Recommended Reading
All about meditation & related topics:
For Your Consideration
Some books about the Vedic perspective:
Creating Affluence, Deepak Chopra. A concise and easy read that reinforces and expands on some of the Vedic concepts we discussed during our instruction/follow-up days.
Life after Death: The Burden of Proof , Deepak Chopra. Explores what happens to us after we die from a Vedic perspective.
Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender, David Hawkins, MD. Great guide to understanding the mechanics of surrender and coping with stress release.
American Veda, Philip Goldberg. Fascinating look at how Vedanta came to the U.S.
Catching the Big Fish, David Lynch. The director/long-time meditator’s musings on creativity, movies and meditation.
These are good for helping us get present outside of meditation:
The Power of Now and Practicing the Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle
Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life, Byron Katie
Classic Texts:
The Upanishads, Volume 1, translated and with an introduction by Swami Nikhilananda (Jeff says: “The introduction in this book could be studied daily for months and still yield wisdom.”)
The Bhagavad Gita, 2nd Edition - introduced and translated by Eknath Easwaran
The Science of Being and Art of Living by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi - the seminal text by the Maharishi
Podcasts
On Being with Krista Tippett. Public radio podcast that is “a pursuit of the ancient and enduring human questions that gave rise to our spiritual traditions and resonate through every institution anew in this century: what does it mean to be human, how do we want to live, and who will we be to each other?”
Buddha at the Gas Pump, with Rick Archer. Interviews with “ordinary” spiritually awakening people.
Neuroscience, etc.
How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, Michael Pollan. Great writer. Fascinating account of his experiences as well as a scientific look at the default mode network of the brain and how it is affected by both meditation as well as psychedelics.
Being You: A New Science of Consciousness, Anil Seth. Love what The Guardian said about Seth’s book: “a brilliant and profound book that explains how our perception of the world, ourselves included, is a ‘controlled hallucination’ … constructed as much from the inside out as the outside in.”
These are for the ladies:
Balance Your Hormones, Balance Your Life: Achieving Optimal Health and Wellness through Ayurveda, Chinese Medicine, and Western Science, Claudia Welch. Really helpful for explaining hormones/menopause.
Gift from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindberg. Acclaimed 20the century author, aviator and mother of 5 reflects on youth and age, love and marriage, peace, solitude, and contentment during a brief vacation by the sea.
Books about trauma: So much research now shows that traumas we experience, especially early in life, can impact our mental and physical wellness. These are resources for exploring that.
Waking the Tiger, Peter Levine.
The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, Bessel van der Kolk M.D.
Mindful Self-Compassion
If you ever feel like you're being just a little too mean to yourself, Kristin Neff and Chris Germer founded the Center for Mindful Compassion and Diana has studied with them. They co-wrote The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook, and it has great guided meditations, exercises.
A few articles by Trudi
Live Consciously to Become Who You Choose
Harness Flow for Peak Performance Using the 3C Method
Use Mindful Exercise to Work Out Your Stress
The Upside to the Downside of Mediation
How to Choose the Best Meditation Practice for You
The Bliss of Losing Yourself in Flow
Enjoy the Silence for a Mental Vacation
Motherhood is an Inside Job & Other Spiritual Truths (MamaDoctors.com)
