A nationally known couples therapist reveals the single root cause of all relationship problems—and offers revolutionary advice on what to do about it
While most of us have moments of loving freely and openly, it is often hard to sustain this where it matters most—in our intimate relationships. If love is so great and powerful, why are human relationships so challenging and difficult? If love is the source of happiness and joy, why is it so hard to open to it fully and let it govern our lives? In this book, John Welwood addresses these questions and shows us how to overcome the most fundamental obstacle that keeps us from experiencing love's full flowering in our lives.
Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships begins by showing how all our relational problems arise out of a universal ‘wound of the heart’ that affects not only our personal relationships but the quality of life in our world as a whole. This core wound shows up as a pervasive mood of unlove—a deep sense that we are not intrinsically lovable just as we are. It shuts down our capacity to trust, so that even though we may hunger for love, we have difficulty opening to it and letting it circulate freely through us.
This book takes the reader on a powerful journey of healing and transformation that involves learning to embrace these imperfections—within ourselves and within our relationships—as trail-markers along the path to great love. It sets forth a process for releasing deep-seated grievances we hold against others for not loving us better and against ourselves for not being better loved. And it shows how our longing to be loved can magnetize the great love that will free us from looking to others to find ourselves.
Written with penetrating realism and a fresh, lyrical style that honors the subtlety and richness of our relationship to love itself, this revolutionary book offers profound and practical guidance for healing our lives as well as our embattled world.
Editorial Reviews
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<p style="line-height: 150%;"> “With clear instructions and an even tone, Welwood shows us how to heal our psychic scars by opening up to the ‘real love’ available to us all at the core of our nature.”—Tricycle
“Welwood challenges us to move from self-hatred to self-love and to do the inner work to embrace the love that sets us free.”—Spirituality & Health
"Drawing equally from spiritual and psychological traditions, Perfect Love reads like a book of philosophy: the ideas seem sound enough, though there's no way to prove them. Welwood is most compelling when he gets practical. . . . His approach is also noteworthy for its emphasis on learning how to receive love as well as give it. . . . Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships offers both grand theories and useful practices for incorporating these lessons into your life."—Body & Soul
"Welwood skillfully identifies the fundamental obstacle in relationships and offers a clear, attainable, and transformative solution. Everyone should read this wonderful book."—Harville Hendrix, coauthor of Receiving Love and Getting the Love You Want
"This book skillfully and eloquently describes how our deepest longing for love is in fact the key to healing our personal wounds and the woundedness of the world at large. John Welwood's message echoes the Buddha's, showing us how we have direct access to the love and happiness we most long for, as our very essence."—Sharon Salzberg, author of Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness
"This book takes us on a healing and transformative journey to address the real, underlying cause of our relationship problems. John Welwood is one of the most brilliant and important teacher of our time."—Debbie Ford, author of The Best Year of Your Life and Spiritual Divorce
"Full of practical wisdom and divinely inspired insight. A marvelous guide for any seeker choosing to walk on love's path."—bell hooks, author of All About Love: New Visions
"A profound guide to healing our hearts and our world. No larger social transformation is possible unless it is simultaneously accompanied by this kind of personal healing, one individual at a time. Every social change movement should encourage its participants to take time to follow the steps outlined in this extremely valuable and important guide to psychic health."—Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun and author of The Left Hand of God
About the Author
As a psychotherapist, teacher, and author, John Welwood has been a pioneer in integrating psychological and spiritual work. Welwood has published six books, including the best-selling Journey of the Heart (HarperCollins, 1990), as well as Challenge of the Heart (Shambhala, 1985), and Love and Awakening (HarperCollins, 1996). He is an associate editor of the Journal for Transpersonal Psychology. He leads workshops and trainings in psychospiritual work and conscious relationship throughout the world.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
All the most intractable problems in human relationships can be traced back to what I call the mood of unlove —a deep insecurity that most people harbor within themselves about being loved or lovable just for who they are. This doubt about our connection to love makes it hard to trust in ourselves, other people, life, or love itself.
The mood of unlove often shows up in the form of instant emotional reactivity to any perception of being slighted or treated badly. It's as though a huge reservoir of distrust and resentment is ready and waiting to be released—which the tiniest incident can trigger. For some couples, these emotional eruptions happen early on, blowing a budding relationship apart in their first few encounters. For others, the mood of unlove might not wreak its havoc until well into a seemingly happy marriage, when one or both partners suddenly wake up one day and realize they don't feel truly loved.
