equus

ARGHHHHHHH!!!! This book by Dr. Scott Peck was the first I found cheeply for my new course (listed as suggested reading). IT'S DRIVING ME NUTS!!!! Anyone else read it? (Very famous)

I so want to vent but I'd get too heated and give a rotten view of myself. I have dragged my butt through the first 50 odd pages (can't seem to read more than half a page at a time) and have bought a new Oliver Sacks book as reward for when I finish this one.

So shoot me for arrogance but if that plonka comes up with one more cheesey one liner or insanely stupid statment (which seems to be the entire contents of each page) - ok I'm just going to have to keep reading because I'm determined.....

I mentioned the book to a friend I saw yesterday, an old head teacher who's a star and giving me a hand with my presentations. I tried a semi polite summary and then had a brain fart and called Scotty a flippin' idiot - she gafawed laughing and added the word 'freak'.

Come back Mr. Sacks, with your sense of wonder, sense of all that we don't yet know and wipe the memory of Peckland with it's self smooching, half baked panacia to life!!

Oh and do I REALLY need half page long descriptions of why any client refusing his treatment was sicker than he had first thought? Not to mention the dreadful sickness of those who keep coming back and never get anywhere! It left me wanted to say 'Why Peck - you're a very sensitive flower aren't you?'

My review - the book is a brain blender!!

splendra

Eq

I have read the book and another book he wrote "Farther Down the Road Less Traveled" I also read the book "People of the Lie".

Since it is on your reckomended reading list I guess you might as well get thru it the best you can. I can see how you feel the way you do about his writing. I can also see how his writing appeals to certain people who are looking for answers to their plight in life.

It goes to show you that all the people cannot be pleased all the time and you may be one of the unpleased at some point in life.

equus

I know I've got to get through it and I will - I'm tempting myself!!

It has left me wondering whether I've made a wise decision for me to venture out of science and into airport lounge reading - but then I may find that course leaders are no more impressed than me and are looking to critique. For that I'll have to wait and see.

I find it has a seductive quality in flattering those who agree and defining as sick those who don't. Only that's not what I find seductive! It's crammed with sweeping statements heavily divorced from reality. While reading his assessment of anyone who lies what struck me is the number of people for who 'facing the consequences of truth' can mean violence and on occasion death. We live in a world that includes countries with collapsed states, run by dictators, even in 'peachy' democracies spouses can live in fear of violence and children who confess to breaking the cookie jar can wind up in hospital. To simply suggest that fear of a consequence is symptomatic of mental illness is bizarre, reckless and banal.

And that would be one of many issues I have with this guy!!

splendra

You want to consider when this book was written too and, the concepts expressed are to help you understand where others have been. I guess you were a young child when this book was written. You were most likely influenced by this book because undoubtably there was at least one person somewhere around you that had read this book when it was "hot".

My first psyc course years and years ago the book: "I'm Okay You're Okay" was on my suggested reading list...I didn't like it but, I was able to see how the concepts of this best selling book soaked into the culture around me and I still see it's influence today. In another psyc course another one of this authors books was on the suggested reading list: "What Do You Say After you Say Hello" I really liked this one and have offered it to many people to read but, very few have taken my offer, I don't know why. This book helped me to see so much.

equus

I reckoned it was perhaps time to learn a little about Dr. Peck....

The Guardian which is one of the UK's more reliable news papers held his orbituary.

Here's a quote from Paeck himself:
and a little of their bio of him...
Reference and full article:
http://books.guardian.co.uk/obituari...585171,00.html

Perhaps now I'll read it with a little more interest - how did he get so well followed? What is it he's offering that people so want? - because it sure as hell isn't his capacity to live life honourably or his relationship wisdom.

Five

Gurus are fascinating. Check out Clay Feet by Anthoney Storr.

An investigation into the 'gurus' mind. Fascinating stuff.

equus

*pulls out deer stalker hast and grabs magnifying glass*

At least I've gotten more interested in reading the confounded thing!!

Five

When I was following a guru, I thought he had such an utter insight into life.

It turned out to be lunatic gibberish though, in the main. In every piece of BS there is a grain of truth.

equus

Absolutely - and in the book already there are things I do think are valid. What makes it hard work and annoying is wading through the codswallop!!

brigid

Makes you wonder what makes people preach, is it their own issues?

I always liked the image of the wise man on the top of the mountain ... content with his own company and not needing to push beliefs ... there to be questioned if someone really needed to.

Interesting that this guru was really not a guru. Actions speak louder than words.

love and peace,
Brigid

shockozulu

Gosh I hated that book Equus. Good luck getting through it.

