Ebook: Lucid waking : mindfulness and the spiritual potential of humanity

Lucid Waking means bringing an intense awareness to the business of living, meeting the challenges of existence sanely, creatively, and philosophically. It is the goal of all the great spiritual traditions of the world; now Georg Feuerstein shows how it is quietly happening to individuals in the West after a prolonged spiritual slumber. Most of us still wander through our days in a partial stupor, stuck in automatic patterns that involve no true thought at all. We seem to have no more control over our lives than we do in our dreams. But just as sleep researchers have developed the technique of lucid dreaming—being consciously aware during the dream state and directing it creatively—Lucid Waking shows us that it is possible to be so vividly engaged in life that it will seem as though others are sleepwalking by comparison.

Feuerstein brings clarity to the often murky concepts of soul, spirit, imagination, wholeness, and enlightenment. He provides a sensible account of higher consciousness and self-transcendence and examines their place in modern life, especially in light of such developments as quantum theory and the “Millennium Effect”— the very real possibility that the year 2000 A.D., psychologically and therefore sociologically, will prove decisive for the future of our species. Rich with philosophy and insight from one of our most gifted chroniclers of the inner experience, Lucid Waking is a statement of unshakable faith in the great potential of humanity.

Georg Feuerstein has been a leading figure in the fields of yoga and the nature of consciousness for thirty years. He is the founder of the Yoga Research Center and serves on the governing board of the Healing Buddha Foundation. A contributing editor to Yoga Journal, Intuition, and Inner Directions, he is also the author of twenty-five books, including The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali, Living Yoga, and the Shambhala Encyclopedia of Yoga. He lives in Northern California.