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This book won't make any sense to a non-meditator but I'm giving it five stars for the intended audience.

A lot of questions I've had are clarified here. Why certain rules are applied, how is the organization structured, and how will it adapt and grow now that S.N. Goenka is dead. I was pleasantly surprised with Goenka's answers to questions regarding the inevitable collapse of the Academy into a cult (or perhaps multiple cults/sects). His analysis and planning around the structure of the centres, the global organization, and the individual meditators/volunteers is staggeringly lucid.

If you have ever wondered who is appointed a vipassana teacher, how land is chosen for a centre, and how the Academy avoids being bought out by religions, corporations, and governments (which all have far more money), this is a really informative read.

Not a book I'd recommend to anyone looking to start a meditation practice but certainly useful background material.

Adorable and often confusing lectures by Suzuki. A worthwhile read whether you meditate or not.

Beyond the title essay/lecture, I find "Zen Mind" less meaningful than Suzuki's other work. Still good for meditators and non-meditators alike.

I don't mind that Vonnegut soaks everything in allegory and this book is saturated. But I usually find his writing, unto itself, to be almost staggeringly beautiful. The language in "Sirens of Titan" was not.

The book starts out strong and also finishes beautifully. But Harari seems to get distracted around the halfway point and meanders back into humanity's history. He does so to justify his construction of ideas which cross-cut culture, religion, politics, and industry ...but at a length that I felt was unnecessary.

I would caution readers to remember Harari's own introduction to the material by the time he comes to what sound like conclusions, toward the end. He's only mapping potential branches. He's not making any bold predictions — the tips of some of the branches are even mutually exclusive. However, he's done a brilliant job of surveying the landscape of the future of humanity with respect to the dissolution of nations and the evolution of the species through biotech and new forms of intelligence.