Rating: 
Summary: Wow! This one is good medicine!
Review: Perhaps through routine, suffering a great loss, or simply being ready for the next phase of your life, you have felt like you are standing still in this living process. This book will move you onward. Are you tired of feeling compelled to search for happiness? Where have you gone? Have you tried food, alcohol, work perfection, the perfect mate? If you are frustrated by the fading external attempts, where nothing seems to satisfy you, this book will move you onward. If you are tired of living, this book will move you onward. I am absolutely thankful for this book.
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Summary: A call for a new consciousness
Review: The authors posit that a fundamental change has occured in human history over the last few generations,namely that the toil and hardscrabble nature that characterized human life from time immemorial has given way to a more comfortable,satiated(even spoiled)wealth of material goods.But the problem is that we are still locked into the mindset that presupposes a more brutal,do or die,confrontational and wary state of existence.Here the book begins to get bogged down in none too realistic(not to mention vague)ideas on how to awaken civilization to the realization that the paradigm of eons has shifted.Zukav doesn't gloss over the fact that a large chunk of the world still lives in abject povery and misery;and he realizes the fact that as we in the Ultramodern Western world become more wealthy and content and satiated with the good things in life it is tantamount to sewing the seeds of our own destruction if we don't find a way to help bring the 3rd world out of the gutter.If we don't we might one day wake up to find that resentment and anger of the have nots has boiled over and we'll be the ones who get burned.The book is short on solutions but is important nonetheless for bringing up issues so desperately in need of inquiry and eventual action.
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Summary: The deaf lead the blind
Review: The basic message is that emotional awareness is a fundamental step on the path to personal power. Our great difficulty lies in the fact that we do not really want to experience our emotions because they are just too hard to take. Zukav and Francis explain how to work with our seven bodily energy centers to identify the source of bodily and emotional pain. While The Heart of the Soul teaches how to do a quick bodily scan so that blocked emotional energy can be more easily perceived, we are not really told how to work with, change, or transcend our emotions. This is a great frustration for the reader. It's sort of like reading a book that tells the virtures of physical fitness but doesn't tell you how to get fit. That said, Zukav and Francis do a great service by drawing our attention to emotional weakness. They also link emotional maturity to spiritual growth in a way that makes sense. (The Spiritual Reviewer)
Rating: 
Summary: Awareness is not enough
Review: The basic message is that emotional awareness is a fundamental step on the path to personal power. Our great difficulty lies in the fact that we do not really want to experience our emotions because they are just too hard to take. Zukav and Francis explain how to work with our seven bodily energy centers to identify the source of bodily and emotional pain. While The Heart of the Soul teaches how to do a quick bodily scan so that blocked emotional energy can be more easily perceived, we are not really told how to work with, change, or transcend our emotions. This is a great frustration for the reader. It's sort of like reading a book that tells the virtures of physical fitness but doesn't tell you how to get fit. That said, Zukav and Francis do a great service by drawing our attention to emotional weakness. They also link emotional maturity to spiritual growth in a way that makes sense. (The Spiritual Reviewer)
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Summary: Interesting Analogies But Somewhat Repetitive
Review: This book was recommended to me by a friend. I had not read any of the author's works before, but was aware of his notoriety. There are not many ex-Green Beret officers who delve into New Age topics such as the soul, energy chakras, and emotional awareness...;-) This work is very interesting, and for the most part, entertaining. The theme is that we, not other people, are the cause for our positive and negative emotions. How we deal with those emotions contributes to our state of being. The authors then describe how to become more emotionally aware by isolating our feelings into different "schools." The analogy is that life is the ultimate teacher, and that we have to master one school (emotion) before graduating to the next. The authors appear to have a sincere desire to help others become more emotionally aware; however, the subject matter becomes somewhat repetitive. They discuss a variety of emotions and life events, but how many times does the reader need to be reminded that your emotions are your own responsibility? Or that you need to be aware of them 24 hours a day? Most readers will not need the gentle yet continual cues. That tone took upon an adult-child quality; however, perhaps that is the author's teaching style. One of his quotes was especially enlightening. And I paraphrase, "Pain is the flower, but the illness is in the plant." Mr. Zukav and Ms. Francis have provided the reader with a thought-provoking work. How one interprets the contents is another matter. Thank you for the opportunity to review this book.
