B. Alan Wallace

Three root texts with lengthy commentaries by Gyatrul Rinpoche. Yes, you get some good offerings here by the incomparable Dudjom Rinpoche as well as one of His Holiness the Dalai Lama's favourite writers, Dodrupchen Jikmé Tenpé Nyima and a Dream Yoga text by Lochen Dharma Shri, the brother of Terdag Lingpa. But the section that always sticks out in my mind is in one of the sections by Gyatrul Rinpoche, in which he humbly recounts his hardships in escaping Tibet and settling in exile. It show more was just a few paragraphs in the midst of the main teaching but it gave me a clear flash of insight into what the Tibetans have been through and brought me to tears . That moment is worth far more than the price of the book. show less

I’m interested in learning to lucid dream, but found out too late that this author asserts that for better to lucid dream we need to be an expert at an obscure form of meditation called Shamatha.

I should have paid more attention to the text on the front of the book which includes the phrase “Tibetan Dream Yoga”, but I didn’t.

The first chapter deals with what the author calls Meditative Quiescence - laying the foundation for lucidity, but since other lucid dreaming authors do not show more prioritize this nor even mention it, I feel of course it must be possible to learn to lucid dream without this particular approach or preparation.

I am at this point not ready to tackle the challenging practice of Shamatha, so I never got to the chapters about lucid dreaming.

Those who do find dream yoga appealing will probably find the book exciting and rewarding, but I do not belong to this category. Such people may well feel that the book warrants 5 stars, but my subjective view of the book has led me to award it only 2.

It seems to deal more with dream yoga, spiritual awakening and Buddhism than anything else. show less

This book grew on me as I read it. At first, I felt quite discouraged by Wallace's frequent references about the true amount of time that one would likely need to spend to even begin to possibly achieve shamatha, particularly during modern times for those of us that have "worldly duties" [my words, not his].
Furthermore, he indicates that Buddhist experts believe that it is rare, at least during our modern times, to achieve shamatha.

Wallace has over 30 years practice, and it is not clear from show more this book whether he reached shamatha.

Nevertheless, as I finished the book, I was encouraged to recall that Wallace asserts early on in the book (and other references confirm) that even earlier stages and practices of attention are definitely beneficial.

It was also fascinating to read small snippets of Wallace's interweaving the concepts of physics and Buddhist philosophy. Though this book only touches on these interrelationships, it was enough to entice me to read more of Wallace's books.

Finally, the techniques and practices of meditation and attention and frequent exhortations of Wallace regarding letting go of one's preexisting conceptualizations, helped to open my mind regarding the nature of consciousness and even reality. show less

Heavy but thought provoking read. The practical sessions where not actually very practical after about the second one - rapidly progressing to concepts I suspect lifetime practioners might have trouble with.

The concepts where well researched and quite engaging, and left me with a strong desire to try more introspective research of my own.