Find Your Life Purpose Even in Difficult Times
Can difficulties in life actually help us to find our purpose and step forward as our best selves? Author and spiritual teacher Stephen Cope takes teachings from the Bhagavad Gita as well as stories from the lives of well-known ordinary people to offer examples for finding meaning and purpose in our lives.
Stephen Cope is Scholar Emeritus at the renowned Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and the founder and former director of the Kripalu Institute for Extraordinary Living. He is a Western-trained psychotherapist who writes and teaches about the relationship between Western psychological paradigms and the Eastern contemplative traditions, and is the best-selling author of such books as The Great Work of Your Life and Yoga and the Quest for the True Self and the book being discussed on this program, The Dharma in Difficult Times. He is the recipient of numerous awards for his work.
THE YOGA HOUR TEAM COMMENTS: I loved how Stephen Cope described our individual dharma or purpose in life, as the intersection of our particular talents with the small corner of life that we can influence for the common good of all life on earth. He illustrated the idea of dharma in difficult times with his clear understanding of the teachings from the Bhagavad Gita and wonderful stories of well-known activists, artists and martyrs in such a way that was inspiring and thought provoking. I will always be influenced by Stephen Cope's inspirational way of talking about how we can find what is our's to do in today's world.
DR. TRUJILLO’S COMMENTS: I enjoyed the richness of our conversation about “Krishna’s Four Lessons for Tough Times”, which are pulled from The Bhagavad Gita, and which Stephen illustrated with examples from people’s lives. The four lessons were: Take Refuge; Look for the Gift in the Wound; Personal Fulfillment, the Common Good Arise Together; and You Are Not the Doer. I was also touched by one of Mahatma Gandhi’s spiritual principles, that only love can overcome hate. Stephen writes: "Gandhi believed that if one consistently acts with love, he will slowly but surely bend the moral arc of the Universe”. To me, this is an essential message for our time.