Fortunately, just as the sun is never permanently obscured by clouds, so our native capacity for love, for genuine warmth and openness, cannot be destroyed. To say that our heart is wounded means that we are lost in clouds that temporarily block our access to the sun that is always shining. Healing the love-wound, then, involves something like opening up spaces in the clouds and inviting the sun to do what it naturally wants to do: shine upon us.
Top reviews from the United States
Judy Roberts
5.0 out of 5 stars What a gift this book has been to me
Reviewed in the United States on May 5, 2016
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This book is so terrific that I don't know how to begin to do it justice -- but I'll try!
Many things I could say about it are paradoxes:
* It's gentle, and yet it encourages the reader to undertake some pretty challenging exercises.
* It acknowledges our wounds -- how our parents stuffed us up, etc. -- and yet it shows the way through that pain to the appreciation and joy waiting beyond the pain.
* It shares enough theory to provide an intellectual understanding of how the human (flawed) side of us is created, yet it also shares at a practical level that helps us to tap into our feelings and, through them, to reach the spiritual dimension (perfect love) that's the ground of our being.
* It uses everyday English rather than psychological or religious jargon.
* I believe people of diverse backgrounds could enjoy this book, whether they approach it from a secular, Christian, Buddhist or whatever other point of view.
Welwood shares details of his own challenges, e.g., in his relationship with his mother, and also case histories of clients in his practice as a psychologist. The stories provide tangible examples that illustrate relevant points. The personal anecdotes convey the impression that he isn't setting himself up as the know-it-all expert lecturing us ignorant minions, but humbly admits to living in the trenches of life himself.
This book has helped me to make a giant leap in accepting myself and having compassion towards myself, in short, loving myself. There has been a corresponding expansion in the sense of compassion I feel towards other people and therefore acceptance of them as they are.
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Jon D. Kitner
3.0 out of 5 stars Another Way of Looking at the Relationships in Your Life
Reviewed in the United States on December 1, 2014
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I first heard John Welwood on Sounds True, a podcast about spirituality. It made a big impression on me, so much so that I listened to the program half a dozen times. Then I shared it with my family and friends. Some family and friends wondered why I wanted them to read his book, Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships. As if my offering them this book was a suggestion that they needed therapy! So here is the point, if you are a "seeker" this book will come as a revelation, as it did for me. But, if you are a person who is not spiritual, or if you are critical of all the self help spin that our culture produces, well you know the expression, "you can lead a horse to water but..." John Welwood has put together an alternative way of viewing family relationships and creating a path towards self healing. As I studied parts of the text over and over, it became increasingly evident to me that the issues presented by the author and his ways of changing your perception about these issues was based on common sense or a kind of pragmatism that the psychologist William James would have liked. There are also Buddhist influences. I am not a Buddhist, but the direction this provides works within the framework of any faith or no faith. Anyone who struggles with their personal suffering, past or present will find some peace in this book.
29 people found this helpful
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Kim Coffey
5.0 out of 5 stars Love is Greater Than Hatred
Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2010
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John Welwood's engaging book of objective love in theory and practicalities has opened a gateway for my 22 yr. marriage of patterns that have been misunderstood; which in turn we have regressed into frustration, underlying resentment, distrust, disconnection and isolation.
John's book has given me/us a lifeline (we are actually reading it together over morning coffee (a first of reading a book together), and it is a springboard for allowing attention and appreciation of the other) to grow into awareness of "why" we are in what what seems to be experiences outside of ourselves, and we can now "co-create" within ourselves as I thou, and discover a communion in relationship from "I thou" to "we are".
After you strip all of the righteous grievances away...there is an inherent diamond in the mud - that "Love is greater than hatred because it can embrace hatred, while hatred cannot embrace love. While love can exist free of hatred, hatred exists only because of love, as a painful symptom of our disconnection from it." (page 60). With this realization, I find myself bathing in a love consciousness that is inherent to my being, and that is enough to swim in the hate, understand it, let it go...and LIVE in the real mission of this planet - the power of love in all of its infinitely wide-spectrum of objectivity, grace and Isness in Being. Thank you John for bringing awareness in the duality of humanity of absolute love and relative love.