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Summary: More Zukav reform school of Earth vs. better alternatives
Review: This book was sent to me by a dear friend. She's an intelligent, accomplished person with some major personal challenges...just like you and me and Gary and Linda. She liked the book, so you might too. Its first 111 pages are basic metaphysics shaped by the Zukav view of authentic power and life as Earth school, and now, emotional awareness. From that point on, both the psychological and metaphysical descriptions of how and why we humans behave are quite negative and questionable. Its the Zukav reform school view of life in Muddville...and there is no joy in Muddville or in this book.
So do yourself a favor and read more enlightened and upbeat alternatives. Books like Why Your Life Sucks and What You Can Do About It, by Alan Cohen, and Excuse Me Your Life is Waiting, by Lynn Grabhorn, provide an upbeat path to our authentic power to create lives of celebration and fulfillment. Loving What Is, by Byron Katie, provides a powerful process for reframing and healing our most debilitating mental and emotional states. And in The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle simply and exquisitely gives us powerful metaphysical keys for a life of inner peace and joy right here and now on planet Earth.
What these authors are telling us is that attendance at the Zukav reform school of life is optional...there really are better alternatives.
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Summary: Very helpful, but perhaps a bit short on advice...
Review: This book was, for the most part, very intuitive and it is obvious that Gary is a man of deep understanding. It could be said that this book is too simplistic, but the reality is that our human `predicaments` really are quite simple when you remove all the useless baggage that surrounds them. This book is shockingly honest and left this reader saying, "Wow, that sounds like me....wow, that`s exactly right, wow..." While most of what Gary says is undeniably true and somewhat eye-opening I was a bit disappointed at his lack of solutions...or at least I expected some sort of method or guidance out of the problems he describes so well. Big on causes, connections and symptoms, but comes up short in the `what to do about it` section. The reader may now realize the harmful emotions and why they occur, but what do they do about it? He says, now you can change this harmful pattern....ummmm....HOW?! I kept thinking the next chapter would give some sort of direction, but I was left waiting. Anyway, I put the book down with a better understanding of myself, my problems, and their underlying causes. A good starting point for anyone ready to have an honest look at themselves and their patterns of behavior.
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Summary: The Heart of the Soul
Review: This is an excellent book for those who are still strugguling to find their identity, and know what they are really feeling.
The author explains how one can be aware of the emotions that circulate in the inner soul. He explains how the inner world is more important than the outward, the importance of being able to know what we are really feeling at all times. I give this book four stars because it has helped me understand my emotions and how I can turn them into possitive energy.
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Summary: Covers all the bases.
Review: This is both a book for personal help and delves into worldwide sentiment, governmental situations, and world shortcommings. The book is convincing on the grand scale, example-The lessor developed countries could in fact bring harm to us if we do not do something, authors however don't say what, but the point is we were attacked by these lessor countries. That may seem simple, but it is the simple truth of this book. The personal level of help is better, bringing the reader to a state of higher awareness. I only question the authors as to why they did not supply some solutions to the shortcommings they mention, for that I would like to recommend a book similar with a suggested solution that I emphatically agree with. SB 1 or God by Karl Mark Maddox
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Summary: What a bunch of hooey
Review: What a painful book to read. I am reading this with my wife who is a fan of the Oprah show. The author(s)continually make broad, sweeping generalizations about life, energy, and emotions without defining terms or offering any evidence that what they claim is factual or even remotely possible. ( The authors would denegrate me as a five-sensory person, not willing to faithfully travel with them to the beautiful realm of the chosen new age guru.) Too many ideas are tautological: they are true only by uncritical acceptance of basic premises and the conclusion is reflective of only the premise. The book also is quite repetitive, the few ideas are recycled constantly. A good editor could have corrected errors of grammar and spelling. Why bother with difficult works such as The Course in Miracles, or translations of original sources when such easy paths to enlightment (complete with child-like drawings and bold-print for the important parts ) are available. There are some good ideas about examining emotions and understanding them before acting, but these ideas are lost in the haze of spirituality. If you like Oprah, or feel that self-help books are meant to help anyone besides the authors own bank account, this is the book for you. Sorry to be so negative after the blissed out reviews below. The lessons of The Dancing Wu Li Masters have been lost in the seductive mists of fame.
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