This beloved book has touched hundreds of thousands of lives with its profound and actionable advice. Retaining the core message of becoming more mindful in our relationships, this edition includes new and revised material that addresses how we live and love today. A new preface touches on David Richo's experience with the book over time and outlines the key updates, including attention to online dating and modern communication styles as well as new perspectives on anger and ending relationships.

Most people think of love as a feeling, says Richo, but love is not so much a feeling as a way of being present. How to Be an Adult in Relationships explores five hallmarks of mindful loving and how they play a key role in our relationships. Adult love is based on a mutual commitment to what Richo calls the five A's attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing. Brimming with practical exercises for couples and singles, How to Be an Adult in Relationships offers heartening insights into a lifelong journey of love. Topics include:

- Becoming conscious of our relationship patterns and how they relate to childhood

- Recognizing and attracting someone who can show adult love

- Understanding the phases relationships go through

- Creating and maintaining healthy boundaries

- Overcoming fears of abandonment and engulfment

- Expressing anger and other emotions in adult and loving ways

- Surviving break-ups with our self-esteem intact

- Understanding love as a spiritual journey

Psychological and spiritual adulthood does not come automatically with age. It requires ongoing and ardent work on ourselves. It involves articulating our own truth and acting in accord with its challenges.

In this best-selling work, David Richo provides a hand-book for achieving psychological and spiritual health. Based on his many years' experience as a psychotherapist and workshop leader, the author uses the metaphor of the heroic journey, whose three phases--departure, struggle, and return--explain what happens in us as we evolve from neurotic ego through healthy ego to the spiritual self. First, he discusses the three challenges to adulthood: fear, anger, and guilt, as well as the self-esteem that comes from meeting those challenges. Then he discusses the dual problem of maintaining personal boundaries and establishing appropriate intimacy. Finally, he discusses the techniques of integration and the return to wholeness and love.

How to Be an Adult is a thoughtful, accessible guide filled with useful quotations and reflections for meditation, as well as other techniques and concrete advice on the process of growth. The new appendix provides readers with practical ways to show integrity and loving-kindness.

David Richo, PhD, is a psychotherapist, teacher, and retreat leader in Santa Barbara and San Francisco, California. He is the author of many books and emphasizes spiritual perspectives in all his work. His website is www.davericho.com.
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Nueva traducción de este bestseller sobre el amor y las relaciones del psicoterapeuta David Richo, que ha tocado cientos de miles de vidas con sus profundos y prácticos consejos.

Esta edición incluye material nuevo y revisado sobre cómo vivimos y amamos en la actualidad, manteniendo su mensaje principal de fomentar la conciencia plena en nuestras relaciones. Un nuevo prefacio explora la experiencia de David Richo con el libro a lo largo de los años y destaca las principales actualizaciones de esta edición, como la atención al mundo de los sitios virtuales de citas y los estilos de comunicación modernos, además de ofrecer nuevas perspectivas sobre la ira y cómo terminar relaciones.

La mayoría de las personas ven el amor como un sentimiento, pero más que un sentimiento el amor es una forma de estar presente, dice Richo. Cómo ser un adulto en las relaciones explora cinco pilares del amor consciente y el papel crucial que estos desempeñan en nuestras relaciones. El amor adulto se basa en un compromiso mutuo con lo que Richo denomina las cinco A atención, aceptación, aprecio, afecto y autorización. Repleto de ejercicios prácticos para parejas y solteros, este libro ofrece una visión esperanzadora sobre el viaje del amor a lo largo de la vida. Entre los temas tratados se incluyen:

- Tomar conciencia de nuestros patrones de relación y cómo se asocian con nuestra infancia
- Reconocer y atraer a alguien que pueda mostrar un amor adulto
- Comprender las fases que atraviesan las relaciones
- Crear y mantener límites saludables
- Superar el miedo al abandono y la asfixia emocional
- Expresar la ira y otras emociones de manera adulta y amorosa
- Sobrevivir a las rupturas manteniendo nuestra autoestima intacta
- Entender el amor como un viaje espiritual

ENGLISH DESCRIPTION

This beloved book has touched hundreds of thousands of lives with its profound and actionable advice.

