Customer Reviews

Living from the Heart: Heart Rhythm Meditation for Energy, Clarity, Peace, Joy, and Inner Power

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This is a great book for both the new and experienced meditator. Exploring the sound of your heart in meditation is a wondefully rich and centering experience. The book guides you step by step to achieving this, as well as advanced methods that will continually allow you to grow. For the new meditator, there is also a program w/ a timetable in the back of the book to help you structure your progress.

Living from the Heart has altered my perception of what it truly means to be "real" and has had a profound effect on not only how I perceive others but more importantly on how I react to all of life's situations. I've found that through the breath practices alone my life has changed. My energy is double if not triple what it was, my ability to listen to others and really hear what they are saying has increased when I listen with my heart and maintain a full breathing pattern. Add the element breath practices and WOW you have a guaranteed method of changing your energy to match the situation. If you need to be the calm voice of reason in a business meeting where everyone else is charged up and you use the air and earth breaths you can not only see the bigger picture and commonality of everyone's concerns but you can remain calm in the storm and actually calm down everyone in the meeting (both in person and via phone). If you've had a long day and need to get a boost of energy or optimism then the fire breadth will increase your energy. The water breadth is perfect for developing and sending empathy and emotions for not only your closer relationships but also with those you may have just met. I've found that learning to harness the power of your breath can be an extremely powerful tool in business as well as in life.
I have tried many different forms of meditation over the past 24 years and have taken multiple leadership, communication, relationship building and "stress relief" courses yet they only cover bits and pieces of how to effectively listen to your intuition, relate to another person, show empathy and relieve stress. Living from the heart gives you sound, easy to practice and incredibly powerful methods of developing your concentration, intuition, communication with yourself, and guides you to living a heart centered life.
The key to this method of meditation is that it is not just visualization or counting or any of the other methods that take you away from your body and self but rather key practices that will apply to every situation in your life. This book not only teaches you how to meditate but gives you the tools to apply the benefits of mediation to enhance your everyday life. It gives you the tools you need to contact your heart, hear what it says, learn how to breath (which if that is all you learn from this book your life will be greatly enhanced), and to really connect with your spiritual side. The method is based on thousands of years of collective knowledge from multiple religions and spiritual practices blended with the latest in scientific research.
Puran Bair has done an absolutely spectacular job of synthesizing the best practices that many spend a lifetime learning and presenting the knowledge in an easy to understand, easy to practice and incredibly powerful manor that anyone can learn and benefit from.
I've given copies of this book to countless friends. Anyone that wants to learn how to really breath and utilize the power of the breath, develop awareness of their body and heart, increase their body's natural healing capacity and connect back with (or enhance) their spiritual awareness will love this book regardless of religious affiliation (or lack of religious belief).

In addition, those who will benefit are not just those on a spiritual path but anyone that wants to harness the power of their breath...using the square (or diamond) breath is a highly effective way to increase your lung capacity and VO2 Max...useful for runners, atheletes, anyone living in or traveling to high altitudes or basically anyone interested in increasign their stamina, recovering from surgury (takes pressure off your chest), and increases your vitality and health.

I have been a meditator for many years. During this time I have had experience with many different forms of meditation and inner work. I have found Heart Rhythmn Meditation as presented in Living From the Heart to be an extremely effective method for reaching a state of inner peace, harmony and balance. This book explains this simple, powerful and effective method of meditation. It works for both those beginning and those sustaining a meditation practice. The aspect of Bair's method that I found particularly valuable is the distinction that he makes between upward and downward meditation. Upward meditation's purpose is to release one's consciousness from the constraints of earthly existence. Upward meditation can create all sorts of personal, emotional and psychic problems for unwary practitioners. In contrast downward meditation helps one to understand the purpose and meaning behind one's daily life. It is a much safer form of meditation designed to make one better able to deal with real life problems. For those of us that have busy, active lives in the world that are geared towards accomplishment and achievement, downward meditation is the more useful technique. I recommend this book to people that would like clear, practical instructions for meditating.

