In this modern spiritual classic, the Tibetan meditation master Chogyam Trungpa highlights the commonest pitfall to which every aspirant on the spiritual path falls prey: what he calls spiritual materialism. The universal tendency, he shows, is to see spirituality as a process of self-improvement--the impulse to develop and refine the ego when the ego is, by nature, essentially empty. -The problem is that ego can convert anything to its own use, - he said, -even spirituality.- His incisive, compassionate teachings serve to wake us up from this trick we all play on ourselves, and to offer us a far brighter reality: the true and joyous liberation that inevitably involves letting go of the self rather than working to improve it. It is a message that has resonated with students for nearly thirty years, and remains fresh as ever today. This new edition includes a foreword by Chogyam Trungpa's son and lineage holder, Sakyong Mipham.