Retaining the core message of becoming more mindful in our relationships, this edition includes new and revised material that addresses how we live and love today. A new preface touches on David Richo's experience with the book over time and outlines the key updates, including attention to online dating and modern communication styles as well as new perspectives on anger and ending relationships.

Most people think of love as a feeling, says Richo, but love is not so much a feeling as a way of being present. How to Be an Adult in Relationships explores five hallmarks of mindful loving and how they play a key role in our relationships. Adult love is based on a mutual commitment to what Richo calls the five A's attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing.

Brimming with practical exercises for couples and singles, How to Be an Adult in Relationships offers heartening insights into a lifelong journey of love. Topics include:

- Becoming conscious of our relationship patterns and how they relate to childhood
- Recognizing and attracting someone who can show adult love
- Understanding the phases relationships go through
- Creating and maintaining healthy boundaries
- Overcoming fears of abandonment and engulfment
- Expressing anger and other emotions in adult and loving ways
- Surviving break-ups with our self-esteem intact
- Understanding love as a spiritual journey

A fascinating exploration of the assisting force archetype, with powerful psychological tools and spiritual insights on how to find and work with these forces in your life--from the bestselling author of How To Be An Adult in Relationships.

Psychotherapist David Richo draws from history, Jungian psychology, Buddhism, nature, and other spiritual traditions to illuminate our connection to the helpers we call upon to navigate life. Some of the assisting forces in our lives are visible, and some are invisible. Some are with us for life; some come and go. Spiritual assisting forces could be bodhisattvas and saints--or partners in a relationship who are allies to one another.

Richo says that helpers are a necessary character on our human journey, and that in every heroic journey story the hero or heroine requires a trustworthy companion to fulfill his/her/their destiny. The assisting force can take many forms, but is often depicted as a sidekick, an aide, a wise advisor, or a spirit guide. In stories, an assisting force can also be an elixir, a magic form of help, an animal, or a wish-fulfilling gem.

In this fascinating inquiry, Richo posits that the archetype of the ally is necessary if we are ever to be fully who we are. He shows us how assisting forces are in and around us, and how we can be one to others. Richo offers a compelling and accessible view--and time-tested practices including meditation, self-inquiry, journaling, and affirmations--that help us recognize and access the allies in our lives.

Work with your triggers to find peace in the painful moments and lasting emotional well-being.

Psychotherapist David Richo examines the science of triggers and our reactions of fear, anger, and sadness. He helps us understand why our bodies respond before our minds have a chance to make sense of a situation. By looking deeply at the roots of what provokes us--the words, actions, and even sensory elements like smell--we find opportunities to understand the origins of our triggers and train our bodies to remain calm in the face of painful memories.

The book offers in-the-moment exercises on how to process difficult emotions and physical manifestations in order to to cultivate the inner resources necessary to deal with recurring memories of trauma. When we are triggered, Richo writes, we are being bullied by our own unfinished business. Explore what your body's knee-jerk reactions can teach you. Triggers: How We Can Stop Reacting and Start Healing acts as a guide to your body's powerful responses, helping you to remain calm under pressure and discover the key to emotional healing.

How to let love into our lives, and how to express that love to the world--the powerful sequel to How to Be an Adult in Relationships.

We were made to love and be loved. Loving ourselves and others is in our genetic code. It's the purpose of our lives--but knowing that doesn't make it easy to do. We may find it a challenge to love ourselves. We may have a hard time letting love in from others. We're often afraid of getting hurt. It is sometimes scary for us to share love with those around us, and love that isn't shared leaves us feeling flat and unfulfilled.

