Wise-Love

2019 Winner the Montaigne Medal, Eric Hoffer Book Awards. 2018 Winner Spirituality, National Indie Excellence Awards. 2018 Finalist Spirituality, Next Generation Indie Book Awards. 2018 Finalist Book of the Year Body/Mind/Spirit Foreword Indies. We all long for boundless love as we long for home. But how can we find our home our meaning and purpose if we don t know our self? Wise-Love is an exploration of the self, or consciousness, guided through the meditative eyes of saints, sages, seers, and mystics. As we embark on the journey to the self, we discover that the self's most charming characteristic part of its eternal, unchanging nature is that it is a lover, a lover who can be satisfied only when ordinary love evolves into wise-love. Pranada Comtois, a devoted pilgrim and teacher, illuminates bhakti's wisdom school of heartfulness and shows why mindfulness alone can never satisfy the self. Joy comes from an awakened heart and expanded consciousness, not from a controlled or stilled mind. The first part of Wise-Love explores the nature of self/consciousness and how we interface with the world with the use of our physical body and subtle body (mind, intelligence, and ego). By understanding the distinctions between our real and false selves, we can factually answer the questions Who am I? What is my purpose? and How can I be happy? The second half of the book examines the nature of matter, the world of consciousness, karma, faith, mysticism, the efficacy of sacred sound, the maha-mantra, kirtan, humility, depth compassion, and how to culture wise-love. Each chapter unfolds with an understanding of matter and consciousness to present a key that unlocks our eternal nature so that we can experience the unbounded joy of the self in our daily lives. When we encounter the self, we're automatically introduced to our Divine Inner Suitor and our loving relationship with him. Filled with insight and fresh perspectives, Wise-Love offers a map for the journey to our home of eternal affection, where a porch light is always lovingly lit, and a warm embrace from our Divine Other awaits. Secretly nestled in the Upanishads and extolled in the Bhagavad Gita, bhakti yoga shines as the crown jewel on the head of India's timeless wisdom about consciousness and how to live one's meditation. Often over-simplified as devotion, bhakti is the method of experiencing the self and its Essence/Source. This concise yet comprehensive handbook exploring the meaning of bhakti's sophisticated philosophy promises to enrich you wherever you are on the spiritual path.

Contents
Foreword
Introduction
Prologue: A Genesis I. Rising Consciousness
1: The Feeling Self
2: The Miracle of Us: Being, Knowing, Loving
3: The Realm of the Mind
4: Who Will Fell the False Self?
5: The Small "My" and the Big "I" II. Peering Over the Horizon.
6: Virtual Reality
7: Intractable Karma - or Not?
8: Karma and Lila: Forced Action and the Freedom to Play
9: Horizontal and Vertical Development
10: Faith, Not Belief
11: Everybody Loves a Mystic III. Layers of Luminosity
12: An Inconceivable Dualism and Nondualism
13. What's Your Ideal?
14: Life After Enlightenment
15: The Yoga of Love
16: Exercises of the Heart IV. Stellar Light
17: Seeing With Your Ears
18: Sacred Sound
19: Mantra
20: Mantra of Names
21: Theology of the Name
22: Prema-Kirtan
23: Bhakti Revivalist, Ecstatic Mystic V. Compass Rays
24: Wise-Love
25: The Culture of Giving
26: Love's Morals
27: Humility
28. Compassion's Play on Love's Scale
29. Depth Compassion VI. Waterfall of Moonbeams
30: Independence from the Constraints of Our Humanness
31: A Home-knowing Person
32: Lifestyle of the Bhakta
33: Two Inches VII. Full Orb of Consciousness
34: The Charming Form of the Absolute
35: The Absolute's Life
36: God's Existential Crisis
37: She Whom He Worships
38: Above the Ceiling of the Sky Afterword: The Feminine Divine
Glossary
Bibliography
Acknowledgments
About the Author