Who Asked Me? (My first ever book review)

I'm finally feeling lots better.  I don't know why.  I have been trying everything.  Pain meds, sleep, old movies, new movies, prayer, and Oprah.  Nothing was working for the longest time.  Then all of a sudden something was working.  I wish I could put my finger on exactly what made me start to feel better, but then I could not exactly put my finger on what exactly started making me feel worse.  Don't get me wrong, I'm still on pain meds (weeeee) and getting tests and seeing specialists and starting to do all the things 40ish year old women do when they start to fall apart, but I feel so much better about it.

WARNING: This blog is not funny.  Or Interesting.  The only reason to read this is if you have been intrigued by Oprah's new book. Wait, that's not right.  The only reason to read this is if you are interested in what I think of Eckhart Tolle's new book.  This was even too dry for my mom who read every word.  I won't be hurt if you don't read this (I won't even know) and you won't be hurt by having wasted your time.  I just had to get this off my chest cause no one here cares what I think of this book and when the new world does come and it is all messed up I want to be able to point to this blog and say "I tried to warn you!"  So if you do read this despite this warning then let me say an advance "I tried to warn you!"

I have had time during this slump to read a lot, including Oprah's new religion, A New Earth.  I can't believe I read the whole thing.  That is really saying something.  I love to read and I love words and people who play with words and smart people I have to stand on my tiptoes to understand...as long as they have a heart to back it up.  I found this sorely missing in this book which is pretty glaring considering this is supposed to be a book about the soul. 

I had to tie my mind into lots of little knots to get into that world with him (this is typical for this genre I find).  I learned some special members only buzz words and phrases and could not refrain from reading passages out of context to my husband who has not read the book (nor any book) so did not know the language.  I often feel like New Age thought is like The Mad Hatter's Tea party.  Delightful and amusing but in an inside joke sort of way unself conscious, confusing or just irritating in its condescension of anyone who disagrees.  In Eckhart Tolle's book I have to really stay awake to follow the thread under the couch, around the dresser, down the hall, in the garden and down the street.  Or as I like to say, the points made are so circuitous and intentionally exotic it is like riding an elephant around the block to get to the house next door.  After I have waded through the special language of enlightened speech I find myself just wanting to say, "well, DUH!" 

Or I see a logical progression of thought go suddenly and terribly awry.  Let me try my hand at it:
I have noticed that there are 3 handicapped people near my neighborhood.  I know that someone living there is handicapped because these houses have ramps.  I have seen people in wheelchairs use these ramps to go into their houses.  There have been no wheelchairs riding into any of the houses without ramps.  Therefore I have concluded, wheelchair ramps cause lameness.  WHAT?  HUH?  AHHHHHHHHHH!

Sometimes I feel like the points made in this book are a breath of fresh air, and yet they are variations on an ancient theme said in a mist filled room to make them sound ethereal and new.  I am glad there are creative people looking at faith and God and love and life in fresh new ways.  The language of faith has gotten sort of worn out with improper use and been rendered impotent by being used thoughtlessly by careless people (or stabbed to death by needle point).   Therefore, if some of these truths can be coated in caramel and sprinkled with spicy middle eastern references, well, I have no objection to it.  What I object to is harder to articulate but the core of my being knows it is a slippery slope (which I worry less about than if the average Oprah watching demographic really had the time or ability to go where I feel this book suggests).

The premise is the evil of the ego.  The dawning of the New Earth (or was it the age of Aquarius?) involves an "awakening" of consciousness to a state of "being".  This state of being is grounded only in the present (The Power of NOW is another book by this author).  The universal energy that is God is like an electrical current we can hook our little lines into (or rather realize we are hooked into already) and the way to do this is through detaching from wanting and fearing and realizing that we ARE.  And that involves staying firmly planted in THE NOW.  The ego is public enemy number one.  Ideally we are not attached to anything or anyone and live our lives in one of three states: acceptance, joyfulness, or enthusiasm. 