In this book, psychotherapist David Richo provides the tools for learning how to love in evolved adult ways--beginning with getting past the barriers that keep us from loving ourselves, then showing how we can learn to open to love others. He provides wisdom from Buddhism, psychology, and a range of spiritual traditions, along with a wealth of practices both for avoiding the pitfalls that can occur in love relationships and for enhancing the way love shows up in our lives. He then leads us on to love's inevitable outcome: developing a heart that loves universally and indiscriminately. This transcendent and unconditional love isn't just for a heroic few, Richo shows, it's everyone's magnificent calling.

Richo covers topics such as:

- how to still be yourself while loving another
- how to embrace your dark side
- what to do when the one who loves you dies
- need versus fear
- clinging
- healthy sexuality, including fantasies and how to experience pleasure without guilt
- how to break destructive patterns in your relationships
- how to have safe conversations with your loved one

The best-selling author of How to Be an Adult in Relationships explains how to build trust--the essential ingredient in successful relationships--in spite of fear or past betrayals

Most relationship problems are essentially trust issues, explains psychotherapist David Richo. Whether it's fear of commitment, insecurity, jealousy, or a tendency to be controlling, the real obstacle is a fundamental lack of trust--both in ourselves and in our partner.

Daring to Trust explores the importance of trust throughout our emotional lives: how it develops in childhood and how it becomes an essential ingredient in healthy adult relationships. It offers key insights and practical exercises for exploring and addressing our trust issues in relationships. Topics include:

- How we learn early in life to trust others (or not to trust them)
- Why we fear trusting
- Developing greater trust in ourselves as the basis for trusting others
- How to know if someone is trustworthy
- Na ve trust vs. healthy, adult trust
- What to do when trust is broken

Ultimately, Richo explains, we must develop trust in four directions: toward ourselves, toward others, toward life as it is, and toward a higher power or spiritual path. These four types of trust are not only the basis of healthy relationships, they are also the foundation of emotional well-being and freedom from fear.

A lucid, thought-provoking, and illuminating guide to finding fulfillment and fluid acceptance of life as it is (Martha Beck, life coach and New York Times-bestselling author)

Why is it that, despite our best efforts, many of us remain fundamentally unhappy and unfulfilled in our lives? In this provocative and inspiring book, David Richo distills thirty years of experience as a therapist to explain the underlying roots of unhappiness--and the surprising secret to finding freedom and fulfillment.

There are certain facts of life that we cannot change--the unavoidable givens of human existence: (1) everything changes and ends, (2) things do not always go according to plan, (3) life is not always fair, (4) pain is a part of life, and (5) people are not loving and loyal all the time. Richo shows us that by dropping our deep-seated resistance to these givens, we can find liberation and discover the true richness that life has to offer.

Blending Western psychology and Eastern spirituality, and including practical exercises, Richo shows us how to open up to our lives--including what is frightening, painful, or disappointing--and discover our greatest gifts.

Discover how to embrace the dark side of your personality, the unconscious and repressed aspects--or the shadow self, as introduced by Carl Jung--to live a fuller, more authentic life.

25th Anniversary Edition

Our shadow is the collection of negative or undesirable traits we keep hidden--the things we don't like about ourselves or are ashamed of, but it also includes our positive, untapped potential. The shadow is often a source of creative inspiration and greater self-acceptance. Befriending the shadow makes fear an ally and enables us to live more authentically. It also automatically improves our interpersonal relationships, because we are freed from the need to project our own negativity onto others, and we become more acutely aware when theirs is projected onto us.

David Richo looks for where the shadow manifests in our personal life, family interactions, religion, relationships, and the world around us. He shows how to use the gentle practice of mindfulness to work with our shadow side, and he provides numerous exercises for going deeper. He is remarkably skillful at making the shadow concept not only easy to understand but supremely practical for enhancing the quality of our lives.

