A well-written and thoughtful exploration of spirituality from a distinctly female perspective.
A former Olympian explores the sacred feminine.
In this debut self-help book, Claire shares her story of competing as an elite athlete and finding fulfillment through developing a spirituality that encompasses psychic awareness and an engagement with the female divine. In this guide, “W.I.T.C.H.” is an acronym that stands for “woman in total conscious healing,” a term the author applies to herself and other women who have embraced a holistic spirituality and taken control of their lives. Claire combines her personal story—growing up in a Scottish Irish family in Germany, fencing in the Olympics, immigrating to the United States—with advice for readers on developing their spiritual sides and finding happiness. Themed chapters move seamlessly between the two threads as the author uses her experience as an example, then offers a series of questions designed to encourage readers to explore each topic as it relates to their own lives. The book looks at how femininity has been represented and rejected in spiritual traditions, how a solid spiritual practice can lead to a sense of purpose, and how readers can build authentic and honest relationships. Claire is an engaging narrator with a fascinating and unique background, which makes the book intriguing and often compelling. She makes it clear from the opening pages that the volume’s target audience is women and addresses them exclusively. But it is not a guide for skeptics; readers should be prepared for frequent references to energy, vibrations, karma, and astrology, which are fundamental to the author’s experience of the world. Readers who are on their own mystical paths, particularly outside the bounds of mainstream religions, will find the manual useful, particularly when it addresses some of the challenges of incorporating spirituality into everyday life and the hazards of using spiritual engagement as a way to avoid dealing with underlying problems. While it is not a work for all readers, those who are part of its defined audience are likely to find it fits well on their shelves next to books by Gabrielle Bernstein and Marianne Williamson.
A well-written and thoughtful exploration of spirituality from a distinctly female perspective.Pub Date: March 8, 2023
ISBN: 9798986394305
Page Count: 204
Publisher: Siobhan Claire Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
These platitudes need perspective; better to buy the books they came from.
A lightweight collection of self-help snippets from the bestselling author.
What makes a quote a quote? Does it have to be quoted by someone other than the original author? Apparently not, if we take Strayed’s collection of truisms as an example. The well-known memoirist (Wild), novelist (Torch), and radio-show host (“Dear Sugar”) pulls lines from her previous pages and delivers them one at a time in this small, gift-sized book. No excerpt exceeds one page in length, and some are only one line long. Strayed doesn’t reference the books she’s drawing from, so the quotes stand without context and are strung together without apparent attention to structure or narrative flow. Thus, we move back and forth from first-person tales from the Pacific Crest Trail to conversational tidbits to meditations on grief. Some are astoundingly simple, such as Strayed’s declaration that “Love is the feeling we have for those we care deeply about and hold in high regard.” Others call on the author’s unique observations—people who regret what they haven’t done, she writes, end up “mingy, addled, shrink-wrapped versions” of themselves—and offer a reward for wading through obvious advice like “Trust your gut.” Other quotes sound familiar—not necessarily because you’ve read Strayed’s other work, but likely due to the influence of other authors on her writing. When she writes about blooming into your own authenticity, for instance, one is immediately reminded of Anaïs Nin: "And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” Strayed’s true blossoming happens in her longer works; while this collection might brighten someone’s day—and is sure to sell plenty of copies during the holidays—it’s no substitute for the real thing.
These platitudes need perspective; better to buy the books they came from.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-101-946909
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2015
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