Founder of Shambhala Publications, Samuel Bercholz, reflects on a lifetime of dharma and encourages us to challenge our often distorted perceptions of reality.

This time on the CSM podcast, Sam and David explore:

• Samuel’s new book, Rude Awakenings: An Unconventional Guide to the Buddhist Path
• Shaking up our concepts of reality and social phenomena
• Working with our addictions and habits
• The unpredictability and spontaneous manifestations of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche
• Learning how to walk the Bodhisattva path
• Intergenerational dharma and having an enlightened family
• Practical Buddhism and simply being ‘dharmic and decent’
• How Buddhism has traveled from East to West

“The way I perceive and most humans perceive is 180 degrees from the way things actually are. For the most part, we live in a fantasy world of make-believe and we believe it.” 

About Samuel Bercholz

Sam Bercholz is the founder of Shambhala Publications, one of the leading independent publishers of Buddhist and Eastern spiritual literature. He started the company in Berkeley in the late 1960s and later moved it to Boulder, Colorado, where it grew into a major publishing house for authors like Chögyam Trungpa and Pema Chödrön. A senior teacher in the Nyingma and Kagyu lineages of Tibetan Buddhism, Bercholz studied closely with both Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Thinley Norbu Rinpoche, who empowered him to teach dharma. He has taught Buddhist philosophy and meditation across North America, Europe, and Australasia for over forty years, and is also the author of the new book, Rude Awakenings: An Unconventional Guide to the Buddhist Path.