Customer Reviews

Job's Body: A Handbook for Bodywork

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you are a doctor, physical therapist, massage or bodywork therapist of any kind with an appetite for in depth analysis and understanding of the human response to touch, this book is a MUST HAVE for you. It's technical and detailed, and it is also ground breaking, eye-opening and very exciting.

Juhan covers the topic of the human response to touch from the micro-cellular level through to system responses all the way to the origins of the body/mind split in western philosphy and the consequences of pharmaceutical dominance in health care on touch therapies. He introduces many new perspectives that bring a rich vitality to anatomy. He shows the interactivity - the interconnectedness - the interdependence of all aspects of the human body, mind and being. He presents some of the latest theories about how the body mind are integrated and communicate - Candace Pert's molecules of emotion.

Not only is Juhan's research fascinating and valuable to body workers, but also his method of inquiry, the questions he asks, and how he asks and seeks to answer them, are also very educational - modeling ways we can pursue the investigation ourselves.

Here are a few examples of the kind of insight that Juhan offers in the Third Edition:

Page 17

"This personal, sensory engagement with the self does not spring from a rebellion against scientific authority, but rather from a realization of the present inadequacy of that authority's conception of reality, a realization that is not contrived for the purpose of debate, but which is forced upon [us] by [our] own painful circumstances."

"When the conceptions of reality that we maintain do not square with the things we are experiencing, it is not because we are flawed or because our experiences are wrong, but because our conceptions cannot contain all of the facts as we perceive them. And there is no constructive way out of this crisis but to enlarge our sense of reality to include our actual experiences."

Page 142

"The goal of bodywork should not be to impose universalized standards of posture and movement upon an individual, but rather to help the individual to cultivate the mental awareness and the physical flexibility to continually adapt to the changing needs of the moment."

Page 184

"Muscles that have fallen into disuse and flaccidity just don't provide enough pumping action for these intercellular fluids to adequately feed and bathe the nerve cells, and so the general strength of their functions is diminished."

Page 412

"Subjective and objective are not two distinct ways I have of viewing reality; they are two sides of a continuous feedback loop which together make up that reality. How completely I sense my body and how I feel about it has everything to do with the particular course of events going on within it."

I had bought this for a friend about to start massage school--but I'm KEEPING IT! The writing communicates a deep love and interest in the body and how it works, and how we respond to touch as healing. This is a wonderful way to learn about the anatomy and physiology of our living, working bodies.

Great overview of human anatomy and physiology from an integrative perspective. Brings together a lot of scientific information in an easily understood and relevant fashion that particularly explains many aspects of physiology as they apply to massage and bodywork.

Job's Body is theoretical rather than practical. It makes one aware of many interesting ideas and theories not normally encountered. It is like a summary of the author's research so expands the readers general awareness.

On the negative side, the author either has an evangelistic zeal which he indulges at the readers' expense or he fails to distinguish between his belief system and his science. The book is laced with distracting and irrelevant intrusions of Darwinian type evolutionism, which, for someone who has nothing like enough faith to accept the hypothesis, makes constantly having to separate the religious junk from the science very tedious. It spoilt the book for me.

Otherwise, apart from being rather wordy and containing some repetitive grammatical errors, (quite out of place in what is otherwise a well presented and scholarly work), which I would have expected the publisher's proof reader to have weeded out, the book makes a fair contribution to the breadth of one's concepts.

Juhan examines the physiology and psychology of our response to touch, combining excellent illustrations with a detailed but readable technical discussion. Individual sections conclude with his position that through body work, "heightened self-awareness and improved control over conditioned responses" will improve our health and reduce our Job-like suffering. Although Juhan is a professional body worker at Esalen Institute, he does not describe the techniques used and readers will have to test his claims themselves. Recommended for comprehensive collections on human physiology

This book was part of my massage school curriculum. I tried to really get into it like my teachers, but I had a hard time with the 'fluffy' stuff weaved in and out of this book.
However - the theories and ideas presented are WONDERFUL. The book itself is written in a very thoughtful manner, and I can appreciate that. As a massage therapist, I can appreciate this volume.

While I wouldn't say this is a must read, I think if you have the time, give it a go.

I had bought this for a friend about to start massage school--but I'm KEEPING IT! The writing communicates a deep love and interest in the body and how it works, and how we respond to touch as healing. This is a wonderful way to learn about the anatomy and physiology of our living, working bodies.

Absolutely the best bodywork book I've ever read, bar none. I read the first edition of this book about 15 years ago, and it was a big eye-opener for me; I saw the body in a whole new light, it gave me things to think about and apply for years. I wish Deane Juhan would write a lot more books.

This Book is Pure Poetry of the Human Anatomy, Not your average A&P Book, Reading this book is like reading a good Novel.

I am a professional bodyworker and the reading of Job's Body enlighted my work. It's a pity that this book is only published in English and German. I always recommend it to all my students of massage and anatomy.