Wasteland to Pureland

New book by Doug Duncan & Catherine Pawasarat

Transcendence lies in the revolutionary act of question.

Are you curious and are you ready?

The Book Launch Party and Livestream

Was held on Friday Sept 21, 2018, 10am PST, 1pm EST – Click here to watch the replay.

“Catherine and Doug skillfully apply insights from their years of spiritual practice to the critical issues of modern life. Their book challenges us to explore what is truly needed to live a fulfilling life and to make a contribution that is larger than ourselves.”

 -Susan Skjei, Ph.D

Director, Authentic Leadership Center, Naropa University

“Wasteland to Pureland is a crystal clear guide to the many pitfalls, nuances, and puzzlements that can arise on the path to enlightenment. Authors Duncan and Pawasarat write from experience, offering the reader calm authenticity and heartfelt encouragement. Highly recommended for both fledgling and experienced travelers.”

 – Dean Radin, Ph.D

Chief Scientist, Institute of Noetic Sciences

“Continuing on the path of the great wisdom traditions, Doug Duncan and Catherine Pawasarat provide us with an invaluable contribution—relevant teachings placed within the contemporary crisis of our time. In these writings we are given a map to negotiate the spiritual and the material, the inner and outer landscapes of our collective soul co-evolving here on this planet. ”

 – Lauralee Alben

Sea Change Design Institute

ABOUT THE BOOK

There is an awakening experience that is vast and beyond words.

The path beckons.

Are you ready?

 There is a joy that is your birthright – it is awakening, enlightenment, the great healing.

Wasteland to Pureland is for those wanting to walk a path to greater freedom, immense clarity and fulfillment. This is the journey to a state of ultimate care for others.

Gain insights about the nature of an awakening experience that is vast and beyond words.

Understand the practical steps, phases and elements that must come together for transcendental alchemy to occur.

Then walk.

Overview of book

Honest, edgy, and accessible, Wasteland to Pureland  is for anyone ready to shed limiting beliefs, and wake up to the vibrant, creative nature of reality.

Rooted in Buddhist philosophy and modern psychology, these teachings emerge out of decades of practice and study by master teachers Acariya Doug Duncan and Catherine Pawasarat.

Wasteland to Pureland addresses very typical events in a person’s life – including relationship and career, creativity and pain, and loss and trauma. It also talks about practices that you can use, such as tantras, meditations, therapies and psychological approaches that open doors where we get stuck.

Grounded in the belief that awakening is available to everyone, Doug & Catherine teach us how to reunite with our gifts, to become agents of compassion and transformation, personally, interpersonally and globally.

The book is a contemporary guide to integrating spiritual practice with everyday life.

A spiritually awakening being is one who abides in the clear sky realization, even as they live, relate and work in the world with clouds.

– Doug Duncan & Catherine Pawasarat

THE AUTHORS

Meet Doug Duncan and Catherine Pawasarat

DHARMA TEACHERS & SPIRITUAL MENTORS

We wrote this book because we felt that people are in struggle, and are also looking for a release from their struggles.

As Dharma Teachers, we are based in Canada, and teach internationally. We work closely with students as mentors and guides along the path. 

The main thing we’d like to see people get out of the book, is question, debate, and dialogue. A willingness to engage in subjects that may be settled in your mind…but then to open the door to “Oh! That’s an interesting idea.” Question raising is the number one approach to the path of awakening beyond the realization.

In Wasteland to Pureland we raise some interesting questions about the current socio-economic, political, and sexual culture. Some of them will stir up a debate and questioning, and that’s what we intend. We want people to examine some of the questions on the table, that haven’t been heard in the public discourse.

Awakening and the Call to Freedom


What is awakening? Simply put, ‘awake’ is the opposite of ‘asleep’. Our habitual pursuit of comfort – bread and circuses – puts us to sleep. It does take effort to wake up. But once we are spiritually awake, life becomes so much better and so much easier.

Awakening is the most sustainable, ethical, efficient, fruitful and joyous state available to human beings.

Stepping Over the Separate Self and Into Totality

Perhaps the greatest anxiety the modern being faces is loneliness. In any case, the self, by definition, is always alone. Awakening conquers loneliness by ‘stepping over’ the self into a state of totality.

This letting go opens the door to radiant spaciousness, the good emptiness. Whereas before awakening, emptiness was seen as the bad kind, meaninglessness. We can learn to cultivate the calm and quiet necessary to hear the depths of our mind as it connects to the Universal Mind.

The Great Healing Starts with Awareness

We’ve all experienced trauma. We all hold this in our being, in various ways. We hold it in the body, we hold it in emotional patterns, psychological patterns and thought patterns.

Its important to look at where we’re holding tension and trauma in the body. There’s lots of amazing exercises and methodologies to work with that help release. Once we are more aware of the body we can begin looking at the subtler levels of emotions and thinking.

Much of the spiritual path consists of purification; through various practices we purify our bodies, speech, emotions, and our minds. Through training and practice, we polish the mirror of our hearts.

To thrive, we all need a sense of something wonderful and powerful that is not yet seen but nevertheless felt or intuited. All of life is unity, a summation of billions of years of reaching out and exploring.

