First published as Field Notes on the Compassionate Life, this book is an open-minded, curious journey into the heart of this thing called compassion. A “Western Buddhist,” Barasch panhandles and sleeps on the streets with the homeless, communicates in sign-language with chimps, sits in on an Israeli-Palestinian encounter group for youths, and speaks with people who have donated kidneys to complete strangers. More emcee than preacher, he also introduces us to many heart-wise people along the way.

The Dalai Lama points out that the Tibetan term for compassion, tsewa, generally means love of others, but “one can have that feeling toward oneself as well. It is a state of mind where you extend how you relate to yourself toward others.” If it’s true that what goes around comes around, compassion is about nothing if not love’s tendency to circulate. And radiate.

Exploring through the multiple lenses of psychology and biology, pop culture and theology, history and philosophy, Barasch weaves a stirring and wonderfully readable account of his search to find within himself and others: the ability to live compassionately.

Don’t know how to handle your husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend, boss, employee, parent, child, friend, enemy? Love! Everything else is just a finger in the dike, holding back an ocean that, ironically, you could happily drown in. Sometimes I think, trying to get it through my own thick seawall of a skull, that compassion means only this: When in doubt, just love.

He examines such fascinating questions as What can we learn from exceptionally empathetic people? Can we increase our kindness quotient with practice? How do we open our hearts to those who do us harm? What if the great driving force of our evolution were actually “survival of the kindest”?

It is not tooth-and-nail competition but conciliation, cuddling, and cooperation that may be the central organizing principles of human evolution.

Drawing from influences as disparate as Buddhist monks and skeptical neuroscientists, Sufi mystics and the bonobo monkeys—but mainly consisting of insightful depictions of actual experiences and experiments—Barasch creates a persuasive argument that a simple shift in consciousness can have a tremendous, lasting impact on our psyches, our relationships, our health—and the very fate of the earth.

“Barasch is a bard of the human heart, spinning a gripping, thought-provoking, and entertaining tale… An essential guidebook for anyone who cares deeply about the human condition, and about how we can help each other find our way through with love and guts.” —Daniel Goleman, author of Social Intelligence