Tao Te Ching

The Power of Goodness, the Wisdom Beyond Words
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Six Hundred Books to Read and Why

Inspirations easily become chains. The same words that can evoke true happiness and wisdom, can also imprison and chain us to false and harmful beliefs. If we’re not ‘standing on the shoulders of giants,’ we’re looking into the back of someone’s pants.

Words of Wisdom are like tiny sparks with the capacity to light up an aspect of our lives and ignite a bonfire of realization, sanity, awareness. It’s not as much learning something we didn’t know as a reminder of something we’ve always known but forgotten or become numb to - tiny sparks with power to light our way.

A key insight into the development of Shambhala principle - of extending personal, spiritual wisdom into culture, politics, philosophy, and day-to-day living - involves dissolving the thought/motivation/desire of a reward. This helps explain why so many of the prime movers responsible for these sources were unrecognized during their lifetimes; often reviled, persecuted, and killed. And even people that were recognized and highly respected like Benjamin Franklin accomplished a tremendous amount anonymously.

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10 Bulls
by Kakuan Shien

1Q84
by Haruki Murakami

21 Lessons for the 21st Century
by Yuval Harari

2312
by Kim Stanley Robinson

A Buddhist Approach to Politics
by Chögyam Trungpa

A Madman's Diary
by Lǔ Xùn

A Message to Garcia and Thirteen Other Things
by Elbert Hubbard

A Midsummer Night's Dream
by William Shakespeare

A New Translation Based on the Recently Discovered Ma-wang-tui Texts
by Lao Tzu
trans: Robert Henricks