– Doug Duncan & Catherine Pawasarat

Bliss and Insight Fuel Awakening

The spiritual path is, among other things, about using bliss and insight to decrease suffering and ignorance. That’s why a healthy spiritual path feels so rich, wonder-filled and generally happy.

The Great Happiness arises when bliss and insight come together to manifest through everything we do and are. Focusing these elements inward produces a radiant state of being; channeling them outward produces a fulfilling and engaging career or vocation.

The awakening state does not rely on activity to manifest, but can be channeled into activity. It’s the dialogue between being (resting in peacefulness) and becoming (projects). Between resting and doing.

A transcendental career wakes us up and leads us forward into a future that we mold and create in accordance with our heart’s desire. It’s challenging and involves risk and pushing the frontiers of our comfort zone.

 

In the End, We Have to Walk the Path

Our sincere aspiration for awakening, in the context of an instant-gratification-oriented society, has us hoping we can find a shortcut to spiritual awakening, without dedicating ourselves to tried and true systems of ongoing teaching and training.

The reality is that we need face to face contact to learn empathy and compassion. Our mirror neurons fire in contact with others and as we know neurons “that fire together, wire together.”

Our bodies need proximity with other people to foster this learning. Without it we start to look more like computer icons and our avatars live in isolation and fantasy.

We advocate a new form of the spiritual community, a planetary vehicle. In this model, the yogic and monastic traditions are integrated with modern sensibilities and lifestyles.

“If we include the health of the planet and communities in our notions of self and value, as this book resoundingly does, a culture of generosity emerges naturally. This fresh and visionary book offers maps for true economic freedom––where wealth is generative, interdependent and sustainable.”

 – Joel Solomon

Chair & Co-Founder, Renewal Funds, Author of The Clean Money Revolution

“Wasteland to Pureland is a journey. The authors have walked the path of spiritual awareness and share insights gathered along the way. This book is an in-depth exploration of the journey. Well written, it guides the reader in exploration of enduring spiritual truths and the quest towards wholeness.”

 – Bob Stilger, Ph.D

Co-President, NewStories and author of AfterNow

“In the world of spiritual literature, where esoteric teachings can become dry and removed – this book is juicy! Read this not only for the mind, or for the body, or for the spirit, but all of them at once. ”

 – Mark Silver

Master Teacher in the Shaddhulliyya Sufi Tariqa and founder of Heart of Business.

Read the book, learn to:

  1. Walk the path of spiritual awakening.
  2. Reconnect with yourself, your gifts, and the foundations of life.
  3. Discover maps for true economic freedom- where wealth is generative, interdependent and sustainable.
  4. Shed limiting beliefs and see through delusion into the nature of reality.
  5. Become an agent of compassion and transformation, personally, interpersonally and globally.
  6. Let go of anxiety, depression, and the sense that ‘something is missing’.
  7. Work with the suffering and power all around us, and within us.
  8. Bring awareness to work, relationships, and daily experience.
  9. Utilize ancient and modern tools and for spiritual awakening in contemporary life.
  10. Expand your capacity for attentiveness, discernment, joy and wise action.

What does Wasteland to Pureland mean?

From an interview with authors Doug Duncan & Catherine Pawasarat:

We all have that experience of waking up one day and feeling like our life is really not what we have always wanted it to be, and wonder, ‘How did we get here?’ That’s part of being human and that’s an important question. That can be a real time of despair when we have that feeling.

Wasteland to Pureland is about how we get from that moment to a more beautiful place, the Pure Land. A place of clarity, loving kindness, compassion and wisdom that we get to enjoy ourselves and we get to share with everybody around us.  This book shares how to get from here to there.

Order TODAY and Receive These Bonus Gifts.

When you purchase Wasteland to Pureland, you’ll receive these bonus tools that support the journey of awakening.

We’ve consciously curated a selection of innovators who are doing outstanding work in their field. Whether it’s through your conversations, career or relationship with money, all of these tools will enrich your spiritual development. 

BONUS MINI-COURSE

Mindfulness for Life: Essentials of Buddhist Meditation

Naropa University’s e-course, with Frank Berliner This unique course provides insight and clear guidance into developing a successful meditation practice. This study illuminates practical concepts from the Buddhist tradition and includes instruction on posture and breath, guided meditation sessions and supplemental reading.

BONUS AUDIO COURSE

Conscious Love: Tools for Growth Filled Relationships

Planet Dharma’s Conscious Love Audio Course with Doug Duncan and Catherine Pawasarat.  How do you ensure your relationships are conscious, alive and growing? In this series of recordings, discover inspiring and practical exercises that will help you fully show up in your personal relationships and daily life.

BONUS BOOK

Beautiful and Abundant

‘Beautiful and Abundant, Building the World We Want’ by Bryan Welch. This award winning book cuts through the pessimism that pervades today’s discussions of sustainability. You are invited to visualize a verdant and prosperous future for humanity and all the living things that share our planet. Bryan Welch is an organic rancher, and was Publisher and Editorial Director of Mother Earth News for nearly two decades.

Buy Your Copy of
Wasteland to Pureland

Step One: Order your book from Amazon via one of the links below.

Step Two: Return here and complete the form to receive your free inspiring gifts.

Step Three: Use the book and all these tools to be the change you want to see in the world 🙂

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