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Len and Tony

While Tony has been focused more on the inner or spiritual part of life—both in his reviews and poetry, lately I have been more caught up in the mundane, the financial side of life. I am a stock market junky. I have been fascinated with trading, speculating, and investing for most of my adult life. I started trading seriously in the late 1970’s when I was practicing law in Westchester County, New York.

Through a series of rather fortuitous events, in December of 1982 I wound up at Montgomery Securities in San Francisco. Montgomery was a very small entrepreneurial investment banking boutique when I joined. For the most part we followed technology, retail, medical, and financial stocks. I worked there, as an institutional stock broker until June 30, 1999. During that roughly 17 year period I learned a tremendous amount about stocks and the stock market from my colleagues and my clients, many of whom were extremely talented and successful.

After I left Montgomery I worked with a good friend at Faxon Research, where we did independent research on companies and their stock and sold that research to professional investors. After about 2 years I decided I had had enough of serving clients and struck off on my own to trade, speculate, and invest using only my own funds. This is what I have been doing to put a roof over my head and bread on my table for over 10 years now.

During my thirty plus years of trading and investing I have seen all kinds of markets. During the last 10 years of devoting my efforts purely on my own behalf I have had good times and some not so good times. Some markets have been a lot easier to navigate then others.

The one thing I have learned above all is that to be successful one has to be disciplined. Risk control and money management are ultimately far more important to success than “being right” about the market or a given stock. We all are right some of the time and wrong some of the time.

Over the years I have read a number of books which have helped me immensely. Many of these are reviewed on this website. Go to “search by subject” and try business and investing.

If I were to pick a handful that I consider “must reads” I would go with the following: (All of which are reviewed and available on our website)—in order of importance

1. Reminiscences of a Stock Operator by Edwin LeFevre
2. Inside the House of Money, by Steven Drobny
3. All of the “Wizard” books by Jack Schwager
4. Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

I just re-read Inside the House of Money, by Steven Drobny. It was incredibly valuable. The world of investing has changed dramatically. Now everything is based on “the Macro-environment”. This book is focused on interviews with some of the greatest macro traders of our generation. If one is serious about investing, speculating, and/or trading this book is a critical tool to enhance anyone’s understanding and ability to survive. If you fall into the category of being serious about investing go out today and buy and read this book. Not only was it very useful, I found it to be fascinating and enjoyable.

Best to all,

Len

Many of our readers will find this website to be of interest...

It has many spiritual titles that you can download for no charge

http://www.holybooks.com/

If you would like to order photos of Maharishi ect.

Please e mail me .. I will send you a link for ordering.

books21st@gmail.com

We have about a dozen copies left of Darshan: 3 Times in India with Maharishi.

A beautiful hardcover color photograph book of Maharishi in Rishikesh around 1968

Please e mail me if you are inters ted in purchasing this rare book

books21st@gmail.com

Depth Over Time
Kundalini MahaYoga: A Path of Transformation and Liberation
By Swami Khecaranatha
AuthorHouse.com, 300 pages

Review by Ellen Jefferds

Depth Over Time offers a vision of the freedom and liberation available through the practice of Kundalini MahaYoga. Topics include Grace and individual effort, our relationship with God, the wish to grow, the teacher-student relationship, selfless service, surrender, cultivating stillness, and the critical need to consciously choose spirituality, moment by moment.

The author, Swami Khecaranatha, has been teaching since 1972 and is an authentic adept of Tantric Shaivism in the Shaktipat Lineage of Bhagavan Nityananda and Swami Rudrananda. Khecaranatha has the ability to express the highest knowledge of the ancient Kashmiri Shaivite masters in language that Westerners can understand in the context of their own lives.

Mark Dyczkowski, Ph.D., renowned scholar and author on Tantra and Kashmiri Shaivism, wrote a preface for the book and stated: “The direct awakening of Kundalini by shaktipat is considered to be the most excellent in the Tantric tradition, and this form of higher initiation is the essence of the practice taught by Swami Khecaranatha. It is marvelous to see how his teachings coincide with the Trika school of Shaivism. Khecaranatha has attained, through the transmission of his teachers and a lifetime of practice and profound personal experience, a deep understanding of Kashmiri Shaivism and Anuttara Trika. Thus, he summates in his realization and teachings what was considered by the Kashmiris to be the most elevated practice of all the Tantric schools.”

Depth Over Time offers inspirational and practical guidance, emphasizing that spiritual practice does not just happen while sitting on a cushion, but must be integrated into all aspects of one’s life. Swami Khecaranatha makes it clear that attaining liberation and living in Divine Presence is not just the purview of saints, but a real possibility for anyone willing to devote his or her life to the pursuit of unconditional freedom.

Swami Khecaranatha is the spiritual leader of Sacred Space Yoga Sanctuary and director of Rudramandir: A Center for Spirituality and Healing, located in Berkeley, California. More information about his practice can be found at SwamiKhecaranatha.com

When I Was Cool: My Life at the Jack Kerouac School (P.S.) [Paperback]
Sam Kashner (Author)

“With characteristic modesty, writer Kashner opens his memoir with a caveat to readers: this isn’t an encyclopedic history of the beat generation. Rather, it’s his own story of how it felt to leave home and learn to be a poet by hanging out with the great beat poets, albeit in their more gentled phase (past their road-tripping days, but still full of “crazy wisdom”). It was 1976 when Kashner, a fresh college dropout, decided to follow his dream and apply to the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, a yet-to-be-accredited division of the Buddhist Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colo. As their first (and for a while only) student, Kashner’s assignments included finishing and typing Allen Ginsberg’s poems; preventing Gregory Corso from scoring heroin; cleaning the home of their guru, Rinpoche; and mediating between William Burroughs Sr. and Jr., not to mention attending the odd lecture. Kashner undertook all this weirdness with fretful earnestness-e.g., forever worrying that Ginsberg would attempt to seduce him, that Corso would shoot up and he’d be branded a failure, that the school wouldn’t get accredited and his parents would regret letting him go there, and that his lack of poetry expertise would be discovered by his teachers. Were this just the saga of an innocent in beat bohemia, Kashner’s chronicle would be merely amusing, but his genuine love for his crazy-wise mentors makes this a curiously affecting coming-of-age story. 8-page b&w photo insert not seen by PW.”
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --T

24 PATTERNS OF WISDOM [ Kindle Edition]

Anthony Lawlor (Author)

Anthony Lawlor was a long time resident of Faifield
He is a renowned architect of 25 years and author

He applies ancient wisdom and modern technology in creating homes, work places and community spaces

His latest books is available in a Kindle edition only.

This visionary book provides groundbreaking insights for navigating the obstacles and realizations of your human journey. With an innovative series of 24 archetypal symbols, acclaimed author and architect Anthony Lawlor offers new understanding about the patterns of consciousness shaping your daily life. This practical wisdom gives you tools to find clarity in confusion, harmony in conflict, and comfort in chaos.

It guides your passage through common challenges to expansive realizations. 24 Patterns of Wisdom opens the way to seeing the world anew, and finding radiant inspiration on each step of your path.

___________________________

When I was young my passions were reading and film.
Reading and watching movies created a stable ground for my ungrounded self.

I would witness myself becoming involved with one of the characters… I began taking on their mannerisms and a part of their moral structure or in the least confirm my own: creating a feeling of peaceful belonging.

This created a validation of my personhood

For a brief time my pained introversion was diminished.

When this feeling dissipated and while waiting for another character to fill in the empty space

I would feel upended and not quite sure--

Like a child in an unfamiliar back yard.

Watching films and reading books are like life itself .

We pretend to be someone and forget that we are pretending.

Tony