Mindfulness in Plain English by Henepola Gunaratana

Review

A clear, pragmatic, and straightforward guide to mindfulness and vipassana (insight) meditation. I would happily recommend this to anyone interested in the practice.

It’s structured like a training manual. The chapters each have a clear focus and many list different techniques you can use or problems you might encounter. (Spoiler: the solution is usually more mindfulness!)

Buddhism is also threaded through the book. In general this was well incorporated and I found it interesting. Unfortunately this was also the source of the main drawbacks for me. Occasionally it is left to the reader to disentangle the Buddhism from the mindfulness, and we are asked to take certain things on faith. There were even a couple of bits early on which mentioned you might gain supernatural powers!

Overall though, I can see why this book is well regarded by Western audiences. Recommend.

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