Customer Reviews

The World Is a Waiting Lover: Desire and the Quest for the Beloved

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Intrigued by the reviews I bought this book for a friend, planning to read it myself first. 1/3 of the way through I knew I had to have my own copy and also give it to other good friends. I had a brief hurtful flirtation with lust (at the advanced age of 60+) that had reawakened my erotic self and impacted not just my life but my wardrobe .... from LLBean to subtly sexy and loving it. I had the good fortune to have loving intelligent supportive friends who guided me through the pain to healing and reclaiming a part of me long dormant. This book is like that - a good friend that challenges you to look deeper than the circumstances of different encounters in life to where they lead you, what they arouse in you that is truly yours. I have seen how a woman can pine after a lost love long after he's gone from her life, naively expecting some kind of reunion, when his role was to "escort" her to a dormant part of herself and move on - not to excuse men behaving badly but to find the pearl amidst the swine.
Inspired by Trebbe's book I made a list of all the "escorts" in my life from childhood (with it's good share of issues) to now that led me to a more authentic sense of myself. Brief romantic but unrequited encounters sychonistically came at a time when I was resigning myself to living a life less than what I knew was my deepest heart's desire - real human love with a man who would be my friend, lover and soul-mate. This book helped me grasp the difference between the man appearing in my dreams/fantasies, none other than Eros, the god, and the human one, who will be different and a surprise.
Trebbe's skillfully weaves her revealing personal story together with myth, psychology and spirituality. It was a surprising page turner you would not expect from a "personal growth" book - difficult to put down, profound, eye-opening, insightful yet easy to read and grounded. I had to pause only to digest and reflect it's application to my own life. It helped to thread together the people and experiences in my life to who I am today and to walk forward with eagerness to what is to come. It made me look deeper at the subtle and not so subtle things that attract, delight, ground me, warm my heart and guide me to plumb the depths of my own spirit: from the luscious taste of dark chocolate mousse cake to the expansive wild beauty of the Colorado mountains to the way I fall in love instantly with a bouncy Golden Retriever puppy. What do they say about who I am? is the question this book poses.
It has indeed made me more aware that the love I seek from a man is already alive in me (while still desiring the human form), that I already live in the world passionately, creatively with gratitude for the warmth of the sun after a cold winter storm, for the bright light of the moon in the night sky, for the loved ones that grace my life. Eros is alive and well and living in me. Thank you Trebbe.

I loved this book so much I had to wait a couple of weeks before I could finish it because I didn't want it to be over. If you've ever wondered where a crush could take you in your life, this is the book to read. Initially, it is a bit slow and the style of writing is more descriptive than I like, but it soon turns into a real page turner. One thing is for sure, if you're wondering why you're still getting crushes on people while you're already in a committed and happy relationship, this book will clear any issues you might have with that right up!

Trebbe Johnson shares with us her own experiences with desire and shows us what it means. She tells about how attractions to other people, especially when unrequited, are really calls or escorts to our own inner beloved. The call seems to be for the real person, but instead it leads her to follow and know the deepest part of herself, the part that allows her to express her most valuable passions. She writes that,

"The Escort to the Beloved is the person who by deserting us, eluding us, frustrating us, forcing us to face some truth we've been avoiding or some asset we've been trying to reject with misplaced humility, makes it possible for us to start living in a way we desparately need to and have been postponing all too long." (p. 108)

And she makes it plain to see just how we have a "habit of placing on the heads of others the crown of laurels -- or thorns -- we most need to wear ourselves..." And, "Because we want so badly to find and capitalize on our own vital, developing qualities yet sense that doing so is the work of a lifetime, we take what our heart tells us will be the easier route: we locate the missing link in somebody else and heap our passion there." (p.109)

Johnson did her homework with this book. It is filled with references to myth and psychology in a way that is not only appropriate to the material that she is writing about, but also that seriously educates the reader. She entices even those who aren't that interested in myth or psychology to know more! And for those who are interested, Johnson's Notes and Bibliography are worth their weight in gold.


I rate this book a five star experience!

The compelling story of a mature woman's journey to the fullness of herself, this book is also a thoughtful, well-written, and highly original look at love, passion, and the divine--complete with footnotes and a bibliography for those who want to explore these topics in other readings. But more importantly, in telling her own story of how an infatuation with a younger man shook up her marriage and her work, Trebbe's honesty and curiosity offer a model for dealing with life-challenging allurements.

For the sake of full disclosure, I should say that I know Trebbe and have taken two vision quests with her as my guide. So I had heard details of her story. But the book offers much more than her personal story. It also sheds an interesting light on the meaning of certain classical myths, and offers examples from other people's experiences in fully claiming themselves--aspects they like as well as those they've ignored or run from. Such fulfillment is a lengthy process, as Trebbe documents. And while the quest for the Beloved may begin in middle or later life, it is seldom a journey we complete in this life. It is enough to start in pursuit of our own connection to divine wholeness.

Although highly relevant to women, the quest for individuation and integration is a gender-free process. And this book offers examples of how men and women can deal with a "mid-life crisis" and find greater fulfillment in living. Thank you Trebbe. I look forward to other books from you.

Rarely have I read a book that felt so much like it was written just for me than The World is a Waiting Lover. Over the years I've read many works in an effort to understand love and the innate and elusive longing for "the Other" that so commonly undermines relationships. The He, She and We trilogy by Robert Johnson, The Eden Project by Richard Ellis and others have all been valuable, yet my stubborn confusion persisted. Trebbe Johnson's book helped me separate finally, the capital "B" Beloved that pulls us ever onwards (if we allow it) towards the deepest knowing of our soul selves from the little "b" beloved of our significant others.

