An interesting, if not entirely convincing, argument about the relationship between the mind and body.
A discussion of the connection between physical and mental well-being.
Limmer (Balance, 2002, etc.) argues that dealing with “shadow issues” that “people deny, reject, and do not like to admit” holds the key to being healthy in body and mind. By confronting one’s shadow, one can understand the feelings that cause physical maladies, she says; one can also learn to control diseases (“We are not the victims of our illnesses, and we do have the power to heal ourselves”). The author draws on memories of her experiences as a social worker, and the chapters are filled with instances in which she says her clients’ illnesses were explained or affected by their acceptance of underlying psychological issues. There’s Roger, a cancer patient whose pre-disease “rage and repressed anger created an environment conducive to cancer.” There’s Joyce, whose own cancer went into remission after Limmer worked with her—a claim for which there’s no supporting data. Cancer isn’t the only illness manifested by mental health issues, the author says; readers also see cases of patients with heart disease (symbolized by an “inability to express love”) and asthma. There are also sections on how shadows relate to addiction, midlife crises and death. Limmer’s work helping the sick understand their illnesses through imagery and symbolism is intriguing. However, the larger purpose of the book is unclear. There are chapter-ending questionnaires (with queries such as “What is your level of self-love?”), but the text is mostly theory—Carl Jung is cited frequently—and personal recollection, using terminology that the self-help-literate will recognize but that newcomers may not. Overall, however, Limmer’s text, which includes her own shadow experiences and poems, is easy to follow—casual, personal and honest. Readers currently suffering from physical or mental difficulties may take comfort from the book’s alternative treatment methods.
An interesting, if not entirely convincing, argument about the relationship between the mind and body.Pub Date: April 9, 2014
ISBN: 978-1452594385
Page Count: 274
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: Sept. 17, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should...
Greene (The 33 Strategies of War, 2007, etc.) believes that genius can be learned if we pay attention and reject social conformity.
The author suggests that our emergence as a species with stereoscopic, frontal vision and sophisticated hand-eye coordination gave us an advantage over earlier humans and primates because it allowed us to contemplate a situation and ponder alternatives for action. This, along with the advantages conferred by mirror neurons, which allow us to intuit what others may be thinking, contributed to our ability to learn, pass on inventions to future generations and improve our problem-solving ability. Throughout most of human history, we were hunter-gatherers, and our brains are engineered accordingly. The author has a jaundiced view of our modern technological society, which, he writes, encourages quick, rash judgments. We fail to spend the time needed to develop thorough mastery of a subject. Greene writes that every human is “born unique,” with specific potential that we can develop if we listen to our inner voice. He offers many interesting but tendentious examples to illustrate his theory, including Einstein, Darwin, Mozart and Temple Grandin. In the case of Darwin, Greene ignores the formative intellectual influences that shaped his thought, including the discovery of geological evolution with which he was familiar before his famous voyage. The author uses Grandin's struggle to overcome autistic social handicaps as a model for the necessity for everyone to create a deceptive social mask.
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should beware of the author's quirky, sometimes misleading brush-stroke characterizations.Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-670-02496-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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