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Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion By Sam Harris - Book Summary: BOOK SUMMARY by GetFlashNotes
THIS IS A BOOK SUMMARY on Waking A Guide To Spirituality Without Religion by Sam Harris.
Product Description
For the millions of Americans who want spirituality without religion, Waking Up is a guide to meditation as a rational practice informed by neuroscience and psychology.
From Sam Harris, neuroscientist and author of numerous New York Times bestselling books, Waking Up is for the twenty percent of Americans who follow no religion but who suspect that important truths can be found in the experiences of such figures as Jesus, the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Rumi, and the other saints and sages of history. Throughout this book, Harris argues that there is more to understanding reality than science and secular culture generally allow, and that how we pay attention to the present moment largely determines the quality of our lives.
Waking Up is part memoir and part exploration of the scientific underpinnings of spirituality. No other book marries contemplative wisdom and modern science in this way, and no author other than Sam Harris—a scientist, philosopher, and famous skeptic—could write it.
Product Details
Amazon Sales #301 in Books
Published 2014-09-09
Released 2014-09-09
Original English
Number of 1
8.37" h x 1.00" w x 5.50" l,
Hardcover
256 pages
Editorial Reviews
Review
“Harris’s book . . . caught my eye because it’s so entirely of this moment, so keenly in touch with the growing number of Americans who are willing to say that they do not find the succor they crave, or a truth that makes sense to them, in organized religion.” (Frank Bruni, columnist, New York Times)
“The fact is that Waking Up lends a different picture of Harris (at least to me): an intelligent and sensitive person who is willing to undergo the discomfort involved in proposing alternatives to the religions he’s spent years degrading. His new book, whether discussing the poverty of spiritual language, the neurophysiology of consciousness, psychedelic experience, or the quandaries of the self, at the very least acknowledges the potency and importance of the religious impulse—though Harris might name it differently—that fundamental and common instinct to seek not just an answer to life, but a way to live that answer.” (Trevor Quirk, The New Republic)
"[A]n extraordinary and ambitious masterwork. . . . altogether spectacular." (Maria Popova, Brainpickings)
“Uber-atheist Sam Harris is getting all spiritual. In his new book, Waking A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion, the usually outspoken critic of religion describes how spirituality can and must be divorced from religion if the human mind is to reach its full potential. . . . But there is plenty in Waking Up that will delight Harris’ most militant atheist readers.” (Religion News Service)
“The great value and novelty of this book is that Harris, in a simple but rigorous style, takes the middle way between these pseudoscientific and pseudo-spiritual assertions . . . [leading] to a profoundly more salubrious life.” (Publishers Weekly)
"A demanding, illusion-shattering book.” (Kirkus Reviews)
Product Description
For the millions of Americans who want spirituality without religion, Waking Up is a guide to meditation as a rational practice informed by neuroscience and psychology.
From Sam Harris, neuroscientist and author of numerous New York Times bestselling books, Waking Up is for the twenty percent of Americans who follow no religion but who suspect that important truths can be found in the experiences of such figures as Jesus, the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Rumi, and the other saints and sages of history. Throughout this book, Harris argues that there is more to understanding reality than science and secular culture generally allow, and that how we pay attention to the present moment largely determines the quality of our lives.
Waking Up is part memoir and part exploration of the scientific underpinnings of spirituality. No other book marries contemplative wisdom and modern science in this way, and no author other than Sam Harris—a scientist, philosopher, and famous skeptic—could write it.
Product Details
Amazon Sales #301 in Books
Published 2014-09-09
Released 2014-09-09
Original English
Number of 1
8.37" h x 1.00" w x 5.50" l,
Hardcover
256 pages
Editorial Reviews
Review
“Harris’s book . . . caught my eye because it’s so entirely of this moment, so keenly in touch with the growing number of Americans who are willing to say that they do not find the succor they crave, or a truth that makes sense to them, in organized religion.” (Frank Bruni, columnist, New York Times)
“The fact is that Waking Up lends a different picture of Harris (at least to me): an intelligent and sensitive person who is willing to undergo the discomfort involved in proposing alternatives to the religions he’s spent years degrading. His new book, whether discussing the poverty of spiritual language, the neurophysiology of consciousness, psychedelic experience, or the quandaries of the self, at the very least acknowledges the potency and importance of the religious impulse—though Harris might name it differently—that fundamental and common instinct to seek not just an answer to life, but a way to live that answer.” (Trevor Quirk, The New Republic)
"[A]n extraordinary and ambitious masterwork. . . . altogether spectacular." (Maria Popova, Brainpickings)
“Uber-atheist Sam Harris is getting all spiritual. In his new book, Waking A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion, the usually outspoken critic of religion describes how spirituality can and must be divorced from religion if the human mind is to reach its full potential. . . . But there is plenty in Waking Up that will delight Harris’ most militant atheist readers.” (Religion News Service)
“The great value and novelty of this book is that Harris, in a simple but rigorous style, takes the middle way between these pseudoscientific and pseudo-spiritual assertions . . . [leading] to a profoundly more salubrious life.” (Publishers Weekly)
"A demanding, illusion-shattering book.” (Kirkus Reviews)
- GenresAudiobook
15 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 16, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 19, 2014
Basically this is a book about meditation. How the conscious brain works and how to get in touch with your individual spirituality without the dogma of religion. It is written by an atheist who is also has a degree in neuroscience. Kind of fascinating how much we let go of common sense and hold on to stories. When to get in touch with our own spirit all we really have to do is sit quietly and discover it ourselves.
August 15, 2015
Alas, this book didn't do it for me. I had never read any Sam Harris before, although as an atheist myself I was looking forward to it. But the book was a bit too spiritual for me, which made it too esoteric. I much preferred Richard Dawkins book "The God Delusion," which I found on target. Maybe I should read Harris' "The End Of Faith" to get a better sense of his atheist views. But I'm not really in a position to recommend this one to anyone.
March 24, 2015
A middle ground exists between making religion out of spirituality and having no spiritual life whatever. Spirituality, Sam Harris concludes, requires the same commitment to intellectual honesty as science, lest we continue to fail, generation after generation, to eliminate the delusions and animosities of our ancestors and impart the worst and most damaging ideas to our children.
February 10, 2015
Interesting book about how the mind works. I liked his comments about drugs being groundbreaking but also transitory. However, I think you can't discount the spiritual masters who stay within a framework of religion such St Theresa, Thomas Merton, St Catherine of Avila. They have much wisdom too.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews