Anatomy of the Spirit is the boldest presentation to date of energy medicine by one of its premier practitioners, internationally acclaimed medical intuitive Caroline Myss, one of the "hottest new voices in the alternative health/spirituality scene" (Publishers Weekly). Based on fifteen years of research into energy medicine, Dr. Myss's work shows how every illness corresponds to a pattern of emotional and psychological stresses, beliefs, and attitudes that have influenced corresponding areas of the human body.
Anatomy of the Spirit also presents Dr. Myss's breakthrough model of the body's seven centers of spiritual and physical power, in which she synthesizes the ancient wisdom of three spiritual traditions-the Hindu chakras, the Christian sacraments, and the Kabbalah's Tree of Life-to demonstrate the seven stages through which everyone must pass in the search for higher consciousness and spiritual maturity. With this model, Dr. Myss shows how you can develop your own latent powers of intuition as you simultaneously cultivate your personal power and spiritual growth.
By teaching you to see your body and spirit in a new way, Anatomy of the Spirit provides you with the tools for spiritual maturity and physical wholeness that will change your life.
What sets Anatomy of the Spirit apart is Carolyn Myss's ability to blend diverse religious and spiritual beliefs into a succinct discussion of health and human anatomy. For example, when describing the seven energy fields of the human body, she fuses Christian sacraments with Hindu chakras and the Kabbalah's Tree of Life. Fortunately, Myss is a skilled writer as well as researcher, able to ground her extensive spiritual and religious discussions by using real-life stories and a tight writing style. Those who are squeamish with the notion of biography affecting biology will find this book a struggle (in one chapter, Myss links pancreatic cancer with a man's refusal to unburden his life and start fulfilling his dreams). Many, however, hail Myss for creating a valuable contribution to the ongoing exploration of spirituality and health. --Gail Hudson
From Publishers Weekly
One of the hottest new voices in the alternative health/spirituality scene, Myss is a "medical intuitive" whose work with Dr. C. Norman Shealy resulted in their coauthored book, The Creation of Health. In this engaging volume, Myss describes our "spiritual anatomy" and how its dysfunctions affect the physical body. Going beyond the spirit/body connection, she presents a complete program for spiritual growth, drawing on concepts from three major religions. Linking the seven chakras of Hinduism to the seven Christian sacraments and the Jewish mystical Tree of Life, Myss details the struggles associated with each chakra and its correspondents. To Myss, our primary foundation, or first chakra, for example, corresponds to baptism and the mystical Jewish concept of Shekhinah. This chakra's energy, according to Myss, is concerned with our "tribe," be it our family, country or other group we identify with, and it activates our need for loyalty, honor and justice. Misplaced loyalties or conflicts will most likely manifest in the lower part of the body, in afflictions like lower back pain. The author intersperses her text with case studies and keeps her discussion close to real-life concerns. Her tone can be gratingly authoritative at times ("all human stress corresponds to a spiritual crisis"), and it's questionable whether the alleged correspondences are as firm as Myss posits. Still, there's wisdom here, in words that eschew New Age jargon and that make otherwise esoteric material accessible to a general readership. This book has breakout potential. One Spirit Book Club main selection; author tour. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Caroline is dedicated to creating educational programs in the field of human consciousness, spiritually and mysticism, health, energy medicine, and advancing the science of medical intuition. She established CMED, her own educational institute, in 2003, which offers two programs running three courses per year, on Sacred Contracts and Mysticism. Additionally, Caroline maintains a rigorous workshop and lecture schedule internationally and continues a consultation practice with physicians, psychiatrists, psychologists, and other health practitioners, as a medical intuitive.
In 1996, Caroline compiled her years of research in medical intuition with her work in the field of human consciousness, releasing the book, ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT. This book became a New York Times bestseller and has been published in 18 languages. To date, it has sold over 1.5 million copies.
In investigating the underlying reasons why people sabotage their healing processes, Caroline identified a syndrome as 'woundology', characterized by a person who prefers to rely upon the power of illness for manipulation of his or her world as opposed to attained an independent, empowered state of health. As with her other ground-breaking research, this syndrome is now a recognized psychological condition. Her work in this area became the subject of her fourth book, WHY PEOPLE DON'T HEAL and HOW THEY CAN. This book was Caroline's second New York Times bestseller.
Caroline released her fifth book, SACRED CONTRACTS, which became her third New York Times bestseller. As with her previous books, this one is also in 18 languages and reports sales of well over 1.6 million.
Due to the interest generated by her work in Sacred Contracts, in 2003, Caroline opened CMED (Caroline Myss Education), her own educational institute. CMED offers two programs per year, each three sessions long. The first is on Sacred Contracts and the second is on Mysticism, Intuition, and Healing. The Institute draws students from nineteen nations, as well as across the United States.
In 2004, Caroline released her sixth book, INVISIBLE ACTS OF POWER, which also became a New York Times bestseller. She is now working on her seventh book: ENTERING THE CASTLE. She has also just published her first book through her company, CMED, entitled, THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF GEORGE WASHINGTON, an extraordinary piece of literature that was channeled sixty years ago by a nearly-blind woman named Edith Ellis. Myss considers this project to be a vital part of her commitment to support an archive of information on her personal passion, which is the mystical history of America.
