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Summary: this book is from god's hand
Review: The money spend by buying this book will save you 100 or 1000 times of the value of the book. Because due to anger, we go to court, we take revenge, we get sick, we try to escape from reality and spend lot of money.
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Summary: Wonderfully simple
Review: Thich Nhat Hanh's language, ideas and thoughts are based on simplicity and honesty. Anyone who realizes that anger is being detrimental to their personal growth should take a look at this. More importantly, rather than making the reader feel miserable about his/her own shortcomings, Nhat Hanh has made it clear that the root of the problem is owning anger. He only instructs to disown it. And reading him and his words which flow as naturally as I've ever read I increasingly got the feeling that is indeed possible to give up anger.For others who heard about Nhat Hanh and his wisdom, "Anger" would be a great starting point simply because it relates to most of us. If not anything else, we can read Nhat Hanh and feel his boundless love shine through in his writings.
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Summary: East does not meet west...
Review: Thich Nhat Hanh's simplistic approaches work well...initially. Then, it's time to roll up your sleeves and get to work.
I have found his techniques dangerously simplistic at times, feeling drawn to a sense of failure for not wiping my anger away after reading his book.
I take it all with a grain of salt.
Thich Nhat Hanh once wrote: "I know if a person does not make people around him happy, he cannot be happy himself. And this applies not only to monks. If you are unable to make the people around you happy, how can you be happy?" (from a talk given to children on July 23, 1997 in Plum Village)
That's dangerous codependent teaching, in my view.
I take from his writings what works, and drop the rest without reservation...but with careful discrimination.
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Summary: Gentle, humane, wise
Review: Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk, writes with gentle compassion on how to care for the anger which is within all of us, and transform its negative energy into positive energy. His guidance on breathing, walking and acting 'mindfully', with stillness and concentration, is the most clear and helpful I've ever read. And this book is not relevant to anger alone. I have long been unsuccessfully fighting the craving to overeat - and found that when I simply noticed the craving lovingly and non-judgmentally, it lost its hold over me. For anyone who has wrestled unsuccessfully with anger and its consequences, I recommend this compassionate, practical book with all my heart.
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Summary: A perfect system providing refuge & leading to compassion
Review: This book has a subtle mastery - it's effect, if read with respect and deep consideration, will sneak up on you in the week's that follow your completion of it. It's repetition is entirely necessary, as the author clearly recognises his reader's flitting desires to be satisfied with the likes of media friendly sound bytes and so forth. Thich reminds the reader over and over again, with his very style of writing, of the humility required to understand the depths of the human consciousness, and to dwell in the blessings they bring. Thankyou TNH.
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Summary: Outstanding Book!
Review: This book is filled with techniques courtesy of Thich Nhat Hahn that help combat one of our negative emotions -- anger. Have fun reading!
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Summary: One of the better Buddhism/self-help books
Review: This is my first Thich Nhat Hanh book. As such, I do not know for a fact whether he writes in English, but from the absence of credits to a translator, I assume the book was indeed originally written in English, unlike many Buddhism-oriented monographs by Eastern masters. The natural, prose-like flow of its presentation more than testifies to this matter. The book largely consists of 1) anecdotes of how different people managed to salvage their family relationships via practicing, and of 2) small "programs" that help you understand and ultimately manage your anger. These programs, or methods, are easy to implement, and if you can think about them for a single moment, make a lot of sense. An example of such programs might be -- in this case targeted towards your spouse -- to write down a half to full page note of gratitude or happiness you felt earlier in your relationship. The author terms this note your personal "heart sutra (the heart sutra is one of the most recited sutras in Buddhism)," and suggests you pulling it out and reading whenever you become angry with him/her. Another might be to simply carry a pebble, or to that matter any object, in your pocket to remind yourself of your commitment or of dharma. The underlying teaching, or principle, is non-dualism, a Buddhist construct. Anger, according to the author, is not something external to you. As such one should not strive to expel anger from oneself; rather, anger should be accepted, understood, and taken care of, as you would take care of an infant. At times I felt the book repetitious, and overly naive (there is a passage that asserted that violence ultimately does only harm, thus NATO's bombing of Belgrade was not desirable in bringing about peace. In theory I would agree with the author's view, but for this particular case I think that the only fault NATO committed was in not intervening earlier). However the author's compassion, and the overall integrity of the book more than makes up for these qualities. The book in my opinion is among the better ones available in the Buddhism/self-help genre.
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Summary: Disappointed - Mindful Living Recycled
Review: This is not a well designed book addressing Anger. Rather, this is a rehash of Thich Nhat Hanh's message concerning mindful living. Hanh's message is powerful and valuable; it is not well crafted to be responsive to those seeking to resolve Anger. Like the evangelicals of the 70s who gave the answer to all of life's problems, "trust Jesus," Hanh gives a similar superficial answer to the problem of Anger, "trust mindful living." If you have not read Hanh, I highly recommend it. But if you need to deal with Anger, this really wont help. His first solution to anger is to eat only organic food, where anger is not a part of the creation of the food. As a vegetarian, I have a lot of sympathy for that message; I just do not think it is an appropriate first message for someone struggling with Anger. Then he suggests making a peace treaty with the one with whom you have anger. Well that belies the circumstances where anger is a real struggle. There are some circumstances where anger is an issue and "peace treaties" are not possible - such as dealing with people with emotional disabilities. And then there are abuse situations where you should not make a peace treaty: just because I acknowledge that a Tiger is a tiger, and do not hate the tiger, does not mean I try to make personal friends with the tiger. Their are certain contexts, that cause a lot of anger, where reconciliation with the cause of conflict is not the appropriate answer. Bottom line: I found the book superficial suggesting that all of lifes ills can be cured through simple answers. Read Hanh; skip this book.
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Summary: Not What I Expected, But Loved It Anyway.
Review: When I bought this book, I was looking for wisdom for keeping me from anger and irritability in my important relationships. I chose this book over all of the other self-help and anger-management books out there because of the author, Thich Nhat Hanh, whose other books I have read and really enjoyed. I was looking for something that would help me learn not to get angry at people close to me, but what I found in this book was that you cannot stop anger itself, but you can only stop it from ruining your relationships. You can't tell your anger to go away, just the same as if you have a stomach ache you can't tell your stomach to go away. You can only do things to make it better. And this book helps you realize what those things are.
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