Mandala: Journey to the Centre

by Lori Bailey Cunningham (Author), Lori Bailey Cunningham (Author), Brigitte Spillman-Jenny (Foreword), Lori Bailey Cunningham (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2002

  $14.28

  For millennia, mandala art has been used throughout the world for self-expression, spiritual transformation and personal growth. Mandala is the ancient Sanskrit word for circle, and is seen by Tibetans as an ideal diagram of the cosmos, an object of meditation that can lead one to enlightenment. It is used by Native Americans in healing rituals. In Christian cathedrals and gardens, the labyrinth is a mandalic pattern used as a tool for centering and contemplation. An archetypal symbol of wholeness, the mandala was used as a therapeutic art tool by psychoanalyst Carl Jung, who believed that mandalas created spontaneously in dreams or waking life were unconscious attempts to heal one's inner self. Joseph Campbell brought mandalas to the public's attention in The Power of Myth (1988): making a mandala is a discipline for pulling all those scattered aspects of your life together, finding a centre . Mandala: Journey to the Centre explores how the mandala has been used throughout history and is relevant today as a tool for meditation, personal growth and expression. This book offers over 400 breathtaking colour photographs of mandalas in mainifestations from art, architecture and nature - from Buddhist paintings to the Pantheon to our own cellular structure. It also includes illustrated exercises and examples of specific techniques for making mandalas and using them as a path to greater self-awareness. A special international gallery of contemporary mandala art and community healing projects is accompanied by stories from the artists who created them, providing inspiration for our exploration of the mandala - a journey to wholeness that can help us discover the centre within ourselves and beyond.