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July/August 2010 Conscious Media
Reader's Choice

by Vicky Thompson

Radical Forgiveness, Colin Tipping, Sounds True, 2009, $16.95

Colin Tipping offers a step-by-step process to move you from anger, fear and resentment into a place of peace, unconditional love and gratitude. Tipping teaches us to view life lessons from a place of soul contracts, allowing you to see the perpetrator as a guide and teacher in your own life. Release the victim archetype and view your life as a perfect experience. Having read many other books on forgiveness, this book really connected with something in me — I found it refreshing and honest with a truth that resounded from the first page. With a clear and concise writing style, Tipping provides detailed worksheets, exercises, rituals and personal stories that can move you into a much more loving space. Highly recommended for anyone wanting and needing to forgive someone in your life.

— Jelina Vance

The Life Codes, Patty Harpenau, Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2010, $24.95

This is a novel about a young woman searching for answers about life and spirituality. After the death of her father, Michal travels to Jerusalem seeking truth from great mystic rabbis. She discovers seven secret codes to live by that have been locked in restricted texts, passed down over centuries in private rituals to Jewish men when they reach a certain age.

Harpenau is a wonderful storyteller. Her descriptive, imaginative style helps her story come alive on the pages as she describes Michal’s fascinating spiritual journey. As the codes are unveiled, the main character is asked a series of questions. These same questions are included at the end of each chapter, so readers become actively involved in the journey. Powerful and moving — I was thoroughly engaged in the process and I felt that I grew spiritually just from reading the book.

— Annette Epifano

In Tune with the Moon, Michel Gros, Findhorn Press, 2009, $15

Living in balance with nature isn’t just about being green, it’s also about being in touch with the universal cycle of energy that affects life on planet Earth. In Tune with the Moon is a rich guide to understanding how the moon’s cycles influence the growth of plants and gardens. From tides to astrological signs to Chinese elements, this beautifully illustrated book presents a holistic view of the moon’s relationship with our world, reminding us to work with this flow of life-enhancing energy for a greater harvest. A great annual guide that includes a lunar calendar and monthly planner for working in harmony with lunar energy.

— Vicky Thompson

 Faith and Will , Julia Cameron, Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2010, $14.95

Faith and Will is one of Julia Cameron’s faith-based books, which complement her more well-known Artist’s Way series. Unlike those larger guidebooks, filled as they are with steps and graphics and other signposts, Faith and Will is formless and featureless. No subheads, no chapters, no quotes in the margin, it reads like a 220-page “morning page” writing exercise, a long, heady meditation where musings about the nature of the universe and the will of God are interspersed with concrete examples featuring very real people. It’s a fast read, a great, rattling freight train of prose that carries you from word to word, sentence to sentence. You hurtle along and you know you are speeding, yet the momentum is too great and you can’t stop. Paragraphs fly by, with short pauses as you slow down slightly to savor the anecdotes. And then you are done, and you realize the book was like an extended sigh and you are ready to read it again, maybe in bits and pieces this time. But first, you return to the book’s evocative first line: “I would like to begin at the beginning, but I do not know what the beginning is anymore.” Exactly.

— Fran Gardner

Guardians of Being, Eckhart Tolle and Patrick McDonnell, New World Library, 2009, $18

This is a great collaboration between well-known author Eckhart Tolle and illustrator Patrick McDonnell, creator of the comic series Mutts. This book will move the reader to remember the simpler things in life, which are the true pleasures, the ones we often pass over without a second thought. In this simple yet powerful book, I found pleasures long ago lost in this busy, hurried life style that so many of us live. It reminds us all to enjoy the joys our four-legged guardians of being show us every day. One of my favorites: “When you pet a dog or listen to a cat purring, thinking may subside for a moment and a space of stillness arises within you, a doorway into being.” Being in the present moment with life and feeling God in all life — a book for beings of all ages.

— Vicki Burr

Soul Masters, Beyond Words Publishing, 2009, $24.95

In this DVD, two amazing healers come together to teach and to learn the healing techniques of herbal medicine, self healing and fire massage. Dr. Zhi Chen Guo, who resides in China with his wife and daughters, has taught and mentored Dr. Zhi Gang Sha from the United States for over 15 years. Dr. Guo has unique abilities in and beyond traditional Chinese medicine. He is well known for his contributions to understanding the diseases of the heart and circulatory system, diabetes, and especially cancer and SARS. Dr. Sha, a world-renowned healer, physician, author and educator, is the founder of the Institute of Soul Mind Body Medicine. Dr. Sha expands on Dr. Guo’s work to teach us that everything has a soul and the soul can heal. Uplifting and educational, and as Dr. Bernard Beckwith says, “Soul Masters is a healing experience in itself.”

— Jelina Vance

Souls United: The Power of Divine Connection, Ann Merivale, Llewellyn, 2009, $15.95

British author Ann Merivale writes an exhaustive treatise on the concept of twin souls. People yearn for their “soul mates,” and Merivale clears up misconceptions about the various types of souls. She provides very detailed information on twin soul cases she has either researched extensively or has known herself. We learn that twin souls may or likely may not be in relationships, such as husband and wife. Merivale is thorough and scientific in presenting her extensive research on twin souls.

— Alice R. Berntson