Customer Reviews

The Dance: Moving To the Rhythms of Your True Self

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I was so taken with this book that I read it in one day, staying up much past my bedtime! Oriah writes from her heart and her experiences - she acknowledges her frailties, doesn't gloss over the complications of life, and suggests skills to learn that could help a person learn to "Move to the Rhythms of Their True Self." I was captivated by the beautiful poetry, energized by her suggested meditations, and through her writing, realized just how much I need to slow down! I have not read "The Invitation," but will do so in the near future. In the meantime, "The Dance" goes with me wherever I go - to be read again and again and again.

I loved Oriah's first book, "The Invitation" , so I looked forward to "The Dance"...but with the fear that maybe the magic wouldn't happen again; maybe she'd said the important stuff and this would be the leftovers. I needn't have worried.

I read an exerpt on her website and now I've read the whole book. It's powerful and magic, and I feel changed by it. Not because it left me with a sense of who I could be, but because it gave me a sense of the value of who I am, and of how to more fully live with that.

Oriah says of her book " It is the story of my discovery that the question is not Why are we so infrequently the people we want to be? but rather Why do we so infrequently want to be the people we really are? ...It is the story of our struggles with those things that make it hard to remember who and what we really are, the places where is easy to become afraid in our culture."

She also shows us much more of the person she is, of her background in Shamanic teaching and the workshops that she ran, and that makes the "The Dance" more powerful for me. Her stories are vivid and real, and she often tells painfully human anecdotes of mistakes she makes; no "I'm the Master who knows all" fraudulance here.

It's really a wonderful book...if you're on my Christmas gift list, you probably don't need to buy a copy, but otherwise you definitely should.

This was a beautiful book and I will have to agree even better then the Invitation. However, you don't have to read the invitation first to enjoy this book but if you haven't read the Invitation then you would be missing something as it also is a wonderful book. " Take my hand and dance with me " This book will truly change you, your perspective and you just don't want to miss this one!

It is difficult to imagine, but The Dance is even better than The Invitation. With her unique blend of beautiful language and down-to-earth wisdom, Oriah Mountain Dreamer takes us to the next logical, post-invitation step: action. "Don't just say 'yes' to my invitation," Oriah tells us, ". . . take my hand and dance with me." The Dance is about active spirituality, about putting our dance steps where our mouths are. And as with The Invitation, Oriah Mountain Dreamer leads us along this path by taking her turn at vulnerability first. She leads by example, and she is a beautiful, perfectly imperfect example of what humanity can be. The Dance offers fresh perspectives ("I believe that the big picture is somehow shaped by how we live the details, the little pictures that run through our lives."), and wise counsel ("If you need to be afraid, fear will come wherever you are, but you don't have to go out looking for it."), and it confronts the dangers of oversimplified, sugar-coated self-help recipes. ("Guaranteed outcomes and delineated steps may be warranted and useful for baking cookies and assembling bookshelves, but I find them less useful and potentially misleading when we are talking about finding meaning and creating happiness in our own lives and in the world.") As a psychotherapist, as an author, and as a human being, I have found a kindred, anti-namby-pamby spirit in Oriah Mountain Dreamer. Reading The Invitation is not a prerequisite for reading The Dance, but I can't think of a better way to spend your reading time than to read these two babies back to back. I said that it is difficult to imagine that The Dance is better than The Invitation, but you don't have to rely on imagination. Reading is believing.

