Vipassana Beginners Questions

[tnkasthuri]

Hey Everybody ,

I am hoping to practice Vipassana Meditation as given in the book [Practical Vipassana Exercises by Mahasi Sayadaw]http://www.google.lk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=practical%20vipassana%20exercises%20&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CEwQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.buddhanet.net%2Fpdf_file%2Fmahasit1.pdf&ei=vWn-T7beKMzirAfgyczTBg&usg=AFQjCNH-dYF5BbaVt1LowuMNc10o3bZj9w&cad=rja

I can't have a teacher because my family doesn't like the idea of me meditating .
So , My questions are :
Is this the best book to follow ?(If not , what do you recommend)
How should i do my sessions ? (For example : 2 x 30min sessions or 1 full hour session per day)

Thank You in Advance,
May all being be happy

[mikenz66]

Hi tnkasthuri,

You might that some of the articles here:
http://buddhanet.net/insight.htm
Particularly: http://buddhanet.net/imol/wrkshp.htm which can be downloaded as PDF,
will clarify some of the instructions.
Bhikkhu Pesala's web site has many resources: http://www.aimwell.org/
He has updated up a number of translations of Mahasi Sayadaw's books and articles and he can answer questions here.

There are a number of teachers who teach variations on the Mahasi approach.
A very traditional one is here: http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/186/
And Patrick Kearney's retreat instructions, which are updated periodically here:
http://dharmasalon.net/Audio/audio.html
are excellent, though I see that at the moment there is only one talk online, which is a little strange.
Steve Armstrong has some useful talks here: http://www.audiodharma.org/series/8/talk/1848/

I'd recommend starting off doing 10-15 minutes walking then 10-15 minutes sitting and work up from there.


Mike

[tnkasthuri]

Thank You So Much Mike , for the wonderful information given .

[Libertus77]

tnkasthuri,

I know that this thread is a few months old, but just in case you are still looking, I recommend "Mindfulness in Plain English" by Bhante G. The entire book focuses on Vipassana and it is very readable and informative.

Here's a link where you get it in multiple formats.

http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html

Be well!

Libertus

[bodom]

Also see this thread:

Recommended reading
viewtopic.php?f=41&t=341

[Ytrog]

While not exclusively about Vipassana (far from it) this link might be of help:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/auth ... bl015.html
The Maha-satipatthana Sutta (a great discourse about mindfulness): http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

I have also added an ebook by Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw called Practical Vippassana Exercises and a small booklet with the basics in brief. I once downloaded them from buddhanet.net.

I hope it helps a bit.

[theY]

paṭisambhidāmagga and visuddhimagga or vimuttimagga.