About this title: Written in Irv Yalom's inimitable story-telling style, "Staring at the Sun" is a profoundly encouraging approach to the universal issue of mortality. In this magisterial opus, capping a lifetime of work and personal experience, Dr. Yalom helps us recognize that the fear of death is at the heart of much of our anxiety. Such recognition is often ...
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Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780787996680ISBN:0787996688
Description: Good. Used item may show library stamps, stickers and marks. Buy with confidence-your satisfaction is guaranteed at B-Logistics! Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. Please note that Expedited shipping is not available at this time. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Jossey-Bass Inc Pub
Date Published: 2008-02-04
ISBN-13:9780787996680ISBN:0787996688
Description: NEW. Hardcover. From an inventory that is 100% brand-new, 100% direct from the publishers' distribution channel. We carry NO pre-owned, NO remaindered. We pack in CARDBOARD to ensure the pristine quality is maintained. (Bubble-wrap alone is NOT sufficient to protect from USPS equipment. ) Guaranteed brand-NEW, protected with CARDBOARD, your satisfaction is guaranteed. BKLUVID: 9780787996680. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: JOHN WILEY AND SONS LTD Country = UNITED KINGDOM
Date Published: 2009
ISBN-13:9780470401811ISBN:0470401818
Description: BRAND NEW PAPERBACK. 320 pages. Presents a fresh approach to the universal issue of mortality. this book helps us recognize that the fear of death is at the heart of much of our anxiety. (Paperback) read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780787996680ISBN:0787996688
Description: New. Brand New! Buy with confidence-your satisfaction is guaranteed at B-Logistics! Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. Please note that Expedited shipping is not available at this time. read more
Binding: Hardback
Publisher: PIATKUS BOOKS Country = UNITED KINGDOM
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780749928094ISBN:0749928093
Description: BRAND NEW HARDBACK. 320 pages. Carried by each and every human being, death anxiety is the pr1ce for our self-awareness and the shadow from which we cannot be separated. because we cannot live frozen in fear, we turn to our children, to wealth, to fame, or to a belief in a higher power to soften death's terror. this title opens the 'mortal wound', our knowledge of death. (Hardback) read more
Description: Fair. 0787996688 This book belonged to a library and includes a catalog number, card slot and several library stickers, stamps and marks. Customer Satisfaction is our priority. We understand that Customers EXPECT communication, a delivery tracking number, fast shipping, secure & professional packing and an accurate description. read more
"This book is beautifully written and flows like a conversation. It addresses the difficult (for many) topic of facing our own mortality and how to turn the knowledge of our mortality into a force for living better. While Yalom directly addresses fellow therapists in one part of the book, it is still an approachable and useful read for anyone. Coming from my perspective as a future existential therapist, this was a perfect read.
Yalom addresses the different ways death anxiety can show up in our lives which I found quite enlightening. He also answered several questions that I have been asking of myself over and over regarding clients asking questions about my personal faith and belief system. He makes no apologies for not believing in a religion or god, but still manages to support clients in their own belief systems. This is a hard balance to reach, but through meeting his clients where they are and because of his own self-knowledge and confidence, he makes it easy and straightforward.
This book also left me with an impressive reading list. Reading it was honestly was like having coffee with one of my English profs at Duke where I walk away excited with a list of books I must read. Really enjoyable.
While I am painting this book as very cerebral, I think it would be a great comfort to anyone feeling a bit uncomfortable about their own death even if they are not looking for the philosophical discussions or literary references it provides. I highly recommend it."
"A good book to bring up issues on death, but the last part of the book focuses on how therapists can discuss death with their patients. Since I am not a therapist, it became too difficult for me to sift out pertinent points for myself."
To be sure, the subject matter of this book greatly interested me at first, even though the book was written in a somewhat simplistic style that I'm not really used to.
I've always been concerned and perhaps even obsessed with matters of death and the existential dilemma; however, as this book went on, with some great quotes from Nietzsche by the way, the author begins to show his true colours. He doesn't seem very fond of religion, the idea of "God," or anything spiritual. Now, don't get me wrong, I went through my own phase of this, but when I was very young, and being rebellious against religious institutions and peoples' ideas and ideals of God was normal, or is usually normal for any questioning teenager or young adult. But I grew out of this, and, I sort of learned to see through different perceptions of what we deem "reality" that exists in the subjective worlds of others. I have respect for religion, and spirituality, and unlike the author, I don't want to insult any body's spiritual yearnings or spirituality, period, by running their ideals through the muck, for, just as this author alludes -- nobody really knows the true nature of anything, do we?
And, he also claims in his book that nobody can blame their current state on anybody else. Well, then wouldn't this then allude to God as well? Should we then blame God, as the author seems to want to -- or even an imaginary one, for all the evils in the world, when in fact it is we humans who create our own reality and hell on earth? He doesn't want to grovel before a "cruel" God, he says, and truthfully, as a vegetarian and animal rights activist, I understand his anger and pain because I feel very deeply for all sentient beings, but maybe in the end, WE'RE the ones responsible for suffering because we don't do enough to prevent it. Maybe we're not brave enough yet. Maybe we're not strong enough. Whatever it is, you can't really hate God or the idea of God because of the evils of mankind.
Also, I'm not really sure how the theories presented here are supposed to help anybody. I think anyone can come up with their own ideas and do a better job at it. I know that for me, death is a reality, and when it comes, it comes; after that, nobody can prove for sure what happens, but I'm sure it will be a hell of a lot more interesting than what most of us deem it to be.
And, one more thing: I'd also like to know, what is so brave about the ideas in this book? What is brave about deconstructing and destroying? It takes more courage to plummet, to investigate, to build up, to create, than it does to demolish. I do not like the way the author treated his patients either, as if he and only he knows the truth. This is something akin to a God-complex right here, and if I sound or seem angry, in a way I am, because I expected more from this book than to be lectured to, either about the "truth" of God or another human's "truth." I'll come up with my own truths, thank you very much. I don't need somebody to teach that to me."
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