A Return to Love

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Summary: Marianne Willamson's "A Return to Love"
Review: To be of love ...to feel it to the depth of your souls existence and be so absolutely passionate about it, enough to not only receive this love...but to have such a wonderful understanding of it,so much so that you can explain it to others and show others the way "to be of love" is a divine gift. I don't know you Marianne, or know much about you, but what I feel is that God needed someone strong with a personality just like yours, no, actually who he needed was you, because he knew about your determination and resolve to fight injustice as you saw it through your view, and that not only would you be able to be determined enough to understand this love for yourself but to explain it to others as well. God knew you would not only be so intriged by the ideas you "accidently" found but so intense and determined in your soul to understand them, that when things didn't seem right to you, you would be so incensed it would "tick you off" and you would definitely let everyone know about how you felt because the feelings raced through you like a wildfire. "Being you" was just the right "mix' for this, a person with such intense emotions that you would be able to accomplish this. I have some of your tapes and when I hear you pray the emotions I feel well up into my soul and spill out from my heart... because I feel your passion to this quest you have accepted.I feel the emotion in your heart that this gift brings you and appreciate your desire to share it. Maybe some people don't understand this love but it is divine and it is your gift to share it and I appreciate you for who you are...perfect in all ways...perfectly created by Gods love you are... Marianne. Love, Linda

I would like to share something very personal so that others may know that when Marianne writes about surrender she is accurate beyond imagining. She speaks of surrendering to God and that possibly we could agree to surrender things that are of no importance to begin with and so we trifle with God trying to ease our way in to the idea of surrender...but what she shares is true...the more important it is to us...the more we must surrender and let go...detaching without expectations of the outcome... and this is what happened when my son Jason, that I speak of so often with such love, was on his return journey to God. I cannot explain how this happened I just know it did. Events unfolded as they were supposed to and God took care of every detail to perfection and surrender brought us to this place of peace we accept as Gods gift to us for our faith. I feel that God wants us to share this story and He is making everything possible to accomplish His wish. By our faith we walked into the unknown and we were rewarded for it by Gods love. Share your story with the world is what I heard to give hope to everyone...and that is my deepest hearts desire to accomplish Gods vision...begin the love is what I heard...with Jesus always in my heart I share this now. May Gods blessings to us of unconditional love be felt in every heart as we begin the love.Amen. Love, Jason in Heaven and Linda on earth.

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Summary: Great philosophy despite the language
Review: One could hardly expect a rational lawyer, scientist at heart, and agnostic to write such a glowing review of Ms. Williams' new age philosophy. But this book is superb! As a recovering catholic, the language is a bit hard to digest. But if you can get beyond the emotional blocks on the christian terminology, the philosophy she lays out teaches an extrodinarily powerful way to view the many challenges we face in life. This is an excellent book.

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Summary: Take with a huge grain of salt
Review: I read Return to Love on the recommendation of a friend and have to say that the negative aspects of Ms. Williamson's teachings far outweigh the positives. I applaud her exhortation to act out of love, and I cannot take issue with her desire to encourage readers to get in touch with their spirtuality and their relationship with God.

However, I must fault her premise that "there are no sins, only mistakes" as disingenuous at best and (unintentionally I'm sure on her part) Satanic at worst. Life experience teaches us that there are most definitely deliberate acts committed out of evil intentions -- I doubt anyone could seriously dismiss the Columbine massacre as "mistakes" on the part of the two killers. To call evil actions anything less than they are -- sins -- is dangerously misleading, especially for one's spiritual health.

The other item I take issue with is her exhortation to her listeners to "come down off the cross; we need the wood!" While in one sense she may want us to avoid self-pity (a laudable goal), the other interpretation is that there is no value in suffering. Again, life teaches us otherwise, and our souls quite often are much improved for bravely enduring the difficulties of this world.

In sum, this book may be spiritual in its intent, and I have no quarrel with those helped by it, but beware of the serious pitfalls therein. The distortions of Christ's teaching are rampant, and those Christians interested in this book should be careful...better yet, look elsewhere.

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Summary: Spring House Cleaning for the Soul
Review: Author and lecturer Marrianne Williamson breathes life into the esoteric writings of the New Age Bible "A Course in Miracles". She extracts portions of the Course and weaves her life stories and personalized insights into the otherwise obscure texts.

The result is a wonderfully written book that feels like I am reading her spiritual diary rather than a "How-To" book. The book feels real and authentic and provides a nice balance between the teachings found in the Course and examples in her personal life. Even if you don't embrace the teachings in A Course in Miracles, you will definitely not be disappointed by the beautiful insights she provides. Like spring house cleaning for your soul, it will open doors in your heart and mind and breath new life into your soul.

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Summary: Paradoxically beautiful and problematic
Review: A good deal of time has gone by since I read this book, which interestingly enough was a gift of sorts from two of my ex-girlfriends: one suggested that I would love it while we were dating, another bought it as a gift to me sometime afterward, as a way of saying how much she still cared. The book, in its title alone, challenged me to release from judgement and opinionating, and embrace God all around me.

So why not five stars you ask?

After finishing the book, I was also more sensitive to my own instincts and spirit. And in so achieving a greater sensitivity via her insightful words, I could not help but be troubled by some of the attitudes expressed both in specific things she said, and the structure of the book itself.

