"Gesture of Awareness is a remarkable book. The elegant and incisive writing illuminates some of the deepest questions of the spiritual path: I and the other, oneness and duality, and what indeed lies beyond all concepts. These words are meant to awaken, not merely to inform, and they succeed admirably in their intention. The beautiful, haiku-like teachings stretch our minds and open many new levels of understanding. This is an unusual work and one worth many careful readings."

– Joseph Goldstein, author of A Heart Full of Peace and One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

"Charles Genoud is simply one of the deepest and most creative Dharma teachers I've known. I predict that this book will be a classic, much referred to and recommended by Dharma teachers in North America and Europe."

– Lama John Makransky

"Unlike many books that explore the meaning of spiritual practice, Gesture of Awareness is not an account or explanation of such practices but an expression of them. In succinct, poetic style, Charles offers a vision of human existence as it can be lived and embodied, once we take the risk to discard those concepts and assumptions that stand in the way of an immediate encounter with the present. Drawing on Buddhist texts, shamanism and the writings of thinkers such as Maurice Blanchot and Georges Bataille, Gesture of Awareness weaves insights from these diverse traditions into a coherent and compelling whole. At the same time, the text is a workbook that encourages the reader to engage with the material in a way that can make a real difference in his or her life. It is the kind of book that cannot be absorbed in a single reading and then shelved, but one that calls us to pay attention to its message again and again."

– Stephen Batchelor, author of Buddhism without Beliefs and Living with the Devil

"A ground-breaking work that explores the nature of doing and being. This book is not really about anything; it is the real thing itself."

– Lama Surya Das, author of Awakening the Buddha Within

"Original, fascinating, and extremely valuable."

– Georges Dreyfus, Williams College