Books for the Journey
I’ve always been drawn to the comtemplative and intellectual side of this-thing-we-call-yoga. My first yogic experiences stemmed not from physical but from mental ‘postures’. When I came to the physical practise, I got the impression that the intellectual curiousity that led me to yoga in the first place was considered of a secondary importance.
Later I learned of the term svadhyaya (one of the three aspects of kriya yoga in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras). This refers to, and emphasises the importance of, the idea of ‘Self-Study’or ‘Self contemplation’. This can mean both study of the Self (sva) and study done by oneself (or both together). I was encouraged to learn that Pattabhi Jois, the ‘Guru’ of Ashtanga Yoga was, like his Guru before him, an exemplary and incredibly well read scholar and, in being so, was taking part in the great (yogic) intellectual and literary history of India.
Below are a few of the books that have helped me come to my current understanding of yoga and/or spirituality in general (though increasingly less what it is and more what it is not). Each of these in their own way has provided, to a greater or lesser extent, some kind of ‘Aha’ moment. It is a fairly non-sectarian list. I don’t believe that any one tradition has a monopoly on ‘truth’ and, indeed, all may be some kind of reflection of what Huxley calls, the Perennial Philosophy. Neither do I think that one has to be a ‘believer’ or follower of any particular Guru, tradition, or practise in order to have access to what they call the ‘truth’. In the words of J. Krishnamurti, ‘belief has no place where truth is concerned’.
If I had to choose just one of these books to bring with me to my desert island it would be the Tao Te Ching (my first spiritual book) for its lightness, clarity and profound simplicity (Bhagavad Gita would be a close second). I’ve probably omitted reams of crucial tomes but this is should be enough for a start. I’ll continue to add to the list as more come to mind…
From the world of Taoism
Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching (Kwok, Palmer and Ramsey)
Chuang Tzu (Gia Fu Feng, Jane English)
Lieh Tzu (Eva Wong)
From the World of Islam
Omar Khayyam, The Rubaiyat
Barks, The Essential Rumi
From the World of Buddhism
The Heart Sutra
3rd Zen Patriarch, Hsing Hsing Ming
Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginners Mind
Reps, Zen Flesh, Zen Bones
Chogyam Trungpa, Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism
Pema Chodron, Start with Where You Are
‘Hindu’ Scriptures
Vyasa, Bhagavad Gita (Edgerton, Zaehner, Sargeant (Mitchell)
Dattatreya, Avadhuta Gita
Anon, Ashtavakra Gita (Balsekar, A Duet of One)
Upanishads (Radakrishnan, Jacobs)
Ishvara Krishna, The Samkhya Karika
Patanjali, Yoga Sutras (Chapple, Yoga and the Luminous; Bryant; and Osho, Yoga: the Alpha and the Omega)
Hatha Yoga Pradipika
Modern western teachers/teachings
Douglas Harding, On Having No Head
Anthony de Mello, Awareness
Thaddeus Golas, The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment
Alan Watts, The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
Byron Katie, Loving What Is
Gangaji, Who Are You?
Paul Lowe, In Each Moment
Psychology
RD Laing, The Politics of Experience
Wilhelm Reich, Listen Little Man
Indian Mythology
Roberto Callasso, Ka
Wilkins, Hindu Mythology
Wendy Doniger, Hindu Myths
Ramesh Menon, Mahabharata: A Modern Rendering
Ramesh Menon, Siva Purana
Academic Studies
Wendy Doniger, The Hindus
Mark Singleton, Yoga Body
Georg Feuerstein, The Yoga Tradition
Arthur Versluis, American Gurus
Fingarette, ‘Action and Suffering in the Bhagavad Gita’
Gerald Larson, Classical Samkhya
Carrette and King, Selling Spirituality
DG White, Yoga Sutras: An Autobiography
DG White, Kiss of the Yogini
Whicher & Carpenter (ed), Yoga: The Indian Tradtion (particularly the chapter by Lloyd Pfleuger)
Das Gupta, A History of India Philosophy (Might take you a while to get through this one)
Modern Eastern teachers/teachings
David Godman, Be As You Are, Teaching of Sri Ramana Maharshi
Ram Das, Be Here Now
Nisargadatta Maharaj, I Am That
Ramesh Balsekar, Consciousness Speaks
UG Krishnamurti, The Mystique of Enlightenment; Mind is Myth
H Poonja, Wake Up And Roar
Robert Svoboda, Aghora (1,2,3)
Literature
Hermann Hesse, Siddharta
Kahil Gibran, The Prophet
Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
From the world of Ashtanga Yoga
KP Jois, Yoga Mala
Richard Freeman, The Mirror of Yoga
Further Inspiration
Osho, Books I Have Loved. (A more wide-ranging and passionately discussed list which contains many of the books above)
photo shot at Aro Ha