Through the years of her career, Caroline has taught in thirty-five countries, continuing her international work at present. In addition to writing six books, Caroline is the leading recording artist for Sounds True, Inc., the major audio recording company in the holistic field. She has recorded with them since 1990, producing 30 different titles. Her entire library of recordings now number of 180.
In 2003, Oprah Winfrey gave Caroline her own television program for one year with the OXYGEN network in New York City, which ran successfully for one year.
BOARD MEMBERSHIPS
From 1999-2004, Caroline served on the Board of the State of the World Forum with Jim Garrison.
She is presently on the Board of Wisdom University, San Francisco, where she also Chairs the Department of Energy Medicine and the Healing Arts.
In 1995, Myss, along with C. Norman Shealy, M.D., Ph.D., founded the American Board of Scientific Medical Intuition.
CMED Institute
In 2003, Myss founded her own educational institute, CMED (Caroline Myss EDucation), providing seminars in Sacred Contracts and Mysticism and Intuition for students from all over the world. More information on her institute is available on her web site: www.myss.com.
This review is from: Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing (Paperback)
In the last part of ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT, Caroline Myss unites her discussion of three belief systems (Roman Catholic Sacraments, Kabbalah Tree of Life, and Hindu Chakras) within the concept of living in the present moment. Many who have trod the spiritual path Myss describes and faced the Three Big Crises - absence of meaning and purpose; strange new fears; and devotion to something greater than one's self - will appreciate her final words. Suffering produces spiritual rewards.
Not everyone will appreciate Myss' book. I would like to send the audio version to my 87-year old aunt who is devoutly Roman Catholic, but I don't think she would like it. My Southern Baptist aunt would probably disown me. My daughter would appreciate it - but she's a fan of Bishop Pike. For a change, Myss has written a book older folks will appreciate more than younger ones.
I know something about the sacraments having been raised with them. I've also acquired a great deal of knowledge about the Chakras in the past 40 years (via reading and Hindu friends). I have studied the Kabbalah (it is far more complex than Myss' book indicates). Like Joseph Campbell whom she apparently see as a model, Myss sees a larger truth underlying religious structures and/or tribal systems of belief.
Myss is billed as an expert on energy medicine. In the early 1980s, I had the pleasure and privilege of being in Louis Hay's home. I can testify that "whatever your mind can conceive and believe it will achieve." Whenever I have an ailment, I whip out Hays' healing books (Myss cites one of them). Healing takes many forms. Doctors mostly facilitate the process or mess it up. The power of positive thinking, prayer, the laying on of hands, and laughter all work to heal the body-mind-spirit. What Myss shares is not new, but if you haven't heard about it elsewhere you can learn more here.
This is a good book. I've heard, read, and/or experienced most of what Myss describes so I can testify to the truthfulness of it. If you are ready to move beyond tribal boundaries and become whole this may be the book for you.
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This review is from: Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing (Paperback)
Caroline Myss, Ph.D. is a medical intuitive and a specialist in energy medicine. Whenever she visits Boulder, she draws a big crowd, and her sold-out lecture last week promoting her current bestseller, SACRED CONTRACTS, was no exception. "According to energy medicine, we are all living history books," she writes in ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT. "Our bodies contain our histories--every chapter, line, and verse of every event and relationship in our lives" (p. 40). She maintains, in other words, that as our lives unfold, our biography becomes our biology (p. 40).
In ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT, Myss attempts to connect the dots between body and spirit by integrating the wisdom of several spiritual traditions, the Hindu chakras, the Christian sacraments, and the Kabbalah's Tree of Life. She draws from the ancient wisdom of these teachings to radically redefine spiritual and biological health, and to help us understand "what keeps us healthy, what makes us ill, and what helps us heal" (p. 67). The central premise of her book is that our past and present, personal and professional relationships, traumatic experiences and memories, beliefs and attitudes all become "encoded" in our biological anatomies, and then contribute to the formation of cell tissue, which generates energy reflecting our emotional strengths, weaknesses, hopes and fears (p. 34). Dr. Myss teaches us how to move through our wounds, rather than living in them (p. 60). While in her book she says that disease is the result of our negative emotions (p. 43), during her more recent Boulder lecture, Myss acknowledged she no longer believes this, and that this incorrect assertion has caused many to needlessly suffer, while trying in vain to identify the nonexistent negativity in their lives.
In her truly fascinating book, Myss reveals how we are simultaneously matter and spirit, and she encourages us to think about how matter and spirit interact, "what draws the spirit and life force out of our bodies, and how we can retrieve our spirits from the false gods of fear, anger, and attachments of the past" (p. 77). To those readers like me, who may be a bit skeptical of the anatomy lessons Myss offers here, she encourages us take from her book only what feels right to our heart and spirit, leaving the rest behind (p. 94).
G. Merritt
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