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Pure Water - Poetry of Rumi wins Gold Nautilus Award for audio!

This morning at Book Expo America in New York City it was officially announced that Pure Water-Poetry of Rumi with Coleman Barks and Grammy Award-Winning cellist  Eugene Friesen, won the Gold Award in the Audio Category of The Nautilus Book Awards.

Better Listen! is honored to be in the company of the other outstanding Silver and Gold winners in the competition. 

Click here listen to a preview (and purchase) this great title.

Click here for a delightful transcribed excerpt of the audio program.

BetterListen!, a new media publishing label, is a socially responsible social media company.  Less than one year into our launch, (yes our website seems to be in perpetual beta) we are off to a great start.  BetterListen! intends to make a positive impact with our endeavors.  We are open to high quality content for audio and video publishing as well as written content for our blog.   Please let us know your feedback and ideas.

Excerpt from Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser, Part 3 of 5

This week we are delighted to offer another excerpt from the Introduction of BROKEN OPEN: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow.

To be human is to be lost in the woods. None of us arrives here with clear directions on how to get from point A to point B without stumbling into the forest of confusion or catastrophe or wrongdoing. Although they are dark and dangerous, it is in the woods that we discover our strengths. We all know people who say their cancer or divorce or bankruptcy was the greatest gift of a lifetime—that until the body, or the heart, or the bank was broken, they didn’t know who they were, what they felt, or what they wanted. Before their descent into the darkness, they took more than they gave, or they were numb, or full of fear or blame or self-pity. In their most broken moments they were brought to their knees; they were humbled; they were opened. And later, as they pulled the pieces back together, they discovered a clearer sense of purpose and a new passion for life. But we also know people who did not turn their misfortune into insight, or their grief into joy. Instead, they became more bitter, more reactive, more cynical. They shut down. They went back to sleep. The Persian poet Rumi says,

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.

Don’t go back to sleep.

 

You must ask for what you really want.

 

Don’t go back to sleep.

 

People are going back and forth across the doorsill

 

where the two worlds touch.

 

The door is round and open.

 

Don’t go back to sleep.

Excerpted from Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser Copyright © 2004 by Elizabeth Lesser. Excerpted by permission of Villard, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

NEXT WEEK:  More from BROKEN OPEN: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow by Elizabeth Lesser

Elizabeth Lesser Bio and Links 

Excerpt from "Way of the Spiritual Warrior" with David Gershon

Join David Gershon as he explores the first quality of the spiritual warrior – courage and bravery – in this excerpt from his recording “Way of the Spiritual Warrior”.

The seven qualities of the spiritual warrior.  First quality is the quality of courage, or bravery. Let me read a quote. “It requires courage to come out, reach out, and effect positive change in ourselves and in the larger institutions we serve. It requires courage to love.  It requires courage to accept that we ourselves can push the universe into higher states of order.” That’s a quote from Jim Channon, Evolutionary Tactics.  Another quote: “For the warrior, the experience of the tender heart is what gives birth to fearlessness.  Real fearlessness is the product of tenderness; it comes from letting the world into your heart.  You are willing to open up without resistance and face the world. You are willing to share your heart with others.  Without the tenderness, the bravery is brittle like a china cup.” From Rick O’ Shea, How to Be a Warrior.  And one last quote, before we get into actually talking about courage and bravery: “The warrior’s way is not invulnerability but vulnerability -- to the world, to life, and therefore to the presence”. That’s from a book called, The Way of the Peaceful Warrior.

So what are the qualities of courage and bravery? First quality that I see of courage and bravery is the willingness to say the difficult things. The willingness to say the difficult things, to be vulnerable.  I found in my life, that to achieve is not that hard. But what really became scary for me was to share what made me vulnerable, which was in fact that I might be thought of as less than in the eyes of the world.  That is my self-esteem; when that was put into play when that was what was really at stake, that’s where I found my vulnerability or where indeed had fear.  The way I came to know about that was through my wife, who is one of my mentors for better or worse.  

David Gershon Bio and Links

BetterListen! Free Sampler Mix with Thich Nhat Hanh, Shlomo Carlebach, Gloria Steinem, Coleman Barks

Welcome to the First BetterListen! Sampler Mix.

Our sampler mixes offer you a taste of our titles. This Mix features Gloria Steinem, Thich Nhat Hanh, Shlomo Carlebach, Coleman Barks, Beryl Bender Birch, The Indigenous Peoples Message To The World and more.

As far as we know, we've never seen a sampler mix anything like this, both in format and content. So please let us know how the technology works and how you enjoy the content.

Subscribe to our feed to get updates on new preview mixes, new releases, new authors, new blog posts and new audio / video programs.

