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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An important new way of thinking about recovery, January 28, 2003
The yogic techniques Williams describes in "The Spiritual Recovery Manual" are practical and surprisingly down-to-earth, presented in a way that tends to resonate with everyday experience. These subtle mental and physiological roots of recovery provide valuable models for recovery not available in traditional, "Western" addiction/dependency literature.I admit that when I picked up the book, I thought it might be something lightweight and fluffy, filled with affirmations and good moods but little substance. But it's packed (and I use the word advisedly) with practical techniques (some of which I have since tried and found quite effective) from meditation to preventative Ayurvedic medicine to balanced, balancing diet tips, to architecture (of all things). Williams throws in a surprising amount of solid research on the recovery techniques, which a lot of people will find reassuring. I was particularly interested in his societal framework for addiction ("Healing Society"), in which he ties individual addiction to addictive socities (like America's), and offers solutions to create balance and recovery at that level, as well. I found this toolset to be of real use in issues around being an adult child of an alcoholic parent, not only in the strict definition of recovery as it's traditionally understood, but -- and this is the great gift of the book -- in taking my recovery to a broader, and more profound level, towards spiritual enlightenment: the "Total Recovery" with which the book culminates. I hope this book gets into the hands of people in recovery, and particularly that it's read by recovery professionals: I think "The Spiritual Recovery Manual" represents -- yes, I have to say it -- a paradigm shift in thinking about recovery.
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