Customer Reviews

How to See Yourself As You Really Are

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a very comprehensive guide to Buddhist meditation practices. Delivered as always in the Dalai Lama's distinctive style - full of humor, joy, and gentle compassion.

The one proviso regarding this book - unlike many of the Dalai Lama's other books, this book is actually intended as a guide to practitioners of Buddhist meditation, and not as an informative source for interested non-practitions (like "The Art of Happiness).

I believe the Dalai Lama is the closest thing we have to a Buddha on earth. His writing is full of grace and enlightenment. In this book he takes on the difficult task of explaining the true condition of a human being-impermanent conditional consciousness. This topic is very difficult to explain by putting it into words. The Dalai Lama does a great job and then follows up with many exercises. Here is how I would summarize this books teachings:

We are not our body, nor even our mind. if we were we could not say my mind or my body. Then what are we? We are "like" and illusion existing through our 5 aggregates, body, thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and consciousness. No "I" can be located. The closest we can come is understanding that we are consciousness observing the present moment, all else is thought and mental formation. Who we think we really are is just a mental formation we hold in our mind of our beliefs about ourselves our religion, height, weight, name, etc. Enlightenment is simply understanding this and the nature of reality.

I hope I did some justice to this books topic, but I highly recommend reading this book to move farther down the road to enlightenment.

I have over 100 books on buddhism and meditation and if I had to pick my favorite this is it. To me it contains everything an aspiring buddha needs to know and practice.Especially good if you don't have access to a teacher or a spiritual center.

Only someone with such a profound insight and deep understanding over a subject as complex as emptiness is, can expound it as clear, easy going, way as His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama... This is a wonderful book guiding the reader step by step into a precise methodology to discriminate between the way things appear to our senses and the way they actually exist... Inspiring, clarifying, amazing!!!

A book that can be enojoyed at so many levels!!!

I agree with the earlier reviewer who said this book is intended for practicing Buddhists, but anyone interested in Advaita Vedanta, or any other practice which serves to wake one up to the true nature of reality would benefit from reading it. In Buddhism, it is suggested that all our problems spring from the misapprehension that we and everything around us are separate 'things.' This book deals directly with this issue and provides a very solid foundation for practice, which so many other books on this subject lack. If you liked Ken Wilber's "No Boundary," I think you may love this book, as it approaches the same subject from a different perspective and includes methods of practice as well.

This is a book to own and reread if you want to grasp its depth. I would also suggest having some practice or enough introspection to continue the delving into understanding that the HH Dalai Lama is well practiced in and so shares his personal findings within these pages. There are years of wisdom emanating from these words which convinces us that compassion and calm abiding are approachable, it is the way we must be and we must practice and teach others to do so.

But first we must understand ourselves and our tendency toward ignorance most especially our confusion with inherency. That is all is dependant on all, nothing exists in and of itself and as such all is intricately related with cause and effect. Dare I try to explain! The HH Dalai Lama walks us through and provides meditative exercises so we can learn to understand the emptiness of inherency and free ourselves through practicing morality, meditation and wisdom. I am still discovering these blessed implications that manifest themselves each day and further affirm that all is in view. Read to continue your own discovery and to see for yourself.

Like a few other reviewers, I am in the beginning stages of my practice of Buddhism, and I have struggled with some of the concepts I have read about from other authors, lamas, and practitioners. However, when I read this book by the Dalai Lama, the veil was lifted from my eyes and I literally felt the sudden rush of understanding. Never have I meditated on a topic so deep and full of mystery and felt that it had been explained so thoroughly and with such clarity.

The pages just fly by as you get lost in your own thoughts - your world will be literally turned upside down as you proceed through the chapters. This book will have you thinking long after completion and will allow you to experience your life through completely different (and more compassionate and understanding) eyes.

Highly recommended for experienced practitioners, as well as beginners like me who wish to grasp an extremely deep and insightful concept that will not be explained with better clarity.

As a beginner in Buddhism, this was the first Buddhist book that I read. Before reading this, I had heard of many ways of Buddhist thought through small online writings, but His Holiness' 'How to See Yourself As You Really Are' truly helped me to gain a more meaningful understanding of impermanence, dependent arising, and compassion.
I suggest anyone new to Buddhism and still confused read this book.
Also, I'm currently reading His Holiness' 'The Way to Freedom' and I feel as if It's the perfect thing to read along with 'How to See Yourself As You Really Are'.

There is (as always with the Dalai Lama) a good message for all who read this book. It does give you great insight into how you can view the world and be a peace with everything in your life. However, it is a very dry read and sometimes I lost my focus and had to go back and re-read parts of the book. There are also many parts of the book that are redundant which also caused me to lose focus every now and again. I would recommend this book to friends, and did buy this book for my adult son: However, I would tell them to be prepared to sift through the book and gloss over the redundant parts and focus on the gems of wisdom.

This was a wonderfully insightful book that challenges you to take a hard look at the "true you". It makes you think on the choices you have made in life, and where you want to go from where you are now. I found this book very enlightening and found great peace in it's reading. I learned many things about myself that I feel have made me want to be a better person, and I believe it has helped put me on that path. I recommend this title to anyone looking for self awareness.