From Book Buddhist to Practicing Buddhist

If you have started to dip your toe into Buddhism by reading books, you are not alone. I first tested the dharma waters as a “Book Buddhist,” too.

I started reading “spiritual” books in earnest when I was 22, four years in to my yoga practice. This was during my gap year between undergrad and grad school when I had a job at the Capezio store in Costa Mesa, CA. The shop was in a brand new mall which was almost completely empty during my evening shifts, perfect for an avid reader and autodidact, like me.

I remember sitting low behind the cash register, hoping no one would come into the shop so I could devour The Autobiography of a Yogi by Yogananda. His story: finding his guru, meeting Babaji, astrotraveling, all of it sparked a yearning for a deep spiritual connection. I never doubted a word of that book including learning about Giri Bala, the woman who never ate. I drank it all in and wondered about where my own life was going, stuck in a shoe store in a shopping mall.

Could I find a guru? Fly through space and time? Gain an understanding of who I am and what my purpose was? This longing was intangible, yet it was strong and had been part of me for as long as I can remember.

From a young age, I would sit in the church pew and watch everybody drop their chin to their chests as the minister said, “Let us pray.” I didn’t bow my head. I looked at my mother next to me, with her eyes closed in prayer and I wondered, Where did she go? What is it that she feels? Because I didn’t feel anything and I definitely didn’t feel like I wanted to bow my head. I just didn’t get it.

But when I started taking yoga at the age of 18 there was a quivering, a filament deep inside me that began to vibrate. It was like being an alien trying to make contact with their planet. I sat on the beach in the midnight dark, breathing with the sound of the waves. I laid awake naked on my roof, trying the feel the full moonlight beaming directly into my chest so that I could be the moon. My mind climbed that moonbeam up, up, up. Like Yogananada, I wanted to astrotravel. I wanted to fly.

Although my yoga teacher taught me asana, pranayama and kriyas, I hadn’t figured out how to connect those practices with my inchoate urges. I had no teacher or sangha to help me thread together my reading, my longing, and my practices.

And, I hadn’t yet learned the Buddhist wisdom: Study and practice are the two wings of the bird and you need both to fly.

Then, my great mentor and famous dance historian, Olga Maynard, who always saw more in me than I could see in myself, gave me a book by Sybil Leek. Another book that I inhaled, in “Diary of a Witch” Leek instructs, “If you want to be a witch, just say ‘I am a witch three times.” I did that over and over. I closed my eyes and tried to feel a feeling. It was the start of having a practice that might lead to a new state of being.

As soon as I arrived in New York, I saw an ad in the Village Voice for a shop called The Magickal Childe. I was in that shop for less than five minutes when Rhea walked up to me and invited me to join a new coven she was forming. She told me she immediately recognized me as a member of the as-yet-unformed coven. In fact, I was the first person she invited to create this powerful coven of professional New York women: actor, lawyer, bike messenger, business owner, therapist and me… a dancer.

But after several years, the vibe at The Magickal Childe started to feel creepy. Rhea and her wife opened their own magick shop in the East Village, but then broke up and the whole thing fell apart. I still knew how to do white magic but I had lost the high priestess and the practice container. Practicing on my own with only books was a bit of a dead end.

So I started reading Buddhist books. I found some in the East Village branch of the New York Public Library and even more in the slew of tiny used book stores that ran through the EV and all along Fourth Avenue (until the greedy people of the Strand Bookstore put them all out of business).

My copy of The Light of Asia

I paid $2.50 for The Light of Asia by Sir Edwin Arnold, a Tibetan Buddhist teaching published in 1925, and $40 for a beat up first edition of Essays in Zen Buddhism by D.T. Suzuki, Professor of Buddhist Philosophy at Otani University in Kyoto. He later became a professor at Columbia University from 1952-57, famously influencing many artists including John Cage and Agnes Martin. But he didn’t influence me because I couldn’t decipher his teachings.

At Samuel Weiser’s, I paid $15 for Lama Govinda’s book, Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism which has chakras and deities and the meaning of OM but was also a bit beyond me at that point.

The teachings on OM from Lama Govinda’s Foundations of Tibetan Mysticism

I preferred Lama Govinda’s memoir, The Way of the White Cloud: A Buddhist Pilgrim in Tibet. I read it every night, while drinking Tension Tamer tea and soaking my aching dancer’s body in a hot bath. “… thus the pilgrimage in the outer space is actually the mirrored reflection of an inner movement or development, directed towards a yet unknown, distant aim.” That unknown, distant aim was calling me.

My beloved, well-worn copy of The Way of the White Cloud

In fact, the books that really gripped me tended to be biographies and memoirs, not just because they were easier to understand but because without consciously realizing it, I was also on a spiritual quest. I read a lot of books by American Zen students who sat grueling retreats and Tibetan Buddhists who walked through freezing snow mountains into India to escape the Chinese.

I know now that Zen Buddhism is full of kindness and compassion, but in my readings the stories seemed to be targeted at achieving satori, a lightning bolt moment of awakening. That felt like a lot of pressure, like having a public orgasm on command. Tibetan Buddhism seemed softer, and based on the memoirs I had read of the great teachers who had escaped from Tibet, yet held no anger toward their captors, it was very much about the compassion I was needing to experience at that time in my life.

One day, I was talking to a dancer friend on the phone and I told her about my reading and she said, “Well, you know they offer free meditation instruction at the Shambhala Center on Tuesdays at 5.” It just happened to be a Tuesday at 4 and so I hung up the phone and raced up to the center. I received meditation instruction and in that moment, moved from being a book Buddhist to a seeker on the path. Within a few months, I had met my guru, found my sangha and received guidance on what books were good for beginners.

Nowadays—35 years later—there are many more Buddhist books, memoirs and biographies, but also traditional teachings made accessible by contemporary Western and Eastern teachers who have studied deeply and spend years living the teachings.

Beginning on February 18, my online sangha, which is called Lifting the Gaze, will begin a year long study and practice based on the book called Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening by Joseph Goldstein.

This is his practical and quite accessible commentary/explanation of the Satipatthana Sutra, the Scripture on Mindfulness.

It includes so much: The Four Foundations of Mindfulness, The Five Hindrances, The Seven Factors of Awakening, The Four Noble Truths, The Eightfold Path and more. It is the perfect book because it leads you through the Buddhist path in a logical sequence.

Goldstein’s book is easy to read and sangha members are really enjoying it. If this sounds like something you might like to do, it’s not too late to join!

You can join the sangha for one month and if you like it, continue and if you don’t, you can easily cancel your membership.

This is a way to begin or grow your study of basic Buddhism, connect with a friendly group of meditators,

AND to put it in action in your everyday life.

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Practice Opportunities

So many of you have been showing up for my 15-minute retreats! It is wonderful to see how even just those few minutes a day of practice has such a positive and long lasting impact.

Just think if we did this on a regular schedule!

That impact would grow and before you know it, you would have your own Mindfulness Meditation practice.

So, in 2026, I am offering 6 Mindfulness Meditation mini-retreats. Every other month we will sit together for 20 minutes, 5 days in a row… (except August when we will do 30 min.)

At the beginning of each session I will give you a meditation tip—how to work with obstacles, refreshing your posture, working with the breath, the gaze. You will have a chance to refine your meditation technique—so that you can gain confidence in how to practice.

And the why? When you meditate regularly, you will discover for yourself the why. You will begin to experience benefits of stability, clarity and strength of mind, equanimity of spirit. You will find that you are more responsive and less reactive. You will more compassionate to yourself and others.

You won’t notice this on the cushion but you will start to see these results pop up in your every day life.

That might seem like a lot of goodness from such a simple practice but consistency and commitment add up. Or as my guru always said, Drip, Drip, Drip, the Bucket Fills.

If you want to start 2026 by committing to growing your meditation practice, here’s your chance.

Open to everyone, beginners welcome.

Cost

• Each mini-retreat costs $45.

• Sign up for all of them for $225 and relax in the confidence that you will be showing up for yourself and your world.

• Sign up for 3 of your choice for $115. You can always sign up for more later if it fits your schedule.

• You can also buy a Year of Meditating or even one retreat as a GIFT for your favorite meditator or meditator-to-be.

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Mark Your Calendars!

Upcoming in-person practice opportunities:

Yoga Sky, Berlin, Germany
April 26

(Already 50% Full!)

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Orange Yoga, Cheltenham, UK
May 1 - 4

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HOME Wellness, London, UK
May 7-10

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The Dharma of Engaged Yoga

April 26 — Yoga Sky, Berlin
May 4 — Orange Yoga, Cheltenham
May 7 — HOME Wellness, London

Long Life Yoga Teacher Training & Intensives

April 26 — Yoga Sky, Berlin
May 2-3 — Orange Yoga, Cheltenham
May 9-10 — HOME Wellness, London

Sati & Sustainable Yoga

April 26 —Yoga Sky, Berlin
May 1 — Orange Yoga, Cheltenham
May 8 — HOME Wellness, London

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Speaking of books, you can pre-order my book, Long Life Yoga

In this essential guide to health and well-being, world-renowned yoga teacher Cyndi Lee provides simple, empowering yoga practices to help you feel your best at any age.

Yoga has proven benefits at every age, including increasing one’s lifespan. Set yourself up for success by starting your yoga practice for longevity now[JT1] . Whether you’re dealing with aches and pains, stress, sleep issues, or simply looking for ways to feel healthier and more fulfilled, these pages are brimming with techniques proven to improve the quality of your life.

Featuring hundreds of helpful illustrations paired with expert tips and sidebars featuring accessible meditations, breathing exercises, and relaxing rituals, Long Life Yoga makes it simple to enrich your daily routine with proven well-being techniques to live a long, healthy, joyful life.