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Eman
5.0 out of 5 stars I appreciate that this book helps people tap into their core love and the fabric of love within all people
Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2016
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Poignant book about relationships. It is sometimes difficult to absorb the realities without over-identifying with the challenges encountered in interpersonal relationships. I appreciate that this book helps people tap into their core love and the fabric of love within all people.
3 people found this helpful
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Vanna
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book for helping to heal the wound of the ...
Reviewed in the United States on June 16, 2016
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Excellent book for helping to heal the wound of the heart. Must be far enough along in your spiritual journey to be able to recognize this need, though.
7 people found this helpful
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Taylor Ellwood
5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent look at what makes love work
Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2008
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In this book, Welwood examines the concept of unlove and how that concept motivates the unhealthy patterns that people sometimes act out when in a relationship. I enjoyed this book as I enjoyed his other books. What I found useful was his thoughtful but also detailed examination of unlove and how it manifests. His examples of his work with clients was also helpful for illustrating his theories about unlove. Most importantly I came away with a better recognition of my own issues and how to cultivate a good awareness of those issues. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to better love hirself.
5 people found this helpful
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Julie Reiser
5.0 out of 5 stars the only "self help" book you should ever read
Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2008
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This is a very clear and compelling book that gives meditation-based strategies for overcoming the kind of bad programming we all received as children and that we tend to carry around as unredressed grievances and bottled-up self-hatred. Rather than indulging or enabling the "inner child"--something that too many self-help books tend to do--this book explores how you can learn to let go of it and grow up.
Welwood's ideas and terminology are steeped in Buddhism and the Gurdjieff tradition, but they are presented so clearly and skillfully that anyone would find them relevant and accessible. This is the best $15 bucks you will ever spend.
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mintymoor
5.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful and graceful book full of wisdom and love.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 2, 2020
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Interestingly, I was about to throw this book away - my decluttering and clearing process. I had probably bought it around 2010 and scan-read it at the time. I remember not liking it all that much, but for some reason kept it to return to at a later date. I had found it a little too new-agey. Too vague, kind of obsessed with relationships and couples in the American modern way, which barely resonated with me. Yet, re-reading it, I found it to be something else in its reveal.
And I am very grateful for this.
The book did take some focus and concentration for me. I had to take notes to condense it. It is written in long-hand expressionist way. Yet there is a precision and spareness that means you cannot just read it in one sitting, I felt, in case you miss something important. I am a spiritual Catholic by faith and practice but there were lots of ways the book opened up my understanding of Spirit and Love and the things we find that seem to get in the way, as the author says, the clouds covering the sun. A beautiful and graceful book full of wisdom and love.
I was sorry to read John Welwood died in 2019 (I am writing this in 2020), as would have liked to express my personal gratitude.
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L. Myers
5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect Love, Imperfect Relationships
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 13, 2013
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What a wonderfully insightful book, I wish all couples would read this book and keep it at their bedside for constant referral,
Many of the concepts are truths already learned whilst living my walk with Jesus Christ. many more were new.
This book is so helpful in so many ways that it would be impossible to list them, so I recommend that it be read and re-read with much deep thought and a sincere desire to learn valuable lessons in relationships.
2 people found this helpful
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spood
4.0 out of 5 stars Worth a read
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 26, 2017
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Bit like marmite, but would read as adjunct to counselling course for objective overview of good intentions gone bad and how we can view our attitudes to human interaction from our sometimes misplaced congruent selves
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scott mills
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best books out there
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 13, 2016
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One of the best books out there .......
Helps you understand where relationships start to fail and that our child hood plays a very important role in our future .
This is really for both couples to read and can make you stronger .... :)
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chris b
5.0 out of 5 stars A healing gem
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 26, 2016
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Beautifully clear, wise and incisive analysis of the root of much of our pain. Deep and effective exercises for working with problematic feelings and mind states.
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Jul 08, 2008Steev Hise rated it really liked it
Recommended to Steev by: Jane Martin
Shelves: spirit-self
This is a great book if you're truly interested in understanding intimate relationships and why they're so hard and how to make them work.
Welwood's book "Journey of the Heart" is what got me first interested in his work. He is on the verge of being a little too "oovy-groovy" for me, and a little Christian, but he avoids getting to much into that and keeps it non-denominationally spiritual and psychological.