THE SACRED HEART OF THE WORLD renews our devotion to the Sacred Heart by attending to its scriptural and mystical origins, and expanding our spirituality to embrace universal compassion. It is the first book to tackle the issue of devotedness to the Heart of Jesus that is intelligible and appealing to people of the twenty-first century. Based on a combination of extensive research and the author's own personal devotion to the Sacred Heart--a lost treasure from our Catholic past--and his interest in mysticism, THE SACRED HEART OF THE WORLD unlocks a new future of vibrant and conscious faith. The book has a threefold purpose: - to inspire devotion to the Sacred Heart, - to rekindle spiritual devotion, and - to center the Sacred Heart into the new cosmological realizations that will appeal both to Catholics and people from a variety of religious traditions. The book explores the symbolism of the heart in world religious traditions, and then traces the historical thread of the devotion into modern times. It draws significant links to the philosophy and theology of Teilhard de Chardin and Karl Rahner and their links with Ignatian spirituality. The prayers and meditations at the end of each section provide spiritual bonuses that will continue to benefit the reader after reading the book. +

Everything Ablaze begins with an introduction to Teilhard's work. It then explores mystical themes in his perspectives on science and religion. Each chapter combines relevant quotations from Teilhard and contemplations on them. The goal of mystical transformation is nothing less than a new life in Christ. Teilhard shows us the path to that possibility. His mysticism is earth-conscious. His words help open us to the mysterious forces in the universe that reveal God's face. The meditative responses to the quotations include practices that bring Teilhard's ideas into daily life and will be welcomed by a general lay audience. +

Over the past twenty years, psychotherapist and author David Richo has been gathering powerful quotations from many authors and traditions, quotations that have both given him comfort and challenged him to grow. Now, he has decided to share this very personal collection with fellow seekers. He invites each of us to use these sparks of illumination as he does, as springboards for meditation, reflection and the deepening of our spiritual life. David Richo, PhD is a retreat leader, widely read author, and psychotherapist in Santa Barbara and San Francisco. He is the author of many books, including: Catholic Means Universal: Integrating Spirituality and Religion (Crossroad, 2000) and The Sacred Heart of the World: Restoring Mystical Devotion to Our Spiritual Life (Paulist Press, 2007).

Another masterful work by this renowned and popular author, Wholeness and Holiness guides the reader through grace into the possibilities of a deeper spirituality and relationship with oneself, the world, and God. With his lifetime experience in psychology and spirituality, David Richo takes us on a three-step journey to become psychologically healthy, spiritually aware and active, and sometimes saintly. All three are possible

Everyone is afraid. Sometimes fear is inappropriate and unnecessary. At other times, we have good reason to be afraid. But in every case, fear reduces our ability to be ourselves. It convinces us we shouldn't take chances or risks.

This book is for people who want to let go of unreasonable fear or act more creatively in the face of reasonable fear. It explores the roots of fear--the fear of change, of self-disclosure, of giving and receiving, of being alone. Beneath all of these is the greatest fear of all: the fear of loving and being loved.

This 25th anniversary edition speaks of the enduring message of the book and this new edition has been greatly updated and expanded to include more contemporary developments in psychology and current events. Every chapter of the book has been rewritten and revised with a new audience in mind. Some new sections have been added and existing sections revised.

This revised and updated edition reflects the author's growing understanding of the ageless concern in our lives--becoming free from fear so that we can be more resourceful in our life.
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Richo has chosen twenty-three components of humanness, each a topic of a chapter. He begins each chapter with a short section about the topic as it is described in psychology or spirituality. Then he presents quotations from Shakespeare on that theme. Every passage walks us into who we are and can be, both psychologically and spiritually. The quotations are wonderfully imaginative kick-offs into it. After each Shakespeare quotation is a short re-phrase in modern English. After each set of quotations, he presents a paragraph or two, based on the points made in them, meant to show how they can be springboards into becoming more sensitive to the topic.

