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SPIRITUAL ENERGY EXPLAINED

A detailed handbook for those looking to learn about and connect with spirituality.

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This exhaustive guide aims to teach readers the essential pillars of spirituality.

Debut author Broach, a trained library science professional and realtor, began doing research on metaphysics during his studies at the University of Kentucky. Many religions throughout the world, he notes, hold the belief that there exists a “higher power,” whether it be God, Shiva, or another deity; Broach asserts that these higher powers are examples of spiritual energy and help people to recognize this same energy within themselves. The author writes that, because there’s so much suffering and turmoil in the world, it can be difficult for people to exist in a positive state of being; instead, many pursue the idea of heaven for the promise of future happiness. But Broach argues that, by drawing on spiritual energy, people can create a similarly harmonic state on Earth. His book seeks to answer questions on how to live a spiritual life, including what it means to be a spiritual being: “We, as spiritual people, are part of God,” the author says. It also addresses how spirituality and organized religion are related and how affirmations are connected to one’s spiritual nature; indeed, readers who come from mainstream religious backgrounds should expect to have their worldviews frequently challenged. Other topics include how to embrace a spiritual lifestyle and use familiar spiritual tools, such as meditation and manifesting. Overall, Broach succeeds in creating a comprehensive guide for those who may be new to these spiritual ideas and eager to explore them. Occasionally, the book’s layout feels a bit disjointed, but the author’s clear storytelling talent makes up for this. Some of the concepts that Broach addresses in this book, such as auras or soul mates, are complex and may require patience from readers who are unfamiliar with them, but he supplements his research with engaging personal anecdotes.

A detailed handbook for those looking to learn about and connect with spirituality.

Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2022

ISBN: 9798885270779

Page Count: 268

Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Co.

Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2022

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MASTERY

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

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THE LAWS OF HUMAN NATURE

The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.

A follow-on to the author’s garbled but popular 48 Laws of Power, promising that readers will learn how to win friends and influence people, to say nothing of outfoxing all those “toxic types” out in the world.

Greene (Mastery, 2012, etc.) begins with a big sell, averring that his book “is designed to immerse you in all aspects of human behavior and illuminate its root causes.” To gauge by this fat compendium, human behavior is mostly rotten, a presumption that fits with the author’s neo-Machiavellian program of self-validation and eventual strategic supremacy. The author works to formula: First, state a “law,” such as “confront your dark side” or “know your limits,” the latter of which seems pale compared to the Delphic oracle’s “nothing in excess.” Next, elaborate on that law with what might seem to be as plain as day: “Losing contact with reality, we make irrational decisions. That is why our success often does not last.” One imagines there might be other reasons for the evanescence of glory, but there you go. Finally, spin out a long tutelary yarn, seemingly the longer the better, to shore up the truism—in this case, the cometary rise and fall of one-time Disney CEO Michael Eisner, with the warning, “his fate could easily be yours, albeit most likely on a smaller scale,” which ranks right up there with the fortuneteller’s “I sense that someone you know has died" in orders of probability. It’s enough to inspire a new law: Beware of those who spend too much time telling you what you already know, even when it’s dressed up in fresh-sounding terms. “Continually mix the visceral with the analytic” is the language of a consultant’s report, more important-sounding than “go with your gut but use your head, too.”

The Stoics did much better with the much shorter Enchiridion.

Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-525-42814-5

Page Count: 580

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018

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