An analytical, ultimately optimistic blueprint for taking charge of life and improving it.
A schematic new analysis of the human condition.
Basing his nonfiction debut on extensive experience in the mental health industry—dealing with, among other things, patients with PTSD—Amberg likens the totality of the human experience to an extremely complex piece of machinery, the parts of which need to be working in perfect alignment in order for the machine to function at its peak. Though “humans are clearly much more complex than the machinery we create,” human life can malfunction, and Amberg has isolated five “dimensions” whose efficiencies are essential to the success of the whole. The biological deals with physical health and well-being; the psychological encompasses all varieties of human interaction; the educational “inevitably gives definition to who we are”; the genetic concentrates on DNA, which contains “that which makes us special”; and the energetic connects humans to whatever they conceive of as God. (This is a spiritual rather than strictly religious book; all denominations, even atheists, might find it thought-provoking, since Amberg makes ample allowance for secular forms of inspiration.) The book takes an in-depth look at each dimension in turn, and given the author’s specific area of expertise, it’s not surprising that a group of seven case studies is the book’s most accomplished and rewarding section. These case studies involve people struggling with challenges such as substance abuse, learning disabilities and, of course, PSTD, and Amberg uses them to good effect as illustrations of the workings of the five dimensions he’s sketched out. These case studies also serve to highlight the element of personal accountability that runs through the whole book; for Amberg, “[t]he more responsibility we are willing to assume, the more access we have to our internal power and intelligence.” Accessing that internal power, he says, can lead to “self-actualization.” There’s a good deal of levelheaded, common-sense advice in these pages, all of it presented more in the clear prose of a diagnostic manual than in the fuzzy generalities of a self-help guide.
An analytical, ultimately optimistic blueprint for taking charge of life and improving it.Pub Date: April 18, 2014
ISBN: 978-1491076118
Page Count: 282
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 3, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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