Review by Booklist Review
Christian psychiatrist Peck (World Waiting to Be Born ) offers a sequel to his influential The Road Less Traveled (1978). He discusses "growing up"--becoming self-aware, working through cycles of blame and toward wholesale forgiveness--and then the self-examination we each must undergo in order to groom ourselves for the most important step of all: the search for God. Along the way he comments on New Age movements, speculates--with quotations from John Donne--on the sexuality of God, and, in one of his more sustained and intriguing sections, touches bases with K{{}}ubler-Ross to consider how death gives meaning to life and how its contemplation must be a part of the spiritual journey. Peck is deeply concerned, too, that contemporary psychiatry is relying too heavily on biochemical explanations of mental illnesses; he notes that patients who undergo risky heart surgery--to remedy a disease, one would imagine, without psychological origins--are far more likely to survive if, simply, they wish to. His real point is that there are often several causes for an illness. This is accessible common sense full of winning anecdotes; The Road Less Traveled has sold four million copies, and this gathering of lectures, while it contains no startling revelations, ought to turn a profit, too. (Reviewed Sept. 1, 1993)0671781596John Mort
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Fans of psychiatrist Peck's bestselling The Road Less Traveled will enjoy this self-help sequel, a collection of edited lectures that offers a tough-minded, liberating guide to learning to live and die with dignity, creativity and meaning. Peck maps four distinct steps of spiritual growth. The first stage is exemplified by antisocial persons; in the second are those who depend on religious or other institutions for meaning in their lives; next are religiously skeptical truth-seekers; the fourth stage embraces ``mystical/communal'' people attuned to the interconnectedness of all things. At times sounding himself like a mystic, he urges readers to discover the meaning of their lives by confronting the mystery and inevitability of death; envisages God as a sexual being who endowed human lovemaking with a spiritual component; outlines his vision of heaven and hell; and fuses psychiatric insights with his highly personal approach to Christianity. He also critiques the New Age movement, explores myths as guiding metaphors for psycho-spiritual growth and plumbs the roots of addiction, guilt, blame, self-hate and self-acceptance. BOMC featured alternate; QPB alternate. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
This sequel to The Road Less Traveled ( LJ 9/15/78), composed from lectures that best-selling author and psychiatrist Peck has given since his last success, presents spiritual as well as psychological aspects of adult maturation. He explores growing up into forgiveness rather than blame; finding meaning in death; developing genuine self-esteem while dealing with problems of omnipotence, good and evil, and heroism; coping with addictions, which Peck terms the sacred disease; and finding a personal god. Peck criticizes psychiatry for ignoring the spiritual histories of patients and for misdiagnosing as a result. Highly recommended. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 6/15/93. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Megawriter Peck, whose The Road Less Traveled continues as a smash bestseller more than a decade after publication, weighs in with additional down-to-earth counsel on psychological and religious matters, based this time on his talks and lectures. Peck's orientation is specifically Christian now, a result of a conversion and baptism that took place after Road appeared. Here, he addresses three stages of personal development-- ``growing up,'' ``knowing yourself,'' and ``in search of a personal God''--explaining that all three entail the recognition that ``everything that happens to us has been designed for our spiritual growth.'' This process of maturation brings with it classic psychospiritual issues--such as the casting of blame, the meaning of death, and the mystery of existence--and Peck examines each with his trademark avuncular blend of friendly chat, tough advice, first-person experience (often drawn from his psychiatric practice), and literary citations. Chapters hop unexpectedly from one subject to another (presumably reflecting the various lectures): addiction, which he sees as a yearning for paradise; the New Age, castigated for promoting ``spiritual confusion'' and ignoring the problem of evil; the stages of spiritual growth, from ``chaotic/antisocial'' to ``mystical/communal''; Christian heresies; the danger of cults (Peck provides useful guidelines for recognizing fringe sects); and so on. The bottom line is our relation to God: Life's meaning--which Peck urges the psychiatric profession to take into account--lies in the growth of the soul. This is what Peck's zillions of fans have been waiting for, more sage Road talk from the master. It will hit the fast track fast, and keep on running and running and running.
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