Peak Performance Recommended Books: Spiritual Life

 

Wilber's concise account of our place in a universe of sex, soul, and spirit is told in an accessible and entertaining question-and-answer format. Examines the course of evolution as the unfolding manifestation of Spirit, from matter to life to mind, including the higher stages of spiritual development where Spirit becomes conscious of itself. Wilber offers striking and original views on many topics, including gender relations, modern liberation movements, environmental ethics, the conflict between this-worldly and other-worldly approaches to spirituality, and much more.

 

In 1965 Helen Schucman, a professor of medical psychology at Columbia University, responded to an authoritative inner voice who identified himself as Jesus, and who urged her to take down what would become A Course in Miracles from inner dictation. A self-study course in spiritual psychology, A Course in Miracles focuses on the principles of universal love and forgiveness.

 

Suppose you could ask God the most puzzling questions about existence - questions about love and faith, life and death, good and evil. Suppose God provided clear, understandable answers. You may ask a question, then put this book down. But watch. Listen. The words to the next song you hear. The information in the next article you read. The story line of the next movie you watch. The chance utterance of the next person you meet. I will speak to you if you will listen. I will come to you if you will invite Me. I will show you then that I have always been there. All ways.

 

Spalding's Far East travels starting in 1894 played a ground-breaking role in introducing to the Western world the knowledge that there are "Masters" assisting and guiding humanity. This monumental classic has bequeathed the wisdom and knowledge of the immortal masters, and influenced and inspired generations of seekers. Volumes 1-5 were published from 1924 through 1955. Volume 6 was published in 1996 after ten dusty cartons of Spalding manuscripts, paper, letters and photographs were discovered.

 

In Lily Dale, New York, the dead don't die. Instead, spirits flit among the elms and stroll along the streets, sometimes dressed in garb more common 120 years ago, when Lily Dale was founded and suffragette Susan B. Anthony was a frequent guest. According to Spiritualists who have ruled this Victorian hamlet for five generations, the dead don't go away and they stay anything but quiet. On the hot June day when reporter Christine Wicker comes to the world's oldest and largest Spiritualist community, she is determined to understand the secret forces -- human or otherwise -- that keep Lily Dale alive. Wicker moves beyond the mediums' front parlors and into the lives that tourists never see. She follows the mediums to a place where what we know and how we know it is the greatest mystery of all. (Special Note: Mick's Aunt Lynne spent many summers in Lily Dale and one of the main characters of this book.)

 

The narrator of this extraordinary tale is a man in search for truth. He answers an ad in a local newspaper from a teacher looking for serious pupils, only to find himself alone in an abandoned office with a full-grown gorilla who is nibbling delicately on a slender branch. "You are the teacher?" he asks incredulously. "I am the teacher," the gorilla replies. Ishmael is a creature of immense wisdom and he has a story to tell, one that no other human being has ever heard. It is a story that extends backward and forward over the lifespan of the earth from the birth of time to a future there is still time save. Like all great teachers, Ishmael refuses to make the lesson easy; he demands the final illumination to come from within ourselves.

 

"Whether one believes in religion or not, whether one believes in this religion or that religion, the very purpose of our life is happiness, the very motion of our life is towards happiness." So popular and so rarely understood, this Nobel Peace Prize winner and man of great inner peace brings to a general audience the key to a happy life. In collaboration with a Western psychiatrist, The Art of Happiness is the first inspirational book for a general audience by the Dalai Lama. Through meditations, stories, and the meeting of Buddhism and psychology, the Dalai Lama shows us how to defeat day-to-day depression, anxiety, anger, jealousy, or just an ordinary bad mood. He discusses relationships, health, family, and work to show us how to ride through life's obstacles on a deep and abiding source of inner peace. Based on 2,500 years of Buddhist meditations mixed with a healthy dose of common sense, The Art of Happiness crosses the boundaries of all traditions to help readers with the difficulties common to all human beings.

 

What would you do if you were sitting quietly in your living room when two mysterious strangers appeared from out of nowhere -- and then told you they were "ascended masters" who had come to reveal some shocking secrets of existence and teach you the miraculous powers of forgiveness? Would you call the cops? Call a psychiatrist? Call out for pizza? When two such teachers appeared before Gary Renard in 1992, he chose to listen to them (and ask a lot of impertinent questions). The result is this startling book: an extraordinary record of 17 mind-bending conversations that took place over nearly a decade, reorienting the author's life and giving the world an uncompromising perspective on A Course in Miracles -- a spiritual teaching destined to change human history.

 

The I Ching was originally used for divination, kind of like palm reading or interpreting the stars. It differs from simple prognostication, however, in that it demands us, as diviners, to cultivate an understanding of the world and ourselves. Without this understanding, the text is useless, hence the value of the commentaries, particularly Wilhelm's. He is able to offer enormous assistance because he spent the better part of a decade in China studying under classically trained scholars.

 

From the author: This book was written to depict heroes as they should be, mentors to emulate. I hope this book gives you the encouragement to stretch and reach for your highest self. May you break down all the prison walls of limitation. May you fly into the light of the Luminous Life.

 

Intention is generally viewed as a pit-bull kind of determination propelling one to succeed at all costs by never giving up on an inner picture. However, intention is viewed very differently in this book. Dyer has researched intention as a force in the universe that allows the act of creation to take place. This book explores intention - not as something you do - but as an energy you're a part of. We're all intended here through the invisible power of intention. This is the first book to look at intention as a field of energy that you can access to begin co-creating your life with the power of intention.

 

Helps you to realize that life and self are movement, an endlessly changing present that we can not hold on to. Our sense of 'insecurity' is our trying to make things permanent--typically by regretting the past, worrying about the future, but always doing so in a present moment of which we thus are not aware. As Watts uses the term, 'insecurity' does not refer to a psychological state to be overcome, but rather is a reference to the changing nature of everything.