Since leaving the BK's I have stumbled upon some books that have been really useful - Gyan is so specific and BK's so pointed in their beliefs that it kills both ones personal ideas and any sense of universality or objectivity. Getting my head out of an indoctrinated belief system and into a 'free flowing' and constructive, useful world view has been my biggest challenge. These books have helped. I list 3 books here that others may also find of value. I am sure that others have also found books that they feel the same about and would be interested to list them in this thread too:
"The Power of Now", by Ekhart Tolle. Tolle is a Canadian who defines the relationship between time, ego and confusion. His point is that ego cannot exist without consciousness being trapped in past and future. This means that when we become fully aware of the present moment, of here and now, (soul conscious) we become free of the identity we have created through our relationship with the past. This in turn frees us from living for some future moment with the mistaken belief that it holds the solution to our unhappiness or problems. I don't want to make this book sound cliché, because it definitely is not. It is original and profound and has really had a deep impact on me.
"Woulda, coulda, shoulda", by Dr Arthur Freeman and Rose DeWolf. I got this off Amazon.com and found it to much more profound than I anticipated. The guts of it is a definition of 13 ways in which we think that are guaranteed to make us unhappy - and I found myself prone to almost all of them at some point. That was depressing in itself, but I found that simply the awareness of these processes was enough to limit them. One point in particular that is raised in this book is just how much we use imagination to amplify the wrong thinking we are engaged in the first place - a kind of destructive thinking on steroids.
"A short history of nearly everything" by Bill Bryson. This is described as a 'rough guide to science' - it is hysterically funny at points and Bryson has a brilliant way of taking the reader through the history of science and scientists (an unusual collection of oddballs) and what they have found out along the way. It is easy to read, incredibly informative and all over very enjoyable - this is not a text book, but will leave you much wiser about everything from DNA to evolution to the theory of relativity to what the earth is made of to where humans fit in the grand scheme of things.
I hope you find these useful and look forward to any other books you can recommend.
"The Power of Now", by Ekhart Tolle. Tolle is a Canadian who defines the relationship between time, ego and confusion. His point is that ego cannot exist without consciousness being trapped in past and future. This means that when we become fully aware of the present moment, of here and now, (soul conscious) we become free of the identity we have created through our relationship with the past. This in turn frees us from living for some future moment with the mistaken belief that it holds the solution to our unhappiness or problems. I don't want to make this book sound cliché, because it definitely is not. It is original and profound and has really had a deep impact on me.
"Woulda, coulda, shoulda", by Dr Arthur Freeman and Rose DeWolf. I got this off Amazon.com and found it to much more profound than I anticipated. The guts of it is a definition of 13 ways in which we think that are guaranteed to make us unhappy - and I found myself prone to almost all of them at some point. That was depressing in itself, but I found that simply the awareness of these processes was enough to limit them. One point in particular that is raised in this book is just how much we use imagination to amplify the wrong thinking we are engaged in the first place - a kind of destructive thinking on steroids.
"A short history of nearly everything" by Bill Bryson. This is described as a 'rough guide to science' - it is hysterically funny at points and Bryson has a brilliant way of taking the reader through the history of science and scientists (an unusual collection of oddballs) and what they have found out along the way. It is easy to read, incredibly informative and all over very enjoyable - this is not a text book, but will leave you much wiser about everything from DNA to evolution to the theory of relativity to what the earth is made of to where humans fit in the grand scheme of things.
I hope you find these useful and look forward to any other books you can recommend.