A People's History of the United States​
by Howard Zinn

A Story Waiting to Pierce You
by Peter Kingsley

A Study of History
by Arnold Toynbee

A Sudden Flash of Lightening: Words Out of Silence
by Gesshin Myoko Roshi

Abbey Road
by Beatles

Aeneid
by Virgil

Aesop's Fables, the Aesopica
by Aesop

Age of Faith
by Will Durant

Age of Napoleon
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

All Slave-Keepers That keep the Innocent in Bondage, Apostates
by Benjamin Lay

All's Well That Ends Well
by William Shakespeare

American Gods
by Neil Gaiman

Amusing Ourselves to Death
by Neil Postman

Analects
by Confucius

Art of Living
by Lǐ Yú

Art of Loving
by Erich Fromm

Art of War 孙子兵法
by Sun Tzu
trans: Denma Translation Group

Art of Worldly Wisdom
by Balthasar Gracian

As You Like It
by William Shakespeare

Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
by Benjamin Franklin

Autobiography of Bertrand Russell
by Bertrand Russell

Autobiography of Madame Guyon
by Madame Guyon

Avesta
by Zarathushtra

Awakening of Intelligence
by Krishnamurti

Bacchae Βάκχαι
by Euripides

Beautiful Losers
by Leonard Cohen

Beyond the Postmodern Mind
by Huston Smith

Bijak of Kabir
by Kabīr

Blue Cliff Record, Biyan lu 碧巖錄
by Yuanwu Keqin

Bodhisattva Path of Wisdom and Compassion
by Chögyam Trungpa

Bodhisattva Way of Life, Bodhicaryavatara
by Shantideva
trans: Marion L. Matics

Bone Clocks
by David Mitchell

Book of Equanimity
by Hóngzhì Zhēngjué

Book of History
by Sima Guang

Book of Mencius 孟子
by Mencius

Book of Psalms
by King David

Book of Rites
by Confucius

Brave New World
by Aldous Huxley

Bringing it all Back Home
by Bob Dylan

Broken Earth
by N. K. Jemisin

Brothers Karamatzov
by Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky

Caesar and Christ
by Will Durant

Candide
by Voltaire, François-Marie Arouet

Canterbury Tales
by Geoffrey Chaucer

Cantos
by Ezra Pound

Catcher in the Rye
by J. D. Salinger

Cause, Principle, and Unity: And Essays on Magic
by Giordano Bruno

Chiao Hung and the restructuring of in the late Ming
by Edward T Chʻien

Choice of Pearls
by Solomon ibn Gabirol

Cloud Atlas
by David Mitchell

Complete Works of Lao Tzu
by Lao Tzu
trans: Hua-Ching Ni

Complete Works of Lao Tzu
by Hua-Ching Ni

Constitutional Code
by Jeremy Bentham

Core of the Teaching
by Krishnamurti

Cosmic Trigger II
by Robert Anton Wilson

Creative Evolution
by Henri-Louis Bergson

Creative Mind: An Introduction to Metaphysics
by Henri-Louis Bergson

Creators: Heroes of the Imagination
by Daniel J. Boorstin

Critique Of Pure Reason
by Immanuel Kant

Crooked Cucumber: the Life and Zen Teaching of Shunryu Suzuki
by David Chadwick

Cultivating the Emplty Field
by Hóngzhì Zhēngjué

Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism
by Chögyam Trungpa

Dance, Dance, Dance
by Haruki Murakami

Daodejing Lunbing Yaoyishu, The Tao of War
by Wang Zhen

Das Kapital; Capital: Critique of Political Economy
by Karl Marx

Daughter of Destiny: An Autobiography
by Benazir Bhutto

De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things)
by Lucretius

Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire
by Edward Gibbon

Demian
by Hermann Hesse

Dhammapada धम्मपद
by Buddha

Dhammapada धम्मपद
by Buddha

Dialogue Between a Philosopher, a Jew, and a Christian
by Peter Abelard

Diamond Sutra
by Buddha

Discourses of Epictetus, Ἐπικτήτου διατριβαί
by Epictetus

Discourses on Livy
by Machiavelli

Divine Milieu
by Teilhard de Chardin

Doctrine of the Mean, Maintaining Perfect Balance, Zhongyong 中庸
by Zisi

Dragon Seed
by Pearl Buck

Dream Pool Essays 梦溪笔谈
by Shen Kuo

Duino Elegies
by Rainer Maria Rilke

Dzogchen: The Self-Perfected State
by Namkhai Norbu

Ecclesiastes קֹהֶלֶת‎
by Koheleth

Emperor of China, Self-Portrait of K'ang-hsi
by Kāngxī
trans: Jonathan D. Spence

Encyclopédie
by Diderot

Enlightenment Now
by Steven Pinker

Enneads Ἐννεάδες Plotinus / Porphyry
by Plotinus

Enquiry Concerning Political Justice
by William Godwin

Epigrams
by Philodemus

Epigrams of Lusin
by Lǔ Xùn

Erewhon
by Samuel Butler

Essays, French Essais
by Montaigne

Essential Gate for Entry Into Sudden Enlightenment (Tun-wu ju dao yao-men)
by Hui Hai
trans: John Blofeld

Essential Tao
by Lao Tzu
trans: Thomas Cleary

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds
by Charles Mackay

Fallen Leaves
by Will Durant

Faust, part I
by Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von

Faust, part II
by Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von

Fayan 法言, Exemplary Figures or Model Sayings
by Yang Xiong

Finite and Infinite Games
by James P. Carse

Finnegan's Wake
by James Joyce

Flight of the Garuda
by Shabkar Tsokdruk Rangdrol

Four Books
by Zhu Xi
trans: Thomas Cleary

Four Hundred Verses on the Yogic Deeds of Bodhisattvas
by Āryadeva

Four Quartets
by T. S. Eliot

Frankenstein
by Mary Shelley

Franny and Zooey
by J. D. Salinger

From Age-Ing to Sage-Ing
by Reb Zalman

Gertrude
by Hermann Hesse

Gesar of Ling Epic
by Gesar of Ling

Golden Verses of Pythagoras Χρύσεα
by Pythagorus

Good Work
by E. F. Schumacher

Gospel According to Thomas
by Jesus

Great Gatsby
by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time
by Will Durant

Hallelujah
by Leonard Cohen

Hamlet
by William Shakespeare

Hanfeitse
by Hán Fēi

Harvest of Leisure
by Yoshida Kenkō

Hebrew Bible, The Tanakh
by Rabbinic Sages

Heroes of History
by Will Durant

Histories
by Herodotus

History of Civilization
by Henry Thomas Buckle

History of Florence
by Machiavelli

History of Western Philosophy
by Bertrand Russell

Homo Deus
by Yuval Harari

How Children Fail
by John Holt

How Proust Can Change Your Life
by Alain de Botton

Hsin Hsin Ming
by Jianzhi Sengcan

Huainanzi
by Liú Ān

Human All Too Human - A Book for Free Spirits
by Friedrich Nietzsche

I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban
by Malala Yousafzai

I Am That
by Nisargadatta Maharaj

I Ching
by Fu Xi

Ich und Du, I and Thou
by Martin Buber

Ideas and Opinions
by Albert Einstein

Iliad
by Homer

Illusion's Game
by Chögyam Trungpa

Illustrated Tao Te Ching
by Lao Tzu
trans: Man-Ho Kwok, Martin Palmer, and Jay Ramsay

