My Books Review: September '11

     1) Saints and mystics: This book is a brief biography of a few saints and mystics of the world & is published by Ramakrishna Mutt. The saints and mystics that are covered are: Pavhari Baba, Baal Shem Tov, Swami Brahmananda, St. Vincent de Paul, Sri Narayana Guru, St. Teresa of Avila, Kabirdas, Swami Virajananda, Goda Devi, Sri Aurobindo, Gopaler Ma, Sri Ramana Maharshi, Guru Gobind Singh, Akka Mahadevi.
     Though I knew about a few saints in the book, I did not know in detail about the lives like those of Pavhari Baba, St. Teresa or Guru Gobind Singh. It was a good read. 

     2) Many lives, many masters: This book is written by a prominent psychiatrist Dr. Brian Weiss. It starts with a patient with several psychological disorders coming to Dr. Brian for help. In order to cure the patient, the doctor goes for the hypnosis, regression therapy. But after a few sessions, to his amazement the patient in a session instead of going to the early childhood or infancy slips to a past life. The doctor could not believe it because science has not acknowledged the existence of past lives though in some religions the belief exists. But he could not dismiss it as some non-sense because the descriptions given by the patient is so very vivid and accurate and besides the patient had a strict catholic upbringing which doesn’t believe in past life. It was neither hallucination nor delusion because as a trained psychiatrist, he knew the symptoms of those. 

The doctor continues the past life regression therapy and many previous lives of the patient get unfolded. To his surprise, the problems that the patient had began to heal at a very rapid pace than it would in normal type of therapies. This convinced the doctor about the existence of past as well as the future lives. At the end of multiple sessions of therapy, the patient became more than normal, radiating vibrancy. This is a good book in the fields of Para-psychology or ESP.

My Books Review: June '11

1) My India- The India Eternal: This book is a collection of exhortations by none other than Swami Vivekananda. From the past few days my mind is completely occupied from Vivekananda. That is what Swami Vivekananda's literature does to anyone. So powerful are the words that come from him that if taken with the right spirit, they have the ability to change the very core of the person and put him into action. No wonder he was able to inspire millions of youths for many generations and he continues to inspire even now. 

The book dwells on the glory of our past, the possibility of the future and as Indians our duties, the value of education, problems of women, the way to national integration. Any Indian even with zero patriotism if reads this book, will definitely be not the same as before. Some amount of love for the country, its heritage, its culture, its tradition, the spiritual giants it has produced time and again, would definitely be instilled.

2) Emotional Intelligence: Probably the first book to introduce that there is something called as emotional intelligence to a wide audience. The author of the book is Daniel Goleman. The book talks about the nature of the brain, especially the part that controls emotions, different kinds of emotions, the relevance of emotions to one’s development as an individual and also to socialize and the possible cures for emotional aberrations. The author argues how EQ (emotional quotient) is more important than IQ (Intelligent Quotient). The book is very well written, the use of language is lucid and it is easily one of the best books I've ever read.