Breath By Breath

The Liberating Practice of Insight Meditation

By: Larry Rosenberg, David Guy, Jon Kabat-Zinn - foreward

Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini

Length: 7 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

Freedom from suffering is not only possible, but the means for achieving it are immediately within our grasp - literally as close to us as our own breath. This is the 2,500-year-old good news contained in the Anapanasati Sutra, the Buddha's teaching on cultivating both tranquility and deep insight through full awareness of breathing. In this book, Larry Rosenberg brings this timeless meditation method to life. Using the insights gained from his many years of practice and teaching, he makes insight meditation practice accessible to modern practitioners.

©1998 Larry Rosenberg (P)2014 Audible Inc.

Lovely book, giving you the glimpse of what Buddism is about

Try to be mindful, and let things take their natural course. Then your mind will become still in any surroundings, like a clear forest pool. All kinds of wonderful, rare animals will come to drink at the pool, and you will clearly see the nature of all things. You will see many strange and wonderful things come and go, but you will be still. This is the happiness of the Buddha. —Ajahn Chah

Instructive and easy to follow

I really like the introduction to breathing as a way to enlightenment. I will keep reading and practicing breathing the way he admonishes

Simple but effective application of breathing for calming down the racing mind

Voice of the narrator fits the content of the book. One of the best ways to get familiar with practical Buddhism.

LIFE CHANGING!

Highly recommend if you feel that life is passing too fast like a runaway carousel. This book has profoundly changed my life for the better. I am so grateful for Larry Rosenberg and David Guy. Mindfulness is a way of life!

A great place to be: Breathe by Breathe

One of the best and most engaging work on Mindfulness of Breathing. Subtle and refreshing.

A wealth of practical knowledge

At first I kept thinking am I listen to the previous chapter? Or is it just noticeably repetitive? Then I realized he is pealing back one layer at a time until I arrived at the very center of the subject. Well, written and ton of ancient wisdom and knowledge. But You will want to listen to it over again, . .and again. kudos to the author and the narrator.

Helpful content.

I found this book to be helpful, reminding me mostly of the importance of breath, how I can practice during my time sitting in meditation, and how to bring meditation and breathing fully into my waking hours. My only problem was, I had a real aversion to the voice of the reader. He was overly dramatic, I wish he wouldn’t have “acted” what the author wrote. His voice is clear and understandable. But he speaks the way a condescending doctor talks to an old woman. Just over the top! He gets great ratings for readings from others. So I’m in the minority. When I listened to a novel he read on audible, his voice was fine. I think he got all holy sounding because this is a book on meditation. I’m just a real down to earth person who happens to like doing zazen. His reading was “off putting” for me. Maybe just a personal issue. Try the book, you might find it helpful too. Great content. The author, whom I’ve heard speak, would have done a great job reading his own work. Sadly, he’s passed away.

A GOOD book

If you have the slightest interest in meditation and or want some relief from the angst of the current culture, might want to give this a try.

Great! I just have a hard time focusing

The book is awesome and the Narrator is as good as can be expected. I just had a hard time keeping my attention on it, I was spacing off and a lot of info kinda went through one ear and out the other but I’m hoping I retained some of it hahaha. It’s great for those that don’t have that problem

NUTS & BOLTS OF MEDITATION PRACTICE!

I like the author first of all because he like Suzuki is not trying to sugarcoat meditation! He is refreshingly straight forward! I don’t think he took the scope of his understanding far enough though in his audio book presentation! Like many of the text I have studied in my the past 50 years! I would rather study 10 paragraphs of dense knowledge, over a 500 pages of watered down teaching from someone who I know knows how to teach it correctly! Don’t water down the baby formula, it stunts growth! It cheats the student!
I am unsure of what the motivation of such knowledgeable teachers are? Since, I have seen vast amounts of written material which could off been condensed for the student! Buddhist, and Zen Meditation Texts which have been both unnecessary & purposefully spread over an array of books! A tactic which has been practiced by some of the most well published instructors in the field! I would recommend this book to those of you who are going to seek many councils on the path, and tenaciously broaden the scope of their understanding! I encourage you to draw from a the vast amount resources out there, seek out many disciplines, become well rounded, and if your talented enough write a some better resources for practitioners! I gave Larry Rosenberg’s book this rating, because he should know better, much like Trungpa! The narrator was great, the audio was pretty decent! The author knows his stuff!
You will find gold nuggets in the stream, you’ll just have to pan-out many streams! And, that’s a shame!