Just read “the Dude And The Zen Master”.  It is a useful book that does not appear to be useful.  It appears to be entertaining.  It is entertaining but it conveys the message of Buddhism or for those who are locked down in their thinking, the way of the mind.  The book uses the casual but informed Jeff Bridges to articulate the Dude and to articulate himself  vis-a-vis Buddhism.  Anyways, him and Bernie pass on some essential thinking in everyday situations  that we all can understand.  Meaning, this book does not read like a text book with stages laid out.  Those books are useful but can be erudite and irrelevant to “my life”.  For instance, the desire to keep one’s identity can be stronger than one’s sense of connectedness.  (If we cant connect ourselves to the Energy, and the Energy is where others and I connect optimally, then we will always have this feeling of separateness and its consequences.)  No connectedness results in alienation and a loss of community and its mutuality of goals.  //  You can’t use words to taste an apple; you taste it.  //  We are in resonance with the whole universe because we are that universe.  But how do we experience it?  By getting into that space where that’s all we experience; bearing witness ( a full experience of seeing and being).  “Practice, man.  That’s what scratches my itch.”  Jeff Bridges  //  Miles DAvis -“Don’t worry about mistakes, there aren’t any.”  //  Karma -now a western word that speaks to our   interconnectedness.//  Whoever is not here, please stand up.