health mind and body

Caroline Myss, Ph.D. is a medical intuitive and a specialist in energy medicine. Whenever she visits Boulder, she draws a big crowd, and her sold-out lecture last week promoting her current bestseller, SACRED CONTRACTS, was no exception. "According to energy medicine, we are all living history books," she writes in ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT. "Our bodies contain our histories--every chapter, line, and verse of every event and relationship in our lives" (p. 40). She maintains, in other words, that as our lives unfold, our biography becomes our biology (p. 40).

In ANATOMY OF THE SPIRIT, Myss attempts to connect the dots between body and spirit by integrating the wisdom of several spiritual traditions, the Hindu chakras, the Christian sacraments, and the Kabbalah's Tree of Life. She draws from the ancient wisdom of these teachings to radically redefine spiritual and biological health, and to help us understand "what keeps us healthy, what makes us ill, and what helps us heal" (p. 67). The central premise of her book is that our past and present, personal and professional relationships, traumatic experiences and memories, beliefs and attitudes all become "encoded" in our biological anatomies, and then contribute to the formation of cell tissue, which generates energy reflecting our emotional strengths, weaknesses, hopes and fears (p. 34). Dr. Myss teaches us how to move through our wounds, rather than living in them (p. 60). While in her book she says that disease is the result of our negative emotions (p. 43), during her more recent Boulder lecture, Myss acknowledged she no longer believes this, and that this incorrect assertion has caused many to needlessly suffer, while trying in vain to identify the nonexistent negativity in their lives.

In her truly fascinating book, Myss reveals how we are simultaneously matter and spirit, and she encourages us to think about how matter and spirit interact, "what draws the spirit and life force out of our bodies, and how we can retrieve our spirits from the false gods of fear, anger, and attachments of the past" (p. 77). To those readers like me, who may be a bit skeptical of the anatomy lessons Myss offers here, she encourages us take from her book only what feels right to our heart and spirit, leaving the rest behind (p. 94).

G. Merritt

I sought out Caroline Myss's work because of some lower back pain I've had over the past six months. I believe that physical problems can result from spiritual issues, and since I had not been in any kind of accident, I thought my problems might be the result of something not readily seen.

Anatomy of the Spirit teaches the energies of the seven chakras and compares that knowledge to Jewish and Christian traditions to illustrate their truth and universality.

While explaining the power of each chakra, as well as the physical problems that can result from improper energy flow, Myss also tells stories of friends and clients who have overcome ailments while working through spiritual conflict.

The information here can be difficult to follow and somewhat esoteric, but the personal stories really help the reader grasp the main concepts of each chakra. The book doesn't offer practical advice so much as it offers deeper insight into the spirit and how it works.

It's now up to me to use that insight and intuitively guide my way to healing my back pain. Myss is so convincing, I believe I can do it.

Not very good at all. The whole lecture comes from a christian standpoint. Caroline searches for the basic truths that all older folk-based religions possess, but realizes the christian "religion" does not have these truths. Then she begins to relate the sacraments to the chakras, saying that the truths are hidden. This may be so, but through the finding of these truths she reccomends things like praying to god for help, admitting that your anger is your own fear and asking god to help you. I find this very weak, as I do the whole christian religion. It seems the "new age" thinkers are still trying to twist christianity into the spiritually uplifting religion that every other religion is. Its funny that it has never been taught by nuns or priests the way it is being "interpretted" now.
I don't advocate asking for help from god when things go wrong. I don't believe getting angry with someone shows that I am somehow afraid of something within me-and therefore must submit to god. The church and their bible do not advocate finding your own way through the path of spirituality yet the new age idea of christianity twists it to say it does. Just drop your bible and the whole christian influence as a whole and learn from your blood. A religion that never came from it's own people, but was forced upon them can NEVER lead us to a path of spirituality no matter what you "interpret" it to be.