By Jon Kabat-Zinn
Sounds True, $21.95, 166 pages

Jon Kabat-Zinn is one of the pioneers of mindfulness meditation and his book Wherever You Go There You Are is one of the best introductions available to the practice. His program Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center is a clinically proven method of meditation for better health. In his latest work, Mindfulness for Beginners: reclaiming the present moment and your life, he looks at how beginning a practice of mindful meditation can improve quality of life and how to integrate meditation into daily life.

There is a lot of material covered in Mindfulness for Beginners but readers should not be put off by this. The book is broken into five parts with one page chapters that explain the background of mindful meditation, the attitudes that are the foundation of mindfulness and how awareness of the present can bring about positive change to even the most negative situations. Kabat-Zinn writes in an easy thoughtful manner- more caring friend than clinician. An added bonus is a CD of five guided meditations which can be used in conjunction with the book but are also a stand-alone resource.


Reviewed by Catherine Gilmore,

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