A varied potpourri of metaphysical teachings.
Electrical engineer and self-described “energy facilitator” and “psychic warrior” Burford tells of how to maximize intuitiveness in this debut self-help-book.
The author says that he believes that everyone is born with metaphysical abilities that are suppressed by conventional wisdom and education: “In playing with my own children when they were young,” he writes, “I realized that children can see angels, energy fields, auras, and so on.” In this book, he seeks to help readers who wish to revive these natural abilities through simple exercises. He focuses heavily on the concept of one’s “energy field,” which he also calls an “energy egg.” Chapters such as “Energy Awareness,” “Energy Healing,” and “Energy Self-Defense” provide extensive background on the different roles that he believes one’s energy can play in one’s life, including explanations of the body’s chakras. Burford tells of how he has used his own energy field—expanding it as a barrier, for instance, or drawing it back to make it less vulnerable to others’ energies—to protect himself and others, both physically and psychologically. He frankly discusses the benefits and challenges of meditation, particularly when beginning the practice, but he stresses, above all, the importance of positivity, kindness, and self-love. Throughout this easy-to-read manual, Burford insists that anyone can learn to master the skills he describes, even astral projection. However, the most useful section is the “Exercises” portion of the appendix, in which he describes exactly how to develop the metaphysical skills that he claims everyone has. The glossary will also be helpful to newcomers, although many readers who are interested in the book’s subject matter will likely already know some of the terms. Obviously, this work isn’t for everyone; some, for instance, may scoff at the idea of astrally traveling to a family member’s funeral in Prague, as he says that he helped one client do. That said, the underpinnings of Burford’s philosophy—helpfulness, kindness, and so on—are ones that anyone can embrace.
A varied potpourri of metaphysical teachings.Pub Date: Nov. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5320-3196-0
Page Count: 160
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2018
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
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.
Lessons about life from those preparing to die.
A longtime hospice chaplain, Egan (Fumbling: A Pilgrimage Tale of Love, Grief, and Spiritual Renewal on the Camino de Santiago, 2004) shares what she has learned through the stories of those nearing death. She notices that for every life, there are shared stories of heartbreak, pain, guilt, fear, and regret. “Every one of us will go through things that destroy our inner compass and pull meaning out from under us,” she writes. “Everyone who does not die young will go through some sort of spiritual crisis.” The author is also straightforward in noting that through her experiences with the brokenness of others, and in trying to assist in that brokenness, she has found healing for herself. Several years ago, during a C-section, Egan suffered a bad reaction to the anesthesia, leading to months of psychotic disorders and years of recovery. The experience left her with tremendous emotional pain and latent feelings of shame, regret, and anger. However, with each patient she helped, the author found herself better understanding her own past. Despite her role as a chaplain, Egan notes that she rarely discussed God or religious subjects with her patients. Mainly, when people could talk at all, they discussed their families, “because that is how we talk about God. That is how we talk about the meaning of our lives.” It is through families, Egan began to realize, that “we find meaning, and this is where our purpose becomes clear.” The author’s anecdotes are often thought-provoking combinations of sublime humor and tragic pathos. She is not afraid to point out times where she made mistakes, even downright failures, in the course of her work. However, the nature of her work means “living in the gray,” where right and wrong answers are often hard to identify.
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-59463-481-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
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