In Search of Lost Time
by Marcel Proust
trans: Jonathan D. Spence

In the American Grain
by William Carlos Williams

Infinite Game
by Simon Sinek

Inner Structure of the I Ching
by Anagarika​ (Lama) Govinda

Internal Book of Medicine
by Huangdi

Island
by Aldous Huxley

It's Up to You
by Dzigar Kongtrül Rinpoche

Jewel Ornament of Liberation
by Gampopa

Journey to Enlightenment
by Matthieu Ricard

Journey to Ixtlan
by Carlos Castaneda

Journey Without Goal
by Chögyam Trungpa

Killing Commendatore
by Haruki Murakami
trans: Philip Gabriel, Ted Godssen

Kindly Bent to Ease Us, Trilogy of Finding Comfort and Ease ངལ་གསོ་སྐོར་གསུམ་
by Longchenpa

King Lear
by William Shakespeare

Koran
by Muhammad محمد‎;

Kubla Khan
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions
by John Fire Lame Deer

Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra
by Buddha
trans: Red Pine or Bill Porter

Lao Tzu - A Book about the Way and the Power of the Way
by Lao Tzu
trans: Ursula Le Guin

Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
by Lao Tzu
trans: D. C. Lau

Lao-Tze’s Tao-Te-King
by Lao Tzu
trans: Paul Carus

Lao-tzu-chu
by Heshang Gong

Lao-tzu-chu
by Wang Pang

Lao-tzu-chu, Red Pine Translation
by Cao Daochong

Lao-tzu-shu
by Chéng Xuanying

Lao-Tzu: “My words are very easy to understand.”
by Lao Tzu
trans: Cheng Man-ch'ing

Lao-Tzu's Taoteching
by Red Pine

Lao-Tzu’s TaoTeChing
by Lao Tzu
trans: Red Pine or Bill Porter

Last Temptation of Christ
by Nikos Kazantzakis

Laughter
by Henri-Louis Bergson

Lavinia
by Ursula Le Guin

Leaders Eat Last
by Simon Sinek

Leaves of Grass
by Walt Whitman

Legends of the old Plantation
by Joel Chandler Harris

Lessons of History
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

Leviathan
by Thomas Hobbes

Liezi "True Classic of Simplicity and Perfect Emptiness”
by Lie Yukou

Life of Greece
by Will Durant

Life of Shabkar: The Autobiography of a Tibetan Yogin
by Matthieu Ricard

Light of Discovery
by Toni Packer

Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher
by Lewis Thomas

Lojong III
by Chögyam Trungpa

Lost Horizon
by James Hilton

Madness of Crowds
by Charles Mackay

Magical Mystery Tour
by John Lennon

Maha Ati
by Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Mahābhārata महाभारतम्
by Vyasa

Man in the High Castle,
by Philip K. Dick

Man Who Planted Trees
by Jean Giono

Man's Search for Meaning
by Viktor Frankl

Mandala
by José Argüelles

Mandala Principle
by Chögyam Trungpa

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media
by Noam Chomsky

Martial Arts and the Art of War
by Chögyam Trungpa

Masnavi مثنوي معنوي‎‎) "Rhyming Couplets of Profound Spiritual Meaning”
by Rumi

Masters of Enchantment
by Keith Dowman

Masters of Mahamudra
by Mondup Sherab

Matter of Seggri
by Ursula Le Guin

Maxims
by Epicurus

Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda
by Noam Chomsky

Meditations Τὰ εἰς ἑαυτόν
by Marcus Aurelius

Memories, Dreams, Reflections
by Carl Jung

Merchant of Venice
by William Shakespeare

Middlemarch
by George Eliot

Might Is Right
by Arthur Desmond

Moby Dick or The Whale
by Herman Melville

Modern Man in Search of a Soul
by Carl Jung

Moral Animal — Why we are the Way we Are
by Robert Wright

Mrs. Dalloway
by Virginia Woolf

Much Ado About Nothing
by William Shakespeare

Mudra
by Chögyam Trungpa

My Ántonia
by Willa Cather

My Inventions
by Nikola Tesla

Myth of Freedom
by Chögyam Trungpa

Natural History
by Pliny

Nel VI Centenario della Nascita
by Poggio Bracciolini

New Testament Διαθήκη
by Jesus

No Beginning, No End: The Intimate Heart of Zen
by Jakusho Kwong

Not For Happiness: A Guide to the So-Called Preliminary Practices
by Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche

Notes on the State of Virginia
by Thomas Jefferson

Odyssey, Ὀδύσσεια
by Homer

On Choices and Avoidances
by Philodemus

On Nature
by Epicurus

On Nature
by Parmenides

On Nature
by Empedocles

On Nature (Fragments)
by Heraclitus

On the Duty of Civil Disobedience
by Henry David Thoreau

One Straw Revolution
by Masanobu Fukuoka

Orderly Chaos — The Mandala Principle
by Chögyam Trungpa

Ordinary Wisdom, Sakya Legshe (Jewel Treasury of Good Advice)
by Sakya Pandita

Ordinary Wonder
by Charlotte Joko Beck

Orlando: A Biography
by Virginia Woolf

Othello
by William Shakespeare

Our Oriental Heritage
by Will Durant

Outline of History
by H. G. Wells

Outsider
by Colin Wilson

Outspoken Essays
by Dean Inge

Paradigm Shift
by Reb Zalman

Parallel Lives
by Plutarch

Parerga and Paralipomena, "Appendices" and "Omissions"
by Arthur Schopenhauer

Path of Individual Liberation
by Chögyam Trungpa

Peacemaker's Code
by Deepak Malhotra

Penetrating the Book of Changes
by Zhou Dunyi

Perennial Philosophy
by Aldous Huxley

Phenomenon of Man
by Teilhard de Chardin

Philosophical Dictionary
by Voltaire, François-Marie Arouet

Picture of Dorian Gray
by Oscar Wilde

Pleasures of Philosophy
by Will Durant

Political Consciousness
by Chögyam Trungpa

Politics
by Aristotle

Politics of Experience
by R. D. Laing

Poor Richard's Almanack
by Benjamin Franklin

Power of Myth
by Joseph Campbell

Praise of Folly
by Erasmus

Prayer Mat of Sex 肉蒲团 (Jou Pu Tuan)
by Lǐ Yú

Principles of Morals and Legislation
by Jeremy Bentham

Psychotherapy East and West
by Alan Watts

Raise High the Roof Beams, Seymour an Introduction
by J. D. Salinger

Rangjung Rigpe Dorje
by Karmapa XVI

Real Reality
by Robert Anton Wilson

Realizing Enlightened Society
by Chögyam Trungpa

Red Book, Liber Novus
by Carl Jung

Reformation
by Will Durant

Renaissance
by Will Durant

Report to Greco
by Nikos Kazantzakis

Republic Πολιτεία
by Plato

Rime of the Ancient Mariner
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Road Back to Nature
by Masanobu Fukuoka

Roman Way
by Edith Hamilton

Romeo and Juliet
by William Shakespeare

Rousseau and Revolution
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

Rubaiyat
by Omar Khayyám

Rubber Soul
by John Lennon

Rules for Radicals
by Saul Alinsky

Sadhana of Mahamudra
by Chögyam Trungpa

Sapiens
by Yuval Harari

Sapiens, A Graphic History Vol. 2
by Yuval Harari

Saving Fish From Drowning
by Amy Tan

Second Book of Tao
by Stephen Mitchell

Secret Book on the Inner Elixir
by Sun Bu'er

Secret History of the Mongol Queens
by Jack Weatherford

Secret History of the Mongols, Монголын нууц товчоо, 元朝秘史
by Genghis Khan

Secret of the Golden Flower 太乙金華宗旨; Tàiyǐ Jīnhuá Zōngzhǐ
by Lü Dongbin
trans: Richard Wilhelm

Seven Points of Mind Training, Lojong བློ་སྦྱོངས་དོན་བདུན་མ;
by Atisha

Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior
by Chögyam Trungpa

Shasekishū (Sand and Pebbles)
by Mujū Dōkyō

Shiji, Records of the Grand Historian, 太史公書
by Sima Qian

Siddhartha
by Hermann Hesse

Six States of Bardo
by Chögyam Trungpa

Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics As If People Mattered
by E. F. Schumacher

Some of the Dharma
by Jack Kerouac

Song of Enlightenment 证道歌
by Yòngjiā Xuānjué

Song of the Precious Mirror Samadhi
by Dongshan Liangjie

Songs and Sonnets
by John Donne

Souls of Black Folk
by W. E. B. Du Bois

Sputnik Sweetheart
by Haruki Murakami

Start With Why
by Simon Sinek

Steppenwolf
by Hermann Hesse

Steps to an Ecology of the Mind
by Gregory Bateson

Story of Civilization
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

Summa Theologica
by Thomas Aquinas

Suppliants
by Euripides

Sutra of Huineng
by Huineng

Ta Chuan: The Great Treatise
by Confucius

Talmud
by Rabbinic Sages

Tantric Path of Indestructible Wakefulness
by Chögyam Trungpa

Tao of Spirit
by Lao Tzu
trans: John Roger

Tao Te Ching
by Lao Tzu
trans: Stephen Mitchell

Tao Te Ching
by Lao Tzu

Tao Te Ching 道德经 Dàodéjīng
by Lao Tzu

Tao Te Ching - Introduction and Notes
by Lao Tzu
trans: Charles Muller

Tao Te Ching – Psychedelic Prayers
by Lao Tzu
trans: Timothy Leary

Tao Te Ching — The Power of Goodness, the Wisdom Beyond Words
by Lao Tzu
trans: Shan Dao

