|
|
|
Breath by Breath: The Liberating Practice of Insight Meditation
by Larry Rosenberg
|
Paperback 240 pages / Shambhala / 2004-11-09 / listprice: $13.95
ISBN: 1590301366
Product Dimentions: 8.9 x 5.91 x 0.79 inches
Product Weight: 31 ounces
Customer
Reviews
More details from Amazon.com
or
Barnes&Noble.com
|
|
 Book Description
Meditation instructor Larry Rosenberg takes words attributed to the Buddha`s about the vital link between breathing and meditation, otherwise known as Anapanasati Sutra, and adapts it into an easy-to-grasp manual that is now a regular among meditation students. Everything in this book--from the title, to the chapter headings, even the material itself--is focused completely on breathing. Rosenberg drives home the point that it is not just the act of breathing, but how we consider it, that is the key to understanding the larger concepts of meditation, insight, and self-realization. Newcomer-friendly, this book begins with basic terminology and also includes a condensed method--a quick meditation for those without huge resources of time.
In any meditation class, one of the first things one learns is the importance of breathing. For Larry Rosenberg, a seasoned instructor of insight meditation, the breath is everything. And he's not in bad company since the Buddha himself delivered a sutra on the subject. Rosenberg's Breath by Breath is an elaboration on this short classic but couched in familiar language, liberally spiced with anecdotes from Rosenberg's decades of practice and teaching. It's Rosenberg's earthy humor and patient instruction that make him such a popular teacher and that make Breath by Breath a rewarding read. He takes the beginning student from the wandering "doggy mind" to becoming a chicken, along the way getting a teacher's bite and sitting like a frog. For the hurried and harried, he includes a nutshell, two-step version of the sutra's 16-step practice (appended in the full text of the sutra). More of a coach than a disciplinarian, Rosenberg takes a see-what-happens attitude. "You don't make liberation happen," he says. "To contemplate breathing is to contemplate life itself." --Brian Bruya
Freedom from suffering is not only possible, but the means for achieving it are immediately within our grasp—literally as close to us as our own breath. This is the 2,500-year-old good news contained in the Anapanasati Sutra , the Buddha's teaching on cultivating both tranquility and deep insight through full awareness of breathing. In this book, Larry Rosenberg brings this timeless meditation method to life. Using the insights gained from his many years of practice and teaching, he makes insight meditation practice accessible to modern practitioners.
|
|
|
|
| |
|
