|
|
SPIRITUAL BOOKS |
||
Spiritually Incorrect by Dan Wakefield Spirituality is full of rules. You need to find your own way straight through them. Some people claim that you cannot truly achieve spiritual fulfillment if you're not a vegetarian. Some say you'll never find the path if you don't learn yoga. And some would insist that any display of vanity--cosmetic surgery! hair mousse!--is a sign that inner peace is way out of your reach. With great candor and humor (much of it irreverent!), Dan Wakefield's Spiritually Incorrect shows that there are as many ways to find spiritual fulfillment as there are individual seekers. Part memoir, part essay, part whimsical illustration from his own life, Wakefield's reflections break down the barriers that lie in the way of spiritual fulfillment, showing you that rules were made to be broken, and how it's possible--and imperative--for you to discover a rewarding spiritual life that fits your own personality, your own path. In this age of political correctness and watching what we say, award-winning author Dan Wakefield dares to ask the risky (and sometimes hilarious) questions about spirituality:
Wakefield's creative exploration of these questions is a quest to free the spiritual world from pretension, anxiety, and the seemingly endless rules that can dictate how you identify (or don't) with religion. Humorous stories from his own spiritually incorrect journey to God punctuate Wakefield's ultimate revelation that spirituality is not about conforming to a set of rules, but rather discovering the practices that uniquely work for you.
|
|||
Releasing the Creative Spirit From the author of How Do We Know When It's God?--a practical guide to accessing creative power in every area of your life. In this passionate, compulsively readable guide, award-winning author Dan Wakefield explodes the myths associated with the creative process and shows how everyone can uncover and develop their natural ability to create. Drawing on the wisdom of religion, psychology, and the arts, he teaches us that the key to creation of any kind is clarity--of body, mind, and spirit--and he provides practical exercises that each of us can do to access that centered quality that allows creativity to shine. By learning to embrace each moment of the day as a creative act, this guide reveals how we can tap into the sources of spiritual enrichment that are everywhere around us.
|
|||
How Do We Know When It's God? "One of the Books everyone will be talking about." "Wakefield offers readers an engrossing story as well as a guide to spiritual maturity. With breathtaking honesty, he shows that real spiritual faith requires that we be explorers, open to the possibility that our wrong turns and mishaps might lead to the richest territory of all." "This entertaining sequel continues the religious transformations Wakefield recounted in 1988's "Returning - A Spiritual Journey" ... Down to earth, humorous, confessional..." "... crisp, intelligent writing, a wonderful sense of curiosity and the inspiring tale of his spiritual quest." "Wakefield's life reads like a novel... recommended for all Public Libraries." "By taking an unsparingly honest look at his own life and faith, Wakefield challenges us to look honestly at our own." "For anyone who can't get over having made mistakes, this book might give you hope. I learn from the book that the answer to the title is: you don't. You go on,m you live, you love, and you have hope. This is the kind of spiritual writing I treasure - grounded, undefended, generously human." "His skills as a novelist are evident... a human and compassionate account of how we all stumble on the path." "The book will take it's place alongside such classic seekers' tales as Merton's "The Seven Story Mountain" and Isherwood's "My Guru and His Disciple."
