Study Group for Greg Goode's "The Direct Path" (in Central NJ)
Details
Important note - The date, time, and location of this meeting have NOT been determined. This was posted to guage interest in the idea for such a meeting.
About this meeting :
We're trying to organize a "leaderless" study group that would meet regularly (perhaps bi-weekly or monthly) to review and discuss Greg Goode's new book "The Direct Path" (see description below). GREG WILL NOT BE ATTENDING THESE MEETINGS. The date, time, and location of these meetings are still open for discussion. If you're interested, please RSVP and we'll contact you by email about the particulars.
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The Direct Path: A User Guide [Paperback]
by Greg Goode
Book Description:
Have you ever thought about non-dual inquiry: "I understand it intellectually but I just don't feel it. It's not my experience!"
Well, then, Greg Goode's new book "The Direct Path -- A User Guide" could be right for you. What is meant by the "Direct Path" is a set of self-inquiry teachings attributed to Shri Atmananda Menon and later elaborated upon by Jean Klein, Francis Lucille, and Rupert Spira, among others. Greg's book presents Direct-Path inquiry from beginning to end and beyond, in a "user-friendly" way. The core of the book is a set of 40 thought, perception, and feeling experiments designed to help dissolve the most common non-dual sticking points. The experiments cover the world, the body, the mind, abstract objects and witnessing awareness. Greg takes you step by step from the simple perception of a physical object all the way to the collapse of the witness into pure consciousness. The result is that there's no experiential doubt that you and all things are awareness, openness and love.
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Reviews of the book (taken from Amazon site)
March 12, 2012
Scott Kiloby ("Living Realization"):
This book is astoundingly comprehensive in its reach, a deep and endless resource on nondual awareness. I've read nothing like it in my life, and I have a huge bookcase of books about nonduality ranging from teachings from the great masters of the past to the newest, modern approaches on the subject.
Greg Goode's book is so comprehensive that, after reading it, my mind could not even think of something that was missing. It covers the various dualities we believe we experience such as inside/outside, subjectivity/objectivity, life/death, existence/non-existence and enlightened/unenlightened, to name a few. It also covers the world, the body, the mind, the witness, physical objects, senses, emotions, thoughts, states, positionality, location, identity, containment, choice and doership, time, cause and effect, language, and many other things. It's so thorough that it is helpful to any awareness-styled path. It covers every nook and cranny, every trap, and every angle that I've encountered (and many more that I have not encountered) while meeting with people over the years in the course of my own work in nonduality.
March 7, 2012
Fred Davis ("Awakening Clarity"):
THE DIRECT PATH: A USER'S GUIDE is for all those people who want to wake up badly enough that they're actually willing to do something about it themselves. Teachers are great, and they'll get you to the riverside, but if you don't jump in yourself you'll never actually get wet.
The book has 40 experiments in it to help you move down the path regardless of where you're starting from. Call them koans; call A User Guide itself a whole book of contemporary koans, not totally dissimilar to the Blue Cliff Record, or the Mumonkan. This is deep inquiry offered up for practice in easy, bite-size bits you can nibble at your own speed. Start at the beginning or start where it interests you and go from there. Approach them openly, do the work, and just like koans, allow the questions themselves to crack your shell. You can't do it. The experiments can, and you can do the experiments.
The whole thrust of A User Guide is to get you to take action. When a thing is seen experientially, and not just theoretically, it affects the mind in a different way, and the myth of separation will begin to fade of its own accord, whether slowly or radically. You really cannot directly challenge your mind's view of I-you-world and expect change. The mind cannot transcend the mind. But you can use the mind as a tool to transcend the mind. That's exactly what this book does. It's hands-on, it's practical, and most importantly, it works!
April 6, 2012
Gary Falk:
As a longtime "nondual" seeker, I've read countless books on Advaita, Neo-Avaita, Dzogchen, Ati Yoga, Zen, Mahamudra, you name it, beginning with my first foray into the nondual canon, the classic "I Am That" of Nisargadatta, and plunging ahead almost nonstop into just about anything that had the words "enlightenment" "transformation" "realization" "awareness" or "absolute" in the title, for the next 30+ years.
With Greg's magnificent book, I believe I have come to the end of my reading journey. I don't think I need to, nor do I feel the desire, to read any nondual book again.
In other words, Greg nails it with "The Direct Path." It's all here. All you ever wanted to know about the direct path, Advaita, and whatever else could possibly come under the heading of the pure nondual truth.
I highly recommend taking the "lectio divina" or slow read path through this endlessly fascinating, illumining, and sweet savored book. Yes, by all means, take it slowly. After all, it just may be the last "enlightenment" book you'll ever feel the need, or urge, to read.
Study Group for Greg Goode's "The Direct Path" (in Central NJ)