Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening Hardcover Author: Joseph Goldstein | Language: English | ISBN:
162203063X | Format: PDF, EPUB
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Review
"Mindfulness seems to be everywhere these days. It's clear the ideas associated with it provide helpful direction for dealing with things like addiction, emotional imbalance, and recovery from abuse. Joseph Goldstein, a leading meditation teacher and retreat leader, has put together a discussion of mindfulness in the context of its Buddhist origins, bringing it back to its relevance as a tool for spiritual awakening. Goldstein offers clearly-written discussions of things like awareness of motivation, sustainable application of effort, wholesome recollection, continuity of mindfulness, contemplating impermanence, personalizing difficulties, doubt disguised as wisdom, and mindful listening. The language of the book is down-to-earth and compassionately supportive. Non-English terms are carefully explained and used sparingly. This is a serious, yet very readable text, rooted in traditional, scholarly Buddhist philosophy without distancing itself from lay readers. Let your customers know that the welcoming tone of the writing creates the experience of opening a window and breathing in fresh air."
-Anna Jedrziewski, Retailing Insight
"A major contribution to the clarifying and deepening of our understanding of mindfulness and its traditional Dharma roots."
-Jon Kabat-Zinn
Author of Full Catastrophe Living and Mindfulness for Beginners
"Author Joseph Goldstein, one of the most wise, lucid, and experienced teachers of our times, has written a book on mindfulness that calls forth the depth and power of classical Buddhist teachings. If you are drawn to meditation out of a longing to realize spiritual freedom, this book will be a cherished resource on your path."
-Tara Brach, PhD
Author of Radical Acceptance and True Refuge- Hardcover: 456 pages
- Publisher: Sounds True; 1 edition (November 1, 2013)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 162203063X
- ISBN-13: 978-1622030637
- Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.4 x 1.5 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
As a reader with a Hindu upbringing and essentially a secular view, my early experiments with mindfulness were based on numerous books that prescribed specific lists of exercises without fully articulating its intent (perhaps not the authors' fault - they assume that a reader may have some understanding of the theoretical/philosophical underpinnings of mindfulness) or perhaps oversimplify (lists of one-minute exercises). To borrow an analogy from Goldstein, such books felt like "trying to row a boat across a river, exerting a lot of effort in the process, but never untying the rope from the dock". Perhaps, Goldstein was trying to address similar issues many have felt - and he delivers. (Readers familiar with other Eastern philosophies could find parallels in B K S Iyengar's efforts in Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom and Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali in the context of the practice of yoga)
In a very accessible exposition, Goldstein first systematically guides a reader through the various components of mindfulness and the hindrances that afflict the mind. He then explains the various dimensions of "awakening" and approaches for mindfulness in the context of the fundamental tenets of Buddhist thought.
I believe this to be the magnum opus of Joseph Goldstein's writings. This book is physically exquisite. Sounds True did a fine job of editing and publishing this book. The book is derived from a series of lectures on a particular sutta (talk) of the Buddha, the Satipatthana Sutta, which is found in a collection of talks called the Majjhima Nikaya. (The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha, edited by Bhikkhu Nanamoli and Bhikkhu Bodhi, Wisdom Publications). However, the sutta itself is also to be found as an appendix in Goldstein's new book. Goldstein's lectures were given at the Forest Retreat of the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts. Goldstein used, for these lectures, a recent interpretation of this sutta by a Buddhist monk Analayo, named Satipatthana: the Direct Path to Realization, Windhorse Publications. Over a series of retreats Goldstein systematically commented on every verse of the sutta,using the Venerable Analayo's commentary as an comparative guide for his own commentary. This kind of commentary is a classical method of working with a sutta in the Buddhist world. ( Also, Sounds True has issued the actual talks as a three part cd series, Abiding in Mindfulness.)
The Satgtipatthana Sutta is meant to be a complete and sufficient description of a particular form of meditation that is called vipassana or Insight Meditation. (This meditation has also just been called Mindfulness and has become increasingly popular as a means for reducing stress.) The Buddha says that if this sutta's methodology is strictly adhered to, it will led to realization or Enlightenment. Goldstein takes that claim very seriously. His book reflects a careful, years long, relationship to both this sutta and to the meditations revealed by the Buddha.
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