MESSAGE! The end of seeking is not something to be found in the future it is right here, present at the very heart of experience, just waiting to be discovered by those who are ready and willing to come face-to-face with life.

Jon Bernie expresses the timeless truth of non-duality (non-separation) in such a warm, authentically human voice. He meets you as a wise, loving friend rather than as spiritual master or guru and gently points out the various ways in which you are currently at war with your own experience. His message is rare and precious in that it does not attempt to deny or transcend our humanity, or dismiss it as an aberration, but rather embraces it fully as part of an infinitely bigger picture. Jon honours your embodied experience, whilst at the same time clearly and directly pointing you far beyond the personal, to a wordless freedom that belongs to no-one, and therefore is available to everyone.

Read Ordinary Freedom and rediscover something that you have always known that this seemingly ordinary life is already the miracle youve been seeking, and that here and now is forever saturated with wonder. This is mature, grounded spirituality for grown-ups, and I thoroughly recommend it.

JEFF FOSTER, author of The Wonder of Being and An Extraordinary Absence.