This is an amazing book. The poem itself is fantastic - it just speaks to your inner most being, like a quiet friend asking you those life questions. Each chapter is introduced by a stanza in the poem and then the chapter itself is Oriah talking about her experiences with that particular question or idea. The writing style is simply wonderful, conversational, story style that just draws you in. I bought this book on a whim having only seen the poem once on a postcard and I thought it was nice. I had no idea how much the book and reading the stanzas in a slower way would touch me so much. I was reading along, la di da, thinking really nice book, lots of good "stuff" to ponder, la di da, and then I got to chapter "Hitting the Wall". The stanza that goes with this chapter reads like this: "I have heard enough warrior stories of heoric dancing, Tell me how you crumble when yoy hit the wall, the place where you cannot go beyond by the strength of your own will. What carries you to the other side of that wall, to the fragile beauty of your own humanness?" I've only "hit the wall" once before in my life - not to say that everything has been easy but I've always been able to see the glass half full and get on with things...until this one time. When I read these lines in the book it just touched me so much and her own stories that she provides throughout this book - they're just so honest and frank. There's a lot to think about in here. I haven't read Invitation or her others yet but plan to check them out. I've given this book away s gifts I liked it so much. Definitely recommended to anyone just doing a little introspection, looking to live the dance.

This book does not pray on sentimental or depressed mindstates that so many books float on. Oriah is not only authentic and realistic, she also is very down-to-earth-spiritual. Along with that she definitively has great writing talents of which this book is an overt celebration. Great reading with the impact of a welcome shower to get you back on the essence of things, without having to leave every day life. Absolutely not a just-for-women-book; I just love this book. Thanks Oriah.

I was comforted and inspired by Oriah's latest book.

In a world where we are constantly
under pressure to achieve more and more,
her beautifully written journey into life's experiences
leads us to realize that who we are is already enough
and that this realization is what can help us
to live fully in the present,
not spending our precious time worrying about the future
or mulling over the past.

A thought provoking and inspirational examination of our lives.

The Dance is a great book. I enjoyed it from the first page to the last. Oriah is not just a writer; she is an artist, with a new perspective on life, and on events. Her thoughts flow smoothly, as if you were reading something you wrote, or something you already knew to be true. I am going to say it again, she is an artist.

Some parts of the book, you won't help but read out loud to someone you care for. I did that with my mother, and some other times with a friend of mine. Both of them want to borrow the book.

This book will help you dream, and here I will quote something from the author, as she wrote "To dream is to create the stories of how we live our lives, and these are the stories our children's children will remember. I write with as much honesty and frankness as I can, because I want to offer stories of being present with what is. I recite poetry when I speak, because I want offer beauty and the power of art to remind us of who and what we are. I share personal stories, because I want to cocreate a story of intimacy and cultivate our capacity for compassion in dealing with out human failings. I tell love stories because I want to learn how to love well." (p151)

I will buy The Call, and I know it will be as good as the Invitation and The Dance. And hopefully one day in the future I will make it to one of Oriah's retreats.

Several years ago I listened to the audio version of this book and I thought at the time that it was a nice diversion, but just typical New-Age feel-good stuff. Now in my 50s, when I listened to it again recently I was stunned by how powerfully honest the author is and how her poetic honesty brought strength and character to her message. This is not a "how to . . ." book. It is more likely to impact the reader who is a mature spiritual seeker (Christian or otherwise) who feels bogged down by mundane daily living and, like many spiritual seekers, tripped up by trying to DO before really knowing how to BE. That is no small distinction. This book addresses real issues like chronic illness, divorce, raising children, mid-life love, finances and regret all from a practical perspective that helps the reader assess where she is and where she hopes, someday, to be. Mountain Dreamer doesn't give formulas or pat answers--she even amusingly describes hearing a motivational speaker who's message sounds good, but doesn't ring true in any lasting, practical sense. The book is about both inner and outer balance, cutting yourself some slack while still holding yourself to standards of character that have meaning for you personally, and about offering the reader an opportunity to stop for a time and check his own spiritual development against his dreams. Her passage describing meeting a "significant other" thirty years after a teenage crush, and the clarity he was able to bring to her regarding how essentially true to her young self she had remained is priceless. The reader can find peace and hope merely by acknowledging having faced the issues discussed, and being willing to ask how they mattered.

I read the invitation over and over. At first I was not ready for this book. It wasn't untill I read a half of it that I fell deeply into seeing Oriah's perspective and it healed me.
Now I have read it twice, and it still is moving, and highly recommended from my point of view.