Plant Spirit Medicine: The Healing Power of Plants

Rating:
Summary: This AMAZING book imparts the true spirit of herbal healing.
Review: Buy this book and read it. It is an amazing and powerful experience. I read it three times in a row and soaked up more and more with each reading. This book turned me on to Shamanism, but as I went off and read more about Shamanism, I discovered that nothing else was quite as clear, powerful, or sincere as Eliot Cowan's book. Don't take my word for it, read it for yourself!

Rating:
Summary: This AMAZING book imparts the true spirit of herbal healing.
Review: Buy this book and read it. It is an amazing and powerful experience. I read it three times in a row and soaked up more and more with each reading. This book turned me on to Shamanism, but as I went off and read more about Shamanism, I discovered that nothing else was quite as clear, powerful, or sincere as Eliot Cowan's book. Don't take my word for it, read it for yourself!

Rating:
Summary: Extremely Profound
Review: I am a psychotherapist. Although traditionally trained, I'm drawn to holistic means of healing the psyche. I agree with another reviewer, that this book is not just about plant spirit medicine. It is much bigger than that. To me it is about all healing and about being in relationship with one's self, plant spirits, others, All That Is. Unlike the other reviewer, this book proved to be much greater and more wonderful than I expected. I was deeply moved by it, finding myself tearful at times. It profoundly resonated for me. In my opinion Cowan has tremendous depth and truly gets what's going on. He really speaks to the heart. If you're looking for a herbal recipe book "use this herb for this ailment", you'll be disappointed. If you want to get a strong sense of the loving & amazing power of plant spirits to assist our healing, you won't be able to put it down. I read many books on personal growth and healing. This is one of the best books I've read in a very long time.

Rating:
Summary: Not nearly as great as I'd hoped
Review: I had been looking forward to reading this book for a very long time and was sorely disappointed. I'm sure Cowan has some interesting techniques for healing through plant spirits, but he fails to share them with us in this book. Warning: This book is NOT about plants. This book is about Eliot Cowan and his (boring) pop-psychology, bumper-sticker approach to the human psyche. The book literally has quizzes to tell whether or not you are fear-dominated and lacking in earth or water or whatever... His long chapters on human psychology are not even insightful! Certainly nothing you couldn't find in the self-help section. I really recommend "Sacred Plant Medicine" by Buhner instead if you can find it. Otherwise, you'll learn way more about plant spirits by walking in the woods and having a chat with some plants instead of reading this book. I repeat: It is not about plants.

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Summary: Permanently altered a naturopath's way of relating to herbs.
Review: Of the dozens of books I have read on traditional naturopathy and on the interaction of the chemical compounds present in plants with the human organism, this was the most profoundly moving and amazingly informative yet. Having always been a skeptic of religious and spiritual practices, particularly traditional "folk" healing methods, I found Cowan's credentials and background reassuring in that he and I came from similar pasts. In spite of his education (or perhaps because of it!), he overcame his scientifically critical nature in order to relate to plants in a more pure and spiritual form, and thus opened his healing path to a broader and more thorough way of helping people. Reading about his experiences has helped me to do likewise. The topic of this book aside, I found it well written and engaging, a wonderful read for an afternoon in the sunshine, and one that I will keep on the shelf in my front room for many years to come.

Rating:
Summary: Extremely Profound
Review: Plants...domestic and not domestic. As the native american person looks at life he sees family members. Spirits occupy all that has life. The eagle has a spirit. Horses have nations...spiritual colonies. Trees have a spiritual family structure. California White Sage...there is a spirit who represents that plant. Eliot Cowan patiently waited and meditated and communed with particular plant spirits. It is not uncommon. It is uncommon for someone outside the native american society to even want to do what Eliot did. It isnt something that one can do on a four day vision quest. Just the knowledge of the fact that spirits do exist in plants, should make us more aware of the giant redwood trees. And the whales and sharks...as all of life has spirit. Even you.

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Summary: Healing at the Spirit level with the help of plant spirits.
Review: This book is about healing at the deepest and most fundamental level. Herbs and plant medicine heal at the physical and emotional level. Cowan has learned how to communicate with the Spirit of all of life in the form of plant spirits and collaborates with that Spirit to heal at the level that transforms illness into health. Not about herbal medicine or symptomatic intervention, this process is about contacting the phenomenal power of love that is the Source of life and in cooperation with this Source, determining the underlying cause of imbalance, which manifests as illness, and directing Spirit to provide the kind of intervention that restores balance. This book is about restoration of balance and health, a magical process and a simple one; but this healing requires the kind of sobriety, intentionality, and heart that Carlos Castaneda alludes to in his books about shamanic journeying. Cowan is a deeply committed healer who has traveled into the awesome and sometimes fearful world of Spirit to bring back wisdom for all of life. The book is an introduction, filled with wondrous stories and enticing examples. Read it if you want to enter more deeply into the mystery of being and transformation. Read it if you want to be astonished at possiblities that seem mythical but which Cowan assures us are quite literally possible for anyone willing to practice diligently. Read it if you just want to be impressed with one man's journey into mystery. Whatever your reason, if you're interested in the possiblities of being fully human, I recommend that you read this book.

Rating:
Summary: My opinion
Review: This is not your average book about herbalism. It takes the power of healing that plants have and goes beyond symptomatic treatment. It is an amazingly well written book and I couldn't put it down. It really resonates with the readers heart.