A road map to spiritual renewal, with the crossroads marked by a popular guide who seems to have lost his footing. In his earlier nonfiction works Chopra (Ageless Body, Timeless Mind, 1993, etc.), a medical doctor, successfully balanced medical science and intuitive healing. Ayurvedic medicine from his native India was not incompatible with Western medical technology, he proposed, as he wooed many Americans to an exploration of a body/mind connection with good health. Now based at his newly established Chopra Center for Well Being in southern California, the doctor is exploring—and stumbling over—more ephemeral areas like love. That may be because his subject is so chameleon-like, a four-letter word at the service of saints and sinners, of lusting couples, charismatic preachers, suffering artists, and self-sacrificing parents. Chopra limits his exploration to the love of romantic relationships and launches the trek from babyhood, where "I am completely loved./I am completely lovable," to the experiences between man and woman that are labeled "love." Chapters include attraction, infatuation, courtship, intimacy, surrender, passion, and ecstasy, each a stepping stone to connections with god or the cosmic spirit. The image of god is fairly flexible here but gives major weight to Shakti, the wife of Shiva, as the representative of "cosmic passion." Along the way are thoughts about courtship as "shared birth," and introductions of concepts such as Dharma (unity), Karma (cause and effect), and Moksha (liberation, ascension). Included are excerpts from poetry (among them Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, the Indian Rumi and the Upanishads), checklist exercises, and limp case histories. A concluding chapter set in a New Mexican twilight is reminiscent of Carlos Castaneda's desert dialogues. "Know thyself" is the message here. Neither as direct as the Bible nor as engaging as Shakespeare, Chopra's pathway may nevertheless serve as an on-ramp for some bewildered lovers.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-517-70622-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harmony
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1996
Neurophysiologist Calvin (The Ascent of Mind: Ice Age Climate and the Evolution of Intelligence, 1990, etc.) continues to explore the human mind in a lively, erudite fashion, this time drawing on evolutionary biology, ethology, linguistics, and neuroscience. He begins by distinguishing consciousness, or awareness, from intelligence (``the high-end scenery of neurophysiology'' encompassing foresight, speed, and creativity) and then considers the likely evolution of human intelligence. He argues that syntax, the structuring of relative relationships in a mental model of things, is what human levels of intelligence are mostly about, and to understand why humans are so intelligent, we need to understand how our primate ancestors evolved syntax from the more limited communicative abilities of apes. Calvin argues that not only did a Darwinian process shape a better brain over two million years, but that the same process operating within the brain might explain how the brain gives shape to thoughts and makes decisions. An image emerges of cerebral codes that copy themselves, compete with other cerebral codes, and develop new variations. Calvin tries to help the nonscientist along with clever illustrations and analogies, such as his Rube Goldbergstyle mechanical ``Vacuum-Lifter Package-Carrying System'' to explain how sentences are understood, but close attention is required at all times. In his concluding chapter he considers some of the implications of artificial intelligence, i.e., a computer that simulates brain processes and is capable of abstraction, imagery, talking, planning, and decision making. What values would we want these silicon beings to have, and how would humans fare in competition with them? Challenging and rewarding. As always, Calvin's thinking about thinking gives plenty of food for thought.
Pub Date: Sept. 11, 1996
ISBN: 0-465-07277-1
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Basic Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Through somber stories, a hospice physician shares his experiences of working with people near death, revealing how the dying process can be a time of personal growth. Kearney, medical director of palliative care at Our Lady's Hospice in Dublin, Ireland, argues that the terror of death stems from a split between the rational and intuitive minds. When an individual becomes alienated from his deepest and most fundamental aspect, he says, the result is soul pain. In a series of stories about dying patients, he illustrates how soul pain is manifested and how, using such psychotherapeutic tools as guided imagery, dream work, and prayer, he sometimes is able to relieve that pain. Two models, one mythological and one psychological, provide Kearney's framework. The first is the story of Chiron, a wounded healer in Greek mythology who willingly descended into the underworld of death before achieving immortality in the heavens. The second is a Jungian model, positing that the ego of the surface mind fears and mistrusts the deep mind, or underworld, of the self. As they make their journey toward death, some patients find their own way through soul pain to acceptance and equanimity; many, however, experience overwhelming fear and suffering. Kearney, who stresses that palliative care is always the first step in what he calls ``depth work,'' describes his successes and failures in helping these patients get in touch with their deepest feelings and experience inner transformations that bring them comfort and peace. This is not light reading. All of Kearney's patients have terminal illnesses; there are no miracles and no happy endings—unless a good death can be viewed as one. For those concerned about the growing strength of the assisted-suicide movement, Kearney's approach provides a welcome antidote to that of Dr. Kevorkian. For those curious about the hospice movement, this is a forceful introduction.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-684-83220-8
Page Count: 188
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1996
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