I loved People of the Lie though, but then Peck took that too far in his next book. Ah well, we are all human...even authors.

aloneagainor

I think it is those very things that people are most sensitive to, and have the most violent reactions to, about other people, that are those things that we're most troubled by within ourselves. Because we're so directly able to relate to those things, we know how they manifest themselves and can see how disruptive/ distorted that way of thinking/ being affects everything around us, including our own thinking. It's maddening to me how BOTHERED I am by deception, especially of the deliberate sort. And OH am I deceptive! Insight into self. A worthy pursuit.

equus

You know - I've never bought that theory. If I see some bloke kick ten kinds of ** out of a dog or kid, OH my feelings go sky high, I'm SO BOTHERED. Should I then worry that my concern only comes from some hidden subconscious desire to do likewise? Even worse, should I examine myself until I don't feel bothered at all?

Nah - I don't buy it. Each to their own but I'm not applying that to my reasoning - it just makes no sense to me.

Autumn

Thanks for posting your review Eq. Can't wait to read your opinion when you finish! I have this book somewhere in my basement about half-assimilated. Somehow, when I don't finish books like that I blame myself if the author is obviously more intelligent or educated. It reminds me of when I picked up Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I couldn't finish it, and I was so distraught I didn't bother reading another book for 2 or 3 years (seriously). I didn't either, until I finished that book.

If/when I ever did find out who John Galt was, I don't remember, and the ending was an anti-climactic experience (for me, anyway). I suppose it's all what the reader gathers from the contents and resonates with.

Anyway, The Road Less Traveled is a book a lot of people have high regards for. Your comments are unexpected and refreshing, as always!



Fabulous.

((((Equus)))).

equus

I have huge respect for the effort that goes into gaining qualifications - but I can't help but note that those who have them still dispute so many things; because of that, like age, I reckoned alone it cannot make a person right.

Qualifications should give a person the ability to reason what they say and support 'fact' with evidence - so where that's noticable in it's absence I can't help but be sceptical.

I've just finished a page where he suggest that omitting ANY information from children is lying and teach them to grow up dishonest, he includes in that rows between parents, financial strife, drug taking, ANYTHING. It somehow doesn't surprise me he spent years estranged from his own kids - I suppose they voted with their feet. I don't believe kids want to hear about evry argument, debt, affair and intoxicated night! It's diferent when a child asks or when there's a need to know.

brigid

I agree that there are certain things that bother me because they are contrary to my belief system and I don't do them, I also agree that there are things that bother me because subconsciously I recognise them in myself and they also are contrary to my belief system.

I don't think it is a black and white thing, I definitely look within these days when I find an annoying behaviour and try to be honest with myself ... I sometimes find it. But that is good, once found and recognised I can change it, or accept it within myself, I am not perfect after all, I am just me. Changing / accepting it increases my tolerance and patience for others.

love and peace,
Brigid

Bobbybanned

I enjoyed Atlas Shrugged a great deal; however, I must admit that I read it with a bias attitude. I was once upon a time a huge admirer of Ayn Rand. But as far as your comment goes, that ending was brutal. I think it consisted of two-million pages of getting to the point, which really did lead to an anti-climactic ending, as you described.
She had a brilliant idea and did a good job for the most part of the book, but the woman was full of herself and used her book as a means of spilling herself onto the reader.
But for her to come over to this country, learn to speak english, write it and then use the language as she had, well, I give her credit for that. She was much more articulate than most people (including myself) who are born with english as their primary language.

Bobbybanned

Please Equus, tell me, what is a codswallop? Is it like, poop or something?
I love the sound of that word.

Bobby

Autumn

I enjoyed it very much also. If I remember correctly (I read it in my early 20s), it was the first third of the book that was rather dry. I really thought it was brilliant, especially having been written by a woman in that time period. What a business head. I loved the descriptives she gave the new steel for rails. I think that was the biggest build-up in suspense for me - waiting to discover how that new steel would perform.

When I got to the ending, I was disappointed in that I had made a pact with myself not to read another book until I finished Atlas Shrugged. I realized how silly a pact that was when the ending came. It was just so flat. I'll never do that again.

I'm curious to learn more about her. Back when I realized an interest in her as a philosopher, I didn't have internet access or other reviews. I never did get around to reading The Fountainhead. I have the movie though - maybe I'll pop it in later.

And yeah - she was an amazing writer to be sure.

Autumn

Hey Eq - are there any passages in particular you might want to comment on?

I'm willing to rifle thrugh some boxes to dig out my copy. It's in softcover.