Buddha Mom: The Path of Mindful Mothering

by Jacqueline Kramer

Overview

In Buddha Mom, Jacqueline Kramer beautifully illuminates the ways in which motherhood can be woven with the spiritual life. Drawing upon her twenty years as a practicing Buddhist, as well as many other wisdom traditions from around the world, she offers powerful insights into cultivating a more spiritual attitude toward parenting.

In chapters, guided by central Buddhist themes-Simplicity, Nurturance, Joyful Service, Unconditional Love-Kramer's personal experience of pregnancy, birth, and then raising her daughter to adulthood serves as a guide to integrating the roles of parent and spiritual being. A celebration of all that motherhood can be, Buddha Mom presents an inspiring vision of child rearing.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781585422944
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/12/2004
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	18 - 13 Years

About the Author

Jacqueline Kramer has been a practicing Buddhist for the past twenty years. A spiritual counselor and art teacher, she also writes and performs one-woman shows in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Table of Contents

	Preface	xi
	Setting Foot on the Path
	Pregnancy: Turning Inward	3
	Birthing: Initiation	17
	Mothering: The Path of Loving Kindness	29
	The Practice on the Path
	Householding: Fundamental Morality	47
	Simplicity: Ease	65
	Homemaking: Everyday Art	75
	Nurturance: Cooking with Love	87
	Cleaning: Centering	102
	Joyful Service: Selfless Service	111
	Extended Family: Karmic Relationships	123
	Self-Love: Temple Care	137
	Unconditional Love: Skillful Loving	152
	Attachment: Bonding and Releasing	171
	Faith: Patience and Receptivity	181
	Meditation: Affirmation and Prayer	193
	Universal Mothering: Peace	207

Editorial Reviews

Jacqueline Kramer has been a practicing Buddhist for 20 years, but some of her best insights into Buddhism have come not from meditation but from mothering. I was led to believe that mothering was a side track on the path toward spiritual liberation, but that wasn't my experience, she explains. I have found mothering to be a direct path to spiritual insight. In this gentle book, she explores how she has become a better Buddhist through opening herself to motherhood. Even childbirth (which she did sans epidural) became, for her, a valuable meditation lesson, since the pain forced her to consciously relax and surrender control. In fact, surrendering control is the central theme of the entire book. There are chapters on housekeeping, nurturing (particularly regarding food) and the practice of loving-kindness, or metta. For Kramer, motherhood has been a catalyst to strive for greater selflessness and connection with the universe, both core Buddhist principles. It has also brought home to her the impermanence of all things; there is nothing like the rapid growth of children to remind us that all relationships are destined to change. Such impermanence has led Kramer to a conscious decision to be fully present in the here and now, determined not to miss a moment of her daughter's life or her own. This fluid book on mindful mothering will appeal to many readers who are interested in the profound spiritual significance of the everyday acts of motherhood metta. (Apr.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Unlike most parenting books, which stress gaining skills through experience, this one opts to explore mothering from a conscious psychic perspective. Kramer, a spiritual counselor and practicing Buddhist, shows how to incorporate spiritual concepts such as self-love, unconditional love, and joyful service into the pregnancy, birthing, and mothering roles. Notably, she finds that a parent may unconsciously hold "habits of powerlessness" that may manifest themselves in different ways in her career, sexual relationships, parenting, and spiritual work. Everyday tasks such as cooking and homemaking in terms of "spirit in action" are also discussed. No background on Buddhist principles is provided, yet Kramer makes clear her purpose: conscious mothering fosters spiritual development in the one who undertakes it. As a result, she is often able to bring a healing touch to a chaotic world. Ultimately, through fine descriptive passages, she also moves the reader to feel various emotions, in turn, nurturing a joyful, spiritual sense of "whole being" beyond just feeling well mentally. Suitable for spirituality and parenting sections in public libraries.-Lisa Liquori, M.L.S., Syracuse, NY Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

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