Basically he's all about the idea that people are mostly pretty wounded and imperfect and you have to accept yourself for being broken and learn to love yourself so you can love other people.
pretty wise stuff. (less)
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Nora Berzawy
Oct 09, 2018Nora Berzawy rated it it was amazing
Now I have the answer for the question: which book has much added up to your life? (At least in the perspective score).
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Deb
Oct 18, 2012Deb rated it it was amazing
**To love and be loved…wounds and all**
Being human can often be a strange dilemma, especially in the realm of love. We deeply crave love, but have trouble fully giving and receiving it. The heart of the matter is that our woundedness around love—and the defenses that naturally follow—get in the way of our being able to truly love and be loved.
This is the dilemma the author addresses in _Perfect Love Imperfect Relationships_:
“How then can brokenhearted people like ourselves heal this woundedness around love that has been passed down through the generations, and set ourselves free from the strife that dominates our world? This is the most critical issue of human life, both personally and collectively. It is also the central focus of this book…You will discover that your wounding is not a fault or a defect but rather a guiding compass that can lead to greater connectedness. And this will allow you to live more creatively with the tension between love’s inherent perfection and relationship’s inevitable imperfection.” (pp. 6-7, 21)
The book serves as a guide for healing ourselves by “bringing ourselves back to life in the places we’re wounded and shut down.” (p. 149) It’s obvious that this process has been the focus of the author’s personal and professional life, and he so elegantly and poignantly captures many of his insights about the human struggle to achieve perfect love via imperfect relationships. Here are just a few that I found to be quite profound. (See if they stir your heart up a bit too):
*** The human love dilemma:
“On one hand we hunger for love—we cannot help that. Yet at the same time, we also deflect it and refuse to fully open to it because we don’t trust it…This whole pattern—not knowing we’re loved as we are, then numbing our heart to ward off this pain, thereby shutting down the pathways through which love can flow into and through us—is the wound of the heart. Although this love-wound grows out of childhood conditioning, it becomes in time a much larger spiritual problem—a disconnection from the loving openness that is our very nature.” (pp. 10-11)
*** The primary illusion:
“Yet this also gives rise to one of the most fundamental of human illusions: that the source of happiness and well-being lies outside us, in other people’s acceptance, approval, or caring…But the less experience we have of being loved as we are, the less we feel at home in our own heart. And this leaves us looking to others for the most essential connection of all—with the native sense of rightness and joy that arises only out of being rooted in ourselves…. What keeps the wound from healing is not knowing that we are lovely and loveable just as we are, while imagining that other people hold the key to this.” (pp. 46-47)
*** Love is imperfect:
“But the imperfect way our parents—or anyone else—loved us has nothing to do with whether love is trustworthy or whether we are lovable. *It doesn’t have the slightest bearing on who we really are.* It is simply a sign of ordinary human limitation, and nothing more. Other people cannot love us any more purely than their character structure allows.” (p. 48)
***Grief gets in the way of love:
“This is what is tragic about the mood of grievance: It shuts down the channel through which love could enter into us, cutting us off from its healing and regenerative power…‘I don’t feel loved’ eventually hardens into ‘I don’t trust love enough to let it in.’ Opening to love feels too threatening, and we don’t believe it is safe to do so….This is how grievances invariably become self-fulfilling prophecies…What we fail to grieve turns into grievance.” (pp. 67, 76)
***Grieving the grievance opens the heart to love:
“ The only way to heal the wound of the heart is through freeing up the feelings about loss of connection that remain stored in our body, so that they can be fully digested and move on through us….Learning to hold your woundedness in the embrace of your own compassionate presence help you be present to yourself in a new way that penetrates the thick, defensive shell around the heart. This is what allows the medicine to flow.” (pp. 76-77)
***Meeting yourself in the place where you feel unmet:
“By meeting yourself in the place where you feel unmet, something new and powerful happens. Something so simple yet so radical: You start to inhabit yourself. You reinhabit your lonely heart and bring it back to life.” (p. 82)
*** Allowing love:
“For love can touch you only when your heart is accessible. To be loved, then, is to *be* love.” (pp. 50-51)
***Choosing gratitude over grievance:
“At every moment we have the choice of either feeling gratitude for what has been given to us or indulging in grievance about what is missing. Grievance and gratitude are polar opposites. Grievance focuses on what is *not* there—the imperfections of relative love—and looks for someone to blame. Gratitude recognizes what *is* here –the simple beauty of human presence and contact—and responds to it with appreciation. When we reflect on how our life is possible only because it is held, surrounded, and nourished by a field of kindness, this gives rise to natural gratitude.” (p. 94)
