The book “How to See Yourself as You Really Are” by the Dalai Lama, is good book that talks a lot about human nature. It goes through chapters of how the human mind sees itself. Then he goes on to tell you helpful ways of understanding yourself, or “how to see yourself as you really are.” He explains all of this from a Buddhist perspective, and helps to give good tips on how you can reach the proper state of mind. The theme of the book was mostly based around perspective. It is explained in this...

Lots to think about in this lovely book.

Well, this isn't Buddhism 101, not as easily digestible as The Art of Happiness. I wouldn't recommend for an easy feel-good-before-bed read, as the ideas complex and meditations take some time (perhaps a lifetime) to work through. It seemed to jump around a bit in a non-logical way for my western mind, but it wouldn't call it poorly written. If you are willing to put in some time, pick it up!

If you want to start with buddhism, this is one of the books you should read at first because it introduce you to the basic terms of buddhism and helps you to understand them through meditation suggestions.If you are exhausted from this modern world, the pressure and the way of living today, you should read it as well, it could help you sort out your thoughts and relieve the anxiety and you may start to perceive the world from another angle. Read it. It is healing in a way.

An honour to read and be a part of Dalai Lama's teachings however I felt like I needed to be on some good drugs to understand what he was getting at. I don't do drugs so I didn't understand. Perhaps my mind is not yet open enough. I felt like there was way too much recycling of whole pages. The "I" segment could have been explained in one paragraph perhaps even in one sentence, not half of the book. Plus it was a very simple subject and hardly worth being the main subject. I was expecting to rea...

According to the book: How to See Yourself As You Really Are - there are four general concerns known to mankind. The first focuses on a universal concern for all humanity which is essential to solving global problems. The next, is that love and compassion are the pillars of world peace. Another is that all world religions seek to advance world peace, as do all humanitarians of whatever ideology. The final, is that each individual has a responsibility to shape institutions to serve the needs of t...

Don't recommend as first book on Buddhism for the uninitiated. Very abstract and conceptual, and other authors have explained same concepts better. But this will definitely bend your mind about reality, especially if you're used to Westernized/ego/material-driven concepts of self and reality.

His Holiness shares a universal humanist philosophy. Simple concepts: discipline and altruism. The delivery, however, is cumbersome. Simple concepts become heady and abstract. My favorite part of the book? the meditational exercises that close each chapter.

2.5"You are living amidst the causes of death."The writing is abstract, vague, repetitious, and somewhat contradictory.It would have been possible to say what he's trying to say better formulated and explained and in fewer pages.Reifications such as "morality/moral values" and "cyclic existence" weren't defined, so it took me almost the whole book to figure out most of them. While I may have thought somewhere at the beginning "Oh, ok, he means that", later on I got confused again about how the t...

At one point the author appears to have proved you do not exist. However, that would be missing the point. Of course we exist, but we do not exist in the way we think we do. Our perception through physical senses has created an illusion, like a magic act, where the magician appears to have pulled a rabbit out of a hat. It did not really come from the hat, but it appears to have done so. In the same way, we all appear to be separate from each other, but we are not. Nobody exists wholly independen...

I enjoyed the book over all. I found lots to think about. I did feel like it was geared more towards someone more familiar with Buddhism. They do try to include instruction for beginners.

I'm sure I'm about to be damned for writing this, but if this is supposed to be a book about discovering yourself, I'm afraid that for me it failed completely. Perhaps I'm guilty of all the things the Dalai Lama says most of Western Society is guilty. But, to be honest, I found the book not particularly well-written. It was repetitive, unclear, even nonsensical in parts, and much of it smacked very much of the tired-old Christian harangue of guilty, guilty, guilty, which I found startling for a

I really tried to grasp the concepts in this book, but it just scrambled my brain. Only very rarely do I ever shelve a book that I've started, and I really hate to do this to the Dalai Lama, but I just can't keep going with this one. I give up.Original review:I am the first to admit, I place very little faith in self-help books - it's a genre that I traditionally ignore. But, this book sort of leapt off the shelf at me. I am naturally drawn to Buddhist theory, and would certainly be open to any

Skimming through some reviews of the book How To See Yourself as You Really Are and after finishing the book myself, I can say that:1. The book will not be understood at first read, or in one sit. It contains many esoteric Buddhist teachings and therefore will be hard to grasp initially, for both those who are and are not really familiar with Buddhism I believe. Having said so, the book can be read by the chapters it has already been divided into. I think the author does this on purpose so as to...

"To overcome the misconception that things and people exist as self-sufficient entities, independent of consciousness, it is essential to observe your own mind to discover how this mistake is being conceived, and how other destructive emotions arise with such ignorance as their support. Given that lust, hatred, pride, jealously, and anger stem from exaggerating the importance of qualities such as beauty and ugliness, it is crucial to understand how persons and things actually exist, without exag...

Good book. Is a bit repetitive and moralizing with too much stressing how life is suffering and all.Nonetheless, quite a good explanation of what Buddhists mean by selflessness:That is, selflessness is actually a refutation of soul as independent of mind-body and a refutation of homunculus like theories of self. Taken a step further, one encounters an ancient description of the phenomenological realization that we don't know that 'reality' inherently exists but only our sensory observations.The

It's been many years since a book really changed the way I see the world and my life. What is matter? Who are we? Big questions. It took me about five months to read this book, because after every few pages there's a meditation to do and mostly i wouldn't go on until i felt that i had satisfactorily completed the meditation. Eventually i realized that this is actually the work of several years; in the chapter on single-point meditation, The Dalai Lama shows nine stages: i made it from stage one

A good, purposeful study in observation, not just of the self, but of all things.Delves deeply into the concepts of dependent arising, the fallacy of inherent existence, and emptiness: reminders that our typical patterns of thought are our own worst enemies. Its rote reiteration of thoughts can feel slow and very dense, but that's the point -- these aren't ideas that are easily unpacked without hours, days, and years of reflection.Good jumping-off points for personal practice wrap up each chapte...

I should stop listening to books by the Dalai Lama and read them instead. Very insightful, and comes across as a treatise on applied Buddhist teachings. I appreciated the insightful writing and the inviting tone of it. There is much to contemplate with a book like this. I was impressed by the concept of emptiness and the implications of it.

How to See Yourself As You Really Are is a simply written book full of very complex, even daunting, ideas. The Dalai Lama discusses Buddhist beliefs relating to inherent existence, compassion, love, and impermanence. This isn't a theoretical treatise, though; there are instructions on mediation and meditation exercises (helpfully compiled in an appendix).You don't need to be a Buddhist, or even religious, to get something out of this book. The Dalai Lama invites the reader to engage in analysis