• “Through simple yet profound wisdom, Suzuki Roshi encourages a life of mindfulness, compassion, and non-attachment.”

    — His Holiness the Dalai Lama

  • “These writings are an extraordinary gift for all of us who aspire to live more fully, to ‘become who we are’ in a more wholehearted and free-spirited way. I felt a burden being lifted from my shoulders just by reading this remarkable book.”

    — Oliver Burkeman, author of Four Thousand Weeks

  • “In these uncertain times, as we grapple with who we are and who we are becoming, Becoming Yourself is the book we need for guidance and for ballast.”

    — Ruth Ozeki, author of A Tale for the Time Being

  • “Becoming Yourself is deep and delicious, tender and perplexing, a beautiful follow up to Zen Mind, Beginners Mind. You can feel the sparkle and magical gifts of Suzuki Roshi. He touches your heart, enlightens you and makes you smile.”

    — Jack Kornfield, author of A Path With Heart

  • “Like finding a hidden treasure, the utter wonder and delight of discovering Suzuki Roshi all over again is at the heart of this marvelous book of his teachings. Roshi’s humor, wisdom, and deep love of the Dharma shine through, page after page. This is a modern classic to be cherished by all who read it."

    —Roshi Joan Halifax, author of Being with Dying and Standing at the Edge

  • “In a book that asks to be savored, Suzuki Roshi’s timeless wisdom opens the door to awakening here and now. Through his clear teachings on compassion and awareness readers of all backgrounds can begin to access their true nature in order to fully become themselves.”

    —Sharon Salzberg, author of Lovingkindness and Real Life

  • "In this wonderful new collection of teachings given by Suzuki Roshi there is a brief chapter called 'Why I Came to America.' There he said, “what I want to establish here is Buddhism in some pure form.” Flowing from this wish, which we might also call his vow, we are offered previously unpublished material on the great bodhisattva precepts, showing us the way that they are interpreted in our particular zen lineage. This will be a new turning of the Dharma Wheel for many western students of zen."

    —Reb Anderson, author of Being Upright

  • "Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki’s teaching on becoming turns us towards each moment of our lives in which who we are is revealed. No need to search beyond daily connections and interactions with all things and with each other. The simplicity and complexity of this teaching can bring ease to anyone striving to 'be somebody' in the future rather than honoring the shaping of our lives already unfolding."

    —Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, author of Opening to Darkness and The Deepest Peace

  • "No one expresses the warmth and wisdom of Soto Zen like Suzuki Roshi, whose words have been a beacon for more than fifty years. In Becoming Yourself we hear again his unique voice in a series of short, eloquent, talks that will inspire much re-reading, copying, posting, and contemplating. The book includes a series of talks on Zen ethics and precepts that will be an invaluable resource for all Dharma students and anyone concerned with living an ethical life, with kindness, in our challenging times."

    —Norman Fischer, author of The World Could Be Otherwise

  • “Reading even a few words of this elegant volume feels like a breath of fresh air. Shunryu Suzuki's insight into the Dharma's capacity to bring us more fully into ourselves comes through with a bracing charm all its own. The timeless gems within this previously unpublished collection make it a good friend to take along, again and again, wherever your journey takes you from here."

    —Rhonda Magee, author of The Inner Work of Racial Justice

  • "There could not possibly be a better book for our moment in history. Readable, engaging, comforting, challenging, funny, clear and of course, beautifully mysterious too, this handbook for sanity and balance offers what so many are craving. In the midst of national and international turmoil, it is still possible, if not utterly necessary, to learn the simplest things, like how to sit and how to become oneself - even if you thought you knew."

    —Naomi Shihab Nye, poet and National Book Award finalist

  • "Suzuki-roshi is a master of sweeping our minds clean of distraction and distortion, a kind, direct and crystalline friend reminding us how to become ourselves. Every page in this book contains enough wisdom to last a lifetime and I found myself copying down one sentence after another. Is it any wonder that Suzuki’s books of teachings are the only medicine I send to friends who are suffering in body or mind? What a joy and a relief to have this new one!”

    —Pico Iyer, author of Aflame and The Art of Stillness

  • “In Becoming Yourself, the teachings of Shunryu Suzuki become mirrors in which we can see ourselves free of artifice, free of right and wrong, free of attainments and non-attainments. In these pages, Suzuki Roshi speaks as if he is speaking to us directly while manifesting the immediacy of his Zen practice. This book points us to becoming who we are now when we don’t understand ourself through thoughts and desires. Becoming Yourself is a treasure."

    —Gil Fronsdal, author of The Issue at Hand

  • "Becoming Yourself is Suzuki Roshi's expression of the profound truth that you are already free. To know this deeply, in the midst of gaining and losing, having and lacking, selfing and othering, good and bad, birth and death, is Zen practice. Becoming yourself is not what you think it is. As Suzuki says, that's just 'confusion and suffering.' May you continue to explore the depths of becoming yourself."

    —Guo Gu, author of Silent Illumination