Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion
Sam Harris
For the millions of Americans who want spirituality without religion, Sam Harris’s latest New York Times bestseller is a guide to meditation as a rational practice informed by neuroscience and psychology. From Sam Harris, neuroscientist and author of numerous New York Times bestselling books, Waking Up is for the twenty percent of Americans who follow no religion but who suspect that important truths can be found in the experiences of such figures as Jesus, the Buddha, Lao Tzu, Rumi, and the other saints and sages of history. Throughout this book, Harris argues that there is more to understanding reality than science and secular culture generally allow, and that how we pay attention to the present moment largely determines the quality of our lives. Waking Up is part memoir and part exploration of the scientific underpinnings of spirituality. No other book marries contemplative wisdom and modern science in this way, and no author other than Sam Harris—a scientist, philosopher, and famous skeptic—could write it.
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This book is so self-important? It’s marketed as a “Guide to Spirituality without Religion” but what it really is a collection of Harris’ thoughts on and personal experiences with spirituality, which could be interesting if he had anything new to bring to the conversation. The book offers some interesting passages on the science of consciousness- but those only encompass a small fraction of this book and hardly delve into deep detail. The parts about spirituality are similarly surface level - regurgitating the most basic tenets of Buddhism and meditation with no value added.
I imagine this book would be beneficial to someone who 1.) had literally no knowledge of meditation or spirituality and 2.) was a die hard fan of Sam Harris. This book seems to presume that you already know of Harris and think highly of him. The book jacket exemplifies this best: “No other book marries contemplative wisdom and modern science in this way, and no author other than Sam Harris-a scientist, philosopher, and famous skeptic-could write it.” Gag!
I was also extremely turned off by the almost edgelord atheist tone he has towards religion in this book. I am also an atheist but find it tactless to ridicule religion and refer to it in derogatory words like bullshit. It’s just lazy writing snd plain disrespectful.
I’m curious to try out some his guided meditations per my friend’s recommendations but didn’t really need the book!
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