The Light Inside the Dark: Zen, Soul, and the Spiritual Life

Try smiling at the morning birds while in the grip of profound grief. The effort of just turning up the corners of your lips is enough to send you back to the oblivion of sleep. Escape, John Tarrant tells us, is not the answer; neither is just getting over it. In a lyrical fusion of Jungian psychology and Zen Buddhism, Zen teacher Tarrant narrates the human descent into darkness and, through meditative living, the subsequent ascent to the light. Like a nonfiction version of Dante's Divine Comedy, Tarrant acts as our guide on a journey through myths and stories, crushing experience, and heroic drama, into the maws of despair and out again into the light of compassionate living. Coming face to face with our interior troubles is the catalyst, Tarrant says, for liberating ourselves into the moment. But Tarrant is no glib optimist. The ascent can be as treacherous as the fall and demands constant attention. Second to none in modern Zen literature, Tarrant will bring you smiling into the light, even if it takes a trip through hell to do it. --Brian Bruya