Reddit Reddit reviews Finding the Still Point (Book and CD): A Beginner's Guide to Zen Meditation (Dharma Communications)

We found 3 Reddit comments about Finding the Still Point (Book and CD): A Beginner's Guide to Zen Meditation (Dharma Communications). Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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Finding the Still Point (Book and CD): A Beginner's Guide to Zen Meditation (Dharma Communications)
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3 Reddit comments about Finding the Still Point (Book and CD): A Beginner's Guide to Zen Meditation (Dharma Communications):

u/huuhuu · 2 pointsr/programming

There's a book called "Finding the Still Point" by John Loori that I found to be very helpful in this regard. It's a quick, pragmatic lesson in seated meditation.

I wholeheartedly agree with the idea of meditation as a way to begin a programming session. It quiets the mind and allows me to skip the whole "hey I wonder what's on redditboingboingfacebookreddit real quick before I start" part of my programming session.

edit: formatting

u/[deleted] · 2 pointsr/Meditation

Well, there are tons of meditation practices. Metta/Maitri or tonglen cultivates compassion among other things, mantra meditations, Zazen, Qi Gong, body scans help relax, chakra meditations like Kundalini might be nice, one can do mindfulness meditation using objects like the ambient sounds, breath or anything we choose. For me, mindfulness meditation in which one will focus on an object of meditation has built my concentration (Samadhi) and calmness of mind (Samatha) considerably.

When we have the concentration and awareness we can then better observe our body, speech and mind and identify things that might be making us uneasy.

It's like having the ability to hit the brakes before we swerve off the road and go coasting through the woods. This ability is called insight (Vipassana). We can even begin to see other habitual tendencies like harmful reactions, always resorting to food or smoking when we are agitated, making excuses, defective reasoning and things like that. We can begin to really have control over actions, speech and thoughts. This can all help improve studies, sports and countless other activities.

Basic mindfulness meditation involves placing the mind on an object of focus. Many will use the in and out breath or an object, like a statue. When we get distracted, we patiently place the mind back on the object. It's ok to get distracted, I've written entire poems in my head and then caught myself and placed the mind back on the object. Shakyamuni Buddha taught on this practice, I would recommend reading the [Anapanasati Sutta] (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.118.than.html) to get an idea of how powerful the breath awareness can be. [Finding the Still Point] (http://www.amazon.com/Finding-Still-Point-Book-Communications/dp/1590304799) is a great beginners book.

u/FaustusRedux · 2 pointsr/Buddhism

The book that got me started was Finding the Still Point, which was a very good primer on zazen without a lot of Zen philosophy. After that, I agree that Hardcore Zen and Opening the Hand of Thought were good for introducing me to some deeper stuff.