The Woman's Belly Book: Finding Your True Center for More Energy, Confidence, and Pleasure [Paperback]

Lisa Sarasohn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 20, 2006

From "belly laughs" to "gut reactions," people acknowledge the power and wisdom within our body’s center every day, yet many women sabotage their bellies with tight clothes and shame. This book demonstrates that by celebrating their centers instead of trying to reshape them, women can tap into their source energy to boost vitality, release stress, spice up sexual pleasure, and unleash creativity.

The Woman's Belly Book helps women rejoice in their womanly center. The book takes a soul-powered approach to building confidence and better health, presenting simple exercises and movements to help women awaken their core. Lisa Sarasohn presents the concepts with humor and insight, and the movements — which incorporate techniques such as yoga, breath work, belly dancing, qigong, and tai chi — are fun and invigorating. Reclaiming the belly as honorable, even sacred, the book also provides a foundation for a body-centered spiritual practice that invokes the presence of the sacred feminine.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the second belly book this season (after The Way of the Belly by Neena and Veena Bidasha), Sarasohn, a veteran Kripalu yoga teacher and writer on yoga and health, writes that the life force focused in the belly "activates your physical, emotional and spiritual vitality. It's the source of your passion and creativity, your courage and confidence, your capacity to love fully. It's the starting point of your intuition, insight, and sense of purpose." In this scenario, a bloated, uncomfortable belly is the sign of something out of balance in your life. Sarasohn sees the belly as the site of women's soul power and connection to "Source Energy," and throughout she presents exercises to access this power. In the second half, she presents the seven belly-energizing exercises that make up what she calls "The Gutsy Women's Workout," designed to increase the seven soul qualities: vitality, pleasure, confidence, compassion, creativity, intuition and purpose. While some of the poetry and creative exercises in this book are goofy (writing a letter to your belly? decorating your underwear?), Sarasohn's basic argument is liberating. (July)
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Review

A refreshing change of pace. You'll have fun connecting with your powerful belly and its innate wisdom. -- Judith Hanson Lasater, author of Living Your Yoga

Brims with incredibly powerful ways to listen to your life through your belly. This is a fresh, delicious body treat! -- Jennifer Louden, author of The Woman’s Comfort Book

Make peace with the belly's shape and tap into its amazing power. Bye-bye Xanax! Hello The Woman's Belly Book! -- Susan Reinhardt, author of Not Tonight Honey, Wait 'Til I'm a Size 6

Shows women how to open their eyes to their bodies’ true beauty. A must-read for any woman sick of self-criticism. -- Yogi Times, May 2006

To trust your gut, you've got to reclaim the wisdom of your belly. The Woman's Belly Book shows you how. -- Christiane Northrup, MD, author of Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 307 pages
• Publisher: New World Library (April 20, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1577315375
• ISBN-13: 978-1577315377
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 6.7 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #754,619 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

After more than 20 years of yo-yo dieting, I called a truce in the war I'd been waging to make my belly flat. I fell in love with my body's center, discovering that our bellies shelter the source of our creativity, confidence, compassion, intuition, and much more.

Now, a seasoned yoga and bodywork therapist, I show women how to use breath, movement, and self-expression to know our bellies as sacred, not shameful. I love witnessing how a woman comes alive to joy, creativity, and profound self-confidence as she reclaims reverence for her body and her body's center.

My articles, including "The Goddess Ungirdled: How I learned to love my belly and found the Sacred Feminine within," are popular with women worldwide. In addition to The Woman's Belly Book: Finding Your True Center for More Energy, Confidence, and Pleasure, I've published two illustrated books: Rite for Reconsecrating Our Womanhood and Rite for Invoking the Sacred Feminine.

Through herbalist Susun Weed's online Wise Woman University, I'm teaching "Initiation 2012: Awakening Your Sacred Center." This format enables me to give personal attention to women as they work through the exercises and activities included in The Woman's Belly Book. Fun!

A possible next step: After many years of experimentation, I'm getting ready to share my experience with food choices that can eliminate "belly bulge" and make our belly-power all the more available to us. Stay tuned!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Yes!, April 5, 2007

By 

Susy P. Goins "Susykabloozie" (Pacific Northwest) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Woman's Belly Book: Finding Your True Center for More Energy, Confidence, and Pleasure (Paperback)

When I told my friends that I was reading a book about loving my belly, they all snorted. It seems that no one likes, much less loves, their bellies. The Woman's Belly Book is more about honoring your creative power center. Using breathing techniques, visualizations and art therapy, the reader is led through the process of discovering your secret treasure. Just using her belly dialogue techiniques, I feel more connected to my inner strength. Highly recommended.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Whattabook! Every woman should read this., April 5, 2007

By 

Damaris (www.ArtOfLife.com) "Life is a Journe... (Asheville, NC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Woman's Belly Book: Finding Your True Center for More Energy, Confidence, and Pleasure (Paperback)

This is one Great Book! Easy to follow, real advice ... a leap towards healing the warped image we have of our bodies, especially in this culture where the emphasis on image often ranks above substance. Personally, this book helped me to connect deeper to my body, I am now including short mini-meditations specifically to connect with the center/belly. The instructions are clear and easy and much of it can be done in a matter of minutes! I have also finally changed my wardrobe to eliminate restrictive clothing, my posture changed in the process as well and I feel SO much better! I have recommended this book to many of my female friends, clients and acquaintances and will continue to do so. A real jewel!

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Belly-licious!, April 5, 2007

By 

Lisa B - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Woman's Belly Book: Finding Your True Center for More Energy, Confidence, and Pleasure (Paperback)

This morning when my alarm went off I JUMPED out of bed... eager to do Lisa's belly "workout". It's that good! I absolutely love the way I feel after moving through the gentle rhythms...I feel deeply connected to myself with all the gaps filled in...I feel centered, whole and filled with Self. Lisa's teaching of connecting breath to belly to body is grounded, real and powerful. I highly recommend her work to anyone who is working to heal body image, self esteem or disordered eating issues.