What Book(s) Changed Your Life?

I just posted an article here by a prisoner about how books changed his life.

Nearly everyone has had the experience of reading a book that gave them a new perspective, that radically changed their experience of themselves or the world. Many of us have experienced this more than once! Unlike watching television or even reading the news, there is nothing like a great book to change the course of your thinking or even your life.

What one book has changed your life? Perhaps there was a spiritual book that inspired you to begin meditation practice, or a novel that changed your ideas about human nature, or perhaps a book really woke you up to the seriousness of the prison industrial complex.

Please share your book (or books) and how it changed your life in the comments.

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Permalink Reply by Maggie Hostetler on November 4, 2010 at 7:19pm
Books that have been really helpful to me are: Being Nobody, Going Nowhere by Aya Khema; The Power of Now by Echart Tolle; The Joy of Living by Yongey Mingur Rinpoche.
Permalink Reply by Paulette Graf on November 5, 2010 at 2:44pm
"Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism" by Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche was the most life changing book for me in the 1970's, and I still have it close to me with all of its underlining. And that was just the beginning!
Permalink Reply by Jared Beekman on November 5, 2010 at 3:16pm
Healing Anger by the Dalai Lama, Working with Anger by Ven Chodron, and Gateways to Buddhist Practice by Chagdud Tulku were three of the myriad which changed my perspective on life.
Permalink Reply by Bill Williams on November 7, 2010 at 2:36pm
"Breath by Breath" by Larry Rosenberg, the best book I know of about breathing as a focal point in meditation. It's a book you can read over and over, letting its wisdom sink in.
Permalink Reply by Tamon Mark Uttech on November 15, 2010 at 5:52am
Onegaishimasu, Breath by Breath is indeed a very good book that one can turn to again and again. Zen Mind/Beginner's Mind is the all around classic and I have been reading it for more than 30 years...I used it as my basic life textbook and it has never failed to help me out in situations. "The sharp angle pointing at myself" was my theme for my own time spent in the county jail two years ago.

In gassho,

tamonmark
Permalink Reply by Bevan Suits on December 8, 2010 at 8:07am
Tamon Mark, Zen Mind Beginners Mind , when I first read it, always made me uncomfortable, for the right reasons. It gave no explanation for the intellect to understand. It is a challenge "Brown rice is enough." What the fuck does that mean? It pulls you in, and when you do practice zazen, it makes sense like very few other books do. May I ask more about your county jail experience? I spent only two nights in jail (with my very own cell!) when I was 16. Afterward I knew what freedom was.
Permalink Reply by Tamon Mark Uttech on December 8, 2010 at 9:07am
Onegaishimasu, I spent 6 months in two different county jails a couple of years ago. That is where I picked up the routine of writing two letters per day whether I got replies or not. The letter/journal writing was my own personal therapy that pulled me out of dark thought over and over. Ink pens were banned because of their use for making 'jailhouse tattoos' using the ink and a needle (beats me where they got a needle!) So I wrote daily in pencil and when I was finally released, I began to copy the journal over in ink, furthering my therapy. I was surprised that I seemed to have a sort of PTSD from that experience, something that goes deep enough that you fear ever returning to incarceration and sometimes you do wonder that just by dwelling on incarceration and incarceration thinking you may be inadvertantly drawing something to yourself that you do not want. A few months ago, I took a box of donated books from my personal library to the county jail and just being on the premises made me very uncomfortable... Having said that, I seem to remember something from Zen Mind/Beginner's Mind that talks about how true teaching will make you uncomfortable at first. A less fearful description could be both, the determination and the uncertainty a child encounters when learning how to walk. I hope this bit of explanation helps.
Permalink Reply by Bevan Suits on December 8, 2010 at 9:27am
Maybe going back with the books and feeling uncomfortable was necessary. I find that living in modern USA is so schizoid that it's easy to feel uncomfortable, especially when you peer into the realm of media, corporations, politics. Crazy as shit. Yet on the street I sense some new optimism. Or maybe it's just me.
Permalink Reply by Chris de Ocejo on November 10, 2010 at 12:21pm
Hands down, Small Gods by Terry Pratchett has shaken me and continues to shake me to the core. When I'm feeling confused spiritually or ethically or in any other way, I'll invariably re-read this book and get anchored again.

The Two Commandments prescribed by God in the book are my guiding stars in all darkness:

(1) This is not a game.
(2) Here and now, you are alive.
Permalink Reply by Ron Shepherd on November 19, 2010 at 11:58am
Be Here Now by Ram Dass..... need i say more???
Permalink Reply by Chris de Ocejo on November 19, 2010 at 12:45pm
Honestly? (and I know I'm tossing gasoline on a fire here) I wasn't all that impressed. I found his commentary on the Gita, Paths to God, far better. And I know, I know... for it's time it was a big deal. But seriously, Alan Watts was around, Huxley had written The Perennial Philosophy, and... I dunno. I'm just not as impressed by Be Here Now.

Though I've seen his new Be Love Now, and I can't deny that it looks interesting. Oh, and Fierce Grace (the film) was awesome.
Permalink Reply by Ron Shepherd on November 27, 2010 at 10:20am
Judging from your picture I don't think you are old enough to really appreciate the effect that one book had on millions of people. We had just come out of one of the most turbulant times this country had seen since the Civil War and to publish a book that encompassed all of the triditions, finding a common thread between them and getting it across to an entire generation was tatamount to a miracle. Dare I say that it created a whole new paradigm of unity between all peoples, no matter what race, creed, religion, sex, etc they were. We are all in this together. Even tho Watts preached the relatively the same thing, he did so coming from a position of preaching to the choir and a position of exclusivity. If you didn't know at least something about what he was saying it was just jibberish that really didn't make a lot of sense and you felt seperate from his teachings, not unified by them.
Rest assured, as one who lived it, as one that came from a dirt farm in Oklahoma, being able to pick the book up and be inspired to start on a journey that has lasted 35 years I can truly say that Be Here Now changed my life and in talking to not just a few others from my generation it changed a lot of others too.

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