For devotees of both Dyer and self-help books, an inspirational account of the essence of the man behind Your Erroneous...
A self-help guru’s reflections on how he became who he is.
Self-empowerment is one key to success in life, and nowhere is this more evident than in Dyer's (21 Days to Master Success and Inner Peace, 2012, etc.) rich unfolding of his life stories. From some of his earliest childhood memories in the early 1940s to the present, Dyer takes readers on a nearly year-by-year trip through the events in his life that led him to write more than 40 books and undertake other projects related to self-development. Each action, he writes, often directed by a divine force, put him one step further on the path of becoming the man he knew he was meant to become. For years, he questioned the people and books influencing him, but he continued to follow an inner knowledge that connected him spiritually and emotionally to the world around him. Dyer writes, "It no longer takes years for me to have this insight—everything and everyone are connected to each other and to the Tao or the universal one mind from which all things originate and return." Dyer addresses the fears and setbacks that he encountered along the way, including the need to find his absentee father, whose abandonment filled Dyer with anger for years. Only at his gravesite was the author able to forgive the man and "[cleanse his] soul of the toxicity that living with internal rage brings." Every emotional experience was another pivot point for Dyer, and from them, he produced his best-selling books, audiotapes and lectures. The author’s reflections on the twists and turns of his authentic life reveal the power inherent in each of us to have the same joyful existence, though many of his pronouncements may be too far out there for many readers—e.g., “There is no time; 1968 and 2018 are all one, even though our body-mind sees them as separated by 50 years.”
For devotees of both Dyer and self-help books, an inspirational account of the essence of the man behind Your Erroneous Zones and other self-help titles.Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4019-4403-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Hay House
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2014
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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