Books About Meditation

My recommendations (or not) of books on meditation.

• Meditation for Beginners by Jack Kornfield
  • 'GET THIS BOOK FIRST': This is by far the best intro to mindfulness meditation that I have read. By far. It's short, 90 pages. It gets to the point and covers all the bases with minimal noise. 'REPEAT: GET THIS BOOK FIRST'

• Mind Illuminated by Culadasa
  • This is a textbook on meditation intended to guide you from beginner to enlightenment. The trouble with this book is that it's a textbook. So it's big and a bit dry. Great information but not a thrilling read. I'm considering buying a second copy and chopping it up to see if I could rebind it into a set of smaller works that would be less intimidating and easier to carry around.
• to Sit by Thich Nhat Hanh
  • Easy to read, just a paragraph on each page, but insightful and… enlightening. :)
• Some Headspace by Andy Puddicombe
  • Background and discussion plus how Andy came to Buddhism and meditation, it also includes some starter meditations. I can't read and meditate at the same time so I'm not sure … . Just realized that I've been medit-reading quite a bit recently. If you're mindful, if you're fully present, then everything is meditation. My biggest complaint is that Andy never does explain about the monastery that he has to escape from. I wanted the story of the monastery where he felt he couldn't leave by the front door.

• Not Given: A Guide to Getting Over Yourself by Mark Epstein
• * Great meditation/self-help book wrapped in a tasty dharma tortilla.
• * “Ego is the one affliction we all have in common.” – first line of the book
• Dharma of Modern Mindfulness by Beth Mulligan
• Buddhism Without Beliefs by Stephen Batchelor
• * Reading now and so wish I'd known about this in my 20s. (Which would be a miracle since it came out in 1997.)
• Buddhism is True by Robert Wright
  • A really good backgrounder into Buddhist philosophy and the many ways that science is coming to the same conclusions about the human mind that some Indian dude did 2500 years ago. Covers how Robert came to meditation and some of his experiences, the basics of Buddhist philosophy and what science has to say about it. A little dry and he used too many Indian words. Indian words are fine except there were so many that I couldn't keep track and after a while I got tired of trying. If you're gonna do that you should include a pullout card that can be my bookmark and translator.
• Up by Sam Harris
  • Covers how Sam got into meditation and what he's learned from it, including the “true nature” of the human mind and also what science has to say about that. Also a little dry but an easier read than Wright's book, possibly because I didn't notice the non-English words. I think he just didn't use them as heavily.
• Happier by Dan Harris
  • This is not a book about meditation so much as it is the story of how Dan got into meditation and why you should too.
  • Related:

:* 10% Happier podcast :* 10% Happier app

• for Fidgety Skeptics by Dan Harris

• Having No Head by Douglas Edison Harding

• Mind, Beginner's Mind by Shunryu Suzuki

This is books that aren't directly about meditation but I believe they had a strong influence and where I landed once Headspace made meditation stick for me. For many of them the connection will be obvious but for some the main point is just that they introduced new ideas to a young mind so I didn't stuck in ruts of American society.

• The Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, translated by Stephen Mitchell
• Notes to Myself by Hugh Prather
• Smiles by Marcia and David Kaplan
• The Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anson Wilson
• Principia Discordia by Malaclypse The Younger
• Zen without Zen Masters by Cameron Benares
• The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff
• Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M Pirsig
• The Little Zen Companion by David Schiller
• Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
• Callahan's Crosstime Saloon and Time Travelers Strictly Cash by Spider Robinson

Recommendations from people who are not me.

• Meddit's Book Recommendations
• Meddit's Book list in the wiki
• Mindfulness in Plain English
• The Skeptics Guide 2017 Buddhism Guided Reading Course

• Power of Now] by Eckhart Tolle
• * (2019-03-29) I'm only halfway through this and it's a very odd mix of truth and bullshit. The truth comes when he's describing his experience and talking about the mental state of most humans. The bullshit is when he tries to tell you how to get there. I don't think the bullshit is intentional, I just think Tolle has no idea how he got there so he doesn't know how how to help you get there. It's like he woke up in a beautiful park one morning but he doesn't know where the park is so he can't give you directions beyond “just come here”. I also think he suffers from a lot wishful thinking when it comes to Jesus instructions on how to be enlightened.
• * My LibraryThing review

Because this is unlikely to get frequent updates here's some related links to my LibraryThing which does get frequent updates.

• My Mindfulness collection
• Books I've tagged "Buddhism"
• Books I've tagged "Meditation"