I was initially attracted to this book because the concept of living a heart-centered life is very appealing to me. I have purchased too many spiritually-oriented books over the years that were not truly useful in daily life, however, so, as I leafed through Puran Bair's book, I was looking for evidence that there was something offered that would be of practical benefit to me. I was immediately struck by the clarity of the writing, the accessible organization of the text, the diversity of practical applications offered, and the grounding of the work in a legitimate, long established universalist spiritual tradition. This book has been useful to me in my personal life, particularly in regard to relationships and in the healing of emotional wounds, and it has also been very helpful in my professional life as an educator and counselor. It is a book that helps facilitate the understanding of self and others; a book that teaches how to build bridges between hearts. Our world needs these practices.

I have read many many "heart" entitled books over the years and it is surprising to me that so few people are aware of this book and the method of meditation that it introduces, especially given its ease and effectiveness. Before I discovered this work, my own heart had attained various states----from serious questioning with Ramana Maharshi and other spiritual quests, to the ecstatic verse of Rumi and Hafiz----from sharing with patients, life's trauma and joys through years as a health care provider, to the wrenching-heart-breaking-openings of ended relationships.

When I began Heart Rhythm Meditation, sensations and awareness felt great right away which aroused my curiosity and encouraged me to keep practicing. But it took me six more months of various methods of this meditation before realizing I was experiencing much more than just a temporary high or an insightful understanding. Some essential aspect of my being was gradually changing by such a simple practice of attending to my breathing and my heart-beat.

(For the quickest experiential entry, go immediately to "The First Intervention" practice on page 144 for a limited number of breaths. Then go right on to page 155 "The Second Intervention" also for a limited number of breaths. Gently. Simply. Easily. Entering into a "conversation" with your lungs and then opening to the possibility of a "conversation" with your heart. If any anxiety or concerns arise in this new relationship with your heart, move right on to page 166.)

I have read this book every year for the last nine years and shared it with patients and students. With even a little patience, I know you will discover or uncover within, exactly what the book's subtitle suggests: energy, clarity, peace, joy and inner power. Moving into your heart, layer after layer after layer. Holding a feeling state longer and longer. Living less through your mind, and living more from your heart. You will not lose any mental abilities but calm and enhance them as you gain your full heart function. As Puran Bair speaks so succinctly, you may now live with your mind in service to your heart.

(This book provides practical emotional experience of the Elements and insights on pranayama for those interested in either of these arenas.)

Puran and Susanna Bair have also published another title: Energize Your Heart

This book and its author have had a more profound impact on my life than any other book that I have ever read. I practice the meditations which it contains daily, and have become very involved in Heart Rhythm Practice. When a friend told me about this book and how much it had impacted him, I had no idea of how powerful it would be in my life! Because of it and the author, I have made changes in my way of being in the world that I would never have thought possible. "Livng from the Heart" provides practical tools for managing daily stress and challenges as well as giving a blueprint for accessing a tangible connection to "The One Heart." For me, this book is priceless.
Jeanie Underwood

Living from the Heart is a book that can change your life. Bair writes with great understanding of physiologic principles. He integrates these principles with heart rhythm meditations. This book is methodically written. Each step brings you closer to mastery of the practices of meditation. If you are interested in improving your life, relationships and work, Bair's book is a must read.

Living from the Heart guides the reader to search inwardly for the answer giving clear step by step instructions for connecting to the heart. I found the chapters written on the four elements (earth, water, fire and air) to be the most inspiring. Each chapter feels like it was written by the element not one person. Over several years I have found myself reaching for this book again and again turning to an element chapter enjoying the energy of each element as well as the information.

This user-friendly and engaging book is ideal for introducing people to meditation and helping them establish a regular practice. Meditating with the heartbeat creates a sense of vibrant, warm connection with others and with ones own inner life.

I was studying about relationships in an effort to try to save my marriage, and bought this book since the title was "Living from the Heart"; it seemed it would be a good resource for what I was working on. What I didn't quite grasp then was I was buying a book about meditation, but also much more. And what I really didn't know was how much this one book would set me on a direction that has been unbelievably rewarding. I still work as a commercial real estate broker, but living from the heart has enabled me to be more focused, more confident, more dedicated to others, a much better broker than I was before, and have a more fulfilling life. This book is a gateway to an incredible discovery process that each of us have a birthright to pursue.