Tao Te Ching, a new translation
by Lao Tzu
trans: Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English

Tao Te Ching, a new translation and commentary
by Ralph Alan Dale

Tao Te Ching, Annotated and Explained
by Lao Tzu
trans: Derek Lin

Tao The Ching
by Lao Tzu
trans: John Wu

Tao-te-chen-ching yi-chieh
by Li Xizhai

Tao-te-chen-ching-chu
by Su Che

Tao-te-chen-ching-chu
by Wu Cheng

Taoist I Ching, , Zhouyi chanzhen 周易闡真
by Liu Yiming

Teach Your Own
by John Holt

Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge
by Carlos Castaneda

The Age of Reason Begins
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

The Age of Voltaire
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

The Collected Works of Chogyam Trungpa
by Chögyam Trungpa
trans: Nalanda Translation Committee

The Complete Poems
by Gaspara Stampa

The Exploration of Space
by Arthur C. Clarke

The Garden of Epicurus
by Anatole France

The Gateless Gate, 無門関, 無門關
by Mumon Ekai

The Great Conversation
by Robert Hutchins

The Lathe of Heaven
by Ursula Le Guin

The New Age
by Chögyam Trungpa

The Prince
by Machiavelli

The Proper Study of Mankind
by Isaiah Berlin

The Prophet
by Kahlil Gibran

The Reformation
by Will (and Ariel) Durant

The Sane Society
by Erich Fromm

The Tempest
by William Shakespeare

The Way and its Power
by Lao Tzu
trans: Arthur Waley

The Way of Chuang Tzu
by Thomas Merton

The Wenzi, Wénzǐ 文子
by Wenzi

Theory of Colors
by Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von

Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
by David Mitchell

Thus Spoke Zarathustra
by Friedrich Nietzsche

Tibetan Book of the Dead
by Padmasambhava

Timon of Athens
by William Shakespeare

Toda Raba
by Nikos Kazantzakis

Torch of Certainty
by Jamgon Kongtrul the Great

Transition
by Will Durant

Triumph of Life
by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Trojan Women
by Euripides

Twilight of the Idols
by Friedrich Nietzsche

Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
by Carl Jung

Ubik
by Philip K. Dick

Ulysses
by James Joyce

Union of Mahamudra and Dzogchen
by Karma Chagme Rinpoche I

Unpopular Essays
by Bertrand Russell

Utopia
by Thomas More

Utopia Avenue
by David Mitchell

Waiting At The Window
by A.A. Milne

Walden or Life in the Woods
by Henry David Thoreau

War and Peace in the Global Village
by Marshall McLuhan

War of the Sexes
by Paul Seabright

War With Honour
by A.A. Milne

Way of Lao Tzu
by Lao Tzu
trans: Wing-tsit Chan

Way of Life According to Lao Tzu
by Lao Tzu
trans: Witter Bynner

Way of Perfection
by Teresa of Avila

Wealth of Nations
by Adam Smith

What Makes You Not a Buddhist
by Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche

When Things Fall Apart
by Pema Chödrön

Why Buddhism is True
by Robert Wright

Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
by Haruki Murakami

Winnie the Pooh
by A.A. Milne

Wisdom of China and India
by Lín Yǔtáng

Wisdom of Laotse
by Lín Yǔtáng

Wisdom of Life
by Arthur Schopenhauer
trans: T. Bailey Saunders

Women
by Charles Bukowski

Works and Days
by Hesiod

World's Religions
by Huston Smith

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
by Robert M. Pirsig

Zen Flesh, Zen Bones
by Paul Reps

Zen Letters
by Yuanwu Keqin

Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind
by Shunryu Suzuki Roshi

Zen Teachings of Huang Po on the Transmission of Mind, John Blofeld translation
by Huangbo Xiyun

Zen Teachings of Rinzai (Record of Rinzai), Irmgard Schloegl translation 1976
by Rinzai Gigen

Zhuangzi
by Chuang Tzu

Zorba the Greek
by Nikos Kazantzakis


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