Open letter to the other Elise on Buddhism

I wrote this as an e-mail and then I thought that some other people might be interested. If you don't care about Buddhism at all, stop reading now.

Hey Elise,

Even though I was raised Buddhist, I never got very into it and my parents never pushed me. I have meditated and I lived in a Buddhist communal house for a few months after college but, other than that, you might already know more than me about Buddhism. I find that it is like any faith (Buddhism is not considered a religion... it's a state of mind... whatever); when people get involved they tend to mess it up.

That said, I have not read The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying but I just checked it out on Amazon and it looks like a good place to start. My Buddhist friends seem to like Shambhala: Sacred Path of the Warrior and Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism. Both books are by Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, my parents' teacher. Mind you that my Buddhist friends belong to the same Buddhist group (there are many different types of Buddhism) as my parents so they might be a bit biased in their book choices. I tried reading Shambhala a few years ago. I remember it being okay but I just couldn't get into it. Pema Chodron is popular with the people I know but that also might be because she is a part of "our" Buddhist community.

On a side note, I find Taoism a little more intriguing than Buddhism. Granted I've only read The Tao of Pooh and The Te of Piglet (both by Benjamin Hoff), but I would like to read more about it. I feel that it's the more uplifting version of Buddhism. Buddhists are big on pain and suffering. It seems that Taoists are more into accepting and being (God, I sound like Calvin Klein). Anyway, I hope this helps.

~Elise at dharmajoy.blogspot.com