***Unconditional presence digests childhood pain:
“If the wound of unlove is undigested pain from childhood, then letting yourself experience it with unconditional presence is a way of digesting that old pain. Then it no longer remains something solid and frozen that clogs your system. This is a simple and direct way of starting to heal your woundedness, the fearful shutdown you became stuck in as child.” (p. 108)
***Healing through self-understanding:
“Though you often try to get others to understand you, the understanding that heals you the most is your own. As the warmth of understanding starts to flow, it washes away your grievance against yourself, allowing self-love to take its place.” (p. 117)
***Absolute inner love plugs the holes:
“As long as you still hold onto the childhood fixation on not being loved, then no matter how much others love you, it will never be enough. The wound will operate like a hole in you: No matter how much love someone pours in, it will always leak out the bottom. And you will continue focusing on the love that’s not there rather than the love that is. That is why the practice of tuning in to absolute love is so important. It is a way out of the endless, fruitless attempt to plug the hole of love from outside…To know that you are loved, then, is to know that you *are* love.” (p. 147)
***True healing comes from within:
“Yet even when a relationship functions in this positive way, it’s important to remember that true nourishment, growth, and expansion come about only through what happens within us, in how we learn to soften and open our guarded heart. Looking to someone else to fill our holes or always satisfy our passion only cuts us off from the wellspring of beauty and power within.” (p. 150)
***Existential aloneness—the only guard is the presence of our own heart:
“Of course, in our creaturely vulnerability, there is no way to avoid loss and separation from what we love. We cannot avoid coming back again and again to the experience of being alone. No one can finally get inside our skin and share our experience—the nuances that we alone feel, the changes that we alone are going through, the death that we alone must die. Nonetheless, loss, separation, and this fundamental aloneness are important teachers, for they force us to take up residence in the only real home we have—the naked presence of the heart, which no external loss can destroy…Standing in this, our own true ground, is the ultimate healing balm for the ache of separation and the wound of love. ‘You must fall in love with the one inside your own heart,’ says the teacher Poonja. ‘Then you will see that it has always been there, but that you have wanted something else. To taste bliss, forget all other tastes and taste the wine served within.’ The warmth and openness at our core is the most intimate beloved who is always present, and into whose arms we can let go at last.” (pp. 159-160)
Bottom line: To truly love others (wounds and all), you must first be able to deeply love yourself (wounds and all). Now on to those other human dilemmas…
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Judie68
May 17, 2012Judie68 rated it really liked it
Read this last night...and it floored me. I think is might be one of the most important books I've read in a while. When the student is ready...
"All the beauty and horrors of this world arise from the same root: the presence or absence of love. Not feeling loved and then taking that to heart is the only wound there is. It cripples us causing us to shrivel and contract. Thus, apart from a few biochemical imbalances and neurological disorders, the diagnostic manual for psychological afflictions known as the DSM might as well begin: Herein are described all the wretched
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Nancy
Oct 23, 2009Nancy rated it it was amazing
Shelves: favorites
I was hooked at the introduction and bought 20 copies of the book before I had finished to give to friends. I now have two of this author's books and will place them on my shelves of books to read over and over again. It's right up there with my copies of "A New Earth," "The Power of Now," "Mindfulness in Plain English" and "Breath by Breath." I hope I'm contributing to world peace by sharing this book with others.
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LeeTravelGoddess
Nov 07, 2019LeeTravelGoddess rated it it was amazing
Wonderful book about exploring the debts of where love and process of obtaining such comes from. It’s quite simple. I enjoyed the simplistic ways in which he broke it down and presented exercises at the end! I’m so happy I chose this book I just don’t know what to do.
I’m realizing that I am however on the right track and in time, I’ll know what to do if past emotions find themselves on the rise. This is a part of my tops collection and I stand behind it being recommended reading for the WORLD.
And I just want to say that you can be anti-theist or an atheist but to completely ignore the rest of the world and what their potential beliefs could be is just another way of not allowing love to flow. Be you, that’s fine, your beliefs are yours but to criticize based on a well rounded text that places things in perspective for all is beyond me. Don’t be so afraid that someone else’s beliefs may permeate your being that you feel it necessary to block out the opinions of others; that is absurd. Only YOU CAN CHANGE YOU— it’s your choice! 💚💚💚 I feel a shift in me and I wish to read more of John’s books as well as many others on love! (less)
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Emilija Dukauskaite
Sep 07, 2019Emilija Dukauskaite rated it it was amazing
A beautiful book that helps to understand why you and others around you might be afraid of love. Also, why some lovers are too attached when others are too distant. Overall, it helps you not only understand yourself a little bit more but be more empathetic towards others as well.