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Share these free previews with your online and offline friends. If you like a sample, you can buy the complete program on our site and on iTunes.

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If the player does not show up below in your browser click here to listen.

The New Epicureans by Thomas Moore available on MP3 and iTunes

Recorded live in Europe, this instructive lecture is a great visit with the best-selling author of "Care of The Soul." His new book "A Life at Work," is published by Broadway Books/Random House. In this inspired talk Thomas first shares with the listener the roots of his work and approach to philosophy and living.

Thomas then goes on to explore how our sexually repressed society contributes to violence and dysfunction in the current age. Click here for Digital Liner Notes from the author. Author Bio and Links

Running Time: 78 minutes New Epicureans Preview	Buy From BetterListen! MP3 download $9.95 MP3 download info
	also available on iTunes

Excerpt from "Science and the Inner Experience" with Edgar Mitchell

We continue our series of excerpts from Dr. Edgar Mitchell’s talks with this transcription from “Science and the Inner Experience”.

 

Move out now further into space.  See the shape of the earth as a sphere.  Let’s move on out until we see the earth about as we would see it -- the size of a ball, a baseball held at arms length.  Look at that magnificent little planet blue and white, peaceful.   The turmoil that goes on underneath that layer of atmosphere and those clouds is not evident to us here.  We recognize it as a haven of life, our home, our planet. As far as we know for sure, the only haven of life in our galaxy, but as we suspect, probably not the only one.  But a beautiful little planet in the immensity of space and set in the background, billions and billions of points of light. Far more so -- ten times more than we can possibly see from the surface of the earth. Representing stars, galaxies, galactic clusters, billions and billions of such points of light, and our tiny little planet about the size of a ball held at arms length.  A beautiful peaceful haven for life. And in the immensity of the universe all of a sudden you feel connected. 

We are all apart of the same thing.  There is a connection.  There is intelligence.  There is a feeling of oneness, an extension of self.  And it’s a joyous and wonderful experience.  As I experienced it at this point coming back from the moon and looking at the earth, suddenly I recognized that our scientific description of reality of this universe was far from complete. Our model was not yet filled out, and on the other hand our religious descriptions of ourselves, of creation, of the universe --  all of them were somewhat flawed and incomplete as well. In other words, our knowledge of who and what we are.  How we got here.  Where we came from and where we are going is very inadequate at this point in history, and yet there is a feeling of intelligence, of peace, of abundance, of process, that gives one comfort and joy in observing this magnificent universe of which we are a part.  Contemplate that for a moment. See this little planet from that perspective, and see if you experience it as I did.

Edgar Mitchell Bio and Links

Excerpt from "An Evening with Ram Dass"

BetterListen!’s series of excerpts continues with the following excerpt from the wonderful recording of “An Evening with Ram Dass”.   

I have a friend -- his name is Larry Brilliant and Larry is a doctor.  He used to be known as Dr. America as part of the Hog Farm, which was a hippie commune in Berkeley. It was run by a fellow named Wavy Gravy, who was a clown.  Wavy works with children in leukemia wards as a clown, and among other things he also emcees.  Those of you that saw the movie “Woodstock” remember Wavy offering everybody breakfast in bed, 500,000 people.  Because he gives away food. They would bring the Hog Farm bus and feed people.  Very beautiful man.  Well, Larry was part of that, and he was a hippie doctor, and his wife went to India and met my guru, named Karoli Baba.  She brought Larry to him, and when Larry met my guru, my guru said to Larry, very shortly after meeting him, “U N O doctor”. What Larry heard him saying was “you are no doctor”, which is what his mother had been saying to him for years because he wasn’t earning a living.  But the guru kept repeating “U N O doctor, U N O doctor” ‘till finally it sunk into Larry’s mind that what he was saying was United Nations Organization Doctor. 

UNO doctor.  And there was the  UN World Health Organization project to eradicate small pox that was going on in India.  So Larry went down the bus trip from the mountains down to Delhi, and he went in with his long hair and his beard, and they said, “We don’t want hippie doctors, thank you very much” and he was shown the door.  He came back to the guru,  and the guru said, “U N O doctor. Go”. He went back.  They said, “We don’t want you”.   He came back – and  this is a long bus trip -- and he kept just doing it. It was like seven, eight, nine times. Finally he went into the United Nations and he said, “Look have you got any job at all?  I mean I gotta get this guy off my back.  I’ll take any job you’ve got”. They said, “Well, we don’t have a job as a doctor, but you could be an administration assistant”.  He said, “Fine”.  So he joined the club of a group of people who were getting rid of small pox.