Your Breathing Body Volume 1: [Audiobook] [Audio CD]

Reginald A. Ray (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2008

Your breath is the gateway to a universe of unlimited proportions that lies within. This is the premise of Your Breathing Body, Reggie Ray¿s landmark two-volume breathwork curriculum. Appropriate for everyone from beginning meditators to advanced practitioners, Volume 1 includes 10 CDs of sequential instruction in basic practices drawn from Tibetan yoga, qigong, Zen, Theravada Buddhism, and indigenous traditions. Listeners join Reggie Ray as he combines his renowned scholarship with nearly four decades of practicing and teaching meditation to explore Earth breathing, threefold breathing, cellular breathing, ¿ten-points practice,¿ and much more. ¿Your breath is far more than just air moving in and out of the body,¿ explains Reggie Ray. ¿It is the pathway to everything you need for full realization.¿ With Your Breathing Body, this esteemed teacher gives us the ultimate breakthrough course¿gentle, safe, and extraordinarily effective¿for transforming our mental, physical, and emotional lives.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Reginald A. Ray, Ph.D. is one of the most innovative and experienced meditation teachers currently teaching in the West, drawing on 38 years of study within the Tibetan tradition and many years of solitary and group retreat practice. He teaches within the dharma and meditation lineages of the great siddha Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche. On the faculty of Naropa University since its beginning, he is the author of Touching Enlightenment (Sounds True, 2008), In the Presence of Masters (Shambhala, 2004), Indestructible Truth (Shambhala, 2002), Secret of the Vajra World (Shambhala, 2002), Buddhist Saints in India (Oxford University, 1999), and other books.

Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Sounds True, Incorporated (October 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591796598
• ISBN-13: 978-1591796596
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 6.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #679,567 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

58 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Deft Exploration of Blind Spot, January 11, 2009

By 

Richard Mertes (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Your Breathing Body Volume 1: (Audio CD)

I've wondered why no one has reviewed these CD's yet. I think that Reggie and his students (of which I am not formally one) have a lot of integrity and are holding off from publicly praising their own work/teacher. So...allow me. I cherish these CD's. Part of me is tempted to call this work a "Fourth Turning of the Wheel," but I know that this is really just looking at the first three "turnings (especially the third)" through different lenses in order to allow for the full embodiment of the wisdom already buried in these teachings. This bridging of buddhist philosophy with sensitivity to the somatic-experiential has been--for me, anyway--the perfect medicine. Of course I cannot say how it would resonate with anyone else.

First I listened to the 20 CD's (10 in Volume #1 and 10 in Volume #2) sequentially--roughly one a day--over the course of about three weeks. This served as a sort of home retreat. Each one has a dharma talk and then a guided exercise. I enjoyed beginning this way just to get a general lay of the land. Now I'm going back and working with them in a more focused and luxurious way. Typically I listen in the evening, hold some quiet yoga poses during the dharma talk, and then am ready for the body work. Certain exercises quickly jumped out as being particularly fruitful for me. I won't dismiss the others, though, since I know that there may be treasures also in what does not initially resonate. I can say that every one of the dharma talks has had its share of jewels, and that I have enjoyed them a great deal. I think there are enlightening nuggets available to both the beginning and the advanced practitioner.

I have worked with a lot of body/mind techniques and philosophies...straight Zen and Vipassana meditation, Taoist meditation and chi kung, shamanic journeying, etc.--and have benefitted greatly from all of them. But, Reggie seems to really get where a lot of westerners are at right now--that is, very good at THINKING about their bodies and experiences, but not very good at FEELING them. I'm coming to realize how much that describes me as well, and am having pretty profound results using the techniques he offers. His book, Touching Enlightenment, has also become a source of many insights and inspirations for me.

To sum up, I would say that I think Reggie has described a kind of "blind spot" in the spiritual lives of many contemporary practitioners--mainly about the body being a neglected yet essential starting point for the cultivation of awareness of any kind. Buddhist tradition is by no means mum about this blind spot, it's just that many people have not looked at it with the lenses that would allow them to truly mine the riches that are available there. Reggie goes straight to this place, and I can only say that it resonates with me and that I have benefitted from it greatly. I am deeply grateful and obviously would recommend it highly to others.

PS I particularly enjoyed the buddhist spin he puts on "trauma"--that is, how any and all unfiltered experiences we have of raw reality will be traumatic to our egos, since their purpose is to help maintain our conceptual constructs of reality. It's not just the car crashes and abandonments that traumatize us...it's the bit of reflexive fear that accompanies any flash of light illuminating long-held shadow.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truly Transformative Teachings, January 11, 2011

By 

Ron Feintech (Portland, Maine United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Your Breathing Body Volume 1: (Audio CD)

I am an Integral Psychologist. I have been working with Vipassana, Zen, teachings and practice for over 30 years. I am a veteran of a 3 month silent retreat and innumerable 7 days sesshins and 10-20 day retreats, not to mention years of study of shamanism, Sufism, and the writings and Integral studies of Ken Wilber.
Until I discovered Reggie's somatic protocols, my history has been a frustrating encounter with the demons of discursiveness, restlessness, impatience.
I have worked through both volumes of Your Breathing Body and completed a 5 month intensive with this path which included 2 trips to Colorado for intensive practice at Reggie's beautiful Meditation Center.
I am amazed at the progress I have made in deepening my awareness of my body and entering into profoundly transformative mindstates and experiences.
These teachings and practices are by far the most authentically transformative I have found...truly amazing. I cannot recommend this work enough to
both beginning meditators and hoary old goats alike. You still need to bring right effort to it as well as the rest of the eightfold path, but these teachings are absolutely unsurpassed in profundity, depth, and effectiveness. The perfect antidote to the dreaded "spiritual bypass" and narcissism which
plagues so much of contemporary
American spirituality.
Ron Feintech, PhD
"Heart King"
Portland, ME

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring...!, April 8, 2010

By 

Mirna B. Orellana "mbpach" (Phoenix, AZ) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Your Breathing Body Volume 1: (Audio CD)

This set of CD's has had an impact in our lives. The way the narrator introduces the breathing exercises and meditation techniques is just great. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to get in touch with their inner senses and learn how to meditate.