Pigs Eat Wolves: Going into Partnership With Your Dark Side [Hardcover]

Charles Bates (Author), Mike McColl (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2000

This treasure of a fairy tale is a story of your own transformation. Psychologists, sprirtual leaders, and change experts highly recommend this book as an "enlightening, shocking, insightful, penetrating, and delightful" interpretation of the classic fairy tale which will get us into partership with our dark side and send us on to spiritual development. Pigs Eat Wolves has been widely used as a resource for change and leadership by city governments from Florida to Alberta, and by individuals all over the globe. It has won several awards including publishing's Distinguished Service Award for its wide range of influence and its contribution to understanding difficult areas of human relationships.

--This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Bates ( Ransoming the Mind ) reminds readers of the importance of fairy tales as ``the metaphors and poetry of the human psyche.'' Specifically, he contends that in the story of ``The Three Little Pigs'' (the unexpurgated tale, not the sanitized, truncated version familiar to most readers) lies a powerful paradigm for inner transformation. Snippets of the tale are laboriously exegeted by the author. Bates's analysis, however, crosses the line into eisegesisreading into the text as he reads far more into the story than the text warrants, while vague anecdotes are left standing as if self-explanatory. He blends equal portions of pop psychology, Eastern philosophy and Jungian archetypes to claim that the wicked wolf is a projection of our shadow self, which must be engaged if we are to achieve personal integration. By going into partnership with the wolves of our lives, claims the author, we can grasp the divinity that is rightly ours. Bates's exposition cautions readers to recall that one should never treat evil as if it arises wholly outside oneself, a point better made by St. Augustine 1600 years ago. The very brief afterword by Bly ( Iron John ) adds little.

Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

All of us have a shadow side-this book shows why we should honor this aspect - how to empower us. -- Larry Dossey

All of us have a shadow side-this book shows why we should honor this aspect - how to empower us. -- Larry Dossey

All of us have a shadow side-this book shows why we should honor this aspect - how to empower us. -- Larry Dossey

This intriguing title and unique concept are bound to grab attention.Bates writes a guide for harnessing one's dark side. -- Today's Librarian, December 2001

This is an amazing little book! --Robert Bly

This intriguing title and unique concept are bound to grab attention.Bates writes a guide for harnessing one's dark side. -- Today's Librarian, December 2001

This is an amazing little book! --Robert Bly

This intriguing title and unique concept are bound to grab attention.Bates writes a guide for harnessing one's dark side. -- Today's Librarian, December 2001

This is an amazing little book! --Robert Bly --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Yes Intl Pub; 2nd edition (November 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0936663243
• ISBN-13: 978-0936663241
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,716,242 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Charles Bates is a counselor, story-teller, yogi, teacher, and organizational consultant. An award-winning fine artist, he became a disciple of the saint, Swami Rama in 1969. Internationally known in the fields of leadership and holistic personal development, Bates is an Ericksonian hypnotherapist, a member of the organizational faculty of the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland, a member of the National Training Laboratories (NTL), and member of the board of directors of the national Yoga Alliance. He has taught at the University of Minnesota Bush Foundation for Superintendents and Principals Leadership, and created programs in the integration of yoga and modern therapy, executive leadership, and contemporary systems thinking, helping leaders across the country and Canada into new systems thinking and personal development. In 1999 he established 10th Dot Transformations, carrying the treasures of yoga philosophy to corporate America. He has authored an award-winning book, Pigs Eat Wolves: Going into Partnership with Your Dark Side, as well as Ransoming the Mind: Yoga and Modern Therapy.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A VERY INTERESTING REVELATION, July 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Pigs Eat Wolves: Going into Partnership With Your Dark Side (Paperback)

I loved this book. I couldn't imagine at first where Bates was going with this old, old story, but I was delighted with the new perspective and the underlying revelation that he brings out of this old tale. This is not a children's story. It is a completely new story to me, and has contributed to my person growth. I think he has skillfully reworked the metaphor of pig and wolf in a language that speaks to the inner self. It goes beyond the old moral of " work hard and you'll be rewarded in the end." According to Bates, whether you work hard or not, life still has some challenges for you, and understanding that will better prepare you to meet them. I think anyone who is consciously on the path to person growth will appreciate this story. It's short and can be read over a weekend. I hope that he will do the same with some of the other Mother Goose tales.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A simple and powerful framework to support transformation, June 29, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Pigs Eat Wolves: Going into Partnership With Your Dark Side (Paperback)

By using a familiar story, Charles Bates makes powerful tools easy to grasp. Pigs Eat Wolves engaged me to the point of rethinking significant decisions in my life and the assumptions on which they are based.

I can see a broader range of choices than prior to reading this book. It's easy to read and well worth the effort.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Intriguing, June 1, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Pigs Eat Wolves: Going into Partnership With Your Dark Side (Paperback)

This book examines transformation, growth and change through the story of the 3 Little Pigs. It suggest that we must make a radical shift to become one with our bad half in order to understand and overcome it.

The book introduces 2nd pig thinking (not really a change although it looks like it on the surface) as 2nd order change (example: a Presidential election).

It's an intriguing book worth a weekend read.