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Mattia
Nov 15, 2017Mattia rated it it was amazing · review of another edition
Not a “perfect” book (it’s worth pushing through the stuff on forgiveness and taking it at face value rather than as a judgment), but very much what I️ needed right now. Helped me synthesize a bunch of insights I’ve been poking away at for a while. Five stars because it made such a difference for me.
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Emily
Jan 07, 2012Emily rated it it was amazing
The best book on relationships I've read. Highly recommend.
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haley
Feb 19, 2020haley rated it liked it
Shelves: non-fiction
I started reading this book when I was a really sad and conflicted state of mind. I had recently gone through a breakup with a guy I had really strong feelings for, who I might even describe as my first real love. I felt betrayed and abandoned in the end, and I was incredibly hurt. This experience triggered my old fears that I was worthless and that nobody would ever appreciate me or love me as much as I did for them. I always feel like the loser in the end, giving all my love and loyalty to people who can't or won't do the same for me.
So this book gave me some helpful insights and allowed me to think about my pain from an outside perspective. It was a bit of a healing experience. The tone of the book felt really kind and compassionate, if that makes sense, and it was really nice to read the words of an outside source describe feelings that I've sat with for so long.
A couple drawbacks, in my opinion however. The exercises, while thought provoking, were not always helpful for me. Also this book has a LOT of spiritual and religious-esque language, and as an atheist who isn't particularly spiritual either this just didn't do it for me. It wasn't my cup of tea.
Tl;dr version- an interesting book. It isn't the end all be all of my process of healing my old wounds and growing from my past experiences. But it was a nice start. (less)
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Marianna
Dec 02, 2018Marianna rated it it was amazing
Shelves: relationships, favorites, communication, personal-growth, psychology
A very beautiful and wise book with many passages about human/relative love and absolute/divine love that are sheer gems. Those many priceless passages alone warrant a 5 star review.
I question, however, whether the exercises that focus on the feeling of unlove and the sense of lacking love in order to connect to the absolute love within us are truly necessary and even recommendable. We can go straight to connecting with absolute love without having to subject ourselves to feelings of lack, I think. The "ask" has already been made from time immemorial in order to "receive" or connect with what's already there because that absolute love is a manifestation of our essential nature, so there's no need to continue asking, in my view. That said, perhaps folks who have been hardened enough to not connect at all with their need for love and what they do want may find them helpful. (less)
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Michael-David Sasson
Feb 17, 2019Michael-David Sasson rated it it was amazing
Shelves: romance
"At the bottom of my grievance against a world gone mad, I discovered the vulnerable child who still didn't know that love was fully available or truly reliable." p6 introduction *Also see Deb's 2012 review for important quotes*
This book is an exploration of what human nature desires from love and how romantic relationships are both a gateway to getting that (if viewed correctly) while also a disappointment to realizing those things if seen as an end in themselves. It's interesting that Welwood explores desire with a similar (and to me new) understanding to that presented in Mark Epstein's "Open to Desire: Truth About What the Buddha Taught" that I recently finished and Phillip Moffitt's "Dancing with Life" that I am currently reading. (less)
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Kelley
Nov 09, 2018Kelley rated it liked it
I have to remain pretty neutral on this one. Not because it wasn't good. It may be outstanding, but I wasn't ready for this. This book asks you to do a lot of introspection. A lot of looking within, time with yourself, examining your feelings as they come naturally. Trying to feel love and other emotions through conjuring them in a time of calm.
I want to be here with myself and my feelings. I want to do these things, feel these things, know these things.... but I'm not in that place right now, I'm not ready to dedicate to this.
But I know it's here.... for when I am ready. (less)
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Usama Saeed
May 24, 2020Usama Saeed rated it it was amazing
The most wonderful book i have ever read , I profoundly invite everyone who is interested in spirituality and discovering the true self to read this masterpiece . Thank you so much John Welwood , I wish if you were alive and thank you personally for the great amazing efforts you put in this book
