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PostPosted: Sun Aug 07, 2022 11:33 am 
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Posts: 1671
Howdy y'all. GB here for my last (not latest... LAST) and most important book recommendation on Reality / Consciousness / Space / Truth / TAO / ... [insert synonyms]
(Coming from this topic : Douglas Harding - Three Wishes)

I ended up reading most of Douglas Harding's books, and one stood out as the most insightful, well written, step-by-step and daily-life focused one.

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Amazon link : https://www.amazon.com/Head-Stress-Engl ... B005QBG746
Quote:
An infallible guide to eliminating stress by the author of On Having No Head.

When we come up against stressful situations in our everyday life, our automatic reaction is to turn away and escape. If, on the other hand, we can accept stress, allow it to become part of us, the conflict disappears. The secret lies in seeing that either we are the No-thing that overcomes stress by excluding it or the Every-thing that overcomes stress by including it.

This method of coping with stress applies to its many manifestations in our lives. It can turn boredom into joy and despondency into deep contentment. Learning to head off stress takes no time at all and is impossible to forget. All it requires is that we dare to take a fresh look at ourselves. Revolutionary in its ease and directness, its simplicity and penetration, this approach is guaranteed to turn our preconceptions upside down.
Highly recommended.
MD5 for Libgen / Z-Lib : 986422496BEC9938EE2F6A29ED76BB55

Keywords :
"Being yourself"
"Being your best friend"
"Confidence and Indifference"
"Let it go"
"Tap to your unconscious"
"Base your self-worth on nothing"
"Space"
"Value"
"Wants / needs"
"Moments"
"Experience"
"Stacking evidence"
"Money"
"..."

_________________
"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."
Alvin Toffler


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2023 10:25 pm 
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I'll add one of the best concept he created, the YOUniverse.
https://www.headless.org/hierarchy/youn ... plorer.htm
Quote:
Douglas Harding designed these models in the 1970s. They illustrate the many layers of one's being, both as viewed by others from the outside, and viewed by oneself from the inside.
The official video of the model : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7BNAXHvlgg (1h01m)
The video explaining his book "The Hierarchy of Heaven and Earth" : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOD4Q6kXHzE (58m - second picture is at 23m32s)

Two pictures describing the model :
[ img ]
[ img ]

The book Hierarchy of Heaven and Earth : https://www.amazon.com/Hierarchy-Heaven ... 0956887716 (I still haven't read it, on top of my to-read list though)
Quote:
This book begins with the question 'Who am I?' and immediately sets off in an astonishingly original direction. Why didn't anyone before Harding think of responding to this question like this? It's so obvious, once you see it. Harding presents a new vision of our place in the universe that uses the scientific method of looking to see what is true. It turns out that the truth about ourselves is not only true but also very good, and breathtakingly beautiful. We live in a sacred, many-layered, living universe - or rather it lives in us. Though it was completed in 1950, this book is still ahead of its time. One day it will surely be widely recognised for its greatness: its all-encompassing vision, its originality and freshness, its depth of insight, its wide-ranging knowledge, the clarity and poetry of its language, its humanity. It is a world-view not dependent on local culture or religion, but on universally verifiable facts. It is also a world-view that respects our manifest differences whilst celebrating our underlying unity - the unity not just of oneself with other people but with all of life, indeed with the whole universe. Harding died in 2007 aged 97, leaving behind him an impressive body of work. He was a highly creative person who was passionate about - he was in love with - this living universe and the immortal treasure that abides at its centre - at our centre. "A work of the highest genius." C. S. Lewis.
Interesting review :
Quote:
Reading this book is a miserable, sweatsoaked day of hacking through the dense jungle of Douglas Harding's scattered thoughts. This work is more a celebration of Harding's mind than it is a useful guide to understanding his grand vision. It is utterly frustrating to read, because it often feels more like a series of tangents during periods of sleepless mania than a coherent philosophical work or guide to enlightenment.

Douglas Harding may have been a genius. I do not doubt that he was. But man, while I appreciate some of the more lucid and poetic moments in this book, I mainly hate it. His writing style tends toward rambling. He chooses every time to use a hundred words where thirty would be better, and favours uncommon words and unnecessarily puffy, ornate phrases over communicating the essense of his thoughts in a simpler, more precise and down-to-earth way. Anyway, your mileage may vary. Have fun.

EDIT: I still thoroughly dislike this book, but my perspective has changed -- thanks to Douglas Harding. I have never struggled with a book as much as I have with Hierarchy. But it is not intended to be easy. Simple, yes, in that what he's pointing to is obvious (yet somehow isn't); but easy, no. My ego likes things that it can easily digest, and so when it was confronted by something it couldn't just plow through and reach gratification, it kicked me into a pit of frustration. I don't like to admit this, but I even threw the book against the wall. Hard. But I kept wrestling with it and found, to my astonishment, that I naturally started to take in his words more slowly, more meditatively, without even intending to do that. Only a special book can do that. And this is a special book, worth every second of frustration. Again, your mileage may vary. Have fun.

_________________
"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."
Alvin Toffler


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