The book is divided into three parts. In Part One, the author explores who we are. In Part Two, he looks at what happens to us during a lifetime. In Part Three, he presents specific suggestions found in Shakespeare about how to put these themes into practice.

Take Heart: The Ways of Love Free of Fear and Ego

Our thrilling human destiny is to display in our lifetime the timeless design of love and wholeness that has always been inside us. We can discover something of what it means to live in upright ways, show loving-kindness toward ourselves and others, and free ourselves from ego and fear. This book offers insights and practices that can help us live our lives at those psychologically healthy and spiritually conscious levels.
Yes, we can take heart, that is, grow in hope and courage no matter how chaotic the world becomes or how disappointing people may be to us. Then we joyously see our self-esteem and our spirituality flourish. They are the true paths to contentment with ourselves as we are and can be and with the world as it is and may be. All it takes is heart.
There will never be only love or only peace
but there can be more love
than before we got here
and more peace
because we stayed here in peace and with love.

The guide to finding your perfect timing for life's biggest decisions--whether to stay or go in relationships, jobs, locations, and everything that matters most.

Do we stay in what we know? Or is it the right time to leave and make a change? In more than 50 years as a psychotherapist David Richo has been asked versions of this question more than any other. He has coached countless people of all ages through agonizing decisions related to their partnerships, their career, their home, their faith. In Ready, he shares the deep wisdom we need to make these decisions--and feel confident in following through. The book looks at the mystery of timing, why we stay too long, why we leave too soon, and what it feels like when the timing is right.

Richo shows that readiness is about more than just making a choice. Being ready means we understand ourselves deeply--we are prepared to take action (and staying is an action!), and we are equipped with what it takes to follow through. Filled with relatable stories and helpful practices, including meditation, self-inquiry, journaling, and affirmations, Ready helps us understand our own perfect timing to stay or to go.

In this unique book, psychotherapist David Richo offers fifty-two promises we can make to ourselves that will help us navigate the ups and downs of daily living in a wise, compassionate, and psychologically healthy way. Taken together these commitments, along with the author's brief reflections on them, offer guidance on how to:

- develop genuine kindness toward yourself and others
- find freedom from fear
- maintain healthy boundaries in relationships
- develop greater honesty and awareness
Designed for daily or weekly inspiration and contemplation, Everyday Commitments also features practical exercises--including journaling, contemplation, and guided meditations--to foster inward growth and lasting positive change.

The popular author of How to Be an Adult in Relationships reveals how past trauma can negatively impact our present-day relationships--and offers guidance on what to do about it

We all have a tendency to transfer potent feelings, needs, expectations, and beliefs from childhood or from former relationships onto the people in our daily lives, whether they are our intimate partners, friends, or acquaintances. When the Past Is Present helps us to become more aware of the ways we slip into the past so that we can identify our emotional baggage and take steps to unpack it and put it where it belongs.

Drawing on decades of experience as a psychotherapist, Richo helps readers to:

- Understand how the wounds of childhood become exposed in adult relationships--and why this is a gift

- Identify and heal the emotional wounds we carry over from the past so that they won't sabotage present-day relationships

- Recognize how strong attractions and aversions to people in the present can be signals of our own unfinished business

- Use mindfulness to stay in the present moment and cultivate authentic intimacy

Full of practical guidance, When the Past is Present will teach you how to free yourself from old wounds and destructive behavioral partners so you can foster healthier, happier relationships.

Bestselling author David Richo gets straight to the heart of how to find courage and contentment when life doesn't go according to plan. Rather than fighting against them, we all must accept these five true things: (1) everything changes and ends, (2) things do not always go according to plan, (3) life is not always fair, (4) pain is part of life, and (5) people are not loving and loyal all the time. Drawing on both psychology and spirituality, Richo offers time-tested insights on finding meaning and joy in life as it really is and relationships as they are.

Five True Things distills the essential wisdom of Richo's popular book The Five Things We Cannot Change. By changing our approach to our struggles, we can find deep happiness.