OH and if I read it correctly there is a very scary little part in there about how we have an outgoing energy to our lives and and a returning (like the sea) and while the young are out going the elderly are returning and should not be enthusiastic the same way they were when they were younger. (BULL!)  (I hope I misunderstood this because this is dangerous - especially if the majority of people making end of life decisions or policies for the elderly believe that heaven is just a big recycling center as was suggested in another part of this book - if I understood it correctly). 

The other thing that drove me past my last nerve was this line:"It has been said (in the BIBLE) that 'God is love' but that is not absolutely correct.  God is the One Life in and beyond the countless forms of life.  Love implies duality: lover and beloved, subject and object.  So love is the recognition of oneness in the world of duality (huh?)  This is the birth of God into the world of form (huh?).  Love makes the world less worldly, less dense, more transparent to the divine dimension, the light of consciousness itself.(huh? HUH? AHHHHHHHH!!!!)"  (Italics mine).  (duh). 

I think this is just the New Age "we are all gods or god" line.   I have heard it before.

This is where I take off my Bible belt and bitch slap Eckhart Tolle.  I will spare you the rant but I believe in a God who cares at least as much about me as I do about my creations, (even the inanimate ones) in fact, He says he cares for us like little children, lost sheep, brothers, friends, and as a mother hen her little chicks. God is so personal and intimate as portrayed in the Bible, I'm almost a little embarrassed for Him.  Unrequited love can be so humiliating.  There is so clearly a Lover and a Beloved in this book.  Eckhart Tolle quotes the Bible frequently. I don't see how he can dispute the Bible in some places to prove one point and turn around and quote it to back up another.   He frequently claims to know what Jesus meant when he said this or that (apparently Jesus was a New Ager too).   I do believe no matter how it is marketed this is a religion of sorts.  I seem to quote this a lot, but it always comes back to Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.  (Duality.  Lover.  Beloved.)  Where is the sweetness in "My true essence IS in the power of the ONE LIFE this I know (but don't feel any personal attachment or ego investment in) cause the time of awakening is upon us and Oprah tells us so". 

All I know for sure, is that God is Love.  God is the God of all comfort.  I have needed comfort lately. It is exceedingly more comforting to me to be the object of the Omnipotent affection and attention than to meditate on the truth that I am connected to the "One Life who is in and beyond the countless forms of life, being in the oneness in the world of duality".  So all that other stuff about God seeking us like a lover, staying faithful to us like a devoted lover when we stray, weeping over us, singing over us, delighting in us.  What is that if not personal?  (Again that is all in the Bible).

This is a very well educated man.  He is clever and interesting.  This book is full of all kinds of provocative thoughts on thoughts but misses the heart in all its messy, bleeding, human, adorably pitiful, trite and noble glory.  There are some good thoughts in this book to still an anxious mind, motivate to greatness, or put stupid things we regret into perspective.  What I find amusing is that while he denounces the ego he also appeals to it continuously by announcing that the "awakened" will usher in this new heaven and earth (Wow!  I want to be awakened!) and even praises those who have "awakened" in the final sentence of the book.  AND in case there is someone like me who disagrees, he has a bullet proof vest argument.  Not everyone is able to be awakened or abandon the strong pull of the ego.  I think that is the "Emperor's New Clothes" argument. 

Don't EVEN get me started on his glib insensitive summary of "the pain body" as an answer to life's misery.   PAIN BODY!!!  UGH!!!!!  Let's just blame the victim and then slug them if they act like victims. Here's a fun game.   Find a helpless, lost, confused, suffering person.  Tell them they have all the power.  Tell them that if they are enlightened this condition will not be able to torment them.  I think we could market it for a new reality game show.  It's the INSULT TO INJURY GAME!!

I must admit, there is always the shadow of doubt lingering that perhaps I misunderstood this philosopher.  He is so well read.  It is hard to argue with someone who quotes, the Bible, The Koran, The Tao, Nietzsche, Shakespeare, Emerson, Albert Einstein, and Jesus Himself.  I mean with all these people endorsing his book, who am I to argue?  All these people with opposing world views and theologies in ONE book endorsing and proving THE WAY.  I mean if you can get an atheist, a scientist, and Jesus Himself to agree, who am I to argue?  This is a virtual stone soup of great minds (and you are what you eat, apparently, because served chilled it leaves my heart stone cold). 