Both Karl Marx and Freud, as born-again atheist/agnostic Jews, had this way of revealing not just their anxiety about their religious tradition's influence, but an almost obssessive desire to replace it via becoming a religious leader of their own movement. It was as if to prove that the Oedipal Complex theory was righter than even they could imagine, bleeding into their undistinguished perspectives of the very religion of their forefathers. You see it and feel it in all of their work- part of the reason Jung and Adler became persona non grata to Freud when they came up with new ideas and stopped worshipping him, and Communism (give China another minute) failed in the end. Williamson, daughter of a devout upper-middle class Jewish father and child of the Age of Aquarius 60's and 70's, is gifted with great understanding of a number of different eternal concepts. But I couldn't help feeling that the inner "spoiled brat" still angry with Daddy she discovered via her training in the Course in Miracles is still her co-pilot in this book as much or more than God is. Similiar to how I felt when I finished SEAT OF THE SOUL by Gary Zukav, I waited with bated breath for her to voluminously quote Martin Luther King (whose book on the same subject, STRENGTH TO LOVE, written in the early sixties is pretty deep, as you can imagine). I waited with bated breath to hear her summon the voice of Gandhi, and see his Gita- inspired riffs dance like a God-intoxicated Sufi across the pages and into my mind and soul. I waited for her to quote the Old and New Testament (like Corinthians, and talk a bit possibly about Paul), Kabbalic literature, and God knows what else.

I'm still waiting.

The Course in Miracles I'm sure must be a gift to us all, but the inner magic of it came from somewhere, and as such agrees with the thoughts of a lot more famous people over the centuries of time than just Marianne Williamson. Though it would have brought her ego down a peg, it would have only enhanced the majesty of her spirit for her readers if they were acknowledged. As I waited patiently for the stamp of antiquity to fall on these newly minted but eternally powerful and eternally RE-spoken words and ideas, it never came to my satisfaction- when it came at all.

Her ideas on relationships and what lie at the source of women's problems in them were equally problematic as they also were only touched upon, as she flew past anecdotes on her days in therapy. Ironically enough, the "contempt for men" that she discovered lay at the source of much of her hurtful patterns of failed relationships still seemed to run the show for HER life at the end of the book, let alone those of her friends- particularly the one who was going through hard times while dating a "classic Peter Pan." (News flash: nine times out of ten it's CINDERELLA who falls in love with the boy who won't grow up; it's that simple- not complex.) Such writing actually managed to trivialize the problem of undistinguished male contempt and envy AND relationship addiction, while simultaneously calling attention to it. That paradoxically makes such previously undistinguished forces that much MORE painfully influential in a woman's life, driven by the new batch of New Age spirit-quotes she's been given to involuntarily teach her next boyfriend.

In short (I know- too late, but anyway), the women who I know who have read this book come away feeling wonderful about it, saying she is a gift, and the book "changed my life". The guys I know that date them, and the friends of theirs who also read it but have known them and their familiar behavior patterns (given proper stimuli) for years- and, yes, I'm gonna say it, their Moms and (especially) Dads, would love to see what change actually took place. And the guys I know who have read it are usually too afraid of being called a Troglodyte Joe six-pack closet rapist who's going to Hell (where Oprah doesn't come in) if they disagree with anything that was said. And they do.

RETURN TO LOVE is a beautiful weekend read, but if you still feel resentful at anyone who hasn't read it or "gotten it" when they tell you you haven't changed, don't be surprised if you will need to read the books cherished by Willaimson's oft- stated heroes like King, Ghandhi and Jesus: the New Testament, Old Testament and Gita (not to mention a little Nancy Friday thrown in for good measure). You, perhaps like Marianne herself, may need to be humbled before you can be truly returned to the love you seek. Love IS stronger than arrogance. I hope you discover that if you choose to read this and take it very seriously, because there's more going on here than meets the eye.

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Summary: A Change in my Perception Already!
Review: I had begun reading this wonderful book days ago. Even though I am still reading chapter 3, I can already feel a change in my perception. God, I now realize, is the only reality. And because God is Love, then Love is the only reality. Everything else is illusion. All else is illusion. Never before has the Love of God been so clarified. Thank you, Ms. Williamson, for your book and your insight. No doubt I will become a serious pupil in the Course in Miracles after the completion of Marianne Williamson's inspiring book A Return to Love. Thank you, Amazon.com, for allowing readers to submit reviews. A Return to Love has changed my life.

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Summary: Opened my eyes
Review: Coming from where Mariannes religious side,and being confused growing up in this religious side. No,answers from my leaders.Mariannes book 'Return to Love',cleared my mind. Now I see God and the World in a pleasent loving way. This is the very first selfhealing book I have ever bought.It was a God sent for me. I give my greatest thanks to'Marianne Williamson'! Victoria

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Summary: A must read !
Review: There is no one who won't benefit from this book. I have reccomended it to at least 8 people who have thanked me repeatedly for bringing this to their life. It's a fun, interesting, wisdom-packed, easy reading book.

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Summary: EXCELLENT
Review: I WORKED ON A PSCHIC LINE FOR 3 YEARS, AND RECOMENDED THIS BOOK THOUSANDS OF TIMES.IT IS A MUST.

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Summary: An incredible book that will change your life!
Review: Where do I even begin with this review? This book has entirely changed my life, my perspective, my attitude, my feelings about myself and others, I could go on and on. This is something that I cannot stop talking about. Anyone who is lost, confused about religion, who feels poorly about themselves or others, depressed, or just doesn't feel like life is much "fun" anymore.....read this book! I can't even tell you what a load it takes off and how wonderful it is to learn that God LOVES you, is not out to punish you, and only has your happiness in mind. I can suddenly walk into a room and feel GREAT about myself knowing that I am a BEAUTIFUL, wonderful child of God. It is the most amazing thing I have ever felt! From this book I have learned what life is about, and what it's not about. After reading it, I bought an additional 10 copies and hand them out to anyone who seems interested. My hope is that everyone can find this love that Maryanne teaches so that they may be as incredibly happy with themselves and their lives as I am today!

Thank you so much Maryanne, for changing my life!