BOOKS

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  No spiritual library would be complete without this classic by Paramahansa Yogananda!  Chosen as "One of the 100 Best Spiritual Books of the Twentieth Century", Autobiography of a Yogi has been translated into more than 50 languages, has sold several million copies, and continues to appear on best-seller lists after more than seventy-five consecutive years in print. Paramahansa Yogananda relates the inspiring stories of his life, including the remarkable experiences of his childhood, encounters with saints and masters during his youthful search throughout India for an enlightened master, ten years of training in the ashram of the revered yoga master, and thirty years that he lived, lectured and taught in America. He also records his meetings with Luther Burbank, Mahatma Gandhi, Therese Neumann, Rabindranath Tagore,  and other spiritual personalities of East and West.   

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 The foundation of Anthony De Mello's spiritual message is awareness. Mixing Christian spirituality with Buddhist parables while providing psychological insight, De Mello delivers his message of awareness in a grand synthesis.  This spiritual classic is composed of short chapters for reading in quiet moments at home or in the workplace.  De Mello's challenging message is simply that we must forsake the world we create with our illusions and become aware. This happens, De Mello insists, when we become alive to the needs of others, whether at the workplace or home.  Awareness is a masterfully written book, inviting us to 'wake up' in every area of our lives.

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   Red Pine is one of the world’s foremost translators of Chinese religious and literary texts. Lao-tzu’s Taoteching is one of the essential volumes of world literature, and Red Pine’s eloquent and authoritative English translation, reissued and published with the Chinese text included, is one of the most highly recommended versions. Included are commentaries by scores of Taoist adepts, emperors, monks, poets, and scholars spanning more than two thousand years.  

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 In Mindfulness, Joseph Goldstein imparts the wisdom of four decades of teaching and practice. This book will serve as a lifelong companion for anyone committed to mindfulness, mindful living, and attaining the ultimate freedom.  Goldstein uses the Satipatthana Sutta (the Buddha's legendary discourse on the four foundations of mindfulness) as his source.  The Satipatthana Sutta became the basis for the different types of Vipassana (or insight meditation) found in the world today. Exquisitely detailed and wholly accessible, Mindfulness takes us through a profound study of ardency, mindfulness of the body, mindfulness of feelings, mindfulness of mind, and mindfulness of dhammas (categories of experience including the Five Hindrances, the Six Sense Spheres, the Seven Factors of Awakening).

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 This spiritual classic is by Guy Finley and coauthored by Dr. Ellen Dickstein.  It will reveal to you astounding parts of yourself that you heretofore never even knew existed! You will be taught to observe inner dramas that control your life without your knowledge so that you can awaken to a higher awareness. This higher consciousness provides the only true strength you need to live without fear. By discovering the truth about your identity, you will finally understand how to win the war within yourself, by ending once and for all the existence of that very war.

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 The Mantram (or mantra) is a short and powerful spiritual formula taken from the world’s great traditions. It can be repeated mentally anywhere, anytime.   Eknath Easwaran, the author of best-selling translations of The Bhagavad Gita and The Upanishads taught the use of the mantram as part of his passage meditation program for forty years.  In this classic book, Easwaran explains that the mantram can help to steady your mind and free it from anxiety, frustration, anger, and resentment. Easwaran also gives practical advice for using the mantram to focus your mind and access deeper resources of patience, strength, and love.

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 From the author of the best-selling  The Developing Mind, and a leader and educator in the field of mental health, comes the first book ever to integrate neuroscience research with the art of mindfulness. This groundbreaking approach to not just mental health, but life in general, demonstrates to readers how awareness and attunement can stimulate emotional circuits in the brain, leading to a host of physiological benefits, including greater emotional balance, improved cardiac and immune function, and resilience (just to name a few).

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 In this remarkable and eloquent spiritual classic, Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh gives the reader pleasant anecdotes and down-to-earth exercises for learning the skills of mindfulness. In everyday activities such as washing dishes, answering the phone, or peeling an orange, Nhat Hanh reminds us that the present moment contains within it the opportunity to become fully awake, aware, and peaceful.

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 Used copies only - but still well worth it!  Richard Hittleman--Author, Lecturer, and Instructor--has introduced Yoga to more Americans than any other living authority, and this is his most complete presentation of Yoga to date.  Hittleman explains the Patanjali structure and the Yoga philosophy in perhaps the most succinct, eloquent manner in print to date.  This 1975 classic also includes his famous Hatha Yoga course, illustrated with step-by-step photography.    The student is literally shown what should be visualized and felt in the performance of each exercise.    
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 In the 50th edition (not shown here) of one of the most beloved American Zen books, Suzuki opens with a handful of provocative words:   "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few."  In the more than fifty years since its original publication, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind has become a modern spiritual classic.  Well worth reading and rereading, the work is often recommended as the first book to read on the subject of Zen. The basics of zazen posture and breathing are presented alongside a remarkably clear discussion of nonduality.  The book resonates with joyful insight from beginning to end.

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