But of all the shining stars of revolutionary brilliance I have listed none is endorsing this book more heartily than dear saint Oprah.  It leaves me confused.  How could my patron saint of living room bite sized morsels of wisdom I have gobbled up all these years steer me wrong?  She's every woman!  She's LOST THE WEIGHT!  She MADE THE CONNECTION!!  I want to believe everything she says.   Truthfully at some level I want to believe everything everyone says and so I examine everything for some new way to live life.  I am a revolutionary at heart.  Perhaps I should re-consider this strong opinion I have shared.  Perhaps this is my ego rearing its ugly head trying to fool me into attachment to the things of this world.  Perhaps I am awakening..yes, I am... 

So I went to the temple of Oprah on Wednesday to study (perhaps I need to give away all I have to the poor, perhaps I need to live contentedly in a smaller house.  Eckhart Tolle said that when people awaken they often find that they must walk out of relationships and jobs that are ego manifestations of form over substance.  Yes.  Maybe I should join the Peace Corps).

Oprah newsletter: WEDNESDAY'S SHOW: How to Look Great at Any Age Are you looking too old or dressing too young? Your clothes could be aging you. Whether you're 30 or 60, learn how to look great at any age.

Wow.  I thought something inside me was crying out for awakening but the outsides of me were screaming my age so offensively loudly I was never able to get to sleep in the first place.  I learned a lot that day.  I learned that I need to spend between $600-$6,000 on ONE outfit to feel better about looking the way I look.  Here, I thought I had some weight to lose, but now I know better.  Even if I lose EVERY POUND ON MY BODY I will have problem areas that need hidden (basically all of me.  At 40ish on a budget and busy beyond belief, I am just one tired old problem area).   Before this show I never even thought about matchy matchy shoes and bags (Ages you.  Not a problem. I own 2 purses I don't carry either).  I can't show any cleavage cause I am too old.  My hair is too long and I have never dyed it. (Without my gold tones my complexion is washed out and tired.  Wow.  Who knew?)    Suddenly my poor ego, which I am in trouble for having,  feels worse than ever for being such an eyesore to the outside world. 

Wow, what a racket they are running.  Like the dentist who hands out candy, Oprah tweaks your ego and then has Eckhart Tolle tells you how to over come it.

P.S. I still like Oprah.  But there is this part that in the "pain body" section where he talks of the feminine pain body and in a list of things that have damaged women he lists things like rape, oppression, torture and child birth.  CHILD BIRTH?  I am offended by that one!!  Childbirth was the exact opposite of rape and torture and oppression.  Sigh.  Oprah, Oprah, I can't like this guy.  I'm sorry Oprah.

Comments

[Aimee]

I know!!! OMG I read "The power of now" because it had a lot of hype around it. I tried 3 times to read it and never got more than half way though. By the end of it I had just decided I didnt even want to know about the world he was going on about. I back you all the way and couldnt have said it better myself.

[First Wife]

I HATE Oprah and have only watched her once in about 10+ years. She is so pompous how can anyone stand her?!?!?!?!
I know...
They like to find reasons why they shouldn't like themselves...from someone who is a gazillionaire who can pay people to do all the things she doesn't want to--so she can tell everyone how they could improve their lives if only they thought like her!
Blech!!! I'd rather be a Christian than a New Age bullshit artist--and as you know, that's saying something :)

[First Wife]

And another thing!

Since when should women ever, EVER! listen to a man's philosophical musing on the inner workings of the female mind when it comes to rape, oppression and CHILDBIRTH.
Give me a break.

[Jillibee]

shhhh!!! She might hear you.... I mean, are we really allowed to say these kind of things?? Be careful!

Love you as always for your diplomatic beating around the bush (there's a visual for you)

[jillibee]

Oh...and by "she" I meant the "O" word. We little David housewives with our sticks and stones are no match for the mighty Oliath. So ixnay on the prah-O-AY. Oh look..even in pig latin her name is spiritual. Prahoay for us all, O mighty O.

[Roger Hoffman]

Love the Blog JB! It's been a long time since I enjoyed those hillarious, captivating, meandering mindworks. Keep up the good work!

-Rog