|
|||
The Story of Your Life: "What a wonderful book ... Surely it will help many people to write their own spiritual autobiographies, and so to become aware of their own journey." -- Madeline L'Engle, author of "A Wrinkle in Time"
|
|||
Creating from the Spirit: "I keep this book on my nightstand... just pick a page and read. It's honest and inspiring and has some wonderful exercises for exploring your own creativity." -- Editor, Art's New View "Creating" suggests spiritual center is a wellspring of creativity "We often forget," muses Dan Wakefield, "that every day is a creation -- not only for us, but by us." The writer artfully elaborates in his latest book, 'Creating from the Spirit: Living Each Day as a Creative Act' (Ballantine, $24). In this guide to spirituality and creativity, Wakefield offers suggestions for creating our daily experience as well as works of art, using examples from religion, philosophy and literature. And he offers exercises in drawing, writing and tuning in to our five senses for inspiration. "To access your creative powers, you need only be in awe of the mystery of the universe, the life force and its power and be willing to be open to it," he says. Wakefield's most recent book was 'Expect a Miracle: The Extraordinary Things That Happen to Ordinary People.' A novelist, journalist and screenwriter, he gives workshops in "Creating from the Spirit" and "Expecting Miracles." In 'Creating From The Spirit,' Wakefield, who once struggled with alcohol, challenges the perception of drugs and alcohol as creative muses and suggests that an individual's spiritual center, rather than the "dangerous nirvana" of heroin, marijuana and booze, is the true source of a creative life. The new model of creating from the spirit replaces numbing with enlivening, by replacing drugs and alcohol with clarity, he says. This process enables us to tap into our spiritual resources for inspiration and sustenance, he adds. He draws on the lives and words of creative people, known and not so well known, involved in a wide variety of pursuits, from receptionists and business people to writers, artists and musicians. We hear from musician Judy Collins, theologian Elaine Pagels, rabbi and author Harold Kushner and authors Toni Morrison and Studs Terkel, among many others, on how they use creativity in their own work. Wakefield extols the benefits of bringing the creative sense to daily life and makes the case that everyone is creative. Kushner tells him, "I think creativity is spiritual, creativity is a synonym for inspiration." -- Rex Ruthkoski
|
|||
Expect A Miracle "A grippingly honest account of how one man succeeded in filling the emptiness at the core of his soul. " --Rabbi Harold S. Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People Miracle-telling is on the rise at a time when popular books on angels and God have become commonplace. Society "is more accepting of miracles," he (Wakefield) said in an interview. "It's now okay to talk about such things." He added that the variety of the accounts in the book proves that being "religious is not a requisite for experiencing miraculous things. Being attuned to the "spiritual realm" is. The author's journey into the spiritual evolved from his own "miracle," getting off alcohol in 1980 and returning to church after an adulthood of "intellectual atheism." He described this change in a New York Times Magazine cover story and later in a book, both titled "Returning." Wakefield's return was to a faith he found in a Christian Bible study group in Indianapolis. As a 9-year-old boy, he was amazed at the New Testament miracle stories, so enthralled that he thought he wanted to become a minister, he said. Then he grew up and left for Columbia University to become a writer. As a college student in New York in the 1950's, he embraced "the mythology of the drinking writer." Emulating his heroes Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald, he often drank half a gallon of wine a day as he wrote stories, novels and magazine articles, he said. Wakefield worked that way into the late '70's, through two failed marriages and a seven-year relationship with a third woman. He went to Hollywood and created the NBC television series "James at 15." Two years later, after the show was canceled, he decided to return to Boston, where he had lived since 1963. Wakefield said he was a "physical mess," with a pulse of 120 beats a minute instead of 60 or 70. "Can you stop drinking?" his doctor asked. He not only stopped but suddenly had no desire to drink and hasn't since. "That to me is a miracle," he said. One of his first instincts after that was to return to church, and on Christmas Eve 1980 he walked into King's Chapel in Boston. It was there he took a course in spiritual autobiography and rediscovered Christianity and his love for Jesus' miracles. King's Chapel, he said, is one of a few Christian churches in the Unitarian-Universalist Association. Most are humanist. As part of his therapy, Wakefield went to the Center for Religious Development in Cambridge, where he was assigned a "spiritual director," a nun who told him to find a tree and study it for 20 minutes a day for two weeks. He thought the assignment was silly, but he began to meditate on a huge tree and was "almost pushed backwards" by its massiveness. Then he turned to a blade of grass and started to take notes. At one point he looked up and found himself eye to eye with a squirrel. "I got this feeling that the squirrel and I were made of the same stuff." he said. "It was a terrific feeling." Wakefield, 63, believes that putting aside the "numbing" distractions of television and music summon the spiritual realm, "opening a door no one can close." Once inside, a person can submit to the power within, saying, "Thy will be done." That's when you can expect a miracle, he said.
|
|||
Returning: A Spiritual Journey The author's story of his mid-life return to church and a spiritual path -- as well as a new life of health without drugs or alcohol. "One of the most important memoirs of the spirit I have ever read." -- Bill Moyers
|
|||
Home - Books & Tapes - Novels - Journalism - Spiritual Books - Film & TV
Articles - Speaking Dates - Biography - Author's Notes - Guest Book - Contact
