To rate the book would beat the entire purpose of the book.

And this book was not what I thought it was either. It is interesting and worthwhile but sometimes hard to follow. Of course, that is part of his overall point (I think) - that Buddhism isn't linear and isn't something you actually get a handle on. At least I think that is his point. The writing is lovely, the flow is mostly circular, kinda like a whirlpool. Keep going round and round, touching on similar points from a slightly different depth.

Excellent book that gets straight to the essence of Buddhism and explains it so well. I could keep this in constant rotation and will probably read it several times.

Best writing on Buddhism I have come across as someone who doesn't know much about it. Very good on nature of freedom and attachment.

Too intellectual. Except for a few good examples here and there, books about Zen are pointless

A sober deep dive into what Buddhism and reality is.

Great book, it definitely clears a lot of doubts regarding Buddhism and it makes you understand a lot and yet at the same time it can make you understand even less. Zen is complicated yet at the same time so easy.

Some of the ideas put forth in this book, especially those concerning various Zen conceptions of life and reality, are pretty nice thoughts and have even been pleasant and helpful in everyday life. However, Hagen is unclear at best on a number of important philosophical ideas and claims. Often he falls back on the claim that if we could "just see" reality for what it is in this moment, we would know the truth of Zen teaching.

As an overview of Buddhist teachings and beliefs, this book is useful If a little repetitive. I would now be interested in examining the philosophical presumptions of Buddhism in more depth in another book should I find one more focused on them.

"Whatever you hold to, let it go.
Step into this moment.
Come back to just this.
It takes some effort.
But come back, come back, come back to just this.
Just see what you've been ignoring for so long".

This is how Steve Hagen ends this immensely comforting and insightful book. I picked up this book during 2013 after some personal struggles that left me feeling a lot of things, both physical and emotional, none of which were comfortable, or pleasant or things that I wanted to be experiencing. Earlier that year I'd been to a training workshop on Acceptance and Commitment therapy and was inspired by it to learn more about this alternative way of thinking where thoughts do not have precedence over our behaviour, but are seen as something that can be heard and left behind if that is what would be most helpful in that moment, and in the long-term. A major component of ACT is learning mindfulness skills. Learning the ability to be aware of thoughts, emotions and body sensations for what they are. Sitting with those feelings and really feeling them. Instead of buying into our thoughts about them, which is just the way our minds work.

When I don't feel well or happy I like to look at books. They are comforting. I like the musky smell. They way the paper feels in my hand. I like looking at words on paper. This is what I was doing that day when I came across this book. It was sitting on my parents bookshelves and I just picked it up, took it to my room and decided to read it.

"This is not a feel-good self-improvement book" was the first thing I read. Which is just what I needed. Because when bad things happen and you're miserable, and you have zero energy, and you're in pain, you don't want some douche bag telling you that life is 100 percent the choices you make and that you have the power to be who you want to be and achieve your wildest hopes and dreams. And God fordbid that Rhonda Byrne comes along and tells you that you brought this all on yourself because you "thought too negatively". It's just not helpful. It's saying "you are in control" and when you're life is out of control, heavily dictated by circumstance or you feel blocked in with no where to turn. You don't want someone to say "it's all your choice". You want someone to say "life is shit sometimes, and that's okay because it's the the way life really is. That is reality. This is reality". This is what Steve Hagen told me.

He also told me that I am not my mind, and that my mind is not me. He told me that I am not separate from the world around me, that the only certainty in life is change, that even the very molecules in my body completely change, technically making me something different, and yet I remain the "same". I am always changing from one moment to the next. He told me that every moment is a new moment. He told me that all we have is now. That the future and the past do not exist except in our minds. And he told me many more things that were insightful and helpful and reflected what I already felt instinctively about life but had forgotten amid it all. He also told me a lot of things that I did not know, and I am grateful to him for this.

Somewhere along the way I stopped reading it. I think I was unwell and couldn't focus on it. So I left it for a while. And then I came back to it, and I was glad that I had, because just reading this book made me feel better about life. It made me feel like life is okay. And once I got through it all. Once the moments I was having were filled with a strange thing called happiness it made me feel that life, that reality, is wonderful. It made me feel that the very act of existing, of being, of this world, of experiencing anything at all is a miracle.

I picked up this book for a couple of reasons. General interest in "what is Buddhism", a few times my behavior has elicited a question from a friend if I was studying the subject because of a comment or action on my part. (e.g. not being upset at someone because I felt, how can it hurt me if I choose not to have an ego about it…)

I have to laugh that this book tried to explain Buddhism and being “fully awake and aware of reality” without being able to state how one does it, or what it really is like for the one reaching that point… so how do I explain the book itself? I have a bit of the same issue as the author.

To be fair, the author does a pretty good job and I’m not as talented as he is, so please don’t judge my review too harshly.

This is the first book I’ve ever read on this subject. The author does (from my naïve viewpoint) a pretty good job on trying to describe what can’t be described in a step by step process. He spends most of the book telling us what it isn’t. It’s not a feeling of ecstasy or just hitting “the point” and disappearing into the astral plane. ;-)

He does list many examples of past student’s questions and the somewhat cryptic answers given by their teachers. Much of this is an attempt to start knocking your mind to see and think differently.

I did understand some of his simpler explanations as in his description that everything is in flux, in actuality all is flux, and nothing is concrete. At every moment you change. Your thoughts changes, your feelings, the blood in your body has moved along, atoms move about in you, cells are dying and new being born, and so on. So you are not the person you were a year, day, minute, even a second ago. (This applies to us and everything around us.)

All this is set to prime you to see things differently. There is a lot of description on dropping all pre-conceptions and seeing reality for what it is. This is not easy as in just zoning out, humming and thinking “oh look, the birds are one with the trees and the tree reaches down into the ground to drink water… Ohmmm…” I get the sense that it’s more a case of, “you’ll know it when you get there.”

My only frustration with the book was midway through when I felt I was reading for the umpteenth time that reality just is, we have no control, we can affect no change, etc… Please note, this was my impression, I may have been missing the whole point. I wondered could a society fully “Buddhist” get to the moon or eradicate a disease like Polio.

The message seemed so focused on observing reality for what it is and coming to the realization that one is just part of the every changing flux with no ability to “force a change” that it just gave my Western-sculpted brain a headache.

I do think after finishing the book that I was confusing observation and “true understanding” with an implied inability to still participate in the world and change it. This is the one subject I’d love to talk with the author about if I ever meet him. I’ll spring for the coffee…

I see the author wasn’t allowed to teach until over 20 years of study. I’m sure he’d read my brief review and smile at my kindergarten level description.

Overall I enjoyed the book. It does do a good job (I think) to get one’s toe wet in the subject if it interests you. But with any discussion on a subject/concept this large, one book can never sum it up. It’s just a first step in a longer journey.

Good book, it helped me to understand Buddhism better. It didn't change my life or anything. I do wish the author would stop referencing physics to support his arguments.

I’m sure this is a fine book on Buddhism. I don’t know if it is accurate or not but it seems in line with other texts I’ve read about it. Basically we need to see truthfully and reality is everywhere. We have lots of preconceptions that get in our way of really seeing because we always interpret. It’s all quite slippery but it is also good to be reminded that we should really try to observe and notice what is true.