Daily Reflections on Addiction, Yoga, and Getting Well

by Rolf Gates

Deeply personal essays and daily prompts for self-reflection while healing from addiction and walking the road of recovery from the author of Meditations from the Mat and Meditations on Intention and Being.

You are a process that has called forth a teaching for this day. This teaching will not be new to you; rather it will be reminding you of what you already know. Reminding you of who you already are.

Rolf Gates, author of Meditations from the Mat, has walked the walk of the 12-step method of recovery while traveling down the Buddhist eightfold way and practicing the Eight Limbs of Classical Yoga. His integrated approach has been the key to his understanding of sobriety for over 25 years.

In his series of 365 essays, Gates explores the lessons and experiences from his own practice and study, classical teachings, and his career as a teacher and coach. Each eloquent and brief essay is accompanied by a self-reflection prompt to help guide you on your journey of introspection and change.

As the co-founder of the Yoga + Recovery Conference at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health and Esalen Institute, Gates has made a significant contribution to understanding the role that yoga can play in recovery from addiction. With his personalized approach to both the modern and classic teachings and by embedding it within the space of the human heart and everyday life, Gates is a solid guide to finding and living the freedom that lives within each of us.

433 pages, Paperback

Published September 25, 2018

Reviews

[Susan Hawkins]

This volume is pure magic for the Spirit mind and Body! Rolf Gates is a gem of a writer of his own experience, strength and hope! He is wise, humble, inspiring and deeply applicable to all our relations. He simply tells his profoundly beautiful recovery story braiding together the exquisitely deep and nourishing wisdoms and instructions from Buddhist wisdom, 12 Step principles and spirit and the wisdom of Yoga. I have read it daily (as his other books). A hats off to his wife, Miriam Gates who wrote two phenomenally beautiful volumes Good Am Yoga and Good Evening Yoga for kids. My almost three year old granddaughter knows the flows as does her Mimi and parents. ENJOY!!!!

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

This inspirational book probably deserves 5 stars, but it differs significantly from Gates's two previous volumes, both 5 star classics, in that he focuses intensely on the addiction and recovery benefits of yoga and mindfulness. Not a criticism at all, and this focus may well be more suited to some readers depending on their needs. The two previous volumes have an equally spiritual focus, but more clearly within the yoga tradition of the Sutras, rather than the 12-step focus.

[James McDougall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent daily resource.