Perhaps my longing for "the Goddess" was inordinately strong. No matter. Now I understand just how natural, wonderful and important the pursuit of that longing is in the magical pulling of my soul towards it's highest completion. And finally, no longer will I confuse this sublime pulling with a need to manifest it in a flesh and blood woman. To do so, I now realize would only diminish The Beloved, myself and my partner. This book is a one of a kind detective story tracking passion to it's very lair. Whether it was the author's absolutely enchanting and delicious use of words, her uncanny way of tying mythology to daily experience or her own authentic heart so consistently revealed, I rank this book in the short list of works that have truly impacted life. Thank you Trebbe!

A sexy spiritual book. I just loved it! It brought me back to my younger years when I gobbled up books like "The Road Less Traveled," "The Sacrament of the Present Moment," and the writings of Thomas Merton, Emmet Fox and Krishnamurti. But this book is so fresh and unlike anything I've ever read. I loved the references from literature, myth, scripture, folk tales and present day pop culture. It's scholarly and, at the same time, totally accessible. But what impressed me most was the author's candor about her own personal journey. Her sense of wonder and joy is contagious.

It takes courage to step back from intense passion to see what it's really all about. Trebbe Johnson shows that we don't have to give up the drive behind that passion so much as learn from and keep company with it. Desire of any type is the clarion call of the life force - and as such, its power can lead us away from a considered course of action. Ms. Johnson uses mythology, history, and real life examples to illustrate how we all struggle with wanting to meld into other people, experiences, things - to take them into ourselves on our quest to become whole. She shares the growthful, enriching wisdom that can come from wanting with our eyes, psyches and spirits wide open. Anyone who understands that life is not all it appears to be, and that there is meaning in every strand of the web of our lives, will enjoy this warm, heartfelt book.

What I noticed first about this book was that it is beautifully written - its language is like cold water over river stones. A pleasure to read. But it's also passionate, intelligent, full of imagery and original thought - it's unusual to find passion, clarity, and wisdom in the same writer. I was impressed by Johnson's emotional wisdom. She introduces the reader to the myth and literature of the Beloved but the moving force of the book is the narrative of her own experience -- her personal journey into the heart of desire, risk, joy. (She also includes many "case histories" of those who took a similar journey.) It's a fascinating story - how she, a happily married woman, fell madly in love with a younger man - and what she learned and how she learned it. She's very candid about the experience, but not in the "confessional" mode: there's more light than heat here! This is what makes it a page-turner; I really wanted to find out what wisdoms unfolded as she went along.

For me the book offers inspiration and encouragement to go forward in my life with an open heart. Even those of us, like me, who aren't as bold as Johnson - maybe especially us - can learn from this book to take more risks, not be afraid of looking foolish or making mistakes, dare more. I will reread this one. (Wonderful ending, by the way.)

Trebbe Johnson's "The World Is a Waiting Lover" is an intimate, soulful feast that takes the reader on the author's own Quest for the Beloved within the context of her considerable research into "the myths of many lands, fleshed out by mystics, cosmologists, psychologists, and poets...," including Mechtilde of Magdeburg, Tagore, Rousseau, Abraham Maslow, and Brian Swimme, among others.

Although her story is timeless, it has its temporal beginning in the San Juan mountains of southern Colorado when the mysterious and elusive "Lucas," an apprentice on a vision quest Johnson is co-guiding, tells her, "I am truly and completely in love with you." How the author hears these words sends her on a journey that continues today through this book and her workshops, vision quests, and talks on both sides of the Atlantic. For the whole story, you'll have to read the book, and I highly recommend that you do.

Readers who open themselves up to Johnson's skill as both soul guide and lover of language will find her apparent prose shape-shifting into poetry throughout the narrative. "Immaculate Love Affair" and "emotional anaphylactic shock" are two of the more startling images, but every page seems to offer at least one sentence like, "It was a creature of the heights, this waterfall, like a rare species of mountain goat or wilderness nymph, beings who thrive in certain wild, remote niches and never venture anywhere else" (251).

In telling us her story, Trebbe Johnson invites and indeed dares us to embrace the world like a waiting lover, to recognize the Beloved and the Escort who will seize and guide us, and to open ourselves to both the allurement and rapture of that which most deeply calls our name.

I 'stumbled' upon this book in a review in a magazine that I read regularly and was instantly drawn to the synopsis about desire and understanding that constant desire for 'something'.

The World is a Waiting Lover is a profound and wonderful work that describes almost exactly the rich fantasy life of desire that I have led for the majority of my adult life. What this book provided was a deep heartfelt knowing of just what that was all about for me as well as a deep understanding of the true object of my desires and my continual quest for the Beloved.

As I inhaled the book with such fervent appetite for a true knowing I felt as if Trebbe had somehow gotten into my head and identified all my desires and cascading thoughts surrounding those. It was almost an eerie synchronicity that showed itself in the words that continued to unfold on each page. Through these synchronicities and similarities there came about a true acceptance and understanding of who I was and the events that had transpired surrounding my constant desiring state. It was such a joy and a blessing to realize that I certainly wasn't the only one who had such desires and thoughts playing across the landscape of my mind on a daily basis.

Much of the book became my truest teacher in the realm of desire. There were many times when I would be guided to pick the book up once again and a passage would jump out at me that modeled perfectly a question that I was struggling to find the meaning of at that particular time,. Be it fate, sychronicity or a pure blessing Trebbe's work continues to bring clarity and acceptance to me about my own Quest for the Beloved.

i read the book less than 6 months ago and have turned back around and am reading it for the second time now-- i also have given 4 copies away -- this book is a gentle & loving way toward understanding the pull of the soul as soul moves us through perceived difficulties in order for us to continue on our path - it is the only thing that i have found to give myself forgiveness for having fallen in